The Language of Asylum: Refugees and Discourse

Abstract

The early part of the 21st century has been marked by widespread social upheaval and geographical displacement of people and the need for refuge on a scale not previously encountered. Using the case of the UK as an example, this text examines how refugees, asylum-seekers, locals and professional refugee workers make sense of asylum and refuge against this background and in the light of current asylum policies. It also discusses contemporary debates on integration, such as whether or not those seeking asylum should be entitled to work following arrival, and explores how such rights and entitlements are bound up with questions of who the refugee or asylum-seeker is and how he or she got to the UK. In these ways, the text follows the asylum-seeker's 'journey', from arrival, through the experiences of what happens to them while they are here, to the eventual outcome of their applications for leave to remain.