Strangers at the Gate: The 'Boat People's' First Ten Years in Canada - Softcover

Beiser, Morton

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0802081177 ISBN 13: 9780802081179

Publisher: University of Toronto Press, 1999

Synopsis

Twenty-seven million people in the world are refugees. In this book, Morton Beiser puts readers in touch, emotionally and intellectually, with the reality of refugees in Canada. In the process, he dispels key misconceptions about immigrants in this country and reframes central debates on refugee policy.

The book describes Beiser's ten-year study of 1,300 Boat People admitted to Canada between 1979 and 1981. It chronicles the former refugees' struggles to learn English, and to establish themselves economically in their new environment and shows that, contrary to popular opinion, they use fewer health and social services than indigenous Canadians.

Beiser finds that, although most refugees in most resettlement situations succeed remarkably well, no country, Canada included, offers newcomers the welcome they need and deserve. This remarkable study, with its profoundly human dimension, should be read by all policy-makers in the fields of immigration and social and health services.

About this title

About the Author

Morton Beiser is the professor of Cultural Pluralism and Health, Centre for Addiction and Mental Health and Department of Psychiatry, University of Toronto, and Director of the Toronto Centre of Excellence for Research on Immigration and Settlement.

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Toronto Press
• Publication date: 1999
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0802081177
• ISBN 13: 9780802081179
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 224