Manus Hospital often treats refugees (Image credit: ABC News, Natalie Whiting)
A growing body of literature across multiple disciplines attests to the importance of credibility in the bureaucratic processes for assessing refugee claims. This includes in my own research, exploring the experiences asylum seekers have in these processes, the published reasons of decision-makers and the guidelines aimed at managing their assessments.
However, this focus on whether we should believe people who seek asylum is also popular in media reporting and political discourse. For instance, Australian Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton recently commented that some refugees on Nauru who had fallen pregnant as a result of rape were “trying it on” by seeking medical transfer to Australia via new “medevac” legislation.
This comment is not exceptional but rather part of an ongoing commentary on similar cases. The 2015 “debate” involving “Abyan” (a pseudonym), a Somali refugee living in Nauru, was an earlier case that attracted heavy media coverage, and formed the basis of a case study included in my doctoral research and recently published in the Australian Review of Applied Linguistics and Language in Society.
Abyan was living in the small island nation of Nauru as part of the Australian government’s policy to exclude boat arrivals from being able to seek asylum in Australia. As part of this regime, she had been detained in a detention centre, had her refugee status claim assessed and was then relocated to open accommodation on the island. She approached medical services when she became unwell and when they discovered she was pregnant, she reported that she had been raped. After some delay, Australian authorities arranged for her to be transferred to Australia to access adequate medical assistance and potentially have a termination. After less than a week in Australia, the authorities returned her to Nauru via chartered jet, without her having had the termination, presumably to avoid legal action to prevent her removal.
The ministerial statement
These events and their repercussions were highly reported in the media. My analysis of a corpus of Australian journal articles from this period found that most reporting centred on what was presented as a “debate”, with the then Immigration Minister, Peter Dutton, and Abyan as the two main participants. Their competing versions of the events often drew on two key documents: a media release from the Minister and a handwritten note from Abyan that was circulated by Australian advocates. Whose version of events readers should believe seemed closely tied to determining who could be considered the most credible speaker.
However, the way this reporting presented these and other key actors was problematic. By presenting Abyan primarily as a speaker and decision-maker the reporting gave the impression that she was somehow an equal individual debate participant, pitted against the Immigration Minister. This was aptly demonstrated by reporting reframing Abyan’s statement as her claiming that the Immigration Minister had lied, for instance by suggesting she said that his “description of events – backed by Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull – were false”.
I was troubled by the impression that was created by this “debate” as it appeared to ignore serious structural inequality and individual differences between the two supposed key participants. Could Abyan really have had an equal opportunity to present her side of events and be believed? This led me to more closely examine how communicative resources impact the way different social actors are able to communicate and present credible identities to their audience. In this analysis, I argued that far from being equal participants, the Immigration Minister and Abyan had unequal communicative resources on four different levels.
Abyan’s statement
First, they had different linguistic resources at their disposal to present an argument or version of reality that would be convincing and believable to their audience. I noted, for example, how the Minister’s press release used agent-free passive structures that backgrounded government or individual responsibility for Abyan’s movements to and from Nauru, thus distancing her traumatic experiences from government policy. These structures were largely replicated across the media reporting, suggesting their influence on the broader public discourse. In comparison, Abyan’s handwritten note entailed a series of reasonably basic structures sharing her experiences. English is not Abyan’s first language, and reporting suggests that her ability in English may be even more limited than the language in the note, meaning it may have been composed by somebody assisting her. This obviously limits the linguistic choices she had to engage in the “debate”.
Inextricably intertwined with their linguistic resources are the two actors’ identity resources: the way their language is heard and evaluated depends on how their audience perceives their speech and which version of events is accepted as truth. While the Immigration Minister and/or his policies may not be well liked by all Australians, he has a verifiable identity in the form of his name and history, and titles that mark him as an institutional insider: he is a Member of Parliament and Hon. (honourable). Abyan, on the other hand, is relatively anonymous: the public knows very little about her other than her age, gender and nationality. The elements of her experiences that are known do not necessarily lend support to her credibility: as both a refugee and as a woman who has experienced sexual violence, she falls into identity categories that are known to systematically attract discussion about their credibility.
The two also had obvious different material resources. The Minister’s communication was shared digitally, on an official institutional website with a stable URL, with government header, conventional font and formatting. This contrasts with Abyan’s handwritten note that appears on a page torn from a journal, dated 25th December, and photographed sitting on a wooden table top. While the document resembles the genre of an asylum application statement, setting out her experience, this ironically may index a contested version of events, given that such applications attract credibility assessment, and its deviation from the expected norms of typed and printed forms may further harm its reception.
Finally and crucially, the difference in resources between the two speakers in most obvious when we consider the respective platform resources they have from which they can communicate. The Immigration Minister has ample opportunities to directly communicate with the broader community and media, through a number of means. A count of the larger corpus collected for this project identified at least eighteen occasions over a one-month period in which the Immigration Minister and his senior colleagues, including the Prime Minister, publicly commented on the case, including in radio and television interviews, official press statements and in Parliament.
Abyan’s platform is very different. The public have access to one handwritten note, provided to the media by Australian lawyers. For Abyan and other refugees and asylum seekers in Nauru and Manus Island (PNG) due to Australian policy, this very policy greatly limits the access they have to the Australian media and vice versa. The Government of Nauru has implemented changes to its visa regime to almost universally restrict Australian media from travelling to Nauru in recent years. The Australian Government has also legislated to limit those professionals who do have the opportunity to interact with refugees from being able to speak out publicly about their treatment, with penalties of up to two years’ imprisonment for breaches.
Behrouz Boochani received the Victorian Premier’s Literary Award for his book about his experiences in Australian offshore refugee detention (Image Credit: ABC News)
This final point perhaps most vividly demonstrates the way in which those with power to control the dominant discourse seek to preserve this control. In this case, explicit legal and policy measures are implemented to control how journalists can access information about refugees and the refugees’ own ability to speak out via the media. This restricts challenges to the government’s preferred version of events – not only in the specific case of Abyan, but also in how this and other experiences contribute to the broader ongoing discourse on refugees and refugee-related policy.
However, discourse and its creation are never static. Those who have access to social media either directly or with the assistance of language brokers present a challenge to these types of efforts to control the dominant discourse. For example, an increasing number of refugees and asylum seekers self-advocate through platforms like Twitter, such as in the recent case of Saudi refugee, Rahaf Mohammed, who successfully attracted international attention and support when she was stranded in Thailand on her way to seek asylum in Australia. For some, having access to technology has also facilitated publishing in traditional media. This is the case for Behrouz Boochani, an Iranian refugee in Papua New Guinea, who frequently comments in the media regarding refugee rights, and wrote and published a book sharing his experiences, via messages written by smartphone, and has now been awarded one of Australia’s most prestigious literary prizes.
Still, even as potential platforms change, looking closely at the full range of communicative resources of individual actors helps uncover inequalities: not everyone has access to social media, or has the specific linguistic and communicative skills needed to advocate within a particular area, to a particular audience. The rise of social-media-based self-advocacy therefore presents an opportunity for a closer examination of the ways in which communicative resources are harnessed through non-traditional platforms, whose resources are most valuable in these areas and the implications this has for challenging dominant discourses.
References
Smith-Khan, L. (2018). Contesting credibility in Australian refugee visa decision making and public discourse. (Doctor of Philosophy), Macquarie University.
Smith-Khan, L. (2016). Crucial communication: language management in Australian asylum interviews. Language on the Move
Smith-Khan, L. (2019a). Communicative resources and credibility in public discourse on refugees. Language in Society, 48(3), 403-427.
Smith-Khan, L. (2019b). Debating credibility: Refugees and rape in the media. Australian Review of Applied Linguistics, 42(1), 4-36.
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It is really sad to read the way this case proceeded and it goes to show the role social media and language play in perceptions about one’s credibility. Depends on which side of the refuge situation you are on, reading people’s opinions can greatly vary. I hope that there is a better solution on how situation such as the one discussed in this paper are managed fairly.
This article is very interesting. It discusses different resources which ultimately distinguishes who has more power within communication. Those with power want to retain it and therefore go to lengths to maintain their status. However, all individuals deserve to be heard and given opportunities to express themselves. With social media as a platform for self-advocacy, people will share more to be heard publicly. However, it needs to be ascertained if the information they share is credible. There is also the chance that they may not get the response they are looking for. This is definitely an area that would benefit from further research.
Thank you Laura for sharing this post, it is really interesting and sad article at the same time. I did not have any information about refugee credibility here in Australia before. However, now this made me feel how language can control a person’s life and future. I am not sure what is the best solution to this problem, but the Australian government have to create more opportunities for refugees to assist them overcome these difficulties.
This article makes me realize the power of identity, language and communicative resources in the fighting for justice. Public hear those who have a stronger ethos and sound proficiency in the language with rhetoric skills to present the argument effectively; eloquent statements presented in the easily accessible platforms such as online news portals, official institutional websites, newspapers, etc, do have more chances of getting public endorsement. Moreover, power can create and control the discourse; it can make the credibility of the refugee thoroughly vulnerable. I am thinking the pathetic condition of Abyan whose voice is deemed it’s because of her refugee identity, poor command on the English language -the language of the court and public communication in Australia, and rare access to standard communicative resources. Thus for the justice of linguistically marginalized people, the judicial or extrajudicial bodies where each word used by the parties has the decisive power whether they win or lose the case should employ bilingual law practitioners.
The fact that social media now has been developing as a platform of self-advocacy is interesting. However, self-advocacy is a crucial matter that I believe is quite sensitive and private to be brought up in social media. This action can potentially lead to great success or complete failure (e.g. depression if the person seeking support does not find what he looks for via social media). Nevertheless, the digital era is an era where a private issue can easily become public consumption and I can only hope that those asylum seekers can gain their rights without seeking virtual support.
I found this is really interesting article. After reading this article, I found that social media and language are powerful. This topic is still controversial. To be honest, I do not know how the government can check the credibility of refugees, and if the refugees intentionally do that to get attention – that can be because they seek for a better place. If we focus on the national security, refugees can be a huge problem. However, in term of humanity, we are ongoing looking for a better solution in this regard and how to manage this properly. And it depends on case by case.
There are lot of people who use social media as a platform to against the political issue in my country (which the political issue is sensitive), yet they ask for the asylum and they are successful. Luckily, if you grow up in the country which values the liberty of expression, that is fine. But not, should these people be left behind or considered as a undercurrent just because they do not value the same thing? However, I feel like this article is very interesting and it cannot answer too black or too white. There are still lot of things to take it to the consideration.
Thank you for this sharing. I sincerely feel sorry for Abyan. I think human was born to get their equal right to pursue their happiness, identities, cultures, and languages. Abyan’s case is calling for the fact that the refugees must be listened to and cared more, then get more actions done for their life improvement. Also, it seems to me that media nowadays is eventually ending killing people’s trustworthy since it fails to send the credibility and real value to its users.
It is not strange that when a government department and an individual state same thing, most people choose to trust government. The background of individual mostly influence people’s choice, so when the individual is not a native speaker and not able to express well, it is hard to get the public’s belief. In terms of platforms, government department has many media platforms so its statement can spread quickly, then the public read it and form an intrinsic impression of that thing, it makes the individual’s statement less powerful. However, as an ordinary person, no matter what the background it is of that person, it is hard to compare with a government department.
I feel sorry for the female mentioned in the debate. I am convinced that the language have a significant impact in determine people’s identity and power. The comparison in the debate is really interesting to follow because it makes a great contrast between a powerful and a powerless person. I personal avoid social media due to some personal reason, which makes me lack one of the important communicative sources. But it’s okay to me. I can train my communicative skills and language to increase me own power.
Hi Laura,
Thank you for sharing. Your thoughts on the refugee’s credibility bring a point that I believe is worth to be noticed. People tend to believe in people with higher credibility, however, as you mentioned in the article, credibility is affected by many factors, and there is inequality in achieving credibility. It may lead to a situation where people with higher credibility say might not be true but the public chooses to believe whereas people with less credibility receive less trust in what they claim. We cannot simply believe in the government’s statements due to its deemed high credibility and the refugees should not be considered as less trustworthy. Therefore, the media should make sure that they are reporting in a fair position with substantial information collected from various aspects to report the truth, and the audiences should also perceive the news with a critical mind.
The view I raise from your writing is that communicative resources affect the construction of credible texts and identities in a public debate on Australia’s treatment of a refugee. There are four levels including exploring the parties’ respective linguistic, material, identity, and platform resources, and how these impact their statements’ creation and reception, and their participation in discourse creation more generally. Additionally, there are inequalities on all four resource levels that largely undermine the refugee’s ability to present a credible text and identity and challenge mainstream discourse on refugees. This demonstrates how a multi-level analysis of communicative resources can challenge assumptions about participation and uncover inequalities invisible in the prevailing discourse.
Thank you for your attractive post. I feel sorry about the story of Abyan. In fact, i did not read many articles about refugees. This post indicates difficulties of refugees because of linguistic usage. People who cannot speak English are less likely to obtain asylum from the government. They have serious challenges because of the language. It is true that materials, platforms and language have enormous differences for the government and refugees. The unequal between refugees and medias needs to be solved. With the development of technology, refugees need to be provided more opportunities to express their opinions in different modes, such as medias. Governments all over the world can provide more resources to help refugees, including learning English or providing interpreters.
Hi Laura, thank you for your sharing. I feel sorry for Abyan. When language, identity, material and platform resources are not equal, refugees do need to listen more. In fact, there are a lot of cases where this is not the case. As a window for the public to know the facts, the media should ensure that they are in a fair and just position, report the real situation for the public and provide an opportunity for the vulnerable groups to express themselves fairly.
Hi Laura, thank you for sharing this interesting article. The term “refugee credibility” was very new to me and probably this was my first time to read an article discussing refugee’s right to speak. I felt sorry to know and was astonished by Abyan’s experiences. It seems that she hasn’t had equal resources to present an argument or version of reality, thus couldn’t make her experience convincing enough. I also believe that this inequality exists in most countries between the authoritative and the disadvantaged groups. However, I agree that people can use social media to publish articles or make comments on news, to challenge the authoritative who intend to control the dominant discourse.
It is true that reputation and credibility play an important role in communication. However, there are many related factors that will be effected the effectiveness of communication such as identity and platform. Social media as a supplement to news should be provided as an open platform so that everyone has a channel to express their opinions. At the same time, this article also reminds us that we should objectively and fairly consider opinions of others so that the negative effects of these factors can be avoided.
Hi Laura, thanks for your insightful post regarding how different identity, material, linguistic, and platform resources connect with the power to control the discourse, inequalities and the influence on the credibility of individuals. After reading Abyan’s case, I agree that the inequalities between gender, unverifiable identity, limited linguistic choices to express ideas, and the limitation in accessing social media lead to Abyan discredited by the broader community and hard to challenge the dominant discourses. Finally, I think refugees could develop language skills and learn how to convey ideas through social media to support their credibility and control the dominant discourse.
As every story needs to be heard from multiple dimensions, it is crucial for all involved individual actors to have an equal voice and access to resources to present their sides of the matter. Sadly, there is an enormous difference in material resources, platforms and linguistic asset in the case of asylum seekers and government representatives. The gap is even worse with the limitation in English language to fully express their thoughts and arguments and the government’s power and control over media and other areas across the countries. Thus, this inequality needs to be publicly raised so that refugees could have more chance to speak up and readers could better evaluate an issue from a more objective angle.
Thank you, Laura, for such an informative article. It is quite disappointing to learn about the harsh and astringent regulations that surround the process of asylum in Australia. I was not fully aware of all the limitations that refugees encounter at the time of petitioning asylum. I was also ignorant about the fact that once asylum seekers actually have their claims assessed on the merits, and protection is granted, that still refugees face serious limitations to communicate to individuals outside of Manus and Nauru. Furthermore, it seems a huge lack of transparency from the government side that journalists are not allowed into the detention centres.
The media plays such an important role in shaping public discourse about migrants and asylum seekers, so it is paramount that scholars, such as yourself, shed a light to the real inequalities that undergirds the access to public debate (such as in Abyan´s case). Communicative resources are not equitably distributed among actors of society, but this fact should not make us attach more value or credibility to those individuals or agencies (such as government officials) that are perceived as more legitimate by the mere fact of the position they hold in the community.
Hi everyone,
Now more than ever, I realised the value of effective communication now that reputation and credibility of individuals are on the line. Words are powerful – it can change a man’s life for good or for bad. I now realise that responsible journalism is important in delivering the unbiased and unfiltered message to the society. Nowadays, social media plays a huge role as an alternative means to communicate issues for the underrepresented, but the fact-checking still remains as the responsibility of the reader or consumer of the information.
Reading this article, I have realized how language creates an invisible barrier for refugees since they can not adapt themselves to the community. As I am a Vietnamese, I often came to Cabramatta for shopping, I meet a lot of Vietnamese refugees here. At first, I used to try to communicate with them by English, however, many of them, especially elder people can just say some English word with a lot of grammatical errors and often babble as they try to recount which words they should use to express their ideas. I think that the Australian government should create more opportunities for refugees to overcome such difficulties and create a more equal society for them since Australia is a multicultural nation.
I found this article really interesting but at the same time I’m saddened by Abyan’s story. The Australian government have done a comprehensive job of implementing policy and laws that prevent the public from accessing information regarding asylum seekers on Nauru. And when any information does surface of events relating to Nauru that could depict the government in a bad light, the government and mainstream media seem to be quick to frame such events in a way that depicts the government as credible and asylum seekers as incredible or dubious. I find this control they have of the discourse surrounding asylum seeker processing and Nauru quite concerning, and in cases such as this it would be reassuring if we could affirm Abyan’s side of the story without her simply being framed as a ‘liar’ and sent back to Nauru where she is sadly and conveniently (for the government) ‘censored’ out of Australian existence. It is all too easy for people in power such as Peter Dutton to make use of the symbolic, linguistic and economic capital at his disposal to discredit the story of a refugee such as Abyan, who holds little in the way of such resources by comparison (this article reminded me of Bourdieu’s [1993] work, too).
I hope in the future asylum seekers can continue to find new ways and platforms to self-advocate, so they can find a ‘voice’ that can hold up against the level of censorship and discourse control being leveled against them by governments such as Australia’s.
This article raises the issue of refugee, politics, linguistic accessibility and role of social media. Abyan’s story is so sad, it shows the plight of refugee and how refugees are facing the problem due to linguistic access. In this age of technology and communication English language is not only language but source of getting justice and pride. Those refugee who do not have access in English language are hardly get asylum because of language problem.
Social media such as Facebook, Tweeter and YouTube are also sources to get access in the public world but refugees have no access on those social media, who have access they are easily get asylum in different countries like Australia. Hence, this article genuinely raised the issue of refugee and their difficulties due to linguistic inaccessibility.
This post unveils the disadvantages that asylum seekers as non-native English speakers encounter regarding aspects as different linguistic resources, identity resources, material resources and platform resources. A fact is not the same as a truth. The way how the fact is perceived is more essential in leading to the outcome, especially in fields that legal process is involved. That means grammatical knowledge on a language is far from enough, knowledge on the way how such linguistic structures perceived by native speakers is a key factor. A second language(English) learner/user should attach great importance to the different social meanings that different linguistic structures denote and the way how the discourse perceived in English context in order to diminish misunderstanding, achieve communication goals efficiently.
Thank you for an interesting post. This article post created a sad and disturbing feeling when I read it. It also made me think that how language could close one’s freedom when they don’t have the communicative tool and knowledge to reach for help. Linguistic resources need to be available for these refugees no matter what the situation are for them. Sadly, the only way this is possible is through politics and that is something that is hard to be changed from an individual citizens power. Perhaps, how these refugee weren’t able to defend themselves is something that needs more media attention internationally.
Thank you for an interesting post. I find the four types of communicative resources that you have presented very useful for understanding texts beyond face level. Indeed, people do not only write with languages only, but they are supported or constrained by sociocultural factors like their education, financial status, social positions, or the beliefs and values of their community. Before the birth of social networking sites, the texts that are produced by authorities enjoy an almost automatically high level of credibility compared to texts written by ordinary people. However, with the freedom of speech and the advancement of technology, citizens now could criticize these official documents, spread their opinions on popular sites like Facebook or Twitter, and gather a group of supporters. The social and financial status which are thought to be affordances could become constraints to the authorities in these platforms because it may look like they are bullying the weak. The scale could be titled in the favour of different groups in different contexts. I think that acknowledging inequalities in communication does not mean that we should believe the disadvantaged more, but we should not judge the texts as themselves but in a relation with all the social-cultural factors and seek for more information to uncover the truth.
Thank you Laura for this interesting read. It is amazing how access to social platforms can impact perspectives. But thankfully, our society is educated and people are able to determine which side of the debate is advantaged and which is not (and for what reasons). Abyan’s story shattered me as she only had a pen and a paper to let her voice out to the world, while the minister has a wealth of access to communicate and spread messages. There is clearly a massive hole in the world’s innovating communication systems, and every person deserves a right to have access to a technology that helps express their voice. Especially for people like Abyan, whereby she placed her faith in the traditional powerful tools of pen and paper.
Thanks for pointing out the issue. There are obviously many disadvantages for refugees to express themselves when they have the problem in terms of language and identity, etc. I feel really sorry for the woman mentioned in the article because it’s really important but she has no advantage to argue over it. The unequal communicative resources between two participants affect the power of Abyan’s argument, and I truly hope there will be more helpful resources for such disadvantaged victims in order to support them to stand firmly or equally in the argument.
Thanks for sharing, this is really a very interesting article. Let me think about the right to speak. The refugee problem reached its climax in the years after the outbreak of the Syrian war, and a large number of refugees flocked to various developed countries to seek refuge. However, it also triggered social unrest and even triggered resistance from some nationals. Therefore, the word “refugee” seems to have been linked to negative words such as chaos, low quality, and deception. The emergence of this article has new thinking. The voice of the refugees is really too low. Some of the confusing refugees were reported as “typical”, while other refugees did not have a channel to speak. Can’t stand up and explain their position and defend themselves. Even if the channel can make a speech, it will not gain the public’s trust and have a relatively large impact. Refugees certainly do not have high-quality refugees who can contribute to the target country, but their talents and voices are buried in a negative feeling for the refugees.
In relation to Pierre Bourdieu’s concept of capital, the disparity between Abyan and the Australian Immigration Minister translates into striking differences in their cultural, symbolic, and linguistic capital. Generally, more capital affords more power. Whereas Dutton is in possession of significant capital by virtue of his political position and cognizance of the social contexts and bureaucratic procedures involved, that of Abyan is severely limited due to her poor English skills, relative anonymity, etc. This imbalance consequently tilts in favor of the ministry official. Indeed, refugees appear to have considerable disadvantages to their credibility.
Using the power and control to win a debate or to turn right things into wrong is such a controversial problem in countries having centralized authorities. Variable linguistic resources and media are made use of to achieve the government’s or powerful ones’ purposes. Meanwhile, ones with limited access to linguistics resources and platforms lose their voice in the debate. However, also thanks to social media, these disadvantaged people can find support from international advocates, which is quite powerful and influential to change the situation.
As always thank you for this entry!
This article is a testament to the over-reaching benefits of possessing enormous political power and social and economic resources. It is often an intentional habit of economic and social powerhouses to argue a victim’s morality within the confines of political debate. Abyan’s inability to establish a recognizable social identity hindered her ability to forge a credible persona and led to her moral status being disenfranchised – a remarkably familiar method used by those in power. Abyan carries all the qualities of the often downtrodden, a female immigrant minority with little economic resources. When someone is stripped of their identity and lacks the capacity or resources to rebuild it in a favorable and truthful light, they are often discredited and renounced as a member of any social community. While I agree social media has given a voice to these wrongly excommunicated members of society and helped to establish credibility and identity in their own words – using their own language and calling on the strength of their supporters to do so, it has equally given rise to the voices of the oppressors. Social media is beautiful in its design and strengths but those gifts seem to be more accessible to those who already possess the socially-accepted identities needed to reach a wider audience.
Thanks for your comment, Mary, and a really important argument about social media – while it may be changing the way we interact with each other, it arguably replicates existing power inequalities, and those with greater power/more resources are still in a better position to capture a broader platform and gain support for their beliefs/goals.
Thank you very much for sharing such an informative post. In my mind, the term “refugees” is always associated with difficulties, obstacles and inequalities in life. In this case, it’s linked to language barrier. And this case helps open my eyes about the super power and value of language. With those whose first language is not English, their words and voice are powerless and underestimated. I hope refugees from non-English-speaking countries will have more chances to be literate in English, helping them overcome the language barrier.
In my view, this is quite controvercial topic. The immigration minister and Abyan had completely different view and circumstances. As indicated in the article, 4 resources: namely linguistic, identity, material and platform are defintely unequal and almost impossible to be compared. Regarding to these 4 resources, the Immigration minister had much power and control comparing with Abyan. Nevertheless, both sides were looking for understanding and recognition which can make the public be on their side. In that case, prestige and influence of the Immigration minister is important, however, the reaction and view on that issued of the public is the most important. Personally, I think this should have reflected on this article. If the majority of the public thought Abyan was right, the situation would be completely different.
After reading this article, I realise that language is the biggest obstacle to refugees. It is obvious that Abyan is not proficient in English because it is not her mother tongue; therefore, there are some restrictions about her power, persuasiveness and identity and she must need the help of somebody. Furthermore, as shown to the Immigration Minister on identity resources, platform resources, material resources and linguistic resources, Abyan encountered unfair verbal resources. Thus, encouraging the accessible approaches to the communicative resources to refugees is very significant because this assists refugees in tackle hindrances in various nations.
Thank you for the interesting post!
This post raises the point that literacy closely connects with politics because of its written form. As for linguistic resources, Abyan herself is a refugee, so English is her second language in the Australian context. This means that her linguistic resources do not originally come from the community, so there can be a mismatch between Abyan and the involved individuals in both context of situation and context of culture. Concerning the identity resources, each person’s identity is an unique combination of numerous communities’ memberships, so it is true that Abyan brings her identity resources to the communication. Lastly, I also agree with the point that platform resources play an important role in the communicative event because different channels offer distinctive affordances and constraints on what happens in the information exchanges.
Dee
As can be seen from the article, the most challenging barrier is language. English is not the first language of Abyan, so she has to need someone’s assistance to compose the note. Apparently, Abyan, as a Somali refugee, had unequal communicative resources when compared to the Immigration Minister on linguistics resources, identity resources, material resources and platform resources. Therefore, it is important to increase the available access to these communicative resources to refugees, which partly helps them overcome difficulties in different countries. To me, linguistics resources are important for refugees to be able to express themselves via social media; hence, they should need to be helped these resources first hand.
These horrendous cases of despair and the people in need of protection and safe refuge just break my heart. We have been witnessing the PNG gaol for refugees for way too long. I don’t know what can be done unless Australians wake up and find the last bits of empathy within themselves. I think it’s a similar story for millions of refugees around the globe – they lack basic resources, technology and more importantly they have to deal with language barrier that possibly prevents them from getting more attention from local people. Australia may be one of the most advanced countries but it does not change the fact that some of its policies are very inhuman, and as you mentioned a certain language is used to depersonalised it and to create distance so people can feel like it does not concern them.
As it can be seen from the case of Abyan, there are challenges for refugees who are not able to communicate in English to express themselves. They have to rely on the support from other parties, such as an interpreter, a lawyer or a more “credible” person that could help raise their voice in public. I think that the governments should actively provide assists with humanity legislation and adequate language skills for refugees instead of standing aside and taking no action.
Even if Internet technology and Internet- connected devices has become widespread, many people still have limited access to social media and platforms to claim their requirements. In this case, when people who are disconnected to the social media have to ask for help from authorities, they do not have enough communicate resources to back on. Take Abyan as an example, and and the minister hold different identity resources, material resources as well as platform resources, which led to the unequal status of the minister and Abyan. Among three different types of resources, the last one plays a significant role in this debate. If there was no one helping Abyan to write her experience and post it, Abyan would not get what she wanted. As talked above, platform resources have considerable influence on communication.
One can only have sympathy for people who have run from persecution to find themselves invisible in what is supposed to be a refuge. I am not against border protection, but to prolong suffering to discourage asylum seekers is not the answer. Asylum seekers are at a disadvantage from the get-go. I had not also considered linguistic resources as another one. I think there is an overriding sad truth about turning a blind eye to cases like these. More linguistic resources will give them a fighting chance, but I do not believe it would make much difference. Sure, defining what a refugee is, has an immense effect, but it does not change the government, policy or general sentiment of the day. Back in the 80s, the nation was screaming for migrants to come to this ‘lucky country’, that is not echoed today, so would the refugee issue have been dealt with differently in the 80s?
I am generally, at least for my own personal reasons, usually very negative of social media. It’s even quite a stretch to get me to have to comment socially such as I’m doing now. But in such humanitarian cases where the subjects, such as in Abyan’s case, lack the linguistic ability in a needed language to defend themselves, social media plays an important and needed role and makes me think twice about my own stance on it. The challenges they face are immense and their right to express is sadly completely smothered by political rhetoric.
From the differences in terms of the resources owned by the two participants in the Abyan’s case (Abyan v. Peter Dutton), it is clear that language goes hand in hand with power. This means the higher power a person has, the more meaningful and truthful his/her words become. As a person whose L1 is not English, I totally share Abyan’s feeling of being powerless when her words are not seriously taken and her message gets distorted, losing credibility and becoming the untruth. However, I think that there are many other factors that contribute to the distortion of the message, both of Abyan’s and Dutton’s; and these are not only limited to the platform that is being used, the chosen language style or grammar, but also the number of people who are involved in creating and spreading the message. That is partially the reason why social media have become so powerful in backing someone up (like the cases you mentioned toward the end of the post) or bringing someone down. The more supporters one has in conveying the message, the powerful the closer to the truth it (almost automatically) becomes.
This article shows the importance of language on speakers’ identity.
For Abyan, as English is not her mother tongue and she’s not proficient and fluent in this language, her influence, power, identity and persuasiveness are limited.
Compare to the Australian authorities, with their power identity and the assistance of media sources, it can be noticed that their power overwhelms Abyan.
Refugees therefore should be helped in terms of linguistic resources.
The ideas about ‘resources’ in this post remind me of Bourdieu’s (1993) concept of ‘capitals’ which proposes that the values we contribute to the interaction and get evaluated by other participants depend on the resources we have. It is logical to say that the fewer the resources, the more disadvantages we have. The case presented in this post is just one among numerous examples in our life. Actually, I think even in interactional (daily) conversations, each participant experiences either the joy of being resourceful or the inferiority of being less resourceful, depending on their backgrounds. So, shall I say it is necessary for all of us to try to be literate as much as we can in order to enrich our resources and thus, enhance our credibility and persuasion capability?
I definitely had Bourdieu in mind when carrying out this research 🙂
This article makes me think about different value of languages. I think languages are not only a tool of communication but they are resources that can empower people in a particular community. In the Abyan’s case, her voice had a quite limited power in Australia because she was not fluent in English. It seems unequal that not having linguistic resources caused such a challenge like hers. I think the Australian government should ensure asylum seekers to have linguistic resources enough to express themselves.
I can see and understand that refugee court case has never been simple, because a long process of identification about the credibility of the evidence. But time is limited and it is compulsory for those one who has authority to seek a new remedy to solve these asylum seekers’ cases. I used to hear a story from my Vietnamese friend once she came to Singapore for travelling with her family. She was detained in a room in which many Vietnamese girls and other related ones were being asked some questions for personal identification. Singaporean airport customs asked them to show their own social site accounts such as Facebook, Twitter, in order for these custom officers check their personal police check to clarify whether they come to Singapore with another purpose beyond the travelling purpose. After a while being detained, my friend was let go and continued her journey with her family. Through this case, we can see that our network can partly become our personal identity evidence when we enter a bigger community and it also less or more show our credibility and reliable interactions to other ones.
Thanks for adding this important point! Indeed, social media profiles can actually help/impede credibility building through this process of immigration vetting. It reminds me of a recent story related to this from the US – immigration authorities have reportedly been instructed to use Google Translate or similar auto-translation services to check up on asylum-seekers’ social media accounts. This is very concerning, given the problems related to automatic translation, but also demonstrates how the identity we construct for ourselves online, via social media, can also have a significant impact in really important aspects of our life. See https://www.propublica.org/article/google-says-google-translate-cant-replace-human-translators-immigration-officials-have-used-it-to-vet-refugees
What an interesting topic! I have never been in a position to really sit down and think about the inequalities between the media and refugees.
I thoroughly enjoyed the analysis presented in this post, particularly regarding the difference in platforms, material resources and identity resources. What was most interesting, and disappointing, was to see the way in which Peter Dutton and the media seemingly removed the identity of Abyan in all contexts, referring to her only as ‘the/this woman’ or ‘a woman’. In a sense, this lack of identity is mimicked by the laws mentioned in that professionals who interact with refugees can face imprisonment if they are to discuss the treatment of those refugees publicly. It seems that refugees are being silenced, and it is only those who have access to social media that are able to break through. I personally believe that the government should not be able to ‘control’ the dominant discourse so easily, everyone is entitled to their say, even asylum seekers. I guess this is an issue bigger than myself, however the Australian Government has a chance to take action and help these people.
Firstly, the legal definition of a refugee is outdated. The legal language of refugee has grown into a linguistic nightmare for those seeking Australia as their new home. It must be taken into account by politicians, lawyers, academics and society in general that not all asylum seekers are refugees and that not all refugees can be categorized as the same type. This language barrier has now extended to refugees being associated as illegal migrants. Rarely does the Australian media make the distinction. This has heavily shaped the views that allowing further refugee access to Australia would only produce an illegal uproar of chaos and unleash an uncontrollable and insurmountable array of problems that no Australian government wants to face from either the voting public nor the media. As a result, Australia’s refugee policies entail heightened security phobias and have unwittingly ruined bilateral relationships.
The notion of a solution to a refugee problem stems from the 1951 United Nations Refugee Convention. The crux of the refugee debate lies within the archaic Convention. It does not make adequate provision for governments to manage issues and crises relating to refugee contemporary challenges. Australia first acceded to the Convention in 1954, and to the 1967 Protocol in 1973. The Convention has been incorporated but never interpreted in domestic Australian legislation. However, the Convention has built division and established the language of refugees being categorized as either first or second class people. This obviously must be repealed. Moreover, calls for abandoning the Convention are also not a viable solution for refugees. Under Article 44(2) of the Refugee Convention, Australia would be permitted to denounce or withdrew from any responsibility to help refugees under any circumstances for a year and legislating for extensive Australian migration laws during that gap period would be next to impossible given the slow turn-around of the Australian political arena. Therefore, it would be advisable to remain a signatory under the Convention and make new legislation and policies to create a better functioning protection system for refugees, onshore or off, and a more effective and efficient government management of the needs for refugees.
In policy terms, it is argued that the continuation of mandatory detention, and onshore processing of asylum seekers who arrive in Australia ‘by boat’ does not justify the abhorrent treatment of the people seeking Australia as their new home and their new source of life’s sustenance. Recently, the new Global Compacts on Refugees and Migrants were endorsed in late 2018. If the Australian government willingly joined other countries under this new Global Compact then the development for substantial education, health, internet access, housing, employment and sustainable food and water access for refugees would reform the Australian political, legal and educational systems into a more powerful multilaterism society.
As the global refugee numbers are rising to a record high, with the UNHCR recording on average of one person being displaced every two seconds from 2017 on wards, there is now no more time left to debate. It is time to stop talking. It it time to start acting on behalf of refugees. Actions will speak volumes to the global world as the onlookers seek an answer to this ever-growing problem.
Australia is now is in a unique position to play a pivotal part in helping refugees. It is not only about responsibility. It also accountability. May the debate end and the action begin.
https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/pubs/rp/rp0001/01RP05
https://ethics.org.au/the-australian-debate-about-asylum-seekers-and-refugees/
https://pursuit.unimelb.edu.au/articles/rethinking-australia-s-refugee-policy