Living the Experience: Migration, Exclusion, and Anti-Racist Practice

The book dissects issues facing refugees, immigrants, and other racialized minorities, both in Canada and globally, through a critical, anti-racist lens. It also investigates racist crimes, and public reaction to them, against the long-established African- Nova Scotian community. It moves beyond traditional theories by advancing an anti-racist framework toward migration and refugee studies using African refugees’ lived, and living, experiences in Canada. Based on theoretical, empirical, and qualitative accounts of resettlement challenges individuals have experienced, the book analyzes socio-racial constructs used in the post-colonial North to exclude, contain, and forcibly repatriate refugees.

This work looks at recent migration and refugee initiatives and shows how they breach international human rights and refugee law. Canadian legislation and international human-rights law prohibit discrimination in any form; yet implicit and explicit violations of key refugee protection principles continue. Ighodaro asks, “Does Canada have the political will to stand against racism and bring human-rights violators to justice?” The book strives to move Canadian society toward equality for all citizens, including immigrants and refugees, and to reject the collective denial of racism.

MACDONALD IGHODARO is an assistant professor of sociology at Saint Mary’s University. He has also taught at York University, the Peel District School Board, and the Toronto District School Board. MacDonald received a Ph.D. in Sociology and Equity Studies in Education at the University of Toronto-OISE in 2002. He also has a BA and MA in Education, a B.A. (Hons) Social Science, a General Diploma in Refugee and Migration, and Certificate in Anti-Racist Research and Practice from York University

MacDonald’s research interests include: social equity issues; critical race and racism; human rights and social justice; international development and globalization; ethnography; refugee and immigration; and racialized minorities in Europe and North America.

In his teaching and research, he emphasizes three basic principles: the synthesis of theory and ethnographical research; equity and social justice based knowledge; and anti-racist praxis in public policy formulation and implementation. He is committed to continued excellence in research, teaching and learning, therefore, always strives to inspire critical thinking, individual academic development and growth, and a distinctive passion for learning. MacDonald’s teaching strategy allows students to bring to bear an in-depth interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary analytical perspective based on equity and anti-racism theory and practice. His teaching philosophy fosters students’ research that comparatively examines U.S, Canadian, and international processes that construct standards relating to human rights laws, social justice policies, diaspora politics, and its political implications for social change.