Imperialism, Migration, and Homonationalism: The Impact on LGBTQ+ asylum seekers
This session examines the intersections of western imperialism and homonationalism culminating in savior mentalities that are well-ingrained within western nations’ immigration and asylum systems. This session will use the U.S. as a case study, and focus on how American foreign policy is an exertion of dominance against other nations for cheap labor and resources through war, exploitative trade and labor agreements, and covert operations. The U.S. refuses to acknowledge its role in necessitating migration while largely barring entry to migrants. By focusing on the impact of U.S. immigration policy on LGBTQ+ migrants, we can have a more granular conversation about these larger phenomena. The Chicago People’s Rights Collaborative co-hosts with Dr. Fobear to discuss how we fight these larger phenomena at interpersonal, organizational, and structural levels. Finally, this session discusses our complicity in these structures of violence, and how we can build transnational solidarity and move towards collective liberation.
Speakers
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Dr. Kat Fobear
Dr. Kat Fobear's research and activism focuses on the intersections of race, sexuality, and gender in oral history, migration, transitional justice, health, and housing. Her most recent work is with LGBTQ refugees and undocumented persons in Canada and transgender homeless in California’s Central Valley. She served as an advocate for Rainbow Refugee--a Vancouver, BC based organization focused on assisting those claiming asylum on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity. She is on the board of Trans-E-Motion--a California based organization based in the Central Valley, dedicated to advocacy and support for the transgender community. She is currently working on Qistory, a queer public history initiative in partnership with Community Link that works to record and preserve the voices and lives of LGBTQ+ persons in the Central Valley. She is the author of several journal articles regarding transitional justice and oral history, most notably in International Journal of Human Rights (2019), The Journal of Homosexuality (2012), Journal of Human Rights Practice (2013), Refuge (2014), & Women’s Studies International Forum (2017).
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Dr. Sarah Messmer
Sarah Messmer (she/her) is an Assistant Professor of Medicine and Pediatrics at the University of Illinois at Chicago. She completed her medical school and med-peds residency at Harvard Medical School/Massachusetts General Hospital before returning to the Chicago area as faculty at UIC. Her clinical interests include LGBTQIA+ health, immigrant and refugee health, and opioid use disorder/harm reduction. She is a member of the Physicians for Human Rights Asylum Network and has completed forensic asylum evaluations in both Boston and Chicago, as well as led trainings on conducting forensic asylum evaluations for both pediatric and adult clients.
