Home-based english literacy program

Rohingya Resettlement

 

Of the refugees resettled in 2018, approximately 3,555 have come from Myanmar (formerly Burma). The refugees from Myanmar are mostly Rohingya, a Muslim minority population residing in a Buddhist Rakhine State. The Rohingya have faced discrimination and systemic oppression from the Burmese government for decades. The Burmese government have perpetuated the notion that the Rohingya are not native, claiming that they have illegally immigrated to Myanmar from Bangladesh during a time when the country was colonized by the British. Over the past few decades, since the passing of the 1982 Citizenship Act, violence and persecution against the Rohingya has increased to more extreme levels. This act stripped the Rohingya of their citizenship. As a result,the Rohingya have been denied basic civil liberties including access to healthcare, education, the right to marry, and freedom to move around and seek employment, and even basic sanitation (Ibrahim). The Myanmar authorities, security forces, police, and local Rakhines have subjected the Rohingya to grave human rights abuses in the forms of torture, arbitrary detention, rape, and other serious physical and mental harm (Yale Law School). The United Nations has declared the Rohingya one of the most persecuted minorities in the world, suffering mass genocide from the Burmese government.

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Thousands of Rohingya have found themselves either internally displaced or settling in camps located primarily in Malaysia or Bangladesh. Families have stayed in these countries for months to decades, some have been able to seek asylum in other countries or apply for resettlement in the United States. Those who live outside of camps in Malaysia and Bangladesh often remain in fear of deportation or arrest for lack of documentation. 1948: Burma year of independence1974: Burmese government insists Rohingya accept identity cards that label them as foreigners1962: Burmese military takes power and defines a true citizen of the state as Buddhist; increased persecution against Muslim Rohingya 1982: Burmese government legislation revokes citizenship from the Rohingya 1991-1992: Military attacks on Rohingya result in 250,000 fleeing to Bangladesh

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Rohingya in Chicago, IL

 

Chicago is home to one of the largest communities of Rohingya refugees in the United States, with over 1,600people resettled since 2010. There is a large concentration of Rohingya families in theWest RogersPark/West Ridge neighborhood area. In 2016, Nasir Zakaria, a Rohingya refugee who moved to Chicago in 2013, helped found the Rohingya Cultural Center in West Rogers Park. Zakaria now serves as the director of the center which provides social services such as English lessons and Quran classes, as well as computer training, translation services, assistance with resettlement paperwork, women’s support groups, and more. The Rohingya Cultural Center is one of the only places of its kind in the United States, aiming to meet the needs it sees for the community members.Most of the community members who will participate in this program are women. While many Rohingya women and children are exposed to gender-based violence, witnessing acts of violence and torture, destruction of property and home, kidnappings, etc. in Myanmar, it is not likely that the community members in this program have faced severe traumatic experiences prior to migrating to the United States.Many Rohingya that resettle in Chicago spend years in Malaysia before resettling in the United States. They are not typically coming directly from Myanmar There are many chronic daily stressors that Rohingya refugee women, like many other refugees, experience that can have a serious impact on mental health and well-being during the migration and post-migration phase. Receiving home-based English literacy tutoring services may help alleviate some of the stress associated with a major daily stressor, learning the local language. Traditional ESL classes usually do not offer child-care services, so many women in the community are not able to learn English. Post-Migration/Resettlement Stressors:-Social Isolation-Poverty-Lack of English Language Skills-Difficulty Accessing Resources

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English Language Education for Rohingya Refugees

 

The Rohingya face many forms of oppression and persecution in Myanmar. Access to educational opportunities is one of the many civil liberties that are being denied to the Rohingya. Naturalization under the law in Myanmar require applicants to speak one of Myanmar’s officially recognized languages. Because the Rohingya have limited access to education, they are not able to learn an officially recognized language, and the Rohingya language is not recognized by Myanmar government officials.Not only were they unable to learn an official language, but they were often barred from education altogether, leaving many without the ability to read or write.The Rohingya language is an Indo-Aryan language that is closely related to the Chittagonian (Chittagong) dialect of Bengali (Bangla) which is spoken by the Bangladeshi host population around Cox’s Bazar (UNHCR). Rohingya itself is a completely oral language, meaning it has no written form, further complicating the ability to learn a language.Various scripts are used to capture the Rohingya language in written form: Arabic, Urdu, Rohingyalish (a simplified Rohingya script using Latin letters), and Hanifi (UNHCR).Depending on their migration path, some members of the community may be bilingual or multilingual, speaking languages such as Burmese, Malay, Hindi, Urdu, Arabic, and Arakanese.