Cross-Cultural Schooling Experiences of Arab Newcomer Students: A Journey in Transition between the East and the West
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Book Reviews
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11516-020-0023-7 Cross-Cultural Schooling Experiences of Arab Newcomer Students: A Journey in Transition between the East and the West. Nesreen Elkord. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. XXII+151pp., (paperback), 54.99€, ISBN: 978-3-030-14419-7. Cross-Cultural Schooling Experiences of Arab Newcomer Students tells the stories of four Arab youth who are newcomers to the Windsor region in Canada. The book uses narrative inquiry to examine the lives and schooling experiences of the youth to understand their transitions to Canada and how they navigate new academic experiences and cultural differences. The book is organized around the stories of the four students. Chapter 3 tells the story of Safa, a Somali-Canadian who was born in Canada but lived in Somalia for roughly 11 years of her childhood. Chapter 4 tells the story of Basel, a 14-year-old boy whose family was resettled from a small village in Syria after the war. Chapter 5 focuses on Deema, a Palestinian girl whose family had been forced to move from Iraq to Jordan and then to a refugee camp in Syria, before being resettled to Canada. Finally, Chapter 7 tells the story of Laura, an Iraqi Catholic who came from a well-educated family in Iraq but moved to Syria after the Gulf War. The students’ stories, expressing everything from their difficulties to their resilience, are simultaneously touching, saddening, and inspiring. Each of the chapters gives voice to the student in question as a way of honoring their lived experience, and tells of their initial transitions and hardships, as well as their adjustment over time in their school environments. In her analysis, Elkord points out that Arab newcomers, like other newcomers, will naturally face challenges in their transitions. That said, many recently resettled Arab youth are coming to Canada as resettled refugees, and have often experienced a sudden transition. They may take longer to grieve family and friends left behind, and this is particularly apparent in the story of Basel, who seems to be longing for family and friends back home. In Chapter 7, Elkord offers an overview of how certain cultural perspectives vary between Arab newcomers when confronting Western or Canadian values. These include Arab families’ concerns over more liberal attitudes towards relations with the opposite sex and alcohol. One area where cultural values
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seemed to conflict most was on school trips, as many of the newcomer youth were invited to participate in overnight trips organized by school, but could not attend. In Chapter 3, Safa’s mom explains that an overnight trip outside the home, with those of the opposite gender, “would conflict with our traditions” (p. 44). This conflict was present for both the Muslim and Catholic newcomers in the book. She explains that these can be viewed as one of many “complex tensions that impact their schooling experiences” (p. 108). A clear theme running through all four stories is the importance of English, as without confidence in Eng
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