A Postcolonial Feminist Perspective Inquiry into Immigrant Women's Mental Health Care Experiences
Abstract
The number of immigrants coming to Canada has increased in the last three decades. As a result, there is greater emphasis on health care providers and the health care system to provide culturally appropriate and equitable care. It is well documented that many immigrant women suffer from serious mental health problems and experience difficulties in accessing and using mental health services. In this paper we advocate for new ways of research inquiry in exploring immigrant women's mental health care experiences, ones that move beyond the individual experiences of health and illness toward recognition that the health of immigrant women must be addressed within the social, cultural, economic, historical, and political context of their lives. Drawing on past research we demonstrate how the postcolonial feminist perspective can be used to illuminate the ways in which race, gender, and class relations influence social, cultural, political, and economic factors, which, in turn, shape the lives of immigrant women. We suggest that postcolonial feminism provides an analytic lens to (a) generate transformative knowledge about immigrant women's mental health care experiences; (b) improve equitable health care; and (c) increase understanding of what would be helpful in meeting the immigrant women's health care needs.
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Immigration policy can contribute to and maintain power imbalances, resulting in the marginalisation of immigrant women.
“Immigration policy can contribute to and maintain power imbalances, resulting in the marginalisation of immigrant women [26].”
From A qualitative study of Filipina immigrants’ stress, distress and coping: the impact of their multiple, transnational roles as women (2017) · cites this paper as [26]
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BackgroundSelf-citationBeginning again: West African women's experiences of being migrants in Australia
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- Authors
- Maureen O’Mahony, J., & Truong Donnelly, T.
- Venue
- Issues in Mental Health Nursing
- Publisher
- Informa UK Limited
- Published
- 2010-06-03
- Volume
- 31
- Issue
- 7
- Pages
- 440-449
- ISSN
- 0161-2840 (ISSN-L)
- 1096-4673
- OpenAlex
- W2011429795
- Cited by
- 51
- References
- 62
- Citations by year
- 2026: 2 · 2025: 2 · 2024: 2 · 2022: 3 · 2021: 8 · 2020: 2 · 2019: 4 · 2018: 1 · 2017: 5 · 2016: 2 · 2015: 9 · 2014: 2 · 2013: 4 · 2012: 4
- FWCI
- 3.15
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Issues in Mental Health Nursing (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Funders
- Canadian Institutes of Health Research
- Topics
- Social Sciences › Psychology › Clinical Psychology › Migration, Health and Trauma
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Gender, Health, and Social Inequality
- Social Sciences › Sociology and Political Science › Migration, Identity, and Health
- Keywords
- immigrant women, mental health services, postcolonial feminism, culturally appropriate care, health equity, access to mental health care, race, class, and gender, social determinants of health, transformative knowledge, Canada
- MeSH terms
- Acculturation, Mental Disorders, Canada, Dependency, Psychological, Female, Gender Identity, Health Services Accessibility, Humans, Mental Health Services, Politics, Prejudice, Social Values, Clinical Nursing Research, Transcultural Nursing, Cultural Diversity, Feminism, Emigrants and Immigrants
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