Fatuma
I have first hand experience of being a foreigner and also having a disability. I had to check the rights that I have. I had to talk to the school, you have to fill in some disability forms. It was not so easy. It was hard.
Jessica
Being a person that was blind, and them not knowing the kind of scaffolding and they also did need me to do a lot of the accommodations, kind of professional written stuff professional verbal stuff, due to them being immigrants. So it’s almost like a weird catch 22 if you will, of me, meaning to advocate for myself but also me not really being able to push those boundaries of what I could do.
[Intro piano music: forthright melody accompanied by a habanera dance rhythm.]
Áine
You’re listening to Disability Crosses Borders, featuring stories where disability, migration and culture meet. I’m Áine Kelly-Costello and today I talk to two blind social work students first Fatuma Abdi, and second Jessica Karim. I chose to interview them one at a time as they’ve grown up between totally separate cultures and have distinct life experiences. But you’ll hear how for both, experiences relating to disability and inmigration became driving forces in their decisions to pursue social work.
Fatuma Abdi
Áine
I’m talking with Fatuma Abdi, Hello welcome to Disability Crosses Borders. I wondered if you could introduce yourself and maybe just paint a little bit of a picture of what you especially remember from growing up in Somalia.
Fatuma
My name is Fatuma Abdi. I’m 26 year old, and I’m from Somalia. and I was born partly sighted, but I’m blind. And studying social work. I’m also living in Norway. This is also 11 years since I applied for asylum in Norway.
The thing I remember when I lived in Somalia in Mogadishu, which is also the capital city is [being] a girl who dresses like a boy, which is not a typical Somali girl—who liked playing with boys, mostly football, and gaming. Because like I could see them, yeah. I also like fighting. [Fatuma and and Áine laugh].
In school I was being bullied because like I use spectacles. So, the other students called me “four eyes”.
Áine
That’s super disrespectful.
Fatuma
I used to just in the first place I was very annoyed, very angry. I didn’t say anything when I came home I just shouted, with my grandma, I lived with her and my grandfather, but he died when I was 7 years old. But later on, I fought back.
Áine
Did you get the kind of support that you needed at school, like was there any kind of services at all for having books in Braille?
Fatuma
No, there were no books in braille, and I couldn’t read Braille at that time, I was partly sighted when I was born. As I grew up, I could see, but I could not see at night and I cannot do that now also. And I can’t see in the dark.
In Somalia, I went to a private school, which which was also better than the public [one]. The teachers were like, they could have done better but they tried a little bit, but they didn’t do anything about the bullying. The thing I got was like another student read up what the teacher wrote on the blackboard. When we took exams, the teacher or assistant person read the questions and I could answer them.
Áine
How did you feel around like attitudes to blindness and disability, outside of the school environment.
Fatuma
I was not being hidden, but there was a shame of my family showing me to other people. I remember when we would get some guests. Like they would say, “can you go to that and that house until this and this time in the evening?” Or like, I could get free and play football with my friends.
At that time, I didn’t understand, but now I understand why they kind of did that, but like when relatives came, mostly, I could just greet them and they knew about my disability. And they would just like say, “Oh, I hope God helps you”. I am also Muslim, so people could say “may Allah give her her sight back”, this is a big thing. And they use the word handicap, which made me irritated. I was like, “no I’m not handicapped!”. Until today I hate that word.
Áine
That’s really disrespectful and I think you can also tell so easily when it comes with the tone of, “oh, she’s less worthy”.
Fatuma
You’re the lowest rank of the society. But my childhood became a little bit better when–this is weird saying–my grandpa died. Because he was very … not depressed but like “Oh I have a handicapped, girl”. And he didn’t get a son. That was also a thing in my culture, he got a granddaughter, not a grandson.
Áine
And there was that sense of resentment then, that’s horrible having to grow up around something like that, yeah. As time went on, did Mogadishu become increasingly kind of unsafe, as well.
Fatuma
Yeah, that was also part of living in Mogadishu, the whole time. You have to also know where you are and tell your neighbours and the other people in your relatives. I couldn’t just run away and do other things as my sighted friends did, sometimes.
The other thing was I have to go to two schools, one was the private one. As a Muslim person you also have to learn the religion, and the holy book of Islam, or the Quran. I had to have a big one, big form of the Quran, just to see. Arabic is not the same as the Latin alphabet. That was also kind of hard. I just had to memorise everything, and I couldn’t write it.
Áine
When you were learning the Quran. Were you the only blind student in your class.
Fatuma
Yeah. And I’m left-handed, which also my teacher didn’t like. So she would say, you cannot write the Quran the holy words of God in your left hand. It’s dirty, blah blah blah. Like, come on.
Áine
That theory kind of only works if everyone is born right handed,
Fatuma
And my grandmother also thought it was the best just to drop it and learn the Quran by my own. She was very helping…
Áine
Supportive?
Fatuma
Supportive yeah thank you. That’s the thing I remember of her. She is dead now.
Áine
Tell me about when your family decided to go through the process of seeking asylum. What did that end up involving in coming to Norway?
Fatuma
It was not a thing which was, like, planned. Because the thing was my mom disappeared from Somalia. A year after I was born, because she couldn’t live there because of the war. We are from a minority clan. So, it was also harder for, for us, living there, so she decided to move. I had to stay because my father died before I was born.
The thing that I didn’t know was like, if my grandparents died, then I would move with my mom because there was no other person who could take care of me as a child. If also my disability came worser. So then I had to move from Somalia. The process was not so easy.
Áine
What did that end up involving for you?
Fatuma
It was not so easy, also as a disabled person, because like, you have to fill a lot of forms, and you have to get help from other people,
Áine
are you expected to do all of that in Norwegian as well?
Fatuma
No, you can do it in English thank God. When I apply for asylum in Norway, that was the year of 2010. It was also a challenging year. Winter -20 was not the thing I thought Norway was! [Fatuma and Áine laugh]
My mom got married, I have a step-father. So she didn’t apply for asylum seeker. But I had to. She came as, what do you call—family–
Áine
Reunification.
Fatuma
Yeah, thank you. I couldn’t live with them. But I learned Norwegian language much better, if I see it in a positive way.
I lived with a Norwegian family, a month with them. They were like, “you have to learn Norwegian you can’t speak English all your life in Norway. It’s so important”, blah blah. Yeah, but I can’t learn it very quickly. I was 15
I moved to, when you’re under 18 In Norway, you live in an asylum campus for those who are between 15 and 18. There was like school classes where you could learn Norwegian and Maths. The conditions were not so bad living there, the conditions we had were, I would say, Fine.
But the thing–in Europe they have this thing. The first country you come to, as an asylum seeker is the country you have to apply in, you can’t move from that country to another one[!finger?]. And they call it the Schengen Avtalen in Norwegian.
Áine
Schengen agreement.
Fatuma
The depressing thing was people just became deported at night. When you’re just waking up in the morning, you’re like, ‘oh where is this person?” “Oh, they came and took him last night. Mostly it was like, if your application had gotten three times denial, they you were deported. We can close to everyone. We had a kind of rules and shared toilets in the kitchen. We had the first floor for the boys and the second floor was for girls. So it came. You became friends and like, it was like kind of family there. Because everyone cared for the other one. In a way,
Áine
in an ideal world as well. Would you have preferred to be able to, you know, live with your mother in the community that you would have been living in straightaway rather than going through having to sort of live in the camp and everything like that as well.
Fatuma
I learned things about the Norwegian culture, which I couldn’t have mostly learned with my mom if I lived with her. I remember the first week, I was like, “this is weird, I don’t know anyone”. But, things became easier when I became used [to it] and talked to the others who lived there and we had some activities together, we cooked dish, we watch movies. You could go for a walk and they were very helpful they could–what do they call–Lead me, when we went for a walk in the evenings. In Norway it becomes darker very quickly in wintertime. So, in a way, I’m thankful, living in that camp. My mom is very protective. She’s like “oh don’t hurt yourself. Don’t do this”. She was like, very anxious of me, breaking my leg or my arm, which also happened.
Áine
If you could change anything about that process, to make it like less traumatic and just easier especially for disabled people as well. Is there anything that you would change about it.
Fatuma
It could have made my life a little bit, a little bit better if I, for example, got some, what do we call a cane or a computer with Zoom or, like, we had like computers, and you could like, go in the internet and use Facebook. I remember when, When my friends, use a use the computer I couldn’t. Like, I couldn’t see anything. I asked if I could get the computer with a screen reader or something like that. But they were like, “we can’t because we have to buy the screen reader and we don’t have money, budget for this”.
The thing that could have made it better was like getting a disability support community or like some kind of help would have make that time better. Those who worked there did their best. I’m very thankful that it was not so hard for me, living there. They showed me how to use dishwasher or washing machines or to wash your clothes. Today I can do that alone. I got help from those I lived with also the other youths, and also those who worked there were so helpful and supportive. Everyone in the camp, also had a person who waw that they could talk to or get help from–
Áine
like a buddy or some kind of support,
Fatuma
support person. I remember he bought a lamp, which had yellow light, Because I see better with yellow, rather than blue and white. I get headaches from white, and also blue, and he got some CDs, and I could like borrow the CD player. I’m like, just read an audio Norwegian book. So yeah, no, I’m very thankful. Yeah.
But they took me to like a doctor who said “I don’t understand her diagnosis”. They were like, “we can’t help you, until you get your application, you have to have those five numbers after your birth”
Áine
National Identification number
Fatuma
to get welfare in Norway unless you’re a person from the
Áine
European Union. Yeah, so for, for people who don’t know how the system works here. Everyone who moves to Norway is required to register and get one of these identification numbers, does that also mean that in order to get support at school or as part of your education, you know, you had to wait for that process to come through.
Fatuma
Yeah.
Áine
How long did you end up having to stay at the camp for?
Fatuma
Seven months. In July 2010, I moved to live with my mom.
[Musical interlude: four forthright piano chords]
Áine
And you ended up sort of going to school for the next few years in Norway and did you get sort of the type of support that you needed in terms of learning some kind of blindness skills at that point because you would have been losing a bit more of your sight as well.
Fatuma
Yeah, and was also a teenager who also was denying her lose of sight,
Áine
which is such a common experience right it’s super hard.
Fatuma
I remember when I moved to–the municipality’s called Hamar –I got what you call a disability, teacher who wanted to teach me, orientation, it’s very nice, but she also wanted me to learn how to use the white cane. And I was like, I’m not blind. Fuck off. This went on. I also had to go through primary school, three years in Norway, which was also irritating, but yeah, they said that my studies from Somalia and I also lived in Uganda, were not the same as like the Norwegian ones. Primary school in Norway is to grade ten here. And then you start high school for three to four years. I started learning much better the language, and the language I learned in was English [before] so I just have to learn the same thing in Norwegian. It was not so hard. I liked Math because you didn’t need Norwegian when it comes to Math, But maybe sometimes like when you have those questions, which are like text, and not numbers.
I was 19 when I started feeling my disability teacher was right. I was like okay, I have to use this frickin cane because I had a lot of times I fall and hit my knees and bruises. I also had to adapt to the Norwegian culture, as much as I have my own culture. I think that made it also kind of harder because like mom said also, “do you really have to use this white cane? You’re not blind.’” So I think getting support from her would maybe have helped the situation in a way. But my mom thinks. Also today, if Allah wishes, or God that I would get my site one day. I have told a lot of times, “I am satisfied with this situation. Yes, I am disabled, blind, also in situations also sometimes partly sighted. But I don’t want to change, because I have accepted it. And I want her also to accept it. But I have also accepted that [Fatuma sighs] she’s not going to understand that in a way.
Like religion is also a thing for her. I am Muslim. But my religion doesn’t have to go against my disability, I think so. I used to pray to God to give me my site but now I’m like thank God. And I don’t want better than this. I just thank him, the situation and the help I got here in Norway. If my sight was like this, like the help here in Norway. If my site was like this, and I lived in Somalia at this time, I don’t know what help I could have gotten there. Maybe I just had to sit at a place, unable doing anything.
Áine
Yeah, that’s really awful to think that there are people who obviously have disabilities. In countries like Somalia where there’s such limited resourcing but also like those attitudes of stigma and shame where, you know people really would not get the support to live full lives and fully participate.
[Music: piano chords]
After you ended up finishing school and I think you had a bit of a roundabout route to finding, social work, but tell me what made you decide to study social work,
[Musical interlude: rhythmic piano chords]
Fatuma
While growing up being a disability Somali, girl, being a foreigner, searching your rights. I have first-hand experience of being a foreigner and also having a disability. I had to check what type of rights I have, had to talk to the municipality, the school, you have to fill in some disability forms to apply for a cane and stuff like that. It was not so easy. It was hard because like my mom, she does speak the language, but not in the way that I do, I speak much better than her. I also translated for her. When she had to operate her knees, that’s also a thing. So I was like my own parent and child at the same time.
I remember when I was in high school. The teacher, and also my assistant and also the disability teacher and those who gave those Disabilities Services were like, “you can’t do High School in normal time; you have to take longer time”. I was like, “I want to go with my same class and finish with them”. They suggested me doing High School in like four to five years. I was like “hell no. I will do it in three years, which is also ordinary”.
Yeah, it was hard. I will not deny it. Yeah, I got some headaches. I also got migraine from that. I had to learn Braille as my sight became worse. But they could have helped me. And they didn’t know how to help me and I was like, I can get some assistance, for exams, and also the room when I have exams, which makes it easier for me to take tests and exams.
Áine
you’re fighting low expectations, basically,
Fatuma
they’re like, you’re a foreigner, you can’t, you can’t with the language, as the other students in my class can —they were Norwegian. And I was like, I don’t want that. I can do the same as they. I just need this-and-this helps. I need my books coming on time, or in audio. I need a screen reader which works. I started learning braille. Using a cane the last two years in high school.
Áine
What you needed was the basic blindness support that any blind students would basically have needed, and without which you couldn’t possibly be expected to keep up,
Fatuma
that’s the main thing [why] I wanted to study social work.
And another thing is also to get high school certificate, you also have to have a grade from PE, physical education, which they told me that I didn’t need that. I had to check on my own what was needed to get your high school certificate, and also to apply for higher education. And I was like, ‘no, I have to have PE, this is the criteria”. And they’re like “oh yeah, sorry we forgot” and I was like, “oh no, yeah, you have to do it”. I suggested that another PE teacher would become my assistant, when we had PE. It worked! I got a fine grade, and I did well in PE, which I also like it. That’s also important. They also do it with a lot of disability students here in Norway. It’s a thing that a lot of disability organizations have taken and told them not to do.
Áine
So it’s changing now.
Fatuma;
Yeah.
Áine
So now as like a social worker in training. You bring that really intersectional perspective, from your life experience into that. How do you think that social work, as well as like the social work education that you’re going through as well could be more intersectional?
Fatuma
So, we have learned what disability is in a very lower… As a disability person, I know a lot [more] than my cohort students. The other thing is also, we have learned a little bit about foreigners rights, but not, how about if you’re a foreigner, with also a disability or if you are LGBTQ with a disability. So, the intersectional part of social work is not fully. I think it could have been covered better.
We have learned in the second year, everyone, every student gets a group, you learned a little bit more about a certain part of society, like foreigners, disability or child welfare. But we didn’t also have LGBTQ rights, we don’t learn about those
Áine
from your experiences at the intersection of disability and being an asylum seeker and also LGBTQ, what do you feel like will be really important to you that you would bring to social work that you didn’t necessarily get when you were growing up yourself.
Fatuma
Listen to the client. Because like, they have. You have to listen to them, to overcome their need, don’t like, yeah, suggest what kind of works like, let them talk. I wish I got that. Because like, when I had meetings with the social work. They did a lot of the talking, and I didn’t get to say my needs, what I needed, how things could have been done, also with my teachers. Yeah, listen and be open to other suggestions than yours. I think that’s the main thing.
Áine
Fatuma Abdi, thank you so much.
[Musical interlude: rhythmic excerpt from intro theme]
Jessica Karim
I’m talking to Jessica Karim. Welcome to disability crosses borders Jessica it’s great to have you. Could you introduce yourself.
Jessica
Sure. First and foremost, thank you so much for having me. So, my name is Jessica Karim, I’m 21 years old. I currently reside in New York. I’m a senior and I’m a social work major and totally blind.
Áine
Can you talk about where your parents come from and how that’s shaped your life growing up?
Jessica
Yeah sure, so my parents are from Guyana, and whenever I say that I always have to give like this little disclaimer, as not a lot of people know where that is. So, it’s a small, relatively third-world country located in South America. We eat a lot of Indian food so a lot of people think I’m Indian, but I’ve always marked myself as “other” on those checkboxes, you know, not Latinx but we are in South America, but I’m not native Islander or Pacific Islander. Yeah, but, so my parents emigrated here, right before I was born, my mom had me at 21 and came here at 19.
And I think growing up, you know, even just from a cultural perspective, you have to start with, like, the most basic which is food. So, my grandmother lives lived or still does live rather with us, and did a lot more of the traditional cooking so coming home and the school, lots of my nights was shaped by lots of traditional rice dishes, lots of curry, we do a lot of curried meats, whether that’s chicken or duck or lamb or goat. Lots of like traditional pine tarts and patties and dessert-focused things.
Family has always been huge, to us, so my cousin’s. My mom’s oldest brother, his wife and their two children lived across the street. So we would go over there all the time, I’m still very close to them. My grandfather lives next door to them so it’s always been like this, very interconnected, kind of loving close-knit community of who we are as Guyanese people. And then I guess specifically for my cousin’s, sister and I, we are Guyanese Americans. And it’s so funny because my sister is eight so quite a significant age difference between the two of us, and it’s just interesting to see her own cultural differences where I will gladly eat Guyanese food, you know, any day of the week, basically. With my grandmother not cooking as much. My mom doesn’t want to be cooking, and it’s definitely significantly more Americanised so we’re all on pizza, burgers tacos. My sister Kaylee will kind of just like, eat that and we’ll try to get her to eat Guyanese when she’s just like, she’s not having it. So that’s kind of a little bit about the cultural aspect.
And then in terms of, there was really no linguistic aspect from a translation perspective because the Guyanese people, it’s almost like Caribbean people, there is no set language, there’s just kind of a very distinctive and strong accent, and what I would classify as broken English. But I definitely think that did play a part verbally and grammatically for me growing up where, since my parents never really had the best skills, verbally or grammatically, if a phone call needed to be made or a professional letter needed to be written, I ended up doing it. And I think that definitely had a lot to do with my own lead into the social work profession if you will.
Áine
Totally. Do you want to talk at all about how disability is viewed in Guyana and how your family. Yeah perceived, blindness, and whether that had particular influences on how you see yourself maybe
Jessica
Disability is definitely not spoken about as much as it could be in Guyana. They are very poor. So, they’ve never really had good medical advancements, or they don’t have a lot of disabled people that are particularly successful so I think about that, where I was born here, and was able to get access to good medical care and good disability services, and what my life would have been like if I had been born there. I think my parents did as best as they could when I was born, but I do think that they made decisions, just based on the fact that they were such new immigrants such young immigrants that didn’t understand this system. They enrolled me in a preschool for the blind, and then a regular school for the blind, until I was a senior, which was, if I could have done it differently, I wouldn’t have gone there. Not–just to have the experience. And that was a big part of it was just kind of their idea of wanting to make sure that I had what I needed in terms of accessibility and accommodations, and I think their thought process was okay we’ll just put her in a school for the blind because she’ll be safe there. It was a bit of an uphill battle, getting them to allow me to dorm in college. Granted, I still live 45 minutes away, and they come visit definitely more often than not and I go home more often than not. But that was kind of the first time I really had to go “listen, I know what I’m doing. I promise I’ll be safe. I’m not far”. And now that I’m a senior, we were talking about this thing moved me in about two weeks ago now how fast time flies, but there’s definitely a level of overprotectiveness there that I think was amplified simply by them not being from this country. So it’s interesting because as much as they sheltered me being a person of that was blind, and them not knowing the kind of scaffolding of how things worked, they also did need me to do a lot of the accommodations, kind of professional written stuff professional verbal stuff. Due to them being immigrants. So it’s almost like a weird catch 22 if you will, of me, meaning to advocate for myself but also me not really being able to push those boundaries of what I could do,
Áine
I imagine, part of the kind of wanting to keep your child who’s blind safe thing was also that if you’d gone to a mainstream school, you know, inclusive education still isn’t the default in so many places so just because you go to a mainstream school, Maybe there there would be actually more advocacy in order to get the you know Individualised Education Planning and actually ensure all the resources were in place, and I wonder if there was a sense that they had no idea how those systems worked, you as a little kid wouldn’t have been able to know either. And whether that played into it as well, in terms of no one necessarily being in charge of that scaffolding of like helping immigrant families with disabled kids to actually find their footing.
Jessica
It’s kind of like hindsight, 50-50 or whatever the saying is, because I don’t think I really realise how much my parents’ experiences shaped their decisions for me. But no, you are completely spot on where, you know, I went to preschool for the blind, and they were like, oh, you should go here for her education and I think they knew like okay we’ll have someone telling us exactly what to do, exactly how to help her in ways that they might not necessarily could have done. And it’s so interesting because I wonder a lot like if I had been white, would I have been as good as an advocate for myself when I was younger and even now to this day, if my parents could do it. And I don’t know the answer to that because as sheltered as I was going to school for the blind. I still had to do a big chunk of the advocacy but no I think you’re absolutely correct where there was this almost comfort in them, of saying, “okay, she’s here, she’s safe”. And even when I was in high school and we were at a transition meeting of mine, my transition counsellor was like you know she would be really good in mainstream. And my mom in her head may have been like “okay, but she’s so good here. Why fix what’s working?”
Áine
I know within a lot of blindness communities in the last few years there’s starting to be some conversations about the intersections of disability and race. I wonder how that is for you. Being a brown blind kid in your education, or any other like parts of your life where race ended up playing quite a big part as well.
Jessica
I know for me it’s always been a very hard thing to discuss race right, because I don’t identify as black however definitely not white, right. I’m also a bit of a—segue–It’s so funny because my parents have such strong accents that I’ve been growing up I tried to un-emulate, if that’s even a word, as much as possible. And I will tell you you hear the name Jessica, also stuck me with a very American name, and I do not sound, whatever that means. Brown. So a lot of blind people think I’m white, and it’s always like this “no I’m not, I promise”. Growing up we lived in a relatively lower middle class community, family is a huge part of our life, like I said so. We’ve been at family gatherings with obviously everyone’s brown and then the school for the blind I went to was very diverse; we were majority POC people. So, the first time I think I was ever super culturally aware of my race was college, I go to a relatively expensive private school where it’s very much majority white. So it was definitely the scariest thing for me, coming from a neighbourhood one that was majority Brown, and a school where everyone knew me to kind of shift in that paradox and doing a bit of a way where no one knew me and everyone was white, and obviously able bodied.
And you know there are times I almost wish my parents had somehow integrated me more into the sighted world because coming to college as a freshman at 18 was really my first experience interacting with the sighted world and I just remember the first time it happened with a friend. We went to the Cheesecake Factory with another girl. And we got in her car and she drove and in my mind I’m like, This is what normal people go through? It was like earth-shattering for me because I’m the oldest child and where I live. Public transportation is rampant so I really had that, so race played a huge part just realizing like, wow, this is not something I can do. Financially, you know, as a brown person, it’s not feasible and then disability where I can’t drive a car like that was something that really shocked me, which is maybe more of a class intersect, if you will. How many people my own age were able to just get up and go, and that was something I really struggled with this idea of, you’re still capable, if even if you can’t do any of the transportation and stuff.
I think for me what’s really helped with the whole transition to college was, I think this is something I would suggest for any blind person who’s kind of going into a situation where you don’t know anyone, is to find other blind people of colour to relate to. My two best friends in the whole world, are both Guyanese and totally blind, which is not common, but it’s funny because as many sided friends as I have, there’s just something hard to describe about going to a friend to a best friend who knows exactly who has walked the walk. So, this happened and this happened and getting that relatability over, you know? my able-bodied white friend can sympathise or empathise rather but will never get it.
As a social work student, I’ve taken an oppression diversity class over the summer, and one of our midterm related questions was, okay, look at intersectionality as it relates to your life that explain how sometimes it’s enhanced and sometimes it’s minimised. And I got to give a in depth description of, well, sometimes I’ll be in situations where race comes up more, And sometimes I’ll be in a situation where disability comes up more like if I need access to an accommodation, that’s more disability focused or if a friend invites me to a party, but the party is majority all white and I go as a brown person. That’s racist, or if I’m sitting there speaking in class, and I’m making good points, there’s always that little bit of and there’s like, I always think, okay, are they looking at this from a “wow she’s, she looks like that” as in darker skin in a space that’s majority white–and said that. Or, “Wow, we can really know she’s blind, but still speak really well” or is it… Case in point being, I think that intersectionality is a really important part of my life, but they’re also kind of sub-categories where one will influence the other in terms of marginalization and privilege,
Áine
and it leads nicely into talking about how you got into social work as you mentioned, to do with advocacy, but I’m also interested if you can, or if you want to reflect anymore on how your life experiences, shaped that decision to go into social work.
Jessica
I definitely think that me being an advocate for myself at such a young age, led into my social work. But moreover I decided to go to social work because of a couple of things. One, I’ve always been—it’s funny, I am doing a lot of the talking, but most of the time I do a lot of listening. I’m usually that friend that people can kind of come to, I’m told I’m very easy to talk to. I don’t force the conversation. As I’ve grown up I’ve always “Got a problem? Go to Jessica”.
So, that was like what first did it. Look okay you’ve always been seen as a good listener. Secondly, I just took a lot of social work classes second semester freshman year. Because initially I went in as undeclared, because I don’t quite know what I want to do with my life which I think is kind of commonplace for a lot of 18-year-olds, and took a lot of classes on social equity and diversity inclusion, of violence and trauma and then your intro standard social work 101 class, and at that point during that class, I was in thrall by the myriad of situations, and settings that social workers can work in. That’s something that I pitch to a lot of people when I explain the major. It’s like, you know, you think, oh, Child Services which granted is true, and is wonderful. However, we also work in schools, homeless shelters, hospital, hospice care. My current field placement is working at non for profits doing what we call macro or policy work writing grants and funding proposals and very. It’s almost like social work and business combined, which is not what you think of, so that I think was like the clincher for me.
And I think there’s even some subtext to this because my biggest fear as someone that though I’ve been relatively successful education wise academic wise, is that I will get an MSW, which I’ll be doing–Masters of social work–which I will acquire within the next year and a half, pass my licensing exam, and still not get employed, because of how stigmatised society treats—
It’s funny. I’m a woman, right, so there’s that. I’m brown, there’s that and I’m disabled so I have, as terrible as it sounds, all the strikes against me. So society is not the kindest, and I honestly, I chose social work, inherently because there are so many options like okay, if non-for-profit fails, hospitals. If that fails, schools if that fails, domestic abuse. Maybe pre-emptively I was just like, “alright Jessica, you have all these options, you’ll find something!”–that I might not have found an accountant or something.
Áine
Yeah, that’s such a important consideration that feels like it’s disproportionately definitely placed upon multiply marginalised folks huh?
Jessica
For sure. And again, until I really wrote that paper that I talked to you about earlier from the oppression diversity course, I put it to one of our best friends who is amazing able bodied, and white but amazing, and I sent it to her and she goes, Wow, yeah it’s funny because I knew you identified as marginalised, but I didn’t realise how much it was like yeah, I didn’t even realise how much until you’re sitting there and you’re writing it out. It’s weird, right, I don’t think marginalised folks wake up–I certainly don’t wake up and go, “Wow, I’m really marginalised today!” [Áine laughs]. But it’s just kind of always there, if that makes sense.
Áine
Yes, it has a meaning in comparisons or in relationships with, I guess with other people in power. So it sounds like, at least in this oppression paper, your Social Work Education has really accounted for intersectionality, which is great. And do you feel like there are other ways in which social work education could be more inclusive of experiences, like those you’ve had growing up, preparing social workers of the future to serve those diverse communities
Jessica
from the non-profit sector. One of the things I’m hoping to do at my internship with a fellow professor I worked with, is kind of work on building a programme–that’s the diversity, equity and inclusion train-the-trainer programme–and what we’re hoping to do is have almost a monthly or bi weekly, once every two-week, format of, we bring these non for profit leaders and these employment specialists from non-profits and we train them on diversity, equity, inclusion, using a very dialogic based approach so instead of you know your traditional seminar where you’re sitting there with 30 people or whatever it is and you’re watching the Zoom screen, we engage them so that’s what we’re hoping to do from the macro lens.
From the micro perspective, when it comes to training fellow social workers. I do think there is more that can be done. I have race and I have disabilities, we’ll talk about both separately. So my programme’s school is very predominantly white because that’s based on the demographic of school. However, I had to do a seminar or attend some kind of meeting over zoom with all the other social work schools in the greater New York area, and it was so interesting to see more social workers of colour. So I will say, personally I feel like we could do better diversity wise at the school I go to. However, that is very much skewed based on the fact that it’s just higher income, but overall I think race-wise, we do a good job of having multiracial, biracial non-white folks as social workers.
Disability is a very different thing, because we take, there is at my school anyway there is no specific disability-centred class. We take the oppression to diversity class, which talks about a number of -sims, a number of marginalisations, and we take that. But it’s hard because, you know, we have disability related content and things, podcasts and articles but you know I’m in the class, and I’m, I like to talk in class, get your money’s worth, if you will. I often share my experience but I’m not in every oppression class so it’s hard.
I think of disability inclusion, it’s almost like a driver’s test. You learn these specific things, e.g. person-first language and stuff. But when you get behind the wheel or out in the open, if I’m continuing to attempt to work with this metaphor, you have to kind of go based on needs, and I just don’t think that there is enough exposure to the disabled community for people to learn what those needs are, learn how to interact, which is kind of vital I think for social workers.
Áine
I think there’s also quite a big difference between, you know you generously sharing your experiences in a class, and actually integrating disability perspectives in a way that shows that they’re being taken more seriously, such as funding guest lectures from disabled social workers, or just really including that throughout the education as well, and making sure it’s, yeah, thoroughly integrated.
Jessica
And it’s so interesting because I feel like, okay, whenever you’re multi marginalised, there is always a moment of, I guess almost like imposter syndrome, right. So, for me, when I get to speak at school, there was like a second of. Wow, are they picking me because I feel some sort of quota, I am a physically disabled—blind right–woman of colour, right? There’s a lot of checkmarks to be made there. So a lot of times I get things I get opportunities. And it’s like, wow. Do they really want me. There’s the other side of the coin to that, where I get opportunities, and I’m almost pushed into the spotlight, which I don’t mind.
And I think that’s another aspect of being multiply marginalised I’m going to talk about is like you’re almost the stakeholder, or this placeholder for a lot of a lot of things so I have been asked to speak on a lot of policies, I’ve been asked to speak on a lot of panels. So I think that the willingness to learn, is there, but it’s hard because I am very often the only person I’m the only totally blind student on my campus, the exposures there but I’m always the one having to do the education.
Áine
Yeah, I guess there’s always that question sort of hanging over your head as a multiply marginalised person like, Oh, are they filling a quota and even if they are filling a quota. Does it feel like it’s one that’s going to be meaningful enough that you actually want to sort of do that thing.
So just like leading on from that, I just wondered if you had anything you would sort of want to, in brief, you know the podcast-length version rather than the diversity and inclusion, train the trainer’s length version of what you would sort of share with other social workers about working with any of the communities that you are a part of,
Jessica
I think. So first a race perspective. It’s so funny because I’m brown but I also have to explain that to people so I think just being aware, just asking questions, but I think race, obviously, is a lot more understood than disability so like I personally don’t think that I would experience or a lot of people experience too much bias from just a race perspective, but I will say that this is my own perspective as someone who identifies with disability coming up significantly more than race so maybe that’s not the right answer but for me, race has always been more of a secondary than disability. Disability every disabled person–and I personally use disability-first language–is different. So, from my own perspective, I am very much a ask me questions, get to know me, person, so I love when people ask me things because I’m very much like the more information and education you have, the better. However, I also know that like it’s burdensome and I’ll also admit it, it’s sometimes really vexing to answer questions but I always do it, it’s for the greater good. And then it’s like, oh, we can look up articles and look at these things but again every disabled person is different, so here’s the thing with with disability. It is not one size fits all. So, my perspectives are only my own perspective. I do think that having some general knowledge about disability you may encounter as a social worker, but also just as a person is, is good, but then also going up to whoever the person is and going, “Hey, are you comfortable if I asked you a question?” And if the answer is no, even a follow up to say, “okay, how can I help you best?” Or “how can I get to know your disability best?” I’d like to say that, Oh, everyone does that but let’s be real hardly anyone does, so yeah I think that’s my little, my little tip, research, and then ask.
Áine
yeah, I love that, like asking in a way that figures out where people’s boundaries are around that and like works with the way that people want to disclose and share information rather than sort of forcing out of like a curiosity thing or something for people to come out at come at it from a really like medical lens or anything like that. Are there any contact details, you would like perhaps any social media or anything like that that you’d like to share with listeners.
Jessica
So I have a YouTube channel it is not as active as I’d like it to be. But there is an email address in the about section of that YouTube channel so if you have questions as a listener feel free to contact me through there, or if you just want to watch one of my videos, that works too.
Áine
is the YouTube channel your name, Jessica Karim?
Jessica
Yep, just my name J E S S I C A, K A R I M, and I’ll send you a link to it too.
Áine
Jessica, thank you so much.
Jessica
Thank you so much for having me. This was an absolute pleasure.
[Outro piano music: forthright melody accompanied by a habanera dance rhythm.]
Áine
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Disability Crosses Borders 
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