Resettlement as rebirth : how effective are the midwives?

The refugee experience is, at heart, one of rebirth. Just as becoming a new, distinctive being"”biological birth"” necessarily involves the physical separation of mother and infant, so becoming a refugee entails separation from a "mother country." This mother country may or may not be a recognised nation state; the point is that the refugee transitions from physical connectedness to separation, from insider to outsider, from endemic to alien. Like babies, refugees may have little control over the timing and conditions of their expulsion. Successful resettlement requires not one rebirth but multiple rebirths"”resettlement is a lifelong process (Layton)"”which in turn require hope, imagination, and energy. In rebirthing themselves over and over again, people who have fled or been forced from their homelands become both mother and child.