No abstract

This study explores the effects of conflict on the identities of Sudanese refugees back in Sudan and then in Cairo, namely the experience of ambiguous, ambivalent, and conflicting identities. The conflict in Sudan caused multiple ruptures to the refugees' previously established identities. In Egypt, they come into contact and conflict with the host community, organizations, and fellow Sudanese from different regions or ethnic backgrounds, which creates tensions in religious, tribal, or ethnic identities. Such identity issues were manifested in extreme form during the tragic 2005 Sudanese refugee sit-in. The conclusion sheds light on implications for conflict resolution.

The flexibility and shifting nature of ethnic identities that we witness in everyday life does not necessarily mean that identity is eternally fluid and contextual. Ethnic identity is better characterized by pragmatic flexibility that obscures an underlying self-identification that may or may not be consistent with this surface multiplicity. Studies such as Malhi, Boon, and Rogers' (2009) compel us to acknowledge that the shifting and hybridity we could witness interpersonally is not necessarily synonymous with what the individual may feel intrapersonally. Instead, there appears to be a deeper level of identification that cannot always be freely manifested due to various internal and external constraints. What mediates the process of internalization of ethnic identities and their altered externalization in the interpersonal world is feeling.

Kunz (1973) argued that refugees are a distinct social type, whereas Coker (2004) referred to Victor Turner’s (1967) influential work on liminality to highlight the inherent ‘transitional’ nature of a refugee’s identity. It is an identity that is essentially liminal – a state characterized by ambiguity, openness, and indeterminacy. Refugees are faced with the loss of patterns that sustained previously established identities and new factors that require effective adaptation and identity transformations. The interplay between these factors results in tremendous identity struggles. Not surprisingly, identity confusion is one of the most common stressors facing refugees (Baker, 1983; Stein, 1986).