LGBT migrants and refugees’ search for home: An intersectional struggle

Abstract

Migration is, in many ways, a search for home. Independently from its cause, migration is a process that has to do as much with ‘uprooting’ one’s home as with ‘regrounding’ it. However, migration is not experienced in the same way by everyone: LGBT migrants face increased risks related to their sexual orientation and gender identity. Particularly, I maintain that, in their host countries, LGBT migrants and refugees are exposed to the phenomenon of ‘homelessness’: ostracised from ethnic and migrant communities because of their queer identity, and isolated from the local LGBT communities because of their migrant/refugee status. However, I display how LGBT migrants can combat this process by finding home and sense of belonging within collective frameworks, such as in the spaces provided by NGOs. In this article, I therefore highlight the intersectional struggle of LGBT migrants in their search for home, focusing on the de/construction of ‘home/lessness’.