I recently attended a “Families in Transition” (FIT) workshop run by Frog Hollow Neighbourhood House (FHNH). This past week, a non-profit organization was invited to run a “financial literacy” workshop for the women in attendance.
FIT is a 36-week long pilot program for immigrant mothers that helps them integrate into “mainstream” Canadian society. Among other things, participants develop language skills, learn about parenting in Canada, receive Foodsafe training, and develop job-searching skills. The FIT program illustrates Lauer’s argument that voluntary organizations (such as neighbourhood houses) help immigrants extend their social networks, which can help them incorporate into the community at large.
“L”, the program director for FHNH explained to us that one of the barriers of bringing mothers from certain cultural backgrounds to FIT is that many are used to staying inside the home and tending to their children all day. L. said that separating the women from their children (who were being minded nearby) was challenging at first, but over the course of FIT, most had grown comfortable with being temporarily apart from their children.
At the beginning of the workshop, everyone went around in a circle introduced themselves. The mothers in the group had been living in Canada between four and ten years – an average about 6 – and all had young children under about five years of age. Two of the mothers were also pregnant. The workshop covered topics such as saving money (or “keeping money” as the facilitator framed it), financial norms in Canada, and the predatory nature of both credit and “discounts” at stores.
One woman commented on how surprised she was at the ease of obtaining credit in Canada. Another woman echoed this by sharing how she had 5 credit cards despite not being employed. Most shared their concerns about their ability to save for their children’s education, and about finding a healthy balance between not spoiling their children and not being “bad” mothers for not buying them toys or treats.
Although these are concerns of all parents – not just immigrant parents – this concern had an extra layer to it, as finding this balance was influenced by their experiences in negotiating their identities as new mothers learning cultural norms of urban Canadian society.
An aspect of the workshop that surprised me was the gendered nature of the content. The facilitator made several comments about women wanting to buy products such as purses, dresses, lotion, makeup, and about gender roles between men and women. The facilitator also frequently used the term “husband” to describe the partners of all of the women. I found this surprising, but I considered that my background in sociology has primed me to be more aware of how gender stereotypes present themselves.
Although the topic covered at last week’s FIT was not related to my final project (food and nutrition), I had fun listening and even sharing my own experiences and fears about money with the women in the group.
Sources:
1. Lauer and Yan 2007, “Neighbourhood Houses and Social Ties,” pp. 5-34. http://site.ebrary.com/lib/ubc/docDetail.action?docID=10216306
2. Image from http://www.creditcards.ca/credit-card-news/how-to-find-the-best-savings_accounts-1267.