Dr. Dareen Basma is a clinician, educator, and researcher, one whose work is grounded in social advocacy, community engagement, and the dismantling of oppressive systems. She has a particular interest in understanding the experiences of immigrant clinicians, educators, and clients, as they grapple with numerous oppressive structures. Clinically, she has worked extensively with immigrant populations, included refugees, undocumented immigrants, and international students. 

A Humanitarian Catastrophe: Understanding the implications of war, imperialism, and capitalism on the mental health of refugees.

Plagued by decades of violent conflict and natural disasters, up to half a million Afghans could flee the country by the end of 2021, on top of the 2.2 million Afghan refugees already in neighboring countries and 3.5 million people forced to flee their homes within Afghanistan's borders - making them one of the largest refugee populations in the world. This has been the direct consequence of war, imperialism, and capitalism worldwide, and unfortunately, is not unique to Afghanistan. Today there are over 70.8 million people around the world who have been forcibly displaced from their homes, as reported by the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR). For the last 18 years, since the new era of war and occupation began, there has been no end to war, violence, and economic devastation imposed on people from Afghanistan to Iraq; Syria to Yemen; and Haiti to Libya by imperialist governments, with military interventions and sanctions that have destroyed infrastructure, housing, hospitals, schools, and completely torn apart the social fabric of many countries. With no end to the war in sight, people have been forced to flee, first their homes, then their countries, and then ultimately the region entirely, only to be faced with man-made borders, hostility, fear, and racism. This session focuses on understanding the vast systems that contribute to a humanitarian catastrophe with long-lasting implications on the mental health of individuals impacted. Specifically, this discussion will attend to the compounding effects of pre and post migration trauma occurring simultaneously to the cross-cultural transition.