Immigrant Abuse

“Legal barriers, fear of deportation, possible discrimination in the country of origin, lack of knowledge of American laws, language barrier, poverty and social stigmatization preclude immigrant and other foreign-born women from living abuse free. Almost 100% of these women do not report the first incident of physical domestic violence” (Newsletter of the Violence Against Women Office, Statistics, (2000).

For many of foreign-born women who live in the United States domestic violence is a devastating problem. It is crucial that professionals working with immigrant women be equipped to identify battered women who come into their offices for assistance. These women face unique legal, social and economic barriers. They may suffer higher rates of battering than US citizens because they come from cultures, which accept domestic violence or because they have less access to legal and social services than the US citizens.

Many domestic violence programs employ a Western view of empowerment that calls for a dynamic that is difficult for immigrant and refugee women to understand and use. While it is essential that shelters and programs that work with these women be extremely respectful of their process and their decisions, it is necessary to be more direct with immigrants and refugees than with women from mainstream cultures. Whether we think about it or not, culture provides the context within which an individual lives on daily basis. Therefore, battered immigrant women need to be approached and served differently.

JFSA's Family Violence Services is the only program in the area which addresses the unique needs of battered immigrant women. We provide specialized outreach to immigrants because they are such vulnerable populations. Our extensive experience serving Russian-speaking immigrant victims of domestic violence since 1997 helped lay the foundation for our recent expansion with services to help all foreign- born victims of domestic violence.