The Middle of Everywhere: Helping Refugees Enter the American Community

At first I was apprehensive about reading this book. It was a required reading for a class. Once I started, I realized how wrong I was!!! This is a great book. It brought to light how hard it is for refugees in America. I was also intrigued by the fact that Lincoln, NE is a major refugee hub. I am a teacher, and I come into contact with Hmong students all of the time. This book remided me that they are not like us and everything I need to be aware of. I have recommeded this book to everyone!!! I could not put it down!!!

Mary Pipher's "The Middle of Everywhere" is a marvelously wise book that encompasses the tales of people of many lands who come to Lincoln, Nebraska, and her personal story as a "cultural broker" who appreciates and respects them. The world has come to my town, also. Pipher writes, "Most of my friends were of European background. As I've made friends with people of Mideastern, Latino, African, and Southeast Asia backgrounds, I've changed a great deal. I've stopped seeing myself as a member of a majority culture. Instead, I see myself as a member of a world culture that flourishes in my hometown." That has been my experience exactly. Especially interesting is her chapter on how American-style psychotherapy is not the method many of the refugee peoples use to heal from past traumas. She quotes a saying of her mother's: "There are three cures for all human pain and all involve salt--the salt of tears, the salt of sweat from hard work, and the salt of the great open seas." (She points out that, while once she interpreted the "seas" as an escape from family or memory, now she sees it as the beauty of the natural world.) Pipher believes that young people adjusting to the American lifestyle should carefully choose to incorporate the best of their cultural heritage with the best of what America offers. (The pervasive media advertising and marketing, and all types of sleaze, for example, should be rejected. Family and community, shared meals, fun, love and laughter, should be cherished.) She celebrates the energy and the optimism of these newest Americans. In a carefully reasoned discussion, she upholds the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights and firmly maintains we are not practicing cultural bias when we seek to implant these basic rights all over the world. Hats off to Mary Pipher, one of our own culture's wise women, a down-to-earth midwesterner who eats a lot of pie, and a world citizen whose heart is open to all. This book may stir you to become a cultural broker yourself, and you'll find your life enriched beyond measure. This book deserves the highest recommendation.

I have had experience with a nonprofit church-based organization helping to resettle refugees in North Carolina. I see several errors in your review of Ms. Pipher's book. You say she does not mention English as a Second Language classes--she does only here it is called English as a Taught Language. She says some landlords in Lincoln neglect their properties--this is not unique to Lincoln by any means. Refugees are expected to become financially self-sufficient within about four months and there are many places where their incomes will not stretch to pay for an apartment or home in a good neighborhood so they are likely to live, at least temporarily, in a downtrodden neighborhood. Ms. Pipher describes a variety of refugees--some have intelligence and skills to do well in a new setting; others struggle in low-income jobs due to health problems, depression, lack of skills, lack of language facility, etc. Even though the refugees arrive with an assigned sponsor, the sponsors themselves vary in their familiarity with help available, their own financial ability to aid a refugee family, their degree of continuing involvement in the life of the refugees. I know of one sponsor who seemed to expect to be paid for driving a refugee to the doctor or other services. I think the struggles of new refugees may be much more common than you would have us believe, whether in Lincoln or elsewhere.

I can authenticate the author's perceptions in two areas. Lincoln, Nebraska is my hometown also and her description of its strenghs and failings rings true. I have less experience working with refugees than Ms. Pipher, but I have observed some of the same obstacles, emotions, and challenges working with a single refugee family as she describes in working with a number of diverse refugees in Lincoln. If you imagine that you have problems in life, read about the experiences of some of the refugees in Middle of Everywhere--you will come away thanking God or fate that you are not in their shoes (now that they may actually have shoes). Hopefully, you will also be encouraged to do something for the refugees in your town or at least to be more helpful, cordial, and understanding in your encounters with refugees. Maybe you too will be angry that our Government makes refugees repay the expense of their airfares to the United States! I am angry. Despite the horrors recounted in this book (in a matter-of-fact style), the overall tone is upbeat and optimistic. For the more resilient refugees, America is still a land of dreams and Ms. Pipher has a psychologist's sense of what traits contribute to the resilience needed.

This carefully researched and beautifully written account of Pipher's experiences getting to know and understand the diverse refugee community in Lincoln, Nebraska is both heartbreaking and inspiring. The stories of poverty, loss and resilience she shares help to personalize the people and places most of us think of as not really pertaining to us. Because Pipher is not just an observer, but an active participant in the process of helping her town's refugees, her book and its practical suggestions carry much weight. I highly recommend it, particularly to anyone in reasonable health, living above the poverty level, who has a complaint of any kind about the quality of their life.