Ripping the Cultural Band-Aid by Decolonizing “Culture” in Mental Health Practice: A Tamil Women’s Mental Health Study

Abstract

Currently, there is an established need in mental health research literature to explore racialized mental health outcomes. More specifically in the case of Ontario, there is a need to examine South Asian mental health outcomes due to South Asians being the densest racialized population with significant mental health concerns, yet they draw on available services at a disproportionately low rate. This study explores Tamil centric gendered and intersectional mental health outcomes in Tamil women living in Ontario and brings to light the complexity and diversity within South Asian diasporic populations that tend to be homogenized and hidden within existing literature concerning South Asian mental health research. The study collected and examined experiences of Eelam/Sri Lankan Tamil women’s identity, their engagement and experiences with liberation culture, intergenerational trauma, and social and structural barriers to accessing mental health services in Ontario. By conducting 23 interviews with 11 Tamil Canadian born female participants and 12 Tamil female migrant participants using narrative qualitative methodology, participant narratives were coded, and thematic analysis was conducted in NVivo. This research found that study participants stress the distinctive nature of their Eelam/Sri Lankan identity relative to South Asian and Pan Tamil identities. They expressed significant experiences of unresolved intergenerational trauma and significant engagement with liberation culture, both of which are factors that are not established in the mental health literature surrounding South Asians in the Ontario region This study yielded significant potential implications to reconceptualize liberation culture as a therapeutic resource that is already established and engaged within the Tamil community, in addition to calling for a greater emphasis on Eelam Tamil centric research.