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Rather than focusing on recovery narratives, the memoirs highlight ongoing advocacy issues for undocumented migrants navigating European asylum processes and U.S. citizenship barriers. 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[https://doi.org/10.1007/s10912-024-09874-w](https://doi.org/10.1007/s10912-024-09874-w)  \nORIGINAL SCHOLARLY ARTICLE  \nMigration and Mental Health in Two Contemporary Memoirs  \nLena Englund1  \nAccepted: 26 June 2024 / Published online: 22 July 2024 © The Author(s) 2024  \nAbstract  \nThis article examines two autobiographical texts that address the relationship between migration and struggles with mental health: Karla Cornejo Villavicencio’s The Undocumented Americans (2021) and Dina Nayeri’s The Ungrateful Refugee: What Immigrants Never Tell You (2020) . Both memoirs help bring mental health issues to light in situations of precarity, and the texts indicate that it is not just the experience of physical dislocation that may cause or exacerbate struggles with mental health, but the disconnect from other people, from citizenship, and the nation itself. Nayeri and Cornejo Villavicencio do not focus on narratives of recovery or healing but provide space for the experiences of other undocumented migrants trying to navigate the European asylum system or difficulties in obtaining American citizenship. The article argues that the two authors use their experiences of migration and mental illness for greater advocacy purposes with regard to human rights. The struggles with mental health present in the two memoirs intertwine with the treatment of undocumented migrants as described by the two authors, going beyond the personal experience of mental health, or illness, connecting it with migration practices and policies in the United States and Europe.  \nKeywords Mental health · Mental illness · Memoir · Migration · Refugee · Undocumented · Advocacy  \nCurrent events such as the migrant crisis in Europe in 2015–2016, Australia’s Nauru project, and the Trump administration 2017–2021 (which may be on a repeat trajectory in elections 2024) have made migration a central issue in public debate, bringing to light the mental struggles of people caught up between barriers, in camps, in detention, as undocumented, or trying to come to terms with past experiences of being in flight. The personal narratives emerging engage with current migration policies and practices and shed light on the connection between the precarious migrant experience and mental health. This article engages with two such accounts: Karla Cornejo Villavicencio’s The Undocumented Americans (2021), and Dina Nayeri’s The Ungrateful Refugee: What Immigrants Never Tell You (2020) . Nayeri recounts leaving Iran in 1988, eventually securing asylum in the United  \n* Lena Englund [lena.englund@uef.fi](lena.englund@uef.fi)  \n1 School of Humanities, University of Eastern Finland, Joensuu Campus, Yliopistonkatu 2,  \n80100 Joensuu, Finland  \nStates and getting recognized as a refugee. Cornejo Villavicencio’s memoir centers on having arrived undocumented from Ecuador to the United States and later receiving DACA status, which concerns minors whose deportation is deferred but whose citizenship status is not guaranteed. The two memoirs refute the more traditional model of mental illness memoir which often depicts symptoms, diagnosis, treatment, and potentially some form of recovery. Both authors also question the connection between their migration experiencesand mental illness diagnoses. The article argues that both authors use their experiences of migration and mental illness for greater advocacy purposes. Issues related to mental health in the memoirs intertwine with the treatment of undocumented migrants as described by the two authors, going beyond personal experience and becoming related to practices and policies in the United States and Europe.  \nStruggles with mental health become part of the personal narrative and the migration experience in subtle ways, many of which are culturally specific. Donohue-Smith (2011: 142) observes the importance of acknowledging cultural contexts in illness memoirs. Cornejo Villavicencio writes from an American ","cbCaip9eEYkJ7RcK","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCaip9eEYkJ7RcK","pdf",699829,14,"English","# Abstract\n# Migration and Public Debate\n# Memoir Accounts and Backgrounds\n## Iran and Asylum to Citizenship\n## Undocumented Migration and DACA\n# Challenging Traditional Mental Illness Memoir Models\n# Cultural Contexts and International Audience","[{\"question\":\"Which two contemporary memoirs are analyzed in the article?\",\"answer\":\"The article analyzes Karla Cornejo Villavicencio’s The Undocumented Americans (2021) and Dina Nayeri’s The Ungrateful Refugee: What Immigrants Never Tell You (2020).\"},{\"question\":\"How does the article describe the connection between migration and mental health?\",\"answer\":\"It argues that mental health struggles stem from more than physical dislocation, involving disconnection from other people, citizenship, and the nation itself.\"},{\"question\":\"What is the article’s main claim about advocacy and human rights?\",\"answer\":\"It contends that the authors use experiences of migration and mental illness to support advocacy related to human rights, linking personal suffering to migration practices and policies in the U.S. and Europe.\"}]","Migration and Mental Health in Two Contemporary Memoirs | PDF",1790755528,35]