How to make sense of cultural difference in mental health care: analyzing biographies of diasporic Muslim women with mental health problems

The existing international research evidence shows that second- and third-generation migrant women often have a family history of labor migration and experience mental health problems due to the multi-dimensional problems and precarious life situations in which they are enmeshed. Our qualitative study builds on the suggestion of diverse authors to investigate cultural aspects and dynamics that affect the help-seeking process. Since different research approaches and foci have been used to cast light on this issue, we argue that research risks to rely on an essentialist and pejorative notion of culture. In this study, we adopt an affirmative and productive notion of cultural difference that allows us to uncover the biographies of diasporic Muslim women with mental health problems to capture their strategies of meaning making and agency as rooted in their specific historical, social, political, and cultural contexts.