Embracing Diversity: LMLIP's Commitment to Intersectionality and Collaboration

At the London & Middlesex Local Immigration Partnership, our goal is to help immigrants settle and thrive in our community. While our focus is therefore on immigrants and newcomers, we recognize that "immigrant" is only part of any individual's identity. Immigrants living in our community are made up of a vast number of characteristics including but not limited to: religion, race, ethnicity, culture, ability, sexual orientation and gender expression.

The month of June commemorates several important topics. These include National Indigenous History Month, Filipino Heritage Month, LGBTQ2S+ Pride Month and Deafblind Awareness Month. Working on communications materials to promote and celebrate these months of importance, allowed us to reflect on the ongoing importance of collaboration and intersectionality.

There is so much fantastic work being done that all share common goals of fostering inclusivity, promoting equality and furthering social justice. It remains important that organizations working on social issue areas do not exist in silos. We must pool our resources, our networks and our passion to not only amplify one another's work, but to truly work together.

As we seek to ensure that immigrants and newcomers thrive in our community, we want to ensure that we are well educated on all the aspects of their lives that they may need support in - not just those directly related to resettlement. Similarly, we are here to help businesses and organizations better understand how they can support immigrants that may belong to the groups they serve. As such, we are always open to new opportunities to connect and exchange ideas.

Intersectionality is the only lens through which we can work and truly progress.