Intersectional and embodied: migration as a social determinant of health

Contemporary migration is unprecedented in human history. Often underpinned by historical inequities and neoliberal globalization, a multiplicity of political, economic, environmental, social, and personal factors provides the impetus for out-migration. The ability to cross borders and to successfully settle in another country is decidedly unequal and is informed by the global gendered and racialized division of labour that situates individuals into specific social locations. This chapter examines how migration as a social determinant of health enables us to call in the dynamic, interpenetrating, and cumulative macro- to micro-level effects of socio-political context, gendered and racialized regimes, social hierarchies, the organization of work, and precarity to understand how these configure access to power and subsequently other health determinants. Importantly, by integrating intersectionality and a focus on the body, there is the opportunity to both nuance these effects and uncover their both visible and invisible health impacts.