Asian Canadians in the
Century
JASON VAZ
GRAHAM LEE
DAVE SMITH
th
20
South Asian Canadians
JASON VAZ
1900: The first recorded entry of South Asians (SA) into
Canada.
Upper middleclass farming families sent a capable
member to Canada to alleviate heavy monetary debts
owed to dishonest landowners in the state of Punjab.
At this time, British Columbian farmers were looking
for man-power to till acres of unused yet farmable soil,
and they advertised Canada as the land of opportunity.
In response, 5000 SA Sikh farmers arrived over a
period of 7 years. Since the dominion government
imposed a $500 charge on any Chinese that wished to
enter Canada, most BC farmers looked for SA and
Japanese help.
<- Indian immigrant workers in a British Columbian
lumber mill in 1905.
1907: The British Columbia race riots
The BC race riots were a reaction to the tension of (1)
escalating unemployment of indigenous farmers,
which would eventually lead to depression the
following year, and (2) increasing arrivals of the SA
“menace” to BC in search of work. The BritishCanadian Government, in reaction to these riots
imposed strictures unreasonable restrictions on SA
immigrants, which forced many of them to flee back to
India. The British Government tried to send the
remaining 1,100 SA immigrants to British-Honduras
from where most of them returned due to inhabitable
conditions. In British Columbia, the returning SAs
were allowed to stay but were not permitted to bring
their families from India to live with them.
Indians helped to build the Western Pacific Railroad
lines, completed in 1909
1919: The Government allows SA immigrants to bring their
families to Canada.
The Government allowed “legal SA residents” to bring
their wives and dependent children to Canada. The
illegal SA residents were those that entered the
country between 1908 and 1918 like the the SAs on
board Komagata Maru in 1914.
Left: A Sikh family in B.C., 1920.
Below: passengers on board the Komagata Maru,
1914
1947: Voting rights are awarded to SAs by the BC
government.
This was brought about by the combined lobbying
of local SAs and provincial officials. The
Government agreed because it could no longer
hold on to prejudicial restrictions and justify it
after the Second World War.
1967: Race, ethnicity and nationality disregarded by Canadian
Government in immigrant selection
Recognizing the economic benefits of immigrants and
the growing need to strengthen the Canada’s economy
and man-power, immigrants were now selected on
economic criteria and skill type/ level.
<- The multicultural staff working for the Toronto
and Region Conservation Society (TRCS).
Image sources
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/SSEAL/echoes/toc.html
http://www.google.ca/imgres?imgurl=http://www.frw.ca/alb
ums/TRCA/TRCA_and_FRW_staff_join_Councillor_Cho_at
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mgrefurl=http://www.frw.ca/rouge.php%3FID%3D124&usg=
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=31&hl=en&start=28&zoom=1&tbnid=YfTPCFoV70UarM:&t
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E4TbbDCsvPgAfix9CxCA&esq=2&page=2&ndsp=29&ved=1t:
429,r:1,s:28&biw=1639&bih=800
Chinese Canadians
GRAHAM LEE
September, 1907: Anti-Chinese Riot in Vancouver
In September of 1907, 8000 whites enter Vancouver’s
Chinatown, smash windows and doors, and hurl rocks.
They cause thousands of dollars of damage. Terrified
residents arm themselves with guns and clubs in
preparation for further attacks (which are prevented
on the next day by Vancouver police).
Vancouver Chinatown, the day after the riot. The
windows and doors of the shops have been
boarded up.
Source: Portraits of a Challenge, 119.
Although not the only incident of widespread white
rioting directed towards Chinese Canadians at the
time, it is indicative of the violent hostility they face in
Canadian cities that had been their homes, sometimes
for decades. It is also the largest example of this type of
violence. With a population of 3600, Vancouver’s
Chinatown is the largest in the country at the time.
(Chinatown, 42)
July 1, 1923: Chinese Immigration Act
Many Chinese Canadians know this act as the Chinese
Exclusion Act. It comes into law on “Dominion Day”
(Canada Day), which the Chinese community promptly
dubs “Humiliation Day” in protest. The act bans all
immigration from China for the next 24 years. It is
especially damaging for Chinese communities that are
comprised primarily of male labourers, who had come to
Canada to find work and to earn enough money to
eventually bring their families over to join them.
The act creates isolated communities, and even a gradual
decline in some Chinese Canadian populations. Men are
left without companionship or family. Some of the “ills”
that become associated with Chinatowns in later years,
such as gambling dens, are the direct result of this gender
imbalance and the lack of viable leisure alternatives for the
inhabitants.
Historical Cartoon depicting the differing
immigration policies of the time.
Source: Portraits of a Challenge, 126.
The act is an escalation of the previous Chinese
Immigration Act of 1885, which had already imposed a
head tax on all Chinese immigrants.
May 14, 1947: Chinese Immigration Act Repealed
Because Chinese-Canadians played an important role
in wartime fundraising, joined the armed forces, and
served as secret agents in the Pacific, hostilities
between them and white Canadians are lessened. On
top of this, the post-Nazi understanding of the dangers
of racial crimes, the recently ratified UN Charter, and
the Canadian Citizenship Act of 1946, help set a tone of
increased human rights and racial tolerance in the
country. The culmination of these changes is the
repealing of the Chinese Immigration Act of 1923.
The official repealing of the Immigration Act of
1923.
Source: Portraits of a Challenge, 160
Chinese-Canadians are given full citizenship rights in
1947, including the right to vote. Chinese immigration
remains limited, but the spouses and dependents of
Chinese-Canadians are allowed into the country. The
isolated, predominantly male Chinatowns are
transformed into more balanced and complete
communities.
1967: Immigration Reform
The thriving Vancouver Chinatown of the 1960s.
Source: Chinatown, 48.
The Canadian immigration system is reformed. The
race and “place of origin” section of the immigration
policy are removed and the point system is adopted.
With these changes, independent Chinese immigration
begins, and the family reunification policy continues.
The Chinese Canadian population more than doubles
in the next decade, and the type of immigrant also
changes. (Struggle and Hope, 51) Now wealthier,
educated immigrants and skilled workers are also
entering the country. Chinatowns, which had been
impoverished and decaying until this point, are
revitalized by a fresh influx of capital. Also, many
Chinese Canadians move beyond Chinatowns and take
up residence in traditionally white neighbourhoods.
September 1979: “Campus Giveaway” on CTV
With high levels of Chinese immigration continuing,
tensions rise again. Since 1975 more than 60000 Chinese
refugees have fled Vietnam and Cambodia and settled in
Canada. (Struggle and Hope, 62) This is in addition to the
other immigrants already entering the country.
Chinese Canadian protestors reacting to the “Campus
Giveaway” show on CTV
Source: Chinese Canadian National Council. Chinese
Canadian Historical Photos Exhibit
http://www.ccnc.ca/toronto/history/pgallery.html
In the fall of 1979, the CTV program W-5 runs a report
entitled “Campus Giveaway” that alleges that foreign
students are taking places from Canadian students at
universities. It uses footage of Canadian born, ethnically
Chinese students in a pharmacy class, and implies that they
are foreign students. Subsequent investigations prove that
there were no foreign students in the class, and that many
of the numbers in the report were wildly inaccurate. The
report is seen by many Chinese-Canadians as symptomatic
of the media’s hostility, and its inflammatory use of “Asian
Invasion” rhetoric. They also resent the fact that even when
born in the country they are represented as “foreign.”
Widespread protests eventually force an unconditional
apology and retraction from CTV. Protestors in Toronto
also form the Chinese Canadian National Council (CCNC)
to combat such issues in the future.
Works Cited
Images
Chinese Canadian National Council. Chinese Canadian Historical Photo Exhibit.
http://www.ccnc.ca/toronto/history/pgallery.html
Lee, Wai-man. Portraits of a Challenge: An Illustrated History of the Chinese Canadians. Toronto:
Council of Chinese Canadians in Ontario, 1984.
Text
Yee, Paul. Chinatown: An Illustrated History of the Chinese Communities of Victoria, Vancouver,
Calgary, Winnipeg, Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal and Halifax. Toronto: James Lorimer & Company
Ltd., 2005.
Yee, Paul. Struggle and Hope: The Story of Chinese Canadians. Toronto: Umbrella Press, 1996.
Japanese Canadians
DAVID SMITH
1908: Hayashi-Lemieux “Gentleman’s Agreement”
Following the 1907 Vancouver riot against Asian residents, in
response to growing anti-Asian sentiment in B.C., Minister of
Labour Rodolphe Lemieux meets with Japanese Foreign
Minister Tadasu Hayashi to limit the number of Japanese
labourers and domestic servants arriving in Canada. Though
Japanese citizens are allowed to travel and settle in any part of
the British Dominion (and are guaranteed protection of their
private property), the two ministers agree that something must
be done in response to the riot. Thus, a quota of 400 is set on
the number of Japanese allowed to emigrate from Japan to
Canada. Although no treaty is ever signed, a significant drop in
immigration from Japan occurs from the nearly 8000 Japanese
who enter Canada in 1908 to just under 500 the following year.
Japanese immigrants on the pier in Vancouver,
1908.
Source: “n1908.” 2007. Virtual Museum of
Canada. Web. 20 January 2011.
One notable exemption to this quota is wives of those already
living in Canada, giving rise to the phenomenon of “picture
brides” – Japanese women who come to Canada after being wed
to Canadian-Japanese men by proxy in Japan.
In 1924 the agreement is amended to limit the quota to 150.
December 7, 1941: Pearl Harbor and Hong Kong Attacked
In response to the Japanese attacks on American and British
naval bases in the Pacific, Canada declares war on Japan and
institutes the War Measures Act. Japanese-Canadians’ boats are
impounded and Japanese-Canadian schools are closed.
Japanese nationals, along with Germans and Italians, are
required to register with the Registrar of Enemy Aliens. Unlike
Germans and Italians, Canadian citizens of Japanese origin are
required to register as well.
Winter in the Tashme, B.C. internment camp.
Source: “3_4.” 2008. Sedai: The Japanese
Canadian Legacy Project. Web. 20 January 2011.
A “zone of defense” is established. All Japanese and Japanese
Canadians (approx. 22,000 total) are required to exit the zone
and move eastward. Seventy-five percent of those moved are
Canadian citizens. Many are moved to B.C. ghost towns and
internment camps, while others work on farms and in industries
across the country. Objectors are interned in Ontario POW
camps.
Many of those interned lose their property, which has been
confiscated and sold below value by the government to pay for
the cost of maintaining the camps.
September 2, 1945: Japan Surrenders
The mushroom cloud from the five-tonne “Little Boy”
atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima.
Source: “_41358423_cloud_hirosh203.” 1 November
2007. BBC News. Web. 20 January 2011.
As the war officially comes to a close following the
August bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the
Japanese internment camps are closed. Despite Prime
Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King’s admission
that there was no evidence of wartime JapaneseCanadian sabotage or disloyalty, the interned Japanese
Canadians are not allowed to return to British
Columbia. Influenced by the intense racism and
animosity of the B.C. provincial government toward
the relocated Japanese Canadians, the federal
government insists that the “loyal” Japanese citizens
be distinguished from the “disloyal” and that the latter
be repatriated to Japan. The Japanese were faced with
an ultimatum: move east or leave. Eventually, about
4,000 chose deportation, roughly half of whom were
native to Canada and had never before set foot in what
was now a war-torn and impoverished Japan.
March 31, 1949: Full franchise granted to Japanese Canadians
Japanese Canadian citizen exercising her right to vote
for the first time.
Source: “b05_large.” 2003. 5 Generations. Web. 20
January 2011.
It is not until March 31, 1949 that the last of the
restrictions imposed on Japanese Canadians by the
War Measures Act is finally removed. The B.C.
provincial legislature grants them the right to vote at
the provincial level – the federal franchise having been
granted the previous year. They are now free to obtain
jobs in the public domain, serve on juries, hold public
office, and study and practise law. Japanese Canadians
are now permitted to move and settle freely
throughout the country, including resettlement in B.C.
Few, however, choose to return, having already begun
new lives in Central and Eastern Canada and having
been stripped of their homes and property by the
Custodian of Enemy Property during the war.
September 22, 1988: Redress Agreement Signed
After several years of lobbying by the National
Association of Japanese Canadians and a similar bill
passing in the US, Ottawa agrees to redress the wrongs
done to Japanese Canadians under the Wartime
Measures Act. The federal government acknowledges
its wrongdoing and agrees to compensate those
affected with $21,000 each, as well as $12 million to
the Japanese Canadian community for educational and
social programs, and $24 million to establish a joint
Canadian Race Relations Foundation to combat
racism. In addition, the War Measures Act is amended
to prevent similar occurrences in the future, all
criminal records relating to War Measures offences are
cleared, and citizenship is restored to Japanese exiles.
NAJC President Art Miki shaking hands with Prime
Minister Brian Mulroney at the signing of the Redress
Agreement.
Source: “muloney.” 2008. NAJC. Web. 20 January
2011.