Interaction boarders on Racism

A CBC news story, published a little over half a year ago, highlights the types of conflicts that occur within the suburban communities between immigrant and long term resident populations.

As communities mix disputes over the built form arise. Each culture expresses their lifestyle preference in their home and as the status quo starts to shift disputes and allegations of racism start to arise.

In this story residents of St. Helen's Part, Surrey, protest the introduction of large new homes in to the traditional ranch home community. Consequently a bylaw was put in place limiting home size in the area. In opposition to this bylaw Indo-Canadian residents have complained that the new bylaw has clear racial overtones. They feel that large homes are an expression of their social organization, in which multiple generations live under one roof, and that the underlying purpose behind this legislation is to prevent Indo-Canadians from moving into the area.

Here is a story of immigrants moving outside a traditional ethnic community and moving into a more established community with long term residents. Naturally the situation will give opportunity for conflict. But I wonder why there is so much more conflict than compromise. It seems to me that each side, the established community, with the support of the politians behind them, and the immigrants wielding the labels of racism, discrimination and multiculturalism, sling arrows at the other, with little interest dialogue and communication.

Maybe I'm just an optimist. But I don't see why there can't be integration without so much conflict.

I wonder how common place these sites of interaction and conflict are and how much the media's preference for drama and conflict taints my perception.

Universal Ethnoburbs

Moving outside of North American immigration its funny how immigrant settlement patterns are pretty much the same around the globe. Ethnic communities are pretty universal.

I find the British expatriote communities in Spain pretty amusing. I found different website showing how Brits buy holiday homes around the Spanish coast hoping to escape the rain and discover the real Spain, but what happens all too often is that they end up buying in completely British communities like Costa del Sol and Costa Blanca surrounded by British expats, English supermarkets and Robin Hood pubs. There are estimates that over 500, 000 Brits own homes in Spain. They say that parts of the coast are so crammed with Brits that apart from the weather you could easily forget you were in a foreign country.

Despite their efforts to have some authentic cultural experience the urge to be near a common language, familiar food and playmates for the children drive them together creating mi nature Britains not unlike the ethnoburbs surrounding many Canadian cities.

Site on British expatriates in Spain:

http://www.britishexpat.com/Moving_to_Spain__Buying_Proper.151.0.html

http://www.aboutproperty.co.uk/news/overseas-property/property-in-spain/hsbc-makes-buying-property-in-spain-easier-$475278.htm

http://www.worldofproperty.co.uk/search_form-629.htm

http://www.spanishpropertyinsight.com/costa_azahar_property_guide.htm

Segregation = Multiculturalism?

In his 2001 paper, Immigration and Housing in Gateway Cities: The Cases of Sydney and Vancouver, David Ley, along with Peter Murphy, Kris Olds, and Bill Randolph, puts forward the idea that ethnic segregation is a natural and inevitable process. He argues that through geographic isolation ethnic communities are able flourish and create strong cultural identities. According to Ley, it is only through this process of ethnic segregation that a truly multicultural society will be formed. For him isolation allows for a society of difference not assimilation.

As valid as this idea sounds I find it disturbing. To me it says: we can all live happily in isolation, why bother trying to resolve differences? By living in isolated communities we will have no differences to resolve. I find this approach lazy. It assumes that we needn't work towards cultural integration because things are best the way they are. The label multiculturalism is used giving the whole isolation idea credibility. Ley's argument is simply an easy, guilt-free solution.
Surely there must be a middle ground between isolation and assimilation.

Zones of Non-interaction

As I travel down 120 St (Scott Rd), in Surrey, I am fascinated by the width of the street and a distinctly foreign atmosphere. The sides of the road are lined with store fronts with Punjabi characters advertising clothing, sweet shops, passport photo agencies, and banks.
I venture into one of the shops with curiosity and peruse the skirts, lengas, shawls and jewelry. I look over at the shop attendant and register a stare of curiosity and almost disapproval. For the first time I feel awkward and aware that I don't belong. I wonder, is this hostility I am experiencing? I may have detailed knowledge of culture, language, food and clothing having lived and been educated in India for years of my childhood, none the less here in Canada my Anglo-Canadian skin betrays me. I am not Punjabi and I feel I do not belong.

Of course Canadian cities offer ethnic mixing and integration. My best friends are Latino and my brother's are Iranian. But once we move to the city edge, experiences like mine along Scott Road become all too common. Abbotsford, Richmond, Surrey, Coquitlam (just to mention the suburbs of the Lower Mainland) become the zones of ethnic isolation. It is no wonder that my appearance in a Surrey Punjabi shop is met with stares and curiosity. With such a large Punjabi community in Surrey what is the necessity for inter-cultural interaction and mixing?

Evidently Canada is a society of many ethnicities and cultures. There are all the cultures of all immigrant groups that come, which are so pleasantly preserved within the suburban setting.
But what culture is being created for Canada? A culture of isolation, spectacle and fear?