Editorial Board / Comité de rédaction Advisory Board / Comité

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Editorial Board / Comité de rédaction
Editor-in-Chief
Rédacteur en chef
Claude Couture, University of Alberta, Canada
Associate Editors
Rédacteurs adjoints
Teresa Gutiérrez-Haces, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
Milena Santoro, Georgetown University, United States
Daiva Stasiulis, Carleton University, Canada
Managing Editor
Secrétaire de rédaction
Guy Leclair, ICCS/CIEC, Ottawa, Canada
Advisory Board / Comité consultatif
Malcolm Alexander, Griffith University, Australia
Rubén Alvaréz, Universidad Central de Venezuela, Venezuela
Shuli Barzilai, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israël
Raymond B. Blake, University of Regina, Canada
Nancy Burke, University of Warsaw, Poland
Francisco Colom, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Spain
Beatriz Diaz, Universidad de La Habana, Cuba
Giovanni Dotoli, Université de Bari, Italie
Eurídice Figueiredo, Universidade Federal Fluminense, Brésil
Madeleine Frédéric, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgique
Naoharu Fujita, Meiji University, Japan
Gudrun Björk Gudsteinsdottir, University of Iceland, Iceland
Leen d’Haenens, University of Nijmegen, Les Pays-Bas
Vadim Koleneko, Russian Academy of Sciences, Russia
Jacques Leclaire, Université de Rouen, France
Laura López Morales, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Mexico
Jane Moss, Romance Languages, Colby College, U.S.
Elke Nowak, Technische Universität Berlin, Germany
Helen O’Neill, University College Dublin, Ireland
Christopher Rolfe, The University of Leicester, U.K.
Myungsoon Shin, Yonsei University, Korea
Jiaheng Song, Université de Shantong, Chine
Coomi Vevaina, University of Bombay, India
Robert K. Whelan, University of New Orleans, U.S.A.
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ISSN 1180-3991
ISSN 1180-3991
ISBN 1-896450-33-4
ISBN 1-896450-33-4
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All rights reserved / Toute reproduction interdite.
International Journal of Canadian Studies
Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
Canada and Asia
Le Canada et l’Asie
31, 2005
Table of Contents / Table des matières
Claude Couture & Daiva Stasiulis
Introduction / Présentation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Vijay Agnew
Finding India in the Diaspora . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Subha Xavier
Exiled Metaphors: Woman and Nation in Three
Novels by Ying Chen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Katie Cholette
The Limits on Cultural Expression at Canada’s National
Cultural Institutions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Heather A. Smith
Concentrated Immigrant Settlement and Concentrated Neighbourhood
Disadvantage in Three Canadian Cities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 81
Janusz Przychodzen et Vijaya Rao
Écrire l’Inde au Québec : Mythes et réalités de l’Ailleurs. Suivi de la
Table ronde : Écrire l’Inde au Québec . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
Research Note / Note de recherche
Serge Granger
La recherche historique sur les relations entre l’Asie et le Canada
d’avant 1850 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167
International Journal of Canadian Studies / Revue internationale d’études canadiennes
31, 2005
Open-Topic Articles / Articles hors-thème
Daniel Chartier
« Au-delà, il n’y a plus rien, plus rien que l’immensité désolée. »
Problématiques de l’histoire de la représentation des Inuits, des récits des
premiers explorateurs aux œuvres cinématographiques . . . . . . . . . . . 177
Daniel McNeil
Finding a Home while Crossing Boundaries: Black Identities in Halifax and
Liverpool . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 197
David Palmieri
Stuffing the Scarecrow: The Anti-Americanism of George Grant and Pierre
Vadeboncœur. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237
Review Essay / Essai critique
Leslie Alm and Ross Burkhart
Canada and the United States: Approaches to Global Environmental
Policy-making . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 261
Authors / Auteurs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 281
Canadian Studies Journals Around the World
Revues d’études canadiennes dans le monde . . . . . . . . . . . 283
Calls for papers / Demandes de textes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 287
4
Introduction
Présentation
The massive tsunamis triggered by
the earthquake that hit Southeast
and South Asia on December 26,
2004, provided Canadians with
horrifying images of physical
destruction and a deep and lasting
loss for individuals, families,
communities and entire countries.
An outpouring of compassion
swept Canada, as in many other
countries, and “Asian tsunami
relief” entered our lexicon not only
through the donations pouring in
from tens of thousands of
individuals, but also through the
fund-raising activism among
school children, community
groups, and businesses. These
actions of ordinary Canadians
provoked a lagging federal
government to step up its initially
meager response to the crisis in
South and South East Asia. As
suggested by those who run NGOs
responding to “man-made,” “silent
tsunamis” in Africa, the massive
support for the Asian natural
disaster raises questions as to why
the devastation in this part of the
world has provoked such
unprecedented Canadian public
concern.
Lors du gigantesque tsunami produit
par le tremblement de terre qui a
frappé l’Asie du Sud-Est et l’Asie du
Sud le 26 décembre 2004, les
Canadiens ont vu des images
effrayantes de la destruction
matérielle et des pertes considérables
et durables subies par des particuliers,
des familles, des collectivités et des
pays entiers. Un élan de compassion a
lancé le Canada et de nombreux
autres pays, et le secours aux victimes
du tsunami en Asie s’est traduit non
seulement par les dons de dizaines de
milliers de personnes, mais aussi par
des campagnes de collecte de fonds
organisées par des écoles, des groupes
communautaires et des entreprises.
Ces actions de Canadiens ordinaires
ont incité le gouvernement fédéral,
qui tardait à réagir, à intensifier ses
efforts pour aider les pays de l’Asie
du Sud-Est et de l’Asie du Sud à faire
face à la crise. Comme l’ont indiqué
les dirigeants des ONG qui luttent
contre les « tsunamis » attribuables à
l’homme ou les « tsunamis
silencieux » en Afrique, l’aide
massive accordée aux victimes de
cette catastrophe naturelle en Asie
amène à se demander pourquoi la
dévastation de cette partie de la
planète a provoqué une réaction d’une
ampleur sans précédent chez les
Canadiens.
The historical and contemporary
ties between Canada and Asia are
complex and manifold. Migration
to Canada from Asia has occurred
within a historical context where
Canada defined itself as a white
settler colony, and where Asians
were subjected to severe racially
discriminatory restrictions. In
contrast, the top four source
countries of immigration to Canada
in 2003 and 2004 were China,
India, the Philippines, and
Les liens historiques et contemporains
entre le Canada et l’Asie sont
complexes et multiples. La migration
d’Asiatiques au Canada s’est produite
dans un contexte historique où le
Canada s’est défini comme une
colonie de pionniers blancs et où les
Asiatiques ont fait l’objet
d’importantes restrictions
discriminatoires fondées sur la race.
31, 2005
Pakistan, and current immigration
policy aggressively recruits wealthy
Asian immigrants, yet continues to
impose restrictions on poorer Asian
migrants. The Canadian government
has vigorously promoted foreign
direct investment ties in and from
Asia, with mixed results (e.g. poor
performance of Canadian firms in
China), while defining its security
interests in terms of stemming Asian
“terrorist” threats that undermine
global security, in ways that
nonetheless show some sensitivity to
politicized Asian-Canadian
communities. Asian-Canadians have
changed Canadian, and especially
urban literary, cultural, architectural,
and artistic landscapes. For example,
while Canadian literature has long
absorbed South and Southeast
Asian-Canadian writers such as
Michael Ondaatje and Joy Kogawa,
more recently writers, such as
Wayson Choy, Rohinton Mistry and
M.G. Vassanji or Sui Sin Far in
Québec, reflect the interest of
Canadian readers in Asian-Canadian
writers and novels set in diverse
Asian countries, and the Asian
immigrant experience in Canada.
Par contre, les quatre principaux pays
d’origine des immigrants au Canada
en 2003 et 2004 étaient la Chine,
l’Inde, les Philippines et le Pakistan.
La politique d’immigration actuelle
vise à recruter des immigrants
asiatiques fortunés et elle continue
d’imposer des restrictions aux
immigrants asiatiques pauvres. Le
gouvernement canadien a fait
vigoureusement la promotion des
investissements étrangers directs en
Asie et en provenance d’Asie, avec
des résultats inégaux (p. ex. les
entreprises canadiennes ont enregistré
une piètre performance en Chine) tout
en définissant ses intérêts en matière
de sécurité, c.-à-d. juguler les
menaces « terroristes » asiatiques qui
minent la sécurité mondiale, de
manière à montrer néanmoins une
certaine sensibilité aux collectivités
asiatiques-canadiennes politisées. Les
Canadiens asiatiques ont transformé
le Canada, en particulier sur le plan de
la littérature, de la culture, de
l’architecture et des arts en milieu
urbain. Par exemple, alors que la
littérature canadienne a absorbé
depuis longtemps les écrivains
canadiens originaires de l’Asie du
Sud-Est et l’Asie du Sud comme
In this issue, the contributions reflect Michael Ondaatje et Joy Kogawa, les
the richness and diversity of the
écrivains plus récents comme Wayson
relationship between Canada and
Choy, Rohinton Mistry et M.G.
Asia. For example, Vijay Agnew
Vassanji ou Sui Sin Far au Québec,
writes a deeply personal account of
traduisent l’intérêt des lecteurs
the fierce hold that India exercises
canadiens à l’égard des écrivains
on her, as an immigrant who
canadiens asiatiques et de leurs
migrated to Canada 30 years ago.
romans qui se déroulent dans divers
Informed by postcolonial and
pays d’Asie et de l’expérience des
feminist perspectives on diasporic
immigrants asiatiques au Canada.
narratives, Agnew explores the
significance of plural imagined
Dans le présent numéro, les textes
Indias that provide deep chasms of
reflètent la richesse et la diversité des
misunderstanding but also bridges of relations entre le Canada et l’Asie.
interest and delight, among Indian
Par exemple, Vijay Agnew présente
immigrants, their second generation une description très personnelle de
6
Introduction
Présentation
children, and non-Indian Canadians.
Particularly notable have been the
role of reductive and negative
neo-colonial media depictions —
that regard India only in terms of
poverty, arranged marriages and
dowry deaths — in marginalizing
and alienating Indian immigrants.
Agnew draws upon a storehouse of
personal and cultural memories of
India to illuminate the empowering
effect such memories, and their
reproduction in Indian diasporic
writing, can have in providing
emotional sustenance and in
constructing diasporic citizens.
l’emprise considérable que l’Inde
exerce sur elle à titre d’immigrante
qui s’est installée au Canada il y a 30
ans. À partir de points de vue
postcoloniaux et féministes sur des
récits de la diaspora, elle examine
l’importance dans son imaginaire des
multiples portraits de l’Inde qui
creusent un immense abîme
d’incompréhension, mais qui suscitent
aussi de l’intérêt et de la joie chez les
immigrants indiens, leurs enfants de
la deuxième génération et les
Canadiens non indiens. Elle fait
ressortir en particulier le rôle des
descriptions réductrices et négatives
des médias néo-coloniaux – qui
In the field of literature, Subha
s’arrêtent seulement à la pauvreté, aux
Xavier invites us to join a quest
mariages arrangés et aux morts en
about constructed collective
l’absence de dot en Inde – dans la
identities, where “nationalist
marginalisation et l’aliénation des
rhetoric often relies on metaphors to immigrants de l’Inde. Agnew puise
bind individuals to geographic
dans une mine de souvenirs
spaces.” By looking at recent fiction personnels et culturels de l’Inde pour
by Chinese-Canadian migrant writer illustrer l’effet stimulant que ces
Ying Chen, Xavier stipulates that in souvenirs et leur reproduction dans
the process of “transcending
les écrits de la diaspora indienne
boundaries and peoples, the shadow peuvent avoir sur le soutien affectif et
of ‘home’ is thus far-reaching and
l’avènement d’un sentiment
ever-extending.” In this article, three d’appartenance dans la diaspora.
novels by Chen are explored: The
Memory of Water (1992), Chinese
Dans le domaine de la littérature,
Letters (1993) and Ingratitude
Subha Xavier nous invite à nous
(1995). Xavier examines Chen’s use joindre à son interrogation sur les
of poetic language in these three
identités collectives construites, où la
novels and “each can be read as a
rhétorique nationaliste repose souvent
story of disruption and displacement sur des métaphores visant à lier les
within the national narrative that
individus aux espaces géographiques.
serves to unhinge the metaphors
En examinant l’œuvre récente de
created to give meaning to the
l’écrivaine canadienne chinoise Ying
nation.” In so doing, the author
Chen, Xavier signale que dans le
proposes that Chen’s writing
processus de transcendance des
engages provocatively with
limites et des peuples, l’ombre du
nationalism and its feminist
« pays natal » est omniprésente et
critiques.
s’étend sans cesse. Dans cet article,
trois romans de Chen font l’objet
In another contribution, Katie
d’une analyse : La Mémoire de l’eau
Cholette explores the treatment of
(1992), Les Lettres chinoises (1993)
7
Jamelie Hassan, a multi-media artist
and activist of Lebanese origins by
two of Canada’s national cultural
institutions — the Canadian
Museum of Civilization (CMC) and
the Canada Council for the Arts
(CCA). In her supple analysis,
Cholette documents and accounts for
the contrasting reception by these
two institutions of this
internationally acclaimed artist.
While the CCA awarded Jamelie
Hassan the high honor of a Governor
General’s Visual and Media Arts
Award, the CMC responded with
suspicion and delay to the “Lands
Within Me” exhibit, a collective
show of artists of Arab origins, of
which Hassan was a participant.
The culturally essentializing
response of the CMC’s management
to the exhibit in the over-securitized
climate following “9-11” also meant
that Hassan’s work became folded
into a Manichean dualist framework
that constructed the work of Arabs
and Muslims in the idiom of political
extremism. The response of the
CMC was to reconstruct such work
in the framework of the more benign
“immigrant experience.” In contrast,
Hassan’s recognition by the CCA
prior to the September 11th terrorist
attacks on the US was informed by a
framework of individual merit and
supported, Cholette argues, by
neo-liberalism’s emphasis on
individual achievement. Rather than
being subjected to the homogenizing
and depoliticizing impulses of the
CMC, the Canada Council did not
eviscerate Hassan’s work of its
political activism and gave
recognition to her distinctive cultural
and social voice.
Heather Smith draws upon census
tract data from Statistics Canada to
8
et L’Ingratitude (1995). Xavier
examine l’usage que fait Chen du
langage poétique dans ces trois
romans et chacun peut être lu comme
une histoire de la perturbation et du
déplacement dans le récit national qui
sert à dévoiler les métaphores créées
pour donner un sens à la nation. Ce
faisant, l’auteur indique que les écrits
de Chen répondent de manière
provocante au nationalisme et à ses
critiques féministes.
Dans un autre texte, Katie Cholette
examine le traitement réservé à
Jamelie Hassan, artiste multimédia et
activiste d’origine libanaise, par deux
des institutions culturelles nationales
du Canada – le Musée canadien des
civilisations (MCC) et le Conseil des
arts du Canada (CAC). Dans son
analyse subtile, Cholette présente un
compte rendu de la réception très
différente accordée par ces deux
institutions à cette artiste acclamée à
l’échelle internationale. Alors que le
CAC a octroyé à Jamelie Hassan
l’insigne honneur d’un Prix du
Gouverneur général en arts visuels et
en arts médiatiques, le MCC a
répondu tardivement et avec suspicion
à l’exposition « Ces pays qui
m’habitent », expressions collectives
d’artistes canadiens d’origine arabe,
dont Hassan faisait partie. La réponse
essentiellement culturelle de la
direction du MCC à l’exposition dans
le climat de psychose de sécurité qui
faisait suite au 11 septembre 2001
signifiait également que les travaux
de Hassan s’inscrivaient dans un
cadre dualiste manichéen où les
travaux des Arabes et des musulmans
étaient assimilés à l’extrémisme
politique. La réponse du MCC a
consisté à repenser les travaux de ce
genre dans le cadre de l’expérience
plus inoffensive de l’immigrant. Par
Introduction
Présentation
map and analyze the changing
configuration of immigrant
settlement, poverty and
neighborhood deprivation in
Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal in
1991 and 2001. Importantly, Smith
conceptualizes disadvantage not
only in terms of low income, but
also in terms of inadequate
education, public assistance,
fractured families, inability to
communicate in an official language,
cultural isolation and discrimination.
Her nuanced analysis yields the
rather alarming result that in 2001,
in all three cities, high percentages
of immigrant settlement were far
more strongly correlated with
poverty concentration compared to
1991. But as reflected in the diverse
patterns of immigrant dispersion and
poverty among housing tracts in the
three cities, it is misleading to speak
of an immigrant “underclass” (a
popular concept in US analysis).
Some larger groups of recent
immigrants, such as Chinese, come
to Canada with quite diverse
socioeconomic statuses and amounts
of capital, mitigating the effects of
the downturn in the labour market in
the early 1990s. Moreover, Smith
cautions that, in explicating the
relationship between immigrant
settlement and poverty, attention
must be paid also to the cultural
practices and strategies of
immigrants themselves, e.g., pooling
financial resources so that
income-poor immigrants may in fact
be “house rich.”
ailleurs, la reconnaissance de Hassan
par le CAC avant les attentats
terroristes du 11 septembre aux
États-Unis reposait sur le mérite
individuel, appuyé, selon Cholette,
par l’accent mis par le néolibéralisme
sur la réalisation individuelle. Au lieu
de succomber aux impulsions
d’homogénéisation et de
dépolitisation du MCC, le Conseil des
arts du Canada n’a pas vidé les
travaux de Hassan de leur activisme
politique et il a reconnu l’expression
culturelle et sociale distincte de cette
dernière.
Heather Smith s’inspire des données
des secteurs de recensement de
Statistique Canada pour établir la
cartographie et procéder à l’analyse
de l’évolution de la configuration de
l’installation, de la pauvreté et de la
dépossession des immigrants dans les
quartiers de Toronto, de Vancouver et
de Montréal en 1991 et 2001. Fait
important, Smith conceptualise les
inconvénients non seulement sur le
plan des faibles revenus, mais
également de l’instruction
insuffisante, de l’aide publique, des
familles disloquées, de l’incapacité de
communiquer dans une langue
officielle, de l’isolement culturel et de
la discrimination. Son analyse
nuancée révèle des résultats
alarmants : en 2001, il y avait dans les
trois villes une corrélation beaucoup
plus forte entre les pourcentages
élevés de quartiers d’immigrants et la
concentration de la pauvreté qu’en
1991. Mais comme en témoignent les
divers modèles de dispersion et de
pauvreté des immigrants dans les
The dossier on Asia in this issue
lotissements des trois villes, il est
includes a critical review by Janusz
trompeur de parler d’une sous-classe
Przychodzen and Vijaya Rao of the
d’immigrants (un concept populaire
proceedings of the round table
dans l’analyse américaine). Certains
“Écrire l’Inde au Québec” (2004).
For these authors, the construction of groupes importants d’immigrants
9
modern identity in Quebec has been
shaped by orientalism, and the
authors go on to examine the manner
in which Quebeckers have
represented India. Thus, the image
of India is characterized by the
“temporal dimension outside of
time,” which is at once a reflection
of cultural shock and of escape into
myth. This has culminated
“astonishingly and paradoxically in
the emergence of a more
contemporary awareness, indeed one
that is at the very root of identitary
syncretism.”
The issue also offers a research note
by Serge Granger about the state of
historical research on Canada and
Asia in the 19th century. Granger
underscores the lack of historical
research on the relationship between
Asia and Canada prior to 1850, in
spite of the ties formed by AngloFrench colonialism. Because of
these historical links, many spheres
of human activity are now
influenced by a globalized culture
that has drawn Asia closer to
Canada. However, few historical
studies, particularly in French, have
dealt with Canada-Asia relations
with regard to religion, trade,
politics and/or literature. The
research note explores the various
aspects of Canada-Asia relations and
the extent to which this vast field of
enquiry has, to date, remained
largely untapped.
récents, qui arrivent au Canada,
comme les Chinois, ont des statuts
socioéconomiques et des niveaux de
richesse très différents, ce qui atténue
l’effet du repli observé sur le marché
du travail au début des années 90. De
plus, Smith fait une mise en garde :
pour expliquer les relations entre les
quartiers d’immigrants et la pauvreté,
il faut accorder une attention aux
pratiques et aux stratégies culturelles
des immigrants eux-mêmes, p. ex. la
mise en commun des ressources
financières pour que les immigrants
pauvres en revenu puissent en fait être
riches en immobilisations.
Le dossier sur l’Asie dans le présent
numéro comprend une critique de
Janusz Przychodzen et de Vijaya Rao
sur les actes de la table ronde « Écrire
l’Inde au Québec » [2004]. Pour ces
auteurs, la construction d’une identité
moderne au Québec a été modelée par
l’orientalisme, et les auteurs
examinent la façon dont les
Québécois ont représenté l’Inde. Par
conséquent, l’image de l’Inde se
caractérise par la « dimension
temporelle à l’extérieur du temps »,
qui est à la fois un reflet du choc
culturel et de l’évasion dans un
mythe. Fait étonnant et paradoxal, le
point culminant est l’émergence d’une
sensibilisation plus contemporaine,
qui est à la base même du syncrétisme
identitaire.
Le numéro présente aussi une note de
recherche de Serge Granger sur l’état
The Open-Topic section contains
des recherches historiques sur le
three articles. In the first one, Daniel Canada et l’Asie au XIXe siècle.
Chartier traces the historical
Granger souligne le manque de
evolution of the cultural
recherche historique sur les relations
representation of the Inuit through
entre l’Asie et le Canada avant 1850
the first narratives of the early
malgré les liens établis par le
explorers to more recent
colonialisme anglo-français. En raison
documentary movies. Daniel McNeil de ces liens historiques, beaucoup de
10
Introduction
Présentation
focuses on the “politics of blackness
in Nova Scotia after the provincial
government bulldozed Africville and
its Baptist church.” He documents
how “Black intellectuals inspired by
the memory of Africville have
fashioned an Africadia and
attempted to offer individuals in
urban areas access to mythic,
revolutionary heroes.” He concludes
by comparing the narratives of Black
Scotians with those of Liverpoolborn Blacks. Finally, to complete the
Open-Topic section, David Palmieri
draws a parallel between George
Grant’s anti-Americanism and Pierre
Vadebonceur’s anti-américanisme.
The intense discussion on
l’américanité in Quebec through the
work of Gérard Bouchard and
Joseph Yvon Thériault offers an
interesting prism through which to
read his account of a long tradition,
in both French- and
English-speaking Canada.
In their review essay, Leslie Alm
and Ross Buckhart highlight
common themes in three books that
outline the Canada–United States
relationship as it pertains to
international environmental policy
making: Environmental Politics and
Policy by Walter Rosenbaum
(2005), Canadian Environmental
Policy: Context and Cases edited by
Debora VanNijnatten and Robert
Boardman (2002), and
Environmental Policy: New
Directions for the Twenty-first
Century edited by Norman Vig and
Michael E. Kraft (2006). According
to them, these works illuminate the
vast similarities and differences that
characterize the way each of these
nations views its place in bringing
about environmental globalization.
They also look at how globalization
sphères de l’activité humaine sont
maintenant influencées par une
culture mondiale qui a rapproché
l’Asie du Canada. Toutefois, peu
d’études historiques, notamment en
français, ont porté sur les relations
entre le Canada et l’Asie concernant
la religion, le commerce, la politique
et (ou) la littérature. La note de
recherche examine les divers aspects
des relations entre le Canada et l’Asie
et la mesure dans laquelle ce vaste
domaine d’étude est demeuré, jusqu’à
maintenant, largement inexploité.
La rubrique hors-thème contient trois
articles. Dans le premier, Daniel
Chartier retrace l’évolution historique
de la représentation culturelle des
Inuits dans les récits des premiers
explorateurs jusqu’à des films
documentaires plus récents. Daniel
McNeil met l’accent sur la politique
de la négritude en Nouvelle-Écosse
après que le gouvernement provincial
eut rasé au bouldozeur Africville et
son église baptiste. Il montre,
documents à l’appui, comment les
intellectuels noirs inspirés par le
souvenir d’Africville ont conçu un
Africadia et tenté d’offrir aux
personnes des zones urbaines l’accès
à des héros révolutionnaires
mythiques. En guise de conclusion, il
compare les écrits des Noirs de
Nouvelle-Écosse et ceux des Noirs
nés à Liverpool. Enfin, pour terminer
la rubrique, David Palmieri établit un
parallèle entre l’anti-américanisme de
George Grant et l’anti-américanisme
de Pierre Vadeboncoeur. La
discussion intense sur l’américanité
au Québec dans l’œuvre de Gérard
Bouchard et de Joseph Yvon
Thériault permet de lire sous un angle
intéressant son compte rendu d’une
longue tradition, au Canada français
et au Canada anglais.
11
(especially economic globalization)
affects the salience of the
environment as a policy. They
conclude with an examination of
policymaking in the environmental
arena as a way of comparing and
contrasting the two countries.
Daiva Stasiulis
Associate Editor
Claude Couture
Editor-in-Chief
Dans leur essai critique, Leslie Alm et
Ross Buckhart font ressortir des
thèmes communs dans trois ouvrages
sur les relations entre le Canada et les
États-Unis qui portent sur
l’élaboration de la politique
internationale en matière
d’environnement : Environmental
Politics and Policy de Walter
Rosenbaum (2005), Canadian
Environmental Policy: Context and
Cases sous la direction de Debora
VanNijnatten et de Robert Boardman
(2002), et Environmental Policy: New
Directions for the Twenty-first
Century sous la direction de Norman
Vig et de Michael E. Kraft (2006).
Selon ces derniers, ces travaux
illustrent les grandes ressemblances et
différences qui caractérisent la façon
dont chacun de ces pays envisage sa
place dans la mondialisation
environnementale. Ils examinent aussi
comment la mondialisation (en
particulier la mondialisation
économique) influe sur l’importance
de l’environnement en tant que
politique. En conclusion, ils
comparent les deux pays en fonction
des politiques qu’ils élaborent dans le
domaine de l’environnement.
Daiva Stasiulis
Rédactrice adjointe
Claude Couture
Rédacteur en chef
12
Vijay Agnew
Finding India in the Diaspora
Abstract
This paper analyzes Indian immigrant’s quest to forge a “home” in Canada.
Their emotional and psychological struggles to feel “at home” have much to
do with the biased representations of India that frequently highlight its
poverty and related problems of illiteracy, superstition, gender oppression,
and religious conflict. There is not one imagined India but many and it is the
differences in the imagined that alienate and make immigrants feel that they
do no belong here in Canada. This heightens the immigrant’s nostalgia for
their cultures and lost “homes” in India.
Résumé
Les immigrants indiens cherchent à se constituer un « chez-soi » au Canada,
ce qu’analyse le présent article. Leurs combats affectifs et psychologiques
pour s’y sentir à l’aise ont beaucoup à voir avec les représentations
tendancieuses de l’Inde qui mettent souvent en relief la pauvreté de ce pays
et les problèmes connexes : l’analphabétisme, la superstition, l’oppression
fondée sur le sexe et les conflits religieux. Il n’existe pas une seule et unique
Inde imaginaire mais de nombreuses, et ce sont les différences dans
l’imaginaire qui aliènent les immigrants et les amènent à ne pas se sentir
chez eux au Canada. Ce phénomène intensifie la nostalgie des immigrants
pour les cultures et la terre natale qu’ils ont laissées derrière eux, en Inde.
India clings to me. Perhaps it might be closer to the truth to say I cling to
India, the country that was once my home. I am an Indian who lives in the
Diaspora and works as a professor. I left India some 30 years ago, yet the
country continues to haunt my dreams, and its history and politics, myths
and fables shadow me wherever I go. The fact and fiction of India, as many
Canadians know it, contextualize and explain to them who I am, where I
come from and the cultural baggage I have brought with me. My dijins are
the perceptions and stories, real and imagined, that float around me and
with whom I am always shadowboxing.
India is not merely a space on the map but the place of my childhood. As
such, it is the locus of memory, nostalgia, anxiety and home. My memories
of India are fluid, and they change with time and social context. Memories
of India provide solace and comfort when I am homesick, sad and lonely or
when my present becomes problematic and traps me in an apologetic,
31, 2005
defensive or confrontational mode. Memories create a safe sanctuary for
the immigrant psyche, bruised by racism, and they build self-esteem by
heightening pride in the cultures practised “back home” and in the
Diaspora. Immigrants, like me, share nostalgic memories of childhood,
youth and community with their children, hoping to recreate a history, a
lineage for them that encompasses not only their present selves but also
their past. Although we recall memories for our children, friends and others,
and although these memories serve personal and emotional needs,
collectively they construct communities of interests and beliefs.
In the Diaspora, immigrants create identities for themselves in many
different ways. Immigrants, their second-generation children (whether
born in Canada or elsewhere) and white Canadians have different
interpretations of and perspectives on India. These imagined Indias are a
product of their socially constructed identities that are constituted by race,
gender, ethnicity, class and nation. Although the identities of immigrants
and their second-generation children differ, they often share ambivalence
toward the geographical, physical, emotional and intellectual home.
Chandra Mohanty, an immigrant from India who is a feminist professor
in the United States, asks:
What is home? The place I was born? Where I grew up? Where my
parents live? Where I live and work as an adult? Where I locate my
community, my people? Who are my people? Is home a
geographical space, a historical space, an emotional, sensory
space? Home is always so crucial to immigrants and migrants … I
am convinced that this question — how one understands and
defines home — is a profoundly political one. (2003, 126)
In this paper I analyze Indian immigrants’ quest to find a “home” in
Canada. Their emotional and psychological struggles to feel “at home”
have much to do with the biased representations of India that frequently
highlight its poverty and related problems of illiteracy, superstition, gender
oppression and religious conflict. Immigrants tell stories of “home” to their
second-generation children hoping to evoke positive images of their culture
and heritage, and counterbalance the negative portrayal of India circulated
in the media. Other Canadians have limited knowledge of India and it is
derived primarily from mass media but also, in some cases, from travel,
books, friends and acquaintances. Consequently, there is not one imagined
India but many, and it is the differences in these imagined worlds that
alienate and make immigrants feel that they do not belong here in Canada.
Such feelings heighten their nostalgia for their cultures and lost “homes” in
India.
14
Storytelling: A Feminist Methodology
Storytelling and narratives are at the heart of feminist methodology and
pedagogy (Razack 1998; Giles 2002; Ristock 1996). Biographical and
personal accounts, such as those of bell hooks (1984) and Audre Lorde
(1982), were highly influential in the development of feminist theories in
the 1980s. These accounts of the everyday lives of women, whether at home
in the family or elsewhere, revealed how race, class and gender oppression
constructed their identities. Consequently, feminists value the discovery of
submerged knowledge that helps to deconstruct power relations. Christina
Sommers (1994), a philosopher, is sceptical of the feminist method of
storytelling that is intended to create solidarity and heighten consciousness
of oppression. She argues that storytelling sessions are nothing more than
therapy groups that allow participants to whine; they thus generate little
serious discussion and analysis.
An immigrant’s past is sutured to the present by stories about family,
home and community as they had once known it. Their stories take the raw
materials of everyday life to construct a coherent narrative that engages the
reader and listener. Storytelling is personal, and although it can be nostalgic
and sentimental, it yet speaks of truths that are local and particular in
contrast to those that are empirical, universal and objective. In her seminal
writings, Dorothy Smith has argued that our everyday lives are embedded
in the power relations of society, but these relations remain invisible to us
because the world around us seems to be so normal, natural and routine
(1987; 1990).
The social location of the storytellers is important to our understanding
of their perspectives. Caren Kaplan argues that “a politics of location” is
most useful when it is used to “deconstruct dominant hierarchy or
hegemonic use of the term gender. Apolitics of location is not useful when it
is construed to be the reflection of authentic, primordial identities that are to
be established and reaffirmed” (qtd. in Mankekar 2003, 63). The “politics
of location” require that we interrogate our privileges and blind spots and
reflect upon how gender, race, class and sexuality inflected the experiences
that constructed our identities and shaped us into our present selves.
However, we all have multiple positionings that are sometimes contradictory and internally inconsistent. Thus, the individual’s perception is also
fluid and shifts and changes over time and place. These shifting positions
and perspectives are a matter of constant negotiation. Over the course of a
lifetime, immigrants may evolve into insiders within their new countries,
but find themselves outsiders in the places where they were born (Assayag
and Benei 2003). Such an evolution requires an emotional realigning and
understanding of self and of home.
For example, some South Asian academics living in the Diaspora
confront the problem of identifying their perspective as that of insiders or
15
outsiders when they research South Asia. Yet it is partly the experience of
encountering racism in its many guises in their personal and professional
lives that created the desire to study their cultural origins, history and
society (Assayag and Benei 2003; Agnew 2003). Clifford argues that
Diasporas generate a “double consciousness” that enables individuals to
transcend disappointments by emphasizing the strengths of self and
community. He states:
Experience of loss, marginality, and exile (differently cushioned
by class) are often reinforced by systematic exploitation and
blocked advancement. This constitutive suffering coexists with
the skills of survival: strength in adaptive distinction, discrepant
cosmopolitanism, and stubborn visions of renewal. Diaspora
consciousness lives loss and hope as a defining tension. (1994,
312)
In contemporary feminist debates about the Diaspora, the terms
hybridity and hybrid identities are favoured for defining identity and
perspective. A hybrid perspective is neither indigenous nor exogenous
(Code 2000, 260). Bhabha (2000) views hybridity favourably because it
provides a space in which the individuals can engage in an ongoing
negotiation with the culture in which they find themselves and thereby gain
a better understanding of self and society. But others, like Grewal and
Caplan (1997), are more critical of hybridity because not all facets of such
an identity are equal and symmetrical; rather, they are uneven because they
stem from histories that transcend individual intentionality. Radhakrishnan
notes that production and representation of the self as a subject in the postcolonial era can be a laborious process that involves taking an inventory of
the many facets of gender, race, class and other socially significant criteria
embedded and encoded in one’s identity. Although a hybrid identity can be
an “intransitive and immanent sense of jouissance,” for the post-colonial
subject it can often also be an expression of extreme pain and dislocation
(1996, 158–59).
A cultural memory that is communicated through stories is an “act in the
present by which individuals and groups constitute their identities by
recalling a shared past on the basis of common, and therefore often
contested, norms, conventions, and practices” (Hirsch and Smith 2002, 5).
The collective memories, documented in stories, bear testimony to the
immigrants’pasts and demonstrate how subjectivities are negotiated within
and adapted to the historical and social circumstances in which women and
other subordinate individuals — transsexuals, for example — find
themselves (Giles 2002, 39). Such knowledge is empowering because it
transforms “disabling fictions into enabling fictions altering our relation to
the present and the past” (McDermott 2002, 291). This activity is
significant since those in power can, and often do, dominate and manipulate
memory to serve their own ends. Thus, women, ethnic minorities,
16
racialized individuals and other marginalized groups need to assert their
presence in masculinist hegemonic memory and history.
When Indians or those of Indian descent get together socially or to
participate in activities organized for immigrants, they find a space in which
they can tell stories about their past (Agnew 1998). Immigrants and their
second-generation children tell stories that speak to alternative and
suppressed truths, and challenge homogenizing and universalizing
discourses that attest to their resistance to varied and intersecting
oppressions (Handa 2003; Dunlop 2004). Sharing stories and identifying
with others who share common roots and similar dilemmas can help
overcome feelings of victimization, eliminate personal blame, avoid sense
of failure, generate critical consciousness and encourage self-reflection.
Such conversations and stories, writes Bhabha, can create a “third space”
that “displaces histories that constitute it, and sets up new structures of
authority, new political initiatives, which are inadequately understood
through received wisdom” (qtd. in Maira 2002, 87). Maira argues that the
“third space” is not necessarily liberating; rather, the positions and wisdoms
that emerge from it are “complex, contradictory, and are enmeshed in the
relations of power that are also part of the everyday experience” (Maira
2002, 87).
Racism, Memory and the Social Construction of Identity
Memories of the past resonate in the hearts of immigrants and shadow their
present. Cultural memories emerge out of a complex dynamic between the
past and the present, the individual and the collective, the public and the
private; between remembrance and omission, power and powerlessness,
history and myth. Memories are “acts of performance, representation, and
interpretation” that require “agents of transfer” and specific contexts
(Hirsch and Smith 2002, 8). Immigrants from India in Canada transfer
stories of the home and homeland to their listeners and readers, but they do
so within a historical and social context that is imbued with race, class and
gender hierarchies.
I remember a lecture I gave as part of the Later Life Learning Program at
the University of Toronto. The program’s theme in 2001–2002 was India,
and I was invited to lecture on women in India. When I walked into New
College at the University of Toronto, the venue for the talk, I found the
entrance hallway full of senior citizens sitting or standing, talking or
reading, looking relaxed and happy. Right across from the doorway, two
women sat at a table, ticking off the names of the attendees on a sheet. When
I walked toward them, they smiled genially and before I could say a word
they handed me my name tag.
17
Since I was a few minutes early, I moved to the side. Looking around
casually, I noticed that I was the only Indian in that exclusively white
gathering. When I caught the eyes of men or women, they smiled pleasantly
and kindly at me. My skin colour was a sure giveaway that I was the guest
speaker. I stood behind a podium at the front and noticed that there were
approximately two hundred men and women in the audience. I was amused
to note that, despite being in my mid-50s, I was the youngest person there.
The audience listened attentively and seemed to find the talk interesting
enough. After my lecture, a man asked, “Is it not true that Indian women are
slaves to their husbands?” He went on to elaborate that Indian women were
required to “serve” their husbands and families.
The question posed a dilemma: how was I to perform my ethnicity to this
white audience? The answer that immediately came to mind was that all
cultures and religions are patriarchal but they differ from each other in the
degree and extent of oppressiveness. Yet where to locate Indian gender
norms in this continuum? I wondered which ideal society this man had in
mind as a norm. Besides, it was not clear whether the question referred to
women in India, in Canada, or in the Diaspora. I had the options of
celebrating the achievements of some exceptional Indian women, adopting
a critical stance toward the oppressiveness of gender norms in India, or
copping out completely by giving a vague and general answer. The man’s
question had also evoked a whole set of associated memories of women —
my grandmother, aunts, cousins, and maids — who had been part of my
everyday family living in India. Nostalgic for the past, I wanted to protest
and say that Indian women were happy and led fulfilling, joyous lives.
I imagined, however, that over the years the audience had read accounts
in Canadian and American newspapers or watched television programs on
the Indian cultural practice of arranged marriages and dowry. The stories
portray these cultural practices as uniquely (read also bizarrely, outdatedly
and oppressively) Indian. These accounts describe such practices in an
ahistorical way and without distinguishing between traditional and current
norms, cities and villages, or India and the Diaspora. Arranged marriages
are contrasted to “our” practices of freely entered heterosexual
relationships between consenting adults. (Recently, as a result of a specific
case involving one individual, arranged marriages were dubbed
erroneously but revealingly as forced marriages in Denmark.) Newspaper
reports on what is termed “dowry deaths” — that is, when a young woman is
killed by greedy in-laws for insufficient dowry — reinforce images of a
traditional and oppressive culture (Williams 2004; Lakshmi 2001;
Stackhouse n.d). The stories are accounts of exceptional and sensationalized cases, yet they become the imagined norm, defining Indian culture as
a homogenous whole without any consideration given to region, religion,
caste, class and myriad other factors. These stories etch pre-existing images
18
of the victimized womanhood of India more deeply in the minds of white
Canadians.
Experiences like mine reveal the subtle and invisible (because they seem
so natural and normal) nature of everyday racism. Everyday racism, writes
Essed in her seminal study Understanding Everyday Racism, involves
“systematic, recurrent and familiar practices” that can be generalized and
which involve “socialized attitudes and behavior.” Reconstructions of
events like mine, whether verbal or written, provide “the best basis for the
analysis of the simultaneous impact of racism in different sites and in
different social relations … [for] these accounts locate the narrators as well
as their experiences in the social context of their everyday lives, give
specificity and detail to events and invite the narrator to carefully qualify
subtle experiences of racism” (Essed 1991, 3–4).
Immigrants are deeply sensitive to negative images that construct them
as the Other in relation to that which is defined “Canadian.” Such
representations, Stuart Hall notes, produce meanings that are central to the
“construction of identity and the marking of difference, in production and
consumption, as well as the regulation of social conduct” (qtd. in Henry and
Tator 2002, 28). Such representations further alienate immigrants and add
to their feelings of marginalization and exclusion. Immigrants experience a
range of emotions in these encounters — outrage, anger, disbelief,
disgruntlement and even the wish to deny the presence of racism — and
ponder and fret over the meanings of them and their implications for their
lives and that of their children in Canada. They wonder how best to
communicate the nature of such encounters to their children. Should they
deny and ignore the implied racism? Or, alternatively, should they
challenge and dispute their hidden meanings? Encounters that deny equal
respect to racialized immigrants rob them of their right to social citizenship
in Canada (Creese, forthcoming). They come to feel they are not at home in
Canada.
Immigrants are not passive recipients or audience for these negative
representations. They respond by creating alternative images of their
groups and therefore themselves. Memories that tell the stories of
immigrants from their own perspectives are less widely known.
Immigrants look back to recall a happy and joyous past in order to move
forward in their lives. In “My Mother’s Lost Places,” Rishma Dunlop
(2004), a second-generation South Asian poet and a professor, notes that
her family’s white French-Canadian neighbours in Quebec could not
possibly imagine her mother’s childhood and youth:
I know they could never imagine,
as I have only just begun to imagine
my mother’s lost places, her girlhood, the
19
laughter in summer houses, wild monkeys
at the hill stations of her youth, peacocks,
the heady profusions of flower and fruit,
jasmine and roses and custard-apples and
guavas. They could not imagine her with
braids and proper Catholic uniform at the
convent school under the stern eyes of nuns
who taught them all their subjects including
domestic skills such as the tatting of lace and
embroidery stitching. They could not taste the
sweetness of Sanskrit poetry, or the star-flung
nights of Persian ghazals.
Memory is interactive. It involves recognizing that those who tell a story
can be understood by their audience as they struggle to represent an identity
and consciousness of themselves (Giles 2002, 25). As an immigrant, I am
haunted by perceptions of women in India; they make me feel vulnerable to
the judgements of others about my nationality, culture and therefore me.
India is an integral part of me, and my skin colouring defines me in Canada
as Indian or being of Indian descent. (By way of contrast, in India it is my
residence in Canada that defines me and not my skin colour.) When I
explain some aspect of India to white Canadians, I am not just talking about
a country but also of my origins and cultural heritage. For me, conversations
about India are not just about people “there”; they have implications for
Indians “here.” What white Canadians know about India intersects with and
influences how they view Indians “there” as well as “here” in the Diaspora.
The personal thus becomes very political.
The question that had been posed to me was difficult to answer anyway.
The diversity of India’s population — factors such as caste, class, sexuality,
region, religion, education, urbanization and their many intersections —
make it hard to come to any meaningful generalizations about women in
India. Similarly, Indian women in the Diaspora have various social, sexual
and other identities. Besides, in answering the question, I wanted to raise
issues of how power constructs knowledge and influences what we know
and how we know it (Code 1991). Would it be polite to speak about
ethnocentrism to this group of interested senior citizens and ask them to
reflect on why they believed Indian women were victimized? Did they also
think white Canadian women were victimized? Could I, in a few seconds,
compel them to think about what was common and different among women
living in varied circumstances and locations? I wondered if the audience
thought that compared to victimized Indian women I was emancipated and
liberated, or perhaps they just thought my freedom was a beneficence and
privilege accorded to me by my residence in Canada.
Stuart Hall notes that cultural identity is an “act of production not an
artifact waiting to be unearthed” (qtd. in Maira 2002, 113). Identity is a
20
social construction that “is a matter of ‘becoming’ as well as ‘being.’ It
belongs to the future as much as to the past. It is not something that already
exists, transcending place, time, history, and culture. Cultural identities
come from somewhere, have histories. But like everything which is
historical, they undergo constant transformation. Far from being eternally
fixed in some essentialized past, they are subject to the continuous ‘play’ of
history, culture, and power” (Lowe 2003, 136).
The lecture and the questions had made me, in the words of Homi
Bhabha, a “vernacular cosmopolitan” who was translating between
cultures, “renegotiating traditions from a position where ‘locality’ insists
on its own terms, while entering into the larger national and societal
conversations” (2000, 138). Cosmopolitanism can mean accepting the
possibility that one’s own culture is “inadequate” or “fallible” or has not
developed particular types of skills or human creativity. An acknowledgment of these shortcomings can prepare the individual to draw upon other
cultures for a more “satisfactory intellectual life.” Such cosmopolitanism,
however, is complicated because it can involve Orientalism, political
correctness, and perspectives and interpretations that imply that there are
“insiders” and “outsiders” (Kaviraj 2003, 149).
Cultural translation is a process that requires those who perform it to
revise and rethink their knowledge, beliefs and points of reference. Bhaba
states:
Ambivalence and antagonism accompanies any act of cultural
translation, because negotiating with the “difference of the other”
reveals the radical insufficiency of sedimented, settled systems of
meaning, and signification; it demonstrates, as well, the
inadequacy of those “structures of feeling” … through which we
experience our cultural authenticity and authority as being
somehow “natural” to us and part of a national landscape. (2000,
141)
Given the time constraints of the lecture, I did not engage the audience in
a prolonged conversation. I grinned and responded glibly by saying that
women all over the world served their husbands, and that comment drew
delighted laughter from the women in the room. They had obviously drawn
on their own experiences, preoccupations, desires and cultural
understanding to make themselves at home in my response.
As I walked toward the subway after the lecture amid jean-clad students
chattering into cell phones, I was flooded with memories of the time when I
attended college in Mumbai (formerly Bombay). I nostalgically recalled
the happy times spent with grandmothers and aunts, and the maids whose
work had freed me from all household tasks. As a young girl, I had paid
scant attention to the care and nurturing that I received from the women in
my family, accepting it all as normal and routine. Memory had connected
21
my past and present, but it had drawn me into a reflective mode that
compelled me to rethink the past. Was the situation of the women in my
family as idyllic as I thought? In rethinking the past, I learned about my
genealogy and gained some additional insights into being an Indian living
in the Diaspora.
Remembering, notes Judy Giles, is a process that helps individuals put
the past into a framework that gives it a set of meanings that makes sense to
them in the present. Thus, individual psyches intersect with historically
specific ideologies. The past is not constructed in some “pure” unmediated
way but in the context of prevailing values and norms and the cultural
repertoire available to the individual at a specific historical moment (2002,
25).
My experiences have partially helped to construct my identity. It is from
such a location, sometimes defined as marginal, that I imagine India and tell
the story of immigrants in the Diaspora. But marginality is not necessarily
disempowering; rather, it is a space from which a new understanding can
emerge. Bhabha notes:
No name is yours until you speak it; somebody returns your call
and suddenly, the circuit of signs, gestures, gesticulations, is
established. You are part of a dialogue that may not be heard or
heralded at first, but your person cannot be denied. The voices of
the crossing, once drawn by the siren’s song, may lead you astray,
but strangely you find yourself the long way around. In another’s
country that is also your own, your person divides, and in
following the forked path, you encounter yourself in a double
movement … once as stranger, and then as friend. (2000, 142)
The Plurality of the Imagined India
Imagination, writes Appadurai, has become a collective fact. It is a social
practice by which we construct new ways of knowing and understanding
and thus imagination has entered the logic of everyday life and is no longer
the preserve of the intellectual elites. In contemporary times, writes
Appadurai, imagination is not just fantasy, escape, elite pastime or
contemplation; it is an “organized field of social practices, a form of work
(both in the sense of labor and of culturally organized practice) and a form of
negotiation between sites of agency (‘individuals’) and globally defined
fields of possibility” (2003, 30). He has coined the terms ethnoscapes,
mediascapes, technoscapes, financescapes, and ideoscapes to characterize
cultural flow across the borders and boundaries of nation-states. The suffix
scapes is meant to indicate “that these are not objective given relations
which look the same from every angle of vision, but rather that they are
deeply perspectival constructs, inflected by the historical linguistic, and
political situatedness of different sorts of actors; nation states, … [and]
diasporic communities … and even face to face groups, such as villages,
22
neighborhoods, and families” (31). These landscapes are the building
blocks, Appadurai says, of “imagined worlds.”
Leaving home and arriving in new worlds has been made easier
throughout the twentieth century with developments in transportation,
media and communication technologies. Ordinary people stimulated by
print and electronic media have begun to deploy the imagination in
constructing worlds that are both near and far from their own physical and
mental locations. Theoretically, it could be said that immigrants never have
to leave their “homes” for they are always accessible to them through
reading, watching movies and videos and listening to music in regional and
national languages. When individuals travel or migrate they leave behind
their families and friends in the hope of making a better life in the new land,
but feelings of cultural alienation and racism keeps them from being “at
home.” They hanker for emotional and psychological homes as they
struggle to adapt themselves to their new neighbourhoods, work
environments, and school routines that are different from the social world
of their past. Intense involvement with original cultures and racialized and
ethnic communities in their new and adopted “homes” is itself symptomatic
of the alienation experienced by immigrants and the social distance they
sometimes find difficult to traverse.
Perspective and imagination are not stable and constant; rather, they are
fluid and change with time and place. Collectively, immigrants imagine an
India, and although it differs in shade and nuance nevertheless these varied
“communities of sentiment” provide them with emotional and
psychological anchors. But the existence of different communities of
sentiment and the diverse ways in which those communities imagine India
differ substantially from those of the immigrants. Immigrants’ imagined
India is imbued with nostalgia, longing and desire, and they resist the biased
interpretations of their culture and therefore of themselves that are
sometimes depicted in print and electronic media. This differs from
“Canadians” who read media accounts of India, watch movies made by
Indian immigrants or read books by immigrant authors. Similarly, the
imagined India of the second-generation children of immigrants differs
from “Canadians” and their parents, although they may be indulgent of the
latter’s nostalgia and predilection of storytelling about “home.” These
plural imagined Indias stem from differences of experiences, sentiment,
perspectives, and social and political locations. These Indias, generated
within communities of sentiment, create feelings of belonging and not
belonging, friend and stranger, and neighbourhood and nationhood.
My imagined India is chaotic and full of contradictions. I bring back to
Toronto, from visits to India, images that vividly portray the ruthlessness of
poverty and the degradation that it wreaks on the individual. India’s
prospects are somewhat better than those of neighbouring Bangladesh or
23
some nations in Africa, such as Ethiopia and Sudan, yet it is a poor country
that has needed foreign aid from prosperous Western nations. Academics
and the larger public, inside and outside of India, view its population of
approximately 1 billion as contributing to its poverty. But here is the
conundrum: Is population the cause of the country’s poverty or its
consequence? Scholars do not agree among themselves as to which criteria
would determine the ideal size of a country’s population, and there is no
consensus even about an appropriate size.
Marxist friends at the university harangue me when I mention the
population dilemma, and they talk of imperialism and its consequences for
colonies. Amartya Sen, a Nobel Prize-winning economist, does not view
the size of the population as a problem per se. He argues that population is a
resource for India. He believes government ought to focus its policies on
developing human capabilities through education, nutrition and by
ensuring an equitable social context (Sen 2000). Well-meaning and
optimistic journalists do not harp on the pervasive nature of India’s poverty
since it is so well known that stories about it are hardly newsworthy. Rather,
they talk of India’s population as overwhelming, difficult to understand, or
as lending the country a charm through its mix of caste, region, religion,
class and their myriad intersections.
Romanticized pictures of colourfully dressed peasants performing folk
dances and playing the sitar, which are intended to inveigle tourists, fly
from my mind when I am in the country amid the bustling crowds that are on
every street corner in Mumbai, Delhi, Chenai and Kolkata. Street scenes in
Bollywood movies, which I view in my home in a quiet residential
neighbourhood in Toronto, portray a sea of humanity that reinforces the
emotional argument that population is the cause of India’s poverty. But I do
not necessarily make the connection between the poverty “there” and the
affluence “here” that enables me to watch movies in comfort. I do not probe
too deeply how I, individually, or “us,” undefined and unknown, are
collectively implicated in the poverty experienced by large segments of the
world’s population. I shy away from assuming any responsibility for the
misery of other people.
I put aside moral and ethical questions that confound and perplex, and
replace them, in my classroom, with abstract and academic explanations of
caste and class, family and community, rural and urban environments. I talk
easily about justice and equality for women, Dalits (untouchables),
peasants, and the poor while maintaining an emotional distance between
the subjects of my rhetoric and me. Slowly, as days, weeks and months go
by, these bold and stark images of my homeland — whether from visits,
movies, or books — dissipate and their blurring brings relief from guilt and
self-questioning.
24
The news from India, reported by the media in Canada, is with some
exceptions usually critical. In 1984, the assassination of Prime Minister
Indira Gandhi by her Sikh bodyguards was widely reported in Toronto’s
newspapers as it was elsewhere around the globe. The coverage was
followed by accounts of the ensuing violence between Hindus and Sikhs,
and these accounts noted that the police, who were largely Hindu, refused to
act, thus implicitly sanctioning the killing of Sikhs by the enraged
population. More recently, in 2002, there were violent clashes between
Hindus and Muslims in Gujarat in which hundreds of Muslims died. There
were also accounts of poor, untouchable villagers who were massacred by
their upper-caste and upper-class landlords, and of poor women being
brutally raped by the police.
Stories such as these raise the consciousness of friends and students of all
ethnicities, who begin to query me about my religion and caste. Their
comments have an undertone that asks if I am part of the oppressor or the
oppressed group, part of the perpetrating upper-caste-class murderers and
rapists or their victims. At times like these I become conscious of my
difference and the need to close the social distance that yawns between us. I
want to assert militantly, “Hey! Wait a minute. I am a Canadian,” yet in
practice I usually keep quiet. Outrageous and inhumane acts perpetrated by
some Indians on the other side of the world spread like a stain to engulf me
here in Toronto. The practical effect is to silence me or at least lessen my
volubility about gender and ethnic inequalities in Canada.
My reactions to racism and biased media stories about India compel me
to question where and with whom I belong, and the location of my “home.”
Is it here or there? Do I have to choose, or could I, like Rushdie, refuse to
choose between emotional and physical home? Rushdie writes:
But I, too, have ropes around my neck, I have them to this day,
pulling me this way and that, East and West, the nooses tightening,
commanding, choose, choose. I buck. I snort, I whinny. I rear. I
kick. Ropes, I do not choose between you. Lassoes, lariats, I
choose neither of you, and both. Do you hear? I refuse to choose.
(1996, 211)
The imagination of a resident of Toronto about India may also be fed by
media stories such as “Monkey Madness! Surly Simians run amok in Indian
Capital,” as an ABC headline noted. Similarly, CNN reported, “In a capital
city where cows roam the streets and elephants plod along in the bus lanes,
it’s no surprise to find government buildings overrun by monkeys.”1 (The
story also ran in the Globe and Mail.) The ABC article stated:
Thousands of monkeys are creating havoc in the corridors of
power in the Indian capital, barging into government offices,
stealing food, threatening bureaucrats, and even ripping apart
valuable documents. The increasingly aggressive animals swing
25
effortlessly between the offices of the defense, finance, and
external affairs ministries, and have even been spotted in the prime
minister’s office.2
The article went on to add that the local population felt helpless since the
monkey is one of the gods in the Hindu pantheon and it would be
sacrilegious to kill or to use violence against them. Instead, the people were
feeding them bananas. The monkeys, it seems, were in charge in New
Delhi.
Quaint stories from exotic locales entertain, amuse and titillate readers.
The media presents images, such as those of monkeys in Delhi, but we
breathe life into them by attaching stories and constructing narratives that
interpret and give them meaning and significance. One neighbour, a white
Canadian teacher, asked, “Is it really true?” Perhaps the story brought to her
mind an image of a monkey sitting on a high-backed leather chair with a
large desk between him and a cowering human. Or perhaps she imagined
monkeys prancing on desks and filing cabinets while trembling
bureaucrats peeked meekly from doorways at what were once their offices.
Such misrepresentations of India constantly provide new stories to the
public that reinforce pre-existing negative images and at the same time
undermine a sense of self and culture of immigrants “here” in Canada. India
thus functions as a framework and regulates the construction of
transplanted identities in the Diaspora.
Reading the story of the monkeys (while sitting in my house in a more or
less white neighbourhood in Toronto) evoked a range of associations,
emotions and memories. The child in me remembered hearing bedtime
stories in Delhi from the Ramayana in which Hanuman, a monkey god, and
his army of monkeys helped Lord Rama rescue his wife Sita from the lair of
the demon Ravana. As a historian who studies India, I recalled that Indira
Gandhi’s first political act was to organize a “monkey brigade” when she
was a child. The children delivered messages between congress politicians
assembled in her grandfather Motilal Nehru’s sprawling house during the
nationalist movement (Frank 2001).
The immigrant in me, struggling for dignity and respect in her new home,
interpreted the story about the monkeys as one more example of media
racism. Frances Henry and Carol Tator (2002), among many others, have
studied media racism extensively and report on its pervasively derogatory
coverage of racialized immigrants. Stories convey ideas and norms that are
used by some people to construct the social world around them (4–5).
Media stories are significant, for they shape our sense of self and others;
they mediate our understanding of what it means to be an immigrant and a
racialized woman in a predominantly white society. Such stories construct
a binary between “us” (rational, objective, scientific and progressive
Westerners) and “them” (spiritual, superstitious, natural Indians). I
26
wondered whether the Indians referred to were out “there” in India or also
“here” in the Diaspora. Did stereotypes stay put within national borders and
boundaries or did they float around among countries and in the Diaspora?
My anguish in confronting such questions is relational, and is not
necessarily about India or Canada. Radhakrishnan says, “The home
country is not “real” in its own terms and yet it is real enough to impede
[Canadianization], and the “present home” is materially real and yet not real
enough to feel authentic” (2003, 123). The imagined India is not stable or
authentic; rather, in telling stories about India and in discussing its many
aspects, whether favourable or not, immigrants constantly envision and
re-imagine India in the changing social and political contexts of their lives
and circumstances. Such imagined Indias are one way of resisting the
consequences of racism and its threat to one’s dignity and self-respect.
Frustrated and disappointed, some immigrants become politicized and
ardent and uncritical supporters of their cultures of origin (128).
In his classic account Orientalism (1979) Edward Said argued that
scholars have constructed the East through their discourses by implicitly
using the practices of the West as a norm. The Orient has thus been depicted
as exotic and the “Other,” which is racist. In contrast to the articles by ABC
and CNN, Jhumpa Lahiri, a second-generation woman of Indian descent
born in America, views monkeys as a natural part of the environment and
not as exotic creatures. In “Interpreter of Maladies” (1999), Lahiri
describes the experiences of an American-born Indian family in India to
visit with parents. While there, the family takes a trip to a hill resort. As the
children walk toward the resort, they play with the monkeys they encounter,
shouting and screaming with laughter. Meanwhile, the parents attempt to
record the moment in a photograph until one of the children is finally
bruised by the animals. I interpret the monkeys in the story as a symbol of
India. Interwoven with other themes are the young wife and mother’s
unresolved issues of identity and her growing doubts about the Indian
cultural norms that she has unreflectively adopted in America. She
mentally grapples with her inner ghosts about where and with whom she
belongs and who she is, but India and its people provide her with no easy
answers.
Immigrants use cultural memories to question dominant images,
perceptions, myths and fables about who they are and where they come
from; in other words, to question their origins, genealogy, and history. Since
identities and subjectivities differ, so do the stories that immigrants tell of
their experiences in the Diaspora. For example, second-generation students
— children of immigrants from India — who come to my courses at the
university are drawn to them by a desire to learn about their cultural heritage
and about origins that are a world away, but they tell me stories about their
families and homes here in Toronto. In these courses, the students and I
share origins, history, and skin colour, yet we may differ from each other in
27
age, gender, class, sexuality, religion and many other factors that mediate
our experiences. The second generation has grown up in the “ever-present
shadow” of racism that constitutes their subjectivity differently from that of
their immigrant parents (Mohanty 2003, 130). Consequently, the way they
imagine India differs significantly from immigrants’ memories of the
country.
The India that the students who attend my courses are usually familiar
with is the one that pervades their home environment — food, artefacts,
norms, beliefs — and inhabits the memories of their parents and grandparents. The cultural norms the students consider Indian are those that are
observed in various regional, linguistic and religious gatherings here in
Toronto in temples, mosques and Gurdwaras. Some of the students are avid
fans of Bollywood movies and Bhangra music from Britain, and frequent
the Indian bazaars located in various parts of Toronto. Others participate in
Indian student associations at the university or in the youth clubs of various
South Asian organizations. The India that I intend to discuss, however,
relates to the geographical one and to its colonial history, contemporary
politics and social movements. Since the students’and my imagined Indias
differ, our understandings collide in the classroom, and it frequently
becomes difficult to maintain a boundary between the India here and there.
Radhakrishnan argues that a significant difference between
first-generation immigrants and their children is the emotional investment
in India. The children may wish to acquire knowledge about their origins
and history but, unlike their parents, they are not psychologically attached
to the country or to its regional, linguistic and religious cultures. My
second-generation students share information with me about India, but our
interpretations often differ. Our conflicting perspectives provide an
opportunity for us to learn that there is no one among us who tells the whole
“truth” or represents the one “authentic” India. Rather, we discover
together that there are multiple representations and interpretations of India
and Indian culture that are “products of history and not subjective
substitutes for history” (Radhakrishnan 2003, 125).
Culture is not unchanging and transmitted “vertically” from one
generation to another. It is also worked out “horizontally” between
communities across lines of gender, class, and sexuality (Lowe 2003, 132).
When students share stories of India in the classroom, they begin to
recognize common patterns of socialization, class and gender hierarchies in
the home and in the larger society. They also reflect on the significance of
their encounters with racism. Through these stories, the second generation
begins to construct and imagine a culture — not as an idealized form that is
inherited in some immutable way from “over there” — but as practised and
lived in the everyday “here” in Canada.
28
The difference between immigrants and their second-generation
children is captured in Diane Mehta’s poem:
Countries have no sympathy; only praises
amplified like distances for the newer
land; the housing gauntlets we had to enter;
Stripped but with freedom!
Standards change like faith in a foreign country:
Did you pledge allegiance to lawns and fences,
better lives for us; the best western education?
Neighbors take the place of extended families,
freedom expires
(qtd in Maira 2002, 1)
Identities, Subjectivities and Community
Identities are not a matter of fixed and stable selves; rather, they result from
recontextualization and travel. For example, the public’s consciousness of
Canada’s ethnic and racial diversity has changed significantly in the last 30
years. Today, for example, few people at university would ask a racialized
immigrant, “Where do you come from?” yet this question was common 30
years ago. When I first meet white Canadians today, they usually do not
enquire about my origins directly because they are wary of being
misunderstood. They think I might interpret their query to mean that the
colour of my skin indicates to them that I am not a Canadian. Nevertheless,
they might ask questions about the city in which I was born or where I
received my early education. Such queries are sometimes instigated by
their having travelled to India and wanting to share their memories with me.
If such acquaintances happen to be in their mid-50s, they sometimes share
nostalgic memories of travelling to Nepal immediately after graduating
from university, or living in houseboats in Kashmir, or being beach bums in
Goa.
These acquaintances focus on subjects that make me feel good about my
origins and birthplace. They may talk of the temple sculptures of Khajuraho
that date back to the 10th century or the paintings and frescoes by Buddhist
monks in the Ajanta and Ellora caves that were done from 200 BC to 600
AD. They are considerate and do not go on about being emotionally
assaulted by the crowds in India, and I, too, am polite and do not talk of
hippies, the drug culture that Western visitors contributed to, or the dreams
of nirvana that took white Westerners to India. My dilemma, nevertheless,
is to find an intellectually satisfactory explanation that would reconcile
India’s glorious past with its inglorious present.
Over the years, friends and students in Canada have asked me countless
questions about India, though their thrust changes with time and social
29
context. For example, when an Indian writer living in Canada or in the
Diaspora publishes a novel, friends may enquire whether I have read it and
what I thought about it. Such casual conversations can create familiarity,
friendship and shared understanding. Novels about India present the
individual and family, community and nation in ways that flesh out the dry,
abstract, academic arguments of colonialism and poverty by evoking the
everyday lives of people, their moral and ethical dilemmas and their joys
and sorrows.
Some Indian writers living in the Diaspora, such as Salman Rushdie,
Vikram Seth and Rohinton Mistry, and some writers of South Asian origin
living in Canada, such as M.G. Vassanji, Anita Rau Badami and Shyam
Selvadurai, have become well known to the Canadian reading public.
Although Rushdie is better known for The Satanic Verses (1992), which
earned him the fatwa, his best novel is thought to be Midnight’s Children
(1982), which won the Booker Prize and was later judged to be the best of
the Bookers in 25 years. Midnight’s Children discusses the social, political
and economic situation of India since independence, while The Satanic
Verses goes back and forth between India and the life of Indian immigrants
in Britain. Vikram Seth’s A Suitable Boy (1993) provides a kaleidoscope
view of contemporary India by discussing caste, Hindu-Muslim relations,
women, academics and the academy, the pretentiousness of middle-class
Westernized Indians and so on. Rohinton Mistry lives in Toronto and has
received many accolades nationally and internationally for his writing.
Although he does refer to the racism encountered by immigrants, he focuses
on India, particularly the Parsees in Mumbai (1987).
Mark Edmundson writes that reading is “nearly boundless in its
promise” and is “life’s grand second chance.” He notes:
All of us grow up once; we pass through a process of socialization.
We learn about right and wrong and good and bad from our parents,
then from our teachers or religious guides. Gradually we are
instilled with a common sense … [that] has been infused with all
that has been learned over time through trial and error, human
frustration, sorrow and joy …
People who often become obsessed readers … don’t read for
information, and they don’t read for beautiful escape. No, they
read to remake themselves. They read to be socialized again, not
into the ways of their city or village this time but into another world
with different values … They want to adopt values they perceive to
be higher or perhaps just better suited to their natures. (2004,
11–12)
I was invited to a book club meeting in an upper-class neighbourhood in
Toronto by a group of white, middle-aged women who were personally
known to me. All of the twelve women present had university educations
30
and were well travelled. They had been to resorts in the Caribbean, but they
had not ventured much outside them to get a sense of how the local people
lived. The group was to discuss Rohinton Mistry’s A Fine Balance (1995)
and thought I might help them understand the book. The novel refers to
India between 1975 and 1977, when Prime Minister Indira Gandhi
temporarily revoked democracy by proclaiming a national emergency.
(There are some parallels between what happened in India and what
happened in Canada in 1970 when Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau imposed
the War Measures Act, which gave sweeping powers to the government and
suspended civil liberties.) The plot of the novel revolves around a
middle-class single woman in Mumbai who has come down in life and is
forced to make a living by becoming a supplier of garments to a local
exporter.
The eighteen-month national emergency period in India robbed the
people of their democratic rights guaranteed by their constitution. Mistry’s
novel condemns dictatorship and critiques the measures instituted during
this time by the government. One of the government’s objectives was to
eradicate poverty by, for example, reducing the population pressure
through a draconian sterilization program. Another of its objectives was to
beautify the city by clearing — or rather bulldozing — slums. In doing so,
the government destroyed the meagre, makeshift dwellings of the very
poor, made them lose their few ragged clothes and cooking utensils and left
them completely homeless. Mistry describes the poor who, though illiterate
and powerless, nevertheless value democracy and their human rights. In
contrast, the novel portrays the middle-classes as being hypocritical,
complacent, pretentious and looking down upon the poor by imagining the
latter’s concerns to be only for food and survival. Mistry suggests that
human empathy can create enduring bonds between people with different
class, caste and gender identities. Although individuals encounter
horrendous personal tragedies such as the loss of livelihood, home and
loved ones, the emotional and moral support they lend to each other enables
them to survive.
The book club could have potentially discussed a variety of subjects —
the human dilemmas that cross national borders and boundaries, the
significance and meaning of human rights, the similarities between
Canadian and Indian politics and its leadership — or drawn comparisons
between democracy in Canada and India. Rather, the women focused on
poverty because they seemed bewildered by its extreme manifestation and
unable to comprehend the misery that it brings to people’s lives. They were
less interested, however, in the strength of character and dignity that
allowed the poor to struggle with and survive their hardships. They were not
impressed by the bonds of love and empathy among those who had little else
to share but whose encouragement of each other enabled them to live. The
novel was simply too foreign for them. Unable to overcome the social and
31
emotional distance between “us” and “them,” they had little insight into the
shared humanity that provides a common, if tenuous, link between all of us.
I did not have the presence of mind of Anita Desai, an India-born novelist
who lives in the Diaspora, to say:
My dear[s], true souls do not turn away from humanity or, if they
do, it is only to meditate and pray, then come back, fortified, to
embrace it — beggars, thieves, lepers, whoever — their sores,
their rags. They do not flinch from them, for they know they are
only the covering, the concealing robes of the soul, don’t you
know? (2000, 13)
The Diaspora has created rich possibilities of understanding different
histories that could potentially bridge the gap between “us” and “them” but
such opportunities are lost in the continuous focus on the negative aspects
of India rather than on the ingeniousness and agency of human beings. As a
diasporan citizen doing “double duty (with accountability both here and
there)” (Radhakrishnan 2003, 128), I want to present an image of India that
does not shy away from its poverty and numerous social problems, yet
communicate an understanding that is empathetic and honours their sense
of self, community and nation. But when an Indian immigrant talks about
India their physical self (persona) reinforce the belief that the individual is
foreign, immigrant, and not “really” Canadian. This intensifies the
individual’s feelings of not belonging and not being and feeling “at home.”
Returning Home
Those who live in the Diaspora but have their roots in India return home to
savour the sights and sounds already imprinted on their hearts, and they feel
nurtured and emotionally sustained. Nevertheless, they frequently have
conflicting and ambivalent feelings about themselves in relation to their
cultural roots in India: Are they insiders or have they, with the passing of
time, become outsiders? V.S. Naipaul writes:
India is for me a difficult country. It isn’t my home and cannot be
home; and yet I cannot reject it or be indifferent to it; I cannot travel
for the sights. I am at once too close and too far. (1977, ix)
Naipaul’s ancestors left the Gangetic plain in India a “hundred years
ago” to immigrate to Trinidad. In Trinidad, the Indians established
homogenous communities that sought to replicate the culture of the region
from which they had migrated by observing its daily practices, norms and
rituals. These communities remained detached from the cultures in which
they lived, and there was a social distance between them and the local
population. Naipaul’s early novels, like A House for Mr. Biswas (1969),
documented how the daily routine of Indians in Trinidad became
compartmentalized into the culture of the home versus the larger society. In
his acceptance speech for the Nobel Prize, Naipaul explains:
32
It was a remnant of our caste sense, the thing that excluded and shut
out. In Trinidad … that excluding idea was a kind of protection; it
enabled us — for the time being, and only for the time being — to
live in our own way and according to our own rules, to live in our
fading India. It made for extraordinary self-centeredness. We
looked inwards; we lived out our days; the world existed in a kind
of darkness; we enquired about nothing. (2003, 187)
Naipaul’s imagined India is a product of his experiences in Trinidad, the
rituals and norms observed by his family and kin, his student days at
Oxford, and his extensive reading of Indian culture, politics and society. In
1962, Naipaul went to India for the first time and was deeply disillusioned
because the country and its people were not what he had imagined. The
myriad cultures and religions he encountered in India were unlike the
idealized norm that he had read about and the fossilized culture that had
been maintained in Trinidad as “Indian.” In retrospect, he became critical of
the quaint, peaceful, rural setting described by the eminent novelist R.K.
Narayan because it was far from the distressing poverty he actually
witnessed. India: A Wounded Civilization (1977), also published as An Area
of Darkness, describes Naipaul’s travels there. As a result of his very critical
assessment of the country, the book was banned in India. Many years later,
Naipaul returned. India: A Million Mutinies Now (1991), which documents
his travels, is a more insightful and sympathetic account of its people.
In the introduction to India: A Wounded Civilization, Naipaul writes:
It has taken me much time to come to terms with the strangeness of
India, to define what separates me from the country; and to
understand how far the “Indian” attitudes of someone like myself,
a member of a small and remote community in the New World,
have diverged from the attitudes of people to whom India is still
whole... In India I know I am a stranger; but increasingly I
understand that my Indian memories, the memories of that India
which lived on into my childhood in Trinidad, are like trapdoors
into a bottomless past. (1977, ix–xi)
The imagined India thrives in the minds of millions of people within its
territory and in the Diaspora despite its poverty, inequities, turbulence and
tawdriness. There are innumerable ways to know India and to feel a sense of
belonging — or not. But just as individuals have various identities that are
contradictory and even internally incompatible, so can a country when
viewed from a thousand different locations and perspectives. Yet in all these
various and competing perceptions that differ in details and nuances there is
an essence — an idea of India — that many within the country can agree
upon (Rushdie 2002, 163–64). Such a perception may also find resonance
in the Diaspora.
Rushdie describes his feelings about home in “A Dream of a Glorious
Return” (2002). He was born in India and left in 1961 when he was thirteen
33
to attend a school in England, but he visited at regular intervals. The
political controversy over The Satanic Verses led the Indian government to
deny Rushdie a visa for twelve years. India, Rushdie writes, was the first
country to ban the book, prevent the importation of A Moor’s Last Sigh and
refuse to allow the filming of Midnight’s Children in India by the BBC. He
feels aggrieved and betrayed by these acts and yet says that “in spite of
everything that has happened between India and myself, in spite of the
bruises on my heart, the hook of love is in too deeply to pull out” (Rushdie
2002, 183).
Rushdie’s visit to India in 1997, which is documented in “A Dream of
Glorious Return,” was made on the occasion of one of his books (whose
title is not identified by him) being shortlisted for the Commonwealth
Writers’ Prize. The ceremonies for the prize were to be held in Delhi.
Accompanied by his son, Zafar, Rushdie enthusiastically showed the boy
historic monuments such as the Red Fort and the Taj Mahal, and some of the
sites in which he has located his fictional characters, so that his son could
begin the “process of making his own portrait of it [India], which may
unlock in him an as yet unknown other self” (2002, 188). Together, father
and son visited the small city of Solan in the Shimla Hills. There, Rushdie’s
paternal grandfather had acquired a summer house in the 1930s, which was
later gifted to Rushdie by his father on his 21st birthday. In 1986, the state
government of Himachal Pradesh peremptorily took over the house and
only after several years of litigation did Rushdie reacquire it. In 1997, he
had not been to Solan since he was twelve years old, yet when he arrived
there he felt, “I’m home.” In an emotional meditative reverie he talks to his
father:
You see Abba [father], I have reclaimed our house. Four
generations of our family, living and dead, can now forgather
there. One day it will belong to Zafar … In a family as uprooted and
far flung as ours, this little acre of continuity stands for a very great
deal. (2002, 200)
That year, the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize went to J.M. Coetzee.
Later, at the reception, Rushdie was greeted by friends with “Welcome
home.”
My heart overflows. I had not really dared to expect this, had been
infected by the fears of the police, and had defended my heart
against many kinds of disappointment. Now I can feel the defenses
falling away one by one, the happiness rising like a tropical dawn,
fast and brilliant and hot. There are few such moments in a lifetime
… It is a rare thing to be granted your heart’s desire. (2002, 207)
India is Rushdie’s creative muse. In his novels, the characters are always
leaving to go to the West, but Rushdie returns, time and time again, to locate
his stories in India. “This, perhaps, is what it means to love a country: that its
34
shape is also yours, the shape of the way you think and feel and dream. That
you can never really leave” (2002, 180).
Notes
1.
2.
See <http://www.CNN.com>, 2 Nov. 2003.
See <http://www.ABCnews.com>.
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August 2.
36
Subha Xavier
Exiled Metaphors:
Woman and Nation in Three Novels by Ying Chen
Abstract
In a quest to construct collective identity, nationalist rhetoric often relies on
metaphors to bind individuals to geographic spaces. Transcending
boundaries and peoples, the shadow of “home” is thus far-reaching and
ever-extending. In many cases, this linguistic process involves a figuration of
woman as mother, lover or daughter of the nation. Recent fiction by
Chinese-Canadian migrant writer Ying Chen can be read as engaging with
this discourse of nationalism, calling into question these metaphoric
constructions of womanhood. This paper examines Chen’s use of poetic
language in her first three novels: The Memory for Water (1992), Chinese
Letters (1993) and Ingratitude (1995). Each can be read as a story of
disruption and displacement within the national narrative that serves to
unhinge the metaphors created to give meaning to the nation. In so doing, the
author proposes that Chen’s writing enters into a provocative dialogue with
nationalism and its feminist critiques.
Résumé
Dans une tentative de construction de l’identité collective, la rhétorique
nationaliste fait souvent appel à des métaphores pour lier les individus à des
espaces géographiques. Transcendant les frontières et les peuples, l’ombre
du « foyer » a donc une grande portée et elle s’étend toujours. Dans bien des
cas, ce processus linguistique suppose une représentation de la femme comme
mère, amante ou fille de la nation. Ainsi, il est possible de lire les œuvres de
fiction récentes de l’écrivaine migrante sino-canadienne Ying Chen comme
des œuvres mobilisatrices comportant ce discours de nationalisme – des
œuvres qui remettent en question ces constructions métaphoriques de la
féminité. Dans le texte qui suit, nous étudions l’utilisation que fait Chen de la
langue poétique dans ses trois premiers romans: La Mémoire de l’eau (1992),
Lettres chinoises (1993) et L’Ingratitude (1995). Chacun d’eux peut être
compris comme l’histoire d’une perturbation et d’un déplacement à
l’intérieur du récit national, une histoire qui sert à démonter les métaphores
créées pour donner un sens à la nation. Ce faisant, l’auteure laisse entendre
que les écrits de Chen entrent dans un dialogue provocateur avec le
nationalisme et ses critiques féministes.
Ying Chen, one of the recent immigrant voices to emerge out of Quebec, is
fast becoming a mainstay on the Canadian literary landscape. Born in
Shanghai, Ying Chen immigrated to Montreal in 1989 and moved to
Vancouver in 2003. Since her arrival in Canada, she has published six
31, 2005
novels as well as several short stories and essays that have competed for
illustrious Canadian and French prizes, including the 1995 Governor
General’s Award. In 1995, her third novel, Ingratitude (L’Ingratitude,
1995), won both the Prix Fémina and the Quebec-Paris Prize, followed by
three more prizes in 1996: the Prix des Lectrices Elle (Quebec), the
Canadian Writers Association Award and the Prix Louis-Hémon par
l’Académie de Languedoc. A prolific novelist, essayist, short-story writer
and poet, Chen’s work can now be found on the shelves of every
French-Canadian bookstore under the heading “Québécois literature.”
Yet while we insist on adorning her with a crown of maple leaves or
fleurs-de-lis, Chen’s first three novels are repeatedly engaged in the
retelling of a story in and about China. The picture Chen paints of her
country of origin in these novels, The Memory of Water (La Mémoire de
l’eau, 1992), Chinese Letters (Lettres chinoises, 1993) and Ingratitude, is a
troubled one wherein a lingering darkness questions the very essence of
Chinese nationhood. It is telling, however, that while Chen’s novels have
been translated into a host of European languages including Polish and
Serbian, they have to date stayed clear of any Asian language versions, as if
to emphasize the importance of a Western readership. In fact, Chen has
chosen not to translate her French novels into her mother tongue even while
she continues to write fiction in Chinese. French Canadians, like the French
themselves, are then among the first readers to whom Chen has chosen to
expose both the beauty of Chinese culture and the horror of Chinese
nationalism. Central to the critique that Chen directs against nationalism in
her country of origin is a sympathetic, if not neutral, Western audience. Her
celebration of Chinese culture is also designed for those in whom its
foreignness resounds. As such, Chen’s evocative French prose captures the
Canadian immigrant experience as one that straddles two cultures and
nations, where integration involves repeatedly relating to one the story of
the other, in search of recognition and acceptance. In her first three novels
Chen thus engages with the rhetoric of nationalism in China but also makes
her mark in Canada’s national story as a voice from within that explores and
unravels the meaning of nationhood.
Definitions of nationalism abound in critical theory, from Ernest Renan’s
“daily plebiscite”1 to Benedict Anderson’s “imagined communities,”2
Richard Handler’s ideology of “individuated being”3 and Michael
Hechter’s nationalism as “collective action.”4 These and many other
theories of nationalism attempt to explain the rise of the nation and the
colossal sacrifices that are made in its name, as well as account for its
various forms throughout history. However, each locates the founding
premises of nationalism in a will to action that is born of competing
paradigms. Renan understood nation as a spiritual principle that was the
expression of shared suffering in the past and individual commitment in the
present. Anderson, while influenced by Renan, substituted the imagined for
38
Exiled Metaphors:
the spiritual. Anderson’s definition points not only to the nation’s
conceptual underpinnings but also to the creative use of language that
ensues. Handler, on the other hand, places possessive individualism at the
heart of his theory, whereas Hechter prefers to emphasize the political
choices that characterize an entire body of people. Others, like John
Breuilly, carefully delineate nationalism’s ties with the oppositional
political movements that act on its behalf.5 Finally, Ernest Gellner, whose
contribution to the theory of nationalism cannot go unmentioned,
constructs a definition based on shared cultural assumptions and voluntary
recognition.6
The search for a viable definition of nationalism is fraught with the
complexities of language and the contradictions inherent to the nationalist
project. While theories of nationalism thus diverge in many respects, most
definitions nonetheless revolve around a conceptualization of a collective
existence within a national space. Anderson conceives of this space as one
conjured up in the name of an “imagined communion”: “It is imagined
because the members of even the smallest nation will never know most of
their fellow-members, meet them, or even hear of them, yet in the minds of
each lives the image of their communion” (1991, 6).
This very space, theorized by Anderson and others, becomes
problematic when taking into account the uprooted, the exiled and the
migrant: those who evade its grasp. Though they are included in the
imagination of the nation, these are conflicted subjects who may opt to shift
their allegiances or even reject their community of origin. In turn,
nationalism looks to fill this gap as it beckons its people home, to one land
and one community.
Such is the rallying cry of the nation, which, in seeking to recreate what
never was, couches that plea in the language of metaphor. Loss is replaced
by language and distance bridged by image. Hence, transcending
boundaries and peoples, nationalism’s metaphoric reality is more difficult
to escape, as the shadow of home reconceptualized is both far-reaching and
ever-extending. The nation casts its shadow across political and geographic
boundaries to include even its furthest diasporic subject. As Homi K.
Bhabha aptly tells us in his critique of nationalism: “Metaphor, as the
etymology of the word suggests, transfers the meaning of home and
belonging, across the ‘middle passage’, […] those distances and cultural
differences, that span the imagined community of the nation-people”
(1994, 139).
No longer “land” but “motherland”; no longer “community” but
“family”; these metaphors summon back nationalism’s wandering
offspring. Woman in turn is asked to assume a metaphoric role as mother to
the nation. A lesson in identity, understood not as distinctness but as
similarity, pervades this mother’s call to her young, for the fissures between
39
the nation and its so-called people now stand as a rhetorical figure for their
common past. Bhabha qualifies this non-sequential narrative as the
“metaphoricity of the people of imagined communities,” which “moves
between cultural formations and social processes without a centred causal
logic” (1994, 142). Bhabha’s neologism helps in locating nationalism’s
fictive logic in the play of language. Metaphor alters meaning through a
transformative leap that crosses many divides to unite people in a gesture
reliant upon the poetic propensity of language. The writing of Ying Chen,
through its own vivid poetry, can be read as a challenge to this reliance on
metaphoric language.
Contrary to nationalism’s call, Chen’s first three novels continually
re-enact the scene of a departure rather than a return home, as each of her
three female characters—Lie-Fei in The Memory of Water, Sassa in Chinese
Letters and Yan-Zi in Ingratitude—resist the roles that are attributed to
them by Chinese tradition. Feminist critiques of nationalism are thus a
useful lens through which to interpret Chen’s writing; they provide a
framework whereby the subversive nature of this prose becomes evident.
Like the “fugues” envisioned by Julia Kristeva in her effort to capture the
“harrowing otherness” of the foreigner (1991, 3), Chen’s themes of identity,
origin and exile resurface time and time again, weaving themselves through
the stories of her characters. Each of these novels repeatedly recounts a
story of Chinese womanhood that is gradually deconstructed to reveal
emptiness and brokenness at its core. One after the other, her characters
relive the agonizing plight of the migrant told by Chen in a poignant poetry
of broken metaphors.
The Memory of Water is the story of Lie-Fei, a Chinese woman born in
1907 under the reign of the last emperor. Her memories, given testimony
through her granddaughter, span the end of a dynasty, years of Japanese rule
and a puppet government in Southern Manchuria. From civil war to
communist rebellion and liberation, Mao’s Cultural Revolution and the fall
of the Gang of Four, Lie-Fei remains a foreigner in her own land. As the title
of the novel suggests, Lie-Fei’s memories of social and political change are
likened to water running by, around her and through but never quite
carrying her away in its constant stream. Throughout these many historical
changes, Lie-Fei carefully refuses allegiances to all sides. Her life is a
strange unhinging of national manifestos of feminine repression, be it the
feudal binding of women’s feet under the old Chinese dynasties or the
emancipation of women through factory work under communism.
The character of Lie-Fei is a cynical glance at the place of woman in
nationalism’s discourse. Nira Yuval-Davis argues that women are required
to carry the “burden of representation” in nationalist discourse in that “they
are constructed as the symbolic bearers of the collectivity’s honour” (1997,
45). This is the burden that Lie-Fei inherits at the tender age of five when her
40
Exiled Metaphors:
mother offers her feet as a “beautiful” example of female sacrifice in a
feudal China:
Un peu plus tard, la mère lui prit les mains et les dirigea vers ses
propres pieds. Lie-Fei put enfin caresser ces petits pieds dont
l’image la hantait depuis longtemps. Étourdie par le bonheur
soudain, ou surprise qu’il lui ait été donné si facilement, elle se
reprocha de ne pas avoir vraiment éprouvé ce qu’elle s’était
s’attendue à éprouver au contact des pieds de sa mère. En effet, elle
n’avait senti que l’os dur comme le bois, et déformés à l’intérieur
des très belles chaussures colorées.
(A little later, the mother took her child’s hands and directed them
toward her own feet. Lie-Fei could finally caress those little feet,
an image that had haunted her for so long. Overcome with sudden
happiness, or surprised that it was so easily granted, she chided
herself for not truly feeling what she had expected to feel at the
contact of her mother’s feet. Indeed, she had only felt hard, wooden
bones, deformed but hidden inside very colourful shoes.) (MW,
12–13)7
Lie-Fei, obviously unimpressed by these disfigured feet, has to lie to her
mother who, only in the sadness of shared sacrifice, shows the first and sole
signs of maternal affection. When asked if she finds her mother’s feet
beautiful, little Lie-Fei responds with a rather unconvincing “yes.” The
practice of foot-binding in the early years of the twentieth century was
mostly prevalent among the Chinese gentry where women were called upon
to safeguard the honour of bloodline by binding their feet to mark their
families as nobility. As Kumari Jayawardene points out in her study of
feminism and revolutionary struggles in China: “This was supposed to be a
sign of beauty, but in effect it prevented the mobility of women and
reinforced their subordination” (1986, 178). “Woman” is here the bearer of
signs, the custodian of identity, called by metaphor to her greater social
purpose. Her physical sacrifice in Chinese feudal society is beautified by
language as the practice’s significance is conveyed to the little Lie-Fei in a
mysterious trope that she will spend much of her life trying to unravel:
-Tout à l’heure, au lit, on va t’enserrer les pieds! annonça maman
Ai-Fu d’un ton tout excité.
-Pourquoi?
-Mais pour les rendre beaux!
-Beaux comme quoi?
-As-tu vu les pieds de ta mère?
-Ils ne sont pas beaux.
-Hum! Alors tes pieds seront beaux comme des lotus.
-Qu’est-ce que c’est, des lotus?
-Ce sont des fleurs.
41
- Soon, when you are in bed, we will bandage your feet! announced
Mama Ai-Fu enthusiastically.
- Why?
- To make them beautiful, of course!
- Beautiful like what?
- Did you see your mother’s feet?
- They are not beautiful.
- Hum! Then your feet will be as beautiful as the lotuses.
- What are lotuses?
- They are flowers.) (13)
In a later conversation Lie-Fei’s nurse Ai-Fu, who is not a woman of noble
blood, suggests a faulty comparison between the bound feet of noble
women and the lotus flower. Lie-Fei will have to wait to be married and far
from her childhood home before this hidden metaphor comes to life:
Maman Ai-Fu s’était donc trompée : On voulait que ses pieds
ressemblent aux racines et non aux fleurs de lotus.
(Mama Ai-Fu had thus made a mistake: they had wanted her feet to
resemble the roots and not the flowers of the lotus.) (59)
The tiny feet of Chinese women are not meant to be beautiful lotus flowers,
floating frailly on the river. They are the roots of the lotus flower, deeply
anchored in the muddy waters of tradition and preventing the national
flower from wandering too far. As a grown woman, Lie-Fei makes this
discovery as her husband’s doctor recommends lotus roots to cure his
severe case of pneumonia. Lie-Fei’s granddaughter and the narrator
therefore follows with: “Les raciness de lotus ne sauvèrent pas mon
grand-père” (“The lotus roots did not save my grand-father”) (59). Indeed,
those lotus roots had not saved anyone or anything: they were a symbol,
under the weight of which many women had succumbed in painful
obedience. Betty McLane-Iles dissects the role of the recurring motif of the
lotus:
…both loved and distrusted [the lotus] is the ultimate symbol of
sensuous beauty and delicacy while it is also a powerful reminder
of the continual unfolding of time, deception and pain. Hidden
embedded in the mud […] it both shields and represses a part of the
soul.” (1997, 223)
While McLane-Iles perfectly captures the double-sidedness of the flower in
The Memory of Water, Chen goes one step further to question its metaphoric
use as a source of female oppression. The protagonist, like the narrator,
exhibits a compulsive fascination with the painstakingly embroidered
shoes, which paradoxically masked women’s damaged feet.
As Jayawardene’s study of early twentieth-century feminism in China
shows, Chen’s condemnation of this ancient practice is not unlike that of
many Chinese feminist movements before her (1986, 178). The novelty of
42
Exiled Metaphors:
Chen’s approach lies in her questioning of the linguistic figures used to
convince women of the advantage of this practice, which exposes the ways
in which reassuring myths were concocted and propagated through
language to deceive. The Memory of Water is in this respect an unveiling of
the violence that is masked through the use of the symbolic, much like what
Kristeva calls the “sacrificial contract into which woman enters at once
reluctantly and willingly” (1986, 200). In “Women’s Time,” Kristeva
explores the function ascribed to woman in Lacan’s psychoanalytic
articulation of the entrance into language, the symbolic code of the father.
“Woman” is reticent to enter into the contract because she is aware of its
unnaturalness. By the same token, she is eager to enter into it because it
carries with it the promise of freedom and power. In nationalism, this power
is experienced in the responsibility conferred upon her to keep culture and
tradition, which transmit political identity. Of course, Kristeva is more
concerned with language than with the physical sacrifice entailed here, but
her contribution to Lacan’s thought is valuable to our study because she
takes up the role of woman in symbolic discourse and isolates it as one that
is ultimately contradictory.
Thus Chen craftily pits Lie-Fei’s mother against her father when it comes
time for Lie-Fei’s feet to be bound. Indeed, the operation stops with the
return of her father, much to the chagrin of her mother. The narrator tells us
that Lie-Fei’s mother is in tears over her husband’s decision, as per their
nurse Ai-Fu. Lie-Fei’s fate is sealed in great secrecy when her father
overrules his wife’s wish to integrate her daughter into the fold of tradition.
With poetic irony, Chen describes Lie-Fei’s disappointment at not being
able to wear the adorable multicoloured shoes that her aunts had given her in
anticipation of her sacrifice. During most of her life, however, Lie-Fie
suffers the embarrassment of her two medium-sized feet; although her feet
grow, their development is stunted by the first stages of the operation
undertaken upon her mother’s orders. Lie-Fei’s “big” feet are blamed for
the downfall of her family during the feudal regime, while she is stoned for
her “small” feudal feet during Mao’s cultural revolution. In a telling
reversal of metaphor, the Red Guards accuse small-footed women of
having “feudal mud” (MW, 103) in their heads, something Lie-Fei’s aunt
would corroborate in a poetic discussion with the narrator:
- Tante, nos anciens poètes disent que les fleurs de lotus sont
sorties de la boue en restant pures, est-ce vrai?
- […] On pourrait juger qu’elles sont laides ou qu’elles ne le sont
pas. Ça n’a rien à voir avec elles. Elles ne se forment pas
elles-mêmes. Ce qui les forme, c’est l’eau, ou plutôt le torrent qui
va et qui vient, en enlevant une boue qu’une autre remplacera.
(- Aunt, our ancient poets say that lotus flowers come out of the
mud and remain pure, is that true?
43
- […] We may think them ugly or not. That has nothing to do with it.
They do not form themselves. What forms them is the water, or
rather the constant ebb and flow that removes one mud to replace it
with another.) (99)
Lotus roots hence become the symbol of the many generations of Chinese
women shaped by the changing tides of nationalism. Rooted in strongly
evolving traditions, women are called upon not so much to act as to become
what Claudia Koontz calls the “national embodiment” (Yuval-Davis 1997,
45). As Deniz Kandiyoti points out in her analysis of contemporary
nationalisms, women represented in nationalist projects take many forms;
they may be “victims of social backwardness, icons of modernity or
privileged bearers of cultural authenticity” (1991, 431). Chen’s protagonist
in The Memory of Water takes on all three of Kandiyoti’s representations at
different times in the novel, as she is both a begrudging participant and a
critical witness of China’s various nationalist projects during the first half
of the twentieth century.
The story of Lie-Fei symbolically continues in the unhappy love story
between Yuan and Sassa in Chinese Letters. Chen’s second novel is an
epistolary one, and recounts the difficult relationship between two young
Chinese lovers separated by migration. Yuan immigrates to Vancouver and
then Quebec to pursue an education and forge a better life, all the while
awaiting the arrival of his fiancée Sassa who is left behind in Shanghai.
Although Sassa’s arrival in Montreal seems imminent at first, it becomes
less likely as the novel progresses. Instead, Sassa’s close friend Da Li
journeys to Quebec shortly after Yuan. Interspersed through the lovers’
letters are the letters between Da Li, a free-spirited young woman energized
by her migration, and Sassa, her wise friend in deteriorating health.
Chinese Letters is a novel about the fading love affair between Yuan and
Sassa, which is shown to mirror a greater conflict of political dimensions.
Hence the poem that is referred to in Chinese calligraphy on the cover of
Chinese Letters and reads:
Ballad on Climbing Youzhou Tower
I see no ancient faces ahead,
and behind me no coming ages.
Thinking of the vast eternity of time and space
I am sad and shed tears.8
Unbeknownst to the francophone reader of Ying Chen, this poem is the
culmination of the lovers’ story. The dying love affair between Sassa and
Yuan speaks the emptiness of the national story. Migration creates a
distance that cannot be bridged, a vacancy that cannot be filled. Yuan,
unhappy in his homeland, embraces adventure and embarks upon his
odyssey to Quebec. Sassa, also desirous of change and promising to join her
fiancé, cannot quite bring herself to leave the motherland. The parting of the
44
Exiled Metaphors:
lovers creates a void that their letters desperately seek to fill, evoking their
glorious past and looking ahead to a triumphant future, in the construction
of a nonexistent national space between them:
Oui, mon ange, j’ai pris ces deux photos de toi au printemps
pendant la floraison. Que tu paraissais simple, modeste et timide!
Tout comme les fleurs sans nom qui épanouissent à l’arrière-plan.
[…] Quand tu viendras, je t’emmènerai à la plage. Nous nous
étendrons l’un contre l’autre sur le tapis de sable, n’ayant devant
nos yeux qu’un ciel immense.
(Yes, my angel, I took these two photos of you in the Spring as the
flowers were blooming. How simple, modest and timid you
seemed! Just like the nameless flowers that were blooming in the
background. […] When you come, I will take you to the beach. We
will lie one against the other on a carpet of sand, with nothing but
the vastness of the sky before our eyes.) (CL, 57)
Appealing to the comforting images of past and future in its effort to
mask the impossible present, this language is reminiscent of Ernest Renan’s
definition of a nation as one where there is “sharing, in the past, [of] a
glorious heritage and regrets, and of having, in the future, [a shared]
programme to put into effect, or the fact of having suffered, enjoyed, and
hoped together” (1996, 41). Yet their letters inevitably point to the
hopelessness of a language that fails to reconcile the distance between
them. Even while Yuan conflates his love and his forsaken country into one,
as his fiancée is likened to the flowers that blossom in Shanghai, his
abstractions betray the distance that separates the lovers both temporally
and spatially. As Yuan dreams of lying one against the other on a carpet of
sand, he is reminded, almost despite himself, of a poem that suggests
another ending to his romantic reverie:
Comme dit un vieux poème :
Nos larmes coulent dans la solitude
Le ciel est loin et la terre immense
Inutile de chercher ici ou là
Nous n’aurons plus d’ancêtres, ni d’enfants.
(As an old poem goes:
Our tears flow in solitude
The sky is far and the earth is vast
It is needless to search here or there
We will have neither ancestors nor children.) (57–58)
The poem hints at the reality underlying Yuan’s words of love and desire,
and breaks apart the language to reveal what is missing in their relationship
and in the story of the nation. First, there is an inherent loneliness to the
nation as the communion that is imagined is precisely that, a fiction.
Second, it is impossible to define a space for their love; they are confronted
by the vast expanse that separates them. And as Handler points out, unless
45
its space can be delimited, there can be no nation.9 Finally, the poem evokes
the problem of lineage and of temporal continuity, again something
Handler considers vital to nationhood: “In principle the nation entity is
continuous: in time by virtue of the uninterruptedness of its history” (1988,
6).
Sassa also draws parallels between the lovers’ situation and that of the
nation. Upon receiving a red maple leaf from Yuan, she finds herself
humming a song praising the heroism of those soldiers sent to war against
Vietnam. Rather than a Canadian flag on which the maple leaf is firmly
emblazoned, Sassa recalls the crimson flag of the Republic of China and the
following poem:
Si je tombe sans pouvoir me relever
Si je ferme les yeux sans pouvoir les rouvrir,
Si c’est ainsi, n’insiste pas pour m’attendre,
Si c’est ainsi ne sois pas triste
Regarde le drapeau de la République
Où est imprégnée la splendeur de notre sang…
(If I fall and am unable to stand
If I close my eyes and am unable to reopen them
If it is thus, don’t insist on waiting for me
If it is thus do not be sad
Look at the Republic’s flag
Which bears the splendour of our blood) (119)
The maple leaf is stripped in this way of its symbolic value in one nation and
laden with a symbolism that befits another. This transference of national
meaning is significant as it points at once to the symbol’s failure across
physical boundaries and its arbitrariness. She does not know why she sings
the song or why she cries as she does so, only that she senses an implicit
death in the redness of the maple leaf, which reminds her of “la splendeur du
sang” (“the splendour of blood”). As Chinese blood thus taints the maple
leaf in this way, Chen creates for us a poignant moment where Canada’s leaf
must symbolically assume the death of the nationality that is renounced in
its favour. In other words, allegiance to one nation involves the sacrifice of
the other, which is metaphorically realized in Sassa’s disappearance from
the story world at the end of the novel.
Da Li’s character further provides an insightful contrast to Sassa because
she integrates, it seems, into Canadian society and falls in love with another
Chinese immigrant whose fiancée, much like Sassa, has been left behind.
Da Li’s love affair is a rejection of the past and the old ties to China; it is the
expression of her new life in Canada. She, like Yuan, partakes in a new
national identity but also describes herself as a plant without roots, arguing
that it is the stubborn insistence on roots that has led to so much historic
violence:
46
Exiled Metaphors:
Je les trouve les unes commes les autres laides, têtues, à l’origine
des préjugés, coupables de conflits douloureux, destructeurs et
vains.
(I find them [roots] all equally ugly, obstinate, the source of
prejudice, the cause of painful conflicts, destructive and vain.)
(65)
She is a wanderer who rejects all nationalisms including that of her home
country. Her effortless participation in Canadian life is coupled with a bitter
critique of the American way of life she sees around her, just as she remains
critical of her native China. At the end of the novel, Da Li announces her
departure for Paris, where she is to study history. Her emigration continues
regardless of national allegiances and cultural obligations.
Sassa, on the other hand, constantly reminds her friend of her true
cultural identity, warning Da Li of the dangers incurred by its loss. At the
same time, Sassa admits to a sense of “otherness” within her own country as
she explains in a letter to Da Li that her physical ailment is the price she pays
for her foreignness to the nation:
Au fond, je reste aussi déracinée que toi, même si je reste encore
sur cette terre où je suis née. […] Je suis née étrangère dans mon
propre pays. Et cela vaudrait une sentence beaucoup plus sévère.
Voilà pourquoi je souffre, Da Li. […] J’ai tellement mal au corps
que je ne sens plus ma douleur du cœur.
(In the end, I am just as uprooted as you are, even though I remain
in this land of my birth. […] I was born an outsider in my own
country. And that has been a far greater sentence. This is why I
suffer, Da Li. I am not well. […] My body is in so much pain that I no
longer feel my heartache.) (66)
Sassa is unable to get a passport to leave China, and no particular reason is
given in the novel to account for this discrepancy in Chinese emigration,
given that both Yuan and Da Li leave the country rather easily. The passport
appears as a leitmotif through Sassa and Yuan’s letters, as Sassa is
continuously refused one or the process of getting one is incessantly
delayed. As such, the passport may be construed as a symbolic mark of
betrayal to the motherland. The character’s anxiety over the passport
mirrors her feelings on exile. Alienated by the very country she cannot
abandon and to which she is also enchained, she longs to leave it.
An important parallel remains to be drawn here between Sassa and
Lie-Fei from The Memory of Water, since they are both characters that
ultimately refuse exile. While Sassa’s fiancé and Lie-Fei’s granddaughter
both leave China (Sassa for Canada and Lie-Fei for the United States),
Sassa and Lie-Fei stay anchored to their home country. Yet, in many ways
these two characters are far more defiant than the latter two: their resistance
comes from deep within the nation itself. Both Yuan and Lie-Fei’s
47
granddaughter reaffirm their ties to China after they leave: Yuan longs for
his fiancée from Montreal and Lie-Fei’s granddaughter feels no sense of
emancipation upon arriving in New York. Sassa and Lie-Fei, on the other
hand, are physically marred by their reluctant allegiance to the nation.
Again Kristeva’s complex female position in the founding of societies is
revealing here because woman is both attracted and repulsed by the
function she is called to assume (1986, 200). Sassa is eager to pursue her
love affair despite all the signs of its failure. (In fact, Da Li’s involvement in
Montreal with a betrothed Chinese man has the reader questioning Yuan’s
fidelity, because we wonder if Da Li’s young suitor is not in fact Sassa’s
migrant fiancé.) It is also Sassa who breaks off the relationship despite
pleading letters from Yuan and, perhaps, the imminent death that seems to
await her in the post-narrative world.
Sassa’s declining health reflects the deterioration of the relationship so
much so that Yuan’s last letters are sent to her in the hospital. Yuan finally
proposes the kite as a metaphor for himself, insisting that the strings that
determine his flight remain in his lover’s hands. Sassa replies by breaking
down the metaphor: the kite that cannot fly without its strings is like the idiot
who, having found a way to make a hole in the wall that imprisons him,
thinks himself lost when that same wall is removed. In her last words to
Yuan, she simply writes:
Un cerf-volant par terre ne vaut plus rien. Et puis, je n’aime pas
beaucoup les idiots. Adieu, Yuan.
(A kite on the ground is not worth anything. And, I don’t care much
for idiots. Goodbye Yuan.) (140)
The heartbreaking end to Sassa and Yuan’s love story can be read as a sad
commentary on nationalism’s attempts at the impossible. As Sassa lies in
her hospital bed, she writes: “J’ai gardé la feuille pourpre que tu m’as
envoyée” (“I kept the purple leaf that you sent me”) (138), referring back
once more to that emblematic maple leaf. Migration thus disrupts their
shared national story, but it is Sassa who is intent on freeing her lover from
Chinese nationhood. After all, it is he who sent her the maple leaf as a sign of
his shifting loyalties; he is learning French, dressing in an American suit
and enjoying life in Montreal. He describes himself as a “nouveau-né”
(“newborn baby”) in Canada, while Sassa grows feeble in Shanghai.
Sassa’s letters to Yuan and Da Li point to the unworkable negotiation of
values and ideas across cultural and political boundaries and, ultimately, to
the futility of one nationalism’s pursuit over another.
Chinese Letters is the only one of Chen’s novels to directly engage with
Canadian nationhood. The characters of Yuan and Da Li are Canada’s
immigrant voices, struggling to fit in and yet grateful for the opportunities
for success that this country promises. Though Yuan complains of the
loneliness of immigration, he writes proudly of his single apartment in
48
Exiled Metaphors:
Montreal and the luxury of his private bath. Da Li condemns the loss of
family values in Quebec after the Quiet Revolution but is enthused by the
solitary journey she has embarked upon in Canada, far from her kin. Just as
Yuan sends a dried maple leaf to his lover back in China as a symbol of his
newfound life, he brings with him to Canada a sense of loss, having left
behind both his love and land. Da Li writes excitedly of new love and then
painfully of her sense of exclusion and foreignness in Montreal. Chen
paints a picture of Canadian nationhood that is burdened with
contradictions. The feelings of doubt, guilt and suffocation that one
nationalism sparks are carried into the other. The pull of Canadian
nationhood in the mind of the migrant is above all the freedom it affords
from another nation despite the nation’s own shortcomings. This is
apparent in Yuan’s decision to stay in Montreal even without his lover, and,
ultimately, Chen’s decision to make Canada her country of residence even
while writing about China and the difficulties of integration in Canada.
The end of the love affair in Chinese Letters exiles Yuan from his woman
and, by extension, his land, but Sassa in turn is exiled from her body as she
grows increasingly sickly as the novel progresses. Without Yuan, Sassa is
left almost unprotected and thus succumbs to death, at least in the narrative
sense. This is reminiscent of what many feminist critiques of nationalism
posit as a relationship of dependency that confers power to the male
protector over the protected woman.10 Since it is she who has failed to
assume her role within the “imagined community”—it is she who ends the
love affair, it is she who relents and destroys the futile hopes of her distant
lover—Sassa’s voice is slowly silenced. When Yuan asks, “Est-ce que tu as
besoin de moi, Sassa?” (“Do you need me Sassa?”) (137), the reply
stubbornly comes back as, “Non, ne viens pas. Ça ne sert à rien” (“No, do
not come. There is no use”) (138). Yet Sassa’s illness and perhaps even her
death are more than a mere sacrifice to the will of an ideology, more than a
decision to rupture the relationship and let go of some metaphoric “kite” of
nationalism. For in giving this dying character such defiance in her speech,
Ying Chen also resurrects a feminine revolt in the character of Sassa, who,
while attached to her land and traditions, is not afraid to expose the artifice
behind the metaphor and the power of nationalist discourse. The weakening
of her body is the price she pays for her disobedience and her refusal to
partake in the language and ultimately the power that is ascribed her as
custodian of the nation.
In Chen’s continuing “fugue” of sadness and rebellion in the face of
nationalism, Yan-Zi retells Sassa’s story from beyond the grave in the third
of Chen’s novels, Ingratitude, a harrowing story of suicide. Yan-Zi is her
mother’s only daughter and the only child her parents had had. Her father
was once a well-known scholar, who, after a serious truck accident, was
reduced to a debilitating silence. Though he had never had much of a role in
his daughter’s life, his accident rendered him completely ineffectual. Her
49
father’s indifference gives full reign to a mother Yan-Zi deems despotic and
cruel. According to Yan-Zi, her mother had wanted a child in her own
image, one who would love, obey and respect her every wish, one who
would remain with her and by her, much like the birds she had reared before
her daughter’s birth. Stifled, oppressed and rejected by a mother who shows
her no real affection, Yan-Zi chooses suicide as her final revenge:
Je brûlais d’envie de voir maman souffrir à la vue de mon cadavre.
Souffrir jusqu’à vomir son sang. Une douleur inconsolable. La vie
coulerait entre ses mains et sa descendance lui échapperait.
(I was burning with the desire to see mom suffering at the sight of
my corpse. Suffering to the point of vomiting blood. An
inconsolable pain. Life would flow out of her hands and her
progeny would evade her.) (I, 16)
Ingratitude is thus the gripping tale of a frightful relationship between
mother and daughter, inscribed in hateful love and doomed to impossible
reconciliation. The novel plays out the destructive consequences of
woman’s role as biological and cultural reproducer of the nation
(Yuval-Davis 1997, 116). Yan-Zi’s life story is a stark expression of the
violence inherent to nationalism. What should be a meaningful bond
between mother and child is hence drawn out to horrific lengths, where the
one solace available to Yan-Zi becomes the tragic loss of her mother’s only
child.
In Yan-Zi’s family dynamic, she is described as “fire,” while her mother
is “water” and her father “oil.” Three elements incapable of concordance,
they are each estranged from the other and condemned to an inescapable
solitude. Her father, unresponsive and distant, is cited by Yan-Zi as the
reason for the family disharmony and her premature death:
Si seulement papa avait pu partager un peu avec moi l’énorme
responsabilité de rendre heureuse cette femme qui avait tant fait
pour moi et pour lui, j’aurais pu respirer et peut-être vivre plus
longtemps. Hélas, papa était fait d’huile et gardait comme elle une
frontière avec l’eau, en poussant le feu vers la folie.
(If only dad had shared a small part of my enormous responsibility
to make this woman happy, this woman who had done so much for
me and for him, I could have breathed and perhaps lived longer.
Alas, dad was made of oil and maintained, like oil is wont to do, a
barrier with water, while pushing fire towards madness.) (30)
The figure of her father is developed as a ghostly presence, silently seated in
his tomblike office, pretending to read the pages of a book that only gusts of
wind turn over from time to time. “Il me regardait comme s’il ne me
connaissait pas” (“He looked at me as if he did not know me”) (30), says
Yan-Zi of her father’s unrecognizing stare, adding a little later, “le vide
dans son regard sur moi ne serait jamais rempli” (“The emptiness of his gaze
50
Exiled Metaphors:
upon me would never again be filled) (31). The vacancy in his eyes had
increased since the accident and, in Yan-Zi’s words, seemed to take over his
body like an unhealed wound (31). Her father’s corpse-like existence is a
disturbing image of masculine impotency in the face of feminine crisis. In
Yan-Zi’s father, the role traditionally ascribed to the masculine and the
paternal within nationalism collapses. The land is left unprotected and
unguarded against the enemy who now infiltrates from within: “C’était bien
lui qui m’avait créée, en quelque sorte, une ennemie” (“It was indeed he
who had created me into an enemy of sorts”) (30). He is able to neither
defend nor ensure peace and is the first to experience the foreignness of the
home. This character undoes the national story from within; his silence is
that of the outsider uncovering the void and slowly succumbing to its
ineffable nature. Yan-Zi tells us that at one time he had been a “joueur des
mots” (“one who played with words”) (31), a writer and a debater, but
concludes, “Hélas, il n’écrivait plus et ne parlait presque plus” (“Alas, he
did not write anymore and barely ever spoke”) (32).
The conflict between Yan-Zi and her mother can be interpreted in light of
our analysis as that which embodies the broken relationship of the nation to
its subjects. Theirs is a story of resistance dating back to Yan-Zi’s very
conception in her mother’s womb. The importance attributed to the womb,
as we shall see in this novel, is evocative of what Cynthia Enloe terms
“nationalist wombs,” thereby calling attention to women’s role as
metaphoric mothers of the nation (1990, 54). Tied to her mother by her
mother’s sense of ownership rather than her own sense of belonging,
Yan-Zi wants a way out, a chance to loosen the restrictive bonds of
motherhood, but her mother’s perception of maternity is one tied to destiny
and physical obligation:
-J’ai envie d’être moi, maman.
-Tu ne peux pas être toi sans être ma fille.
-Je suis d’abord moi.
-Tu as vécu d’abord dans mon ventre.
[…] Dès qu’on met au monde un enfant, on est condamné à vie. Tu
sais, on est condamné à garder cet enfant. Même si notre esprit veut
repousser cet enfant, notre corps le demande.
(- I long to be me, mom.
- You cannot be yourself without being my daughter.
- I am me first and foremost.
- You lived first and foremost in my stomach.
[…] As soon as one brings a child into this world, one is
condemned for life. You know, one is condemned to keep that child.
Even if our spirit wants to reject that child, our body demands that
we keep it.) (133–34; emphasis added)
Ying Chen thus shatters the metaphor of motherhood in the story of Yan-Zi.
Instead of a gentle beckoning, this mother forces her child into sacrificial
51
obedience. Much like the birds she was named after, Yan-Zi is caged by the
duties forced upon her. Her mother’s body becomes a frightening symbol of
incarceration and fatality. The scar across her mother’s stomach reminds
her of the violence of her birth, and the maternal womb is marked with the
poison of death: “Elle avait sur son ventre une ligne foncée en forme de
serpent” (“She had on her stomach a dark line in the form of a serpent) (19).
This dark line of maternal sacrifice calls out to Yan-Zi as her inevitable and
inexorable destiny:
Mais la ligne foncée sur ce ventre étranger me criait en pleine
figure : Tu ne peux pas m’échapper, c’est moi qui t’ai formée, ton
corps et ton esprit avec ma chair et mon sang—tu es à moi,
entièrement à moi!
(But the dark line on this stranger’s stomach cried out to me: You
cannot escape me, it is I who formed you, your body and your mind
with my flesh and my blood—you are mine, completely mine!) (19)
Yan-Zi wishes she had never been born and even that she had died within
the womb that bore her. Instead, she remains ensnared, much like her
literary predecessors Lie-Fei and Sassa, by her own otherness to the nation
out of which she came forth.
All three of Ying Chen’s female characters reject the possessive gesture
that demands subservience of them, but they choose a form of exile that is
ultimately metaphorical rather than literal. They do not flee so much as
disappear, erasing themselves from discourse: Lie-Fei remains impassive
to the political changes that surround her, Sassa ceases her letter writing,
and Yan-Zi actually dies an accidental death rather than succeeding at
suicide. While these women, especially Sassa and Yan-Zi, are
insubordinate in speech, their actions bespeak a quiet retreat that neither
villainizes the nation nor sympathizes with its means. Their lives delicately
undo the metaphor from within, much like Chen’s prose does with its
effortless lucidity.
Yan-Zi’s mother’s sole concern in Ingratitude appears to be her
daughter’s education, through the avoidance of scandals, in order to ensure
her a decent marriage (21). Yet the transmittal of culture takes on a
totalitarian form, transforming motherhood into tyranny because the
sameness between the mother and daughter must necessarily override their
differences:
Je ne vous dois rien, maman, vous qui avez toujours l’ambition de
me faire vous ressembler, vous qui vivez partiellement dans mon
corps sans que je vous aie invitée et décidez en grande partie mon
destin!
(I don’t owe you anything, mom, you who always intended to make
me resemble you, you who partially live in my body without having
52
Exiled Metaphors:
been invited do so, and who determines my fate to a great extent.)
(23)
Such an emphasis on resemblance follows Handler’s explanation of
“national being” as defined by homogeneity encompassing diversity:
“However individual members of the nation may differ, they share essential
attributes that constitute their national identity” (1988, 6). As Partha
Chaterjee explains, this national identity nonetheless takes on an even
greater familial connotation within non-Western societies, where an anticolonial or anti-imperial nationalism emphasizes the importance of the
“inner” domain of the “family” in opposition to the West (1993, 6). The
“inner” spiritual community of the family must bear common resemblances
within itself; that is, the community should be homogeneous so as to better
differentiate itself from the West. It is this family sanctum that is then at
stake from Yan-Zi’s mother’s perspective, as her greatest fear is that her
disobedient daughter will become Westernized by choosing her own
husband, engaging in premarital sex and straying from the ways of
tradition.
Chaterjee’s model of non-Western nationalisms is helpful in describing
Chen’s relationship to Chinese nationalism, since all three of Chen’s female
characters in question are somehow ambivalent in their actions because of
the lingering threat of Westernization. All three of Chen’s novels, while
they critique the oppression caused by an essentially nationalist rhetoric
that permeates the characters’ relationships, are careful to ward off any
illusions of Western superiority on the reader’s part. In The Memory of
Water, Chen dedicates her penultimate chapter to a comparison between
women’s high-heeled shoes today and the ancient practice of foot-binding.
In Chinese Letters, Sassa reprimands Da Li for not behaving like a Chinese
woman; she quotes Confucius and compares her friend to “les
Occidentaux” (Westerners) who sacrifice long-term happiness to satisfy
their impatience (86). Likewise, Yan-Zi’s soul is condemned by Lord Nilou
to hover over the earth in castigation for her cultural treachery toward her
mother.
Yan-Zi’s death is a means of breaking the bonds of maternal oppression.
Like Lie-Fei and Sassa, Yan-Zi declines allegiance to her mother and thus
her nation carries a physical consequence. Yan-Zi’s death not only puts an
end to the family lineage and her mother’s cruelty but it also exiles the
character from her body and from life. “Tu t’engages dans une voie à sens
unique” (“You are embarking on a one-way journey”) (128) says her
mother, reminding her dead child of the irreversibility of her act. As the
nation grieves the child, lost to its own terror, Yan-Zi contemplates the
condition of exile from beyond the grave: “Je suis en exil maintenant. Le
retour est impossible” (“I am exiled now. Return is impossible”) (9). Yan-Zi
looks on her own funeral as Sassa did on her fading love affair and as
Lie-Fei’s granddaughter looks out upon the rank waters that drenched her
53
grandmother: each desperately wants to go back “home” for one brief
instant of nostalgia, just to be reminded once more of why they had to leave.
Against the backdrop of nationalism’s narrative, Chen’s exiled figure in
each of her first three novels stands in defiance of a call she will not answer.
Chen opens the void that language sought to fill and exposes the artifice
behind the metaphor. Nationalism’s metaphoric move is not only
abandoned but also disparaged by the foreignness it bears in the ear of she
who is “other.” Repetition, as Homi Bhabha makes clear, is the mechanism
that exposes language’s vacancy and nationalism’s fiction (1994, 165).
Likewise, we have shown how Chen uses repetition from one text to another
to reveal the void that underlies metaphors of womanhood as they pervade
nationalist rhetoric. One might argue that Chen’s body of texts appeals to a
poetry of the “anti-metaphoric” as defined by Abraham and Torok, later
taken up by Bhabha: “Similar to what Abraham and Torok describe as a
radical anti-metaphoric: ‘the destruction in fantasy’, of the very act that
makes metaphor possible— the act of putting the original oral void into
words, the act of introjection” (165).
Indeed, Chen’s work engages with theories of nationalism and
constitutes a provocative example of feminist and post-colonial critiques of
the national. The novelty of Chen’s style nonetheless lies in her ability to
unveil the violence that is implicit in the “imagination” of nationalism with
a prose that for all its anti-metaphoric work still manages to salvage for
itself an insightful sense of poetry.
As beautifully as nationalism creates its many beckoning metaphors, the
writing of Ying Chen hence breaks open this language of pretense. The
Memory of Water, Chinese Letters and Ingratitude are all stories of
disruption and displacement within the national narrative. Writing the
migrant and the experience of exodus, giving voice to the foreignness of
nationalism’s story, Ying Chen speaks for the woman in exile. Using the
many images that Chinese nationalism posits, Chen unveils the reverse side
of exemplified womanhood. She takes us through the reality of feminine
repression and sacrifice and the violence of a language that repeatedly
excludes the voice of the wife, the mother, the lover and the daughter. She
disturbs the metaphors of nationalism to point to their vacant centre and the
absence of the community they conjure up. Chen’s charge against Chinese
nationalism is also relevant for Canada’s sense of nationhood, created and
defined by immigrants. The migrant writer finds in Canada a safe haven
from whence to speak the trauma of another nation and, in so doing,
condemn all such attempts to salvage loyalty through subtle tools of
coercion. Lie-Fei, Sassa and Yan-Zi each embody the “other” against whom
the nation’s story writes itself. They are its broken metaphors, exposing the
ugly reality of oppression, darkness and violence inherent to nationalism:
54
Exiled Metaphors:
these women are the muddy roots, the sickly lovers and the murdered
children of the “nation.”
Notes
1.
Ernest Renan, “What is a Nation?” in Becoming National: A Reader, ed. Geoff
Eley and Ronald Grigor Suny (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press,
1996), 41–55.
2. Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and
Spread of Nationalism, revised edition (London and New York: Verso, 1991).
3. Richard Handler, “Nationalism and the Politics of Culture in Quebec,” in New
Directions in Anthropological Writing: History, Poetics, Cultural Criticism, ed.
E. George and James Clifford Marcus (Madison: The University of Wisconsin
Press, 1988, 6–8).
4. Michael Hechter, Containing Nationalism (Oxford and New York: Oxford
University Press, 2000).
5. John Breuilly, Nationalism and the State (Chicago: University of Chicago Press,
1985).
6. Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism (Ithaca: Cornell University Press,
1983).
7. All translations are my own.
8. Poem by Chen Zi-Ang, poet of the Tang dynasty of the late eighth century,
translated in Betty McLane-Iles, 228.
9. “In principle a nation is bounded—that is precisely delimited—in space and time:
in space, by the inviolability of its borders and the exclusive allegiance of its
members” (Handler 1988, 6).
10. See Jan Pettman’s treatment of this question by Judith Steihm and Barbara
Roberts in “Women, Nationalism and the State: International Feminist
Perspective,” Gender Studies, Occasional Paper 4, 1992, 8.
Works Cited
Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of
Nationalism. Rev. ed. London and New York: Verso, 1991.
Bhabha, Homi K. The Location of Culture. New York: Routledge, 1994.
Breuilly, John. Nationalism and the State. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985.
Chatterjee, Partha. The Nation and its Fragments: Colonial and Postcolonial Histories.
Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993.
Chen, Ying. La Mémoire de l’eau. Montréal: Leméac, 1992.
———. Lettres chinoises. Montréal: Leméac, 1993.
———. L’ingratitude. Montréal: Leméac, 1995.
Enloe, Cynthia. Bananas, Bases and Beaches: Making Feminist Sense of International
Politics. London: Pandora, 1990.
Gellner, Ernest. Nations and Nationalism. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1983.
Handler, Richard. “Nationalism and the Politics of Culture in Quebec.” In New
Directions in Anthropological Writing: History, Poetics, Cultural Criticism. Ed.
George E. and James Clifford Marcus. Madison: The University of Wisconsin
Press, 1988, 6–8.
Hechter, Michael. Containing Nationalism. Oxford and New York: Oxford University
Press, 2000.
Jayawardene, Kumari. Feminism and Nationalism in the Third World. New Delhi: Kali
for Women, 1986.
Kristeva, Julia. Strangers to Ourselves. New York: Columbia University, 1991.
55
———. “Women’s Time.” In The Kristeva Reader. Ed. T. Moi. Oxford: Blackwell,
1986, 200.
McLane-Iles, Betty. “Memory and Exile in the Writing of Ying Chen.” In Women by
Women. Ed. R. Lewis Dufault. London: Associated University Press, 1997,
221–29.
Pettman, J. Jan. “Women, Nationalism and the State: International Feminist
Perspective.” Gender Studies, Occasional Paper 4, 1992.
Renan, Ernest. “What is a Nation?” In Becoming National: A Reader. Ed. Geoff Eley
and Ronald Grigor Suny. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996, 41–55.
Yuval-Davis, Nira. Gender & Nation. London: Sage, 1997.
56
Katie Cholette*
The Limits on Cultural Expression at Canada’s
National Cultural Institutions
The Government believes that Canada’s
diversity is a great strength — that our capacity
to accept, respect, celebrate and value
differences has made us one of the most open,
resilient, creative and caring societies on earth.1
Abstract
In 2001 the Lebanese-Canadian artist Jamelie Hassan received a Governor
General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts. The same year she participated in
a controversial group exhibition The Lands within Me: Expressions by
Canadian Artists of Arab Origin at the Canadian Museum of Civilisation.
Through an examination of the policies of two of Canada’s cultural
institutions this article questions the extent to which artists are permitted to
express ethnic identity in Canada during times of political uncertainty.
Résumé
En 2001, l’artiste libano-canadienne Jamelie Hassan a reçu le Prix du
Gouverneur général en arts visuels et en arts médiatiques. La même année,
elle participait à une exposition de groupe controversée : « Ces pays qui
m’habitent – Expressions d’artistes canadiens d’origine arabe », au Musée
canadien des civilisations. L’examen des politiques de deux institutions
culturelles du Canada nous amène ici à nous demander dans quelle mesure
les artistes sont autorisés à exprimer leur identité ethnique au Canada en des
temps d’incertitude politique.
On 14 March 2001, supported by her legion of supporters and admirers,2
Canadian artist Jamelie Hassan was awarded the Governor General’s
Award in Visual and Media Arts in recognition of her “distinguished career
achievement in fine arts.”3 An internationally acclaimed multidisciplinary
artist and activist and the recipient of many previous honours, Hassan
expressed both pride and humility at the public honour bestowed upon her
by this particular award.4 To celebrate the occasion, the National Gallery of
Canada mounted an exhibition of the laureates’ works from its permanent
collection.5
Later that same year, Hassan’s artwork was selected to be part of an
exhibition given by twenty-six Canadian artists of Arab descent at the
31, 2005
Canadian Museum of Civilization (CMC) in Hull. The exhibition, The
Lands within Me: Expressions by Canadian Artists of Arab Origin, was
scheduled to open on 19 October 2001.6 In the wake of 9/11, however, the
administration of the museum decided to postpone the exhibition until the
following spring, ostensibly to give the organizers time to add more
contextual material.7 This decision was publicly criticized,8 and reaction to
it reached the highest level of the Canadian government when Prime
Minister Chrétien publicly chastised the CMC during a session of
Parliament on 26 September.9 Two days later the CMC reversed their
decision and the exhibition was reinstated as scheduled.
Although the exhibition opened as originally planned, it became the
focus of intense debates over intolerance, cultural freedom of expression
and the relationship of politics and art. How was it possible that a wellestablished Canadian artist like Jamelie Hassan was both celebrated for her
individual achievement by one national cultural institution and seen as part
of a potentially threatening group by another national institution in the
same year?10
Although this paper will briefly discuss the exploration of social and
cultural identity in Hassan’s art, its focus is not a survey of her artistic career
or subject matter. Instead, the discussion demonstrates the limitations and
boundaries of multiculturalism in politically unstable times. Through an
examination of the policies and mandates of two of Canada’s national
cultural institutions — the CMC and the Canada Council for the Arts (the
organization that administers the Governor General’s Awards) — it
becomes evident that Hassan’s cultural heritage came into conflict with
dominant ideologies and concepts of a national identity during a particular
moment of political unrest. This paper, then, discusses how an
internationally recognized and recently celebrated artist shifted from being
claimed as “Canadian” (and publicly honoured as such) to being of
marginalized “Arab-Canadian” status. With museum mandates, writings
on multiculturalism and a case study of the two aforementioned episodes,
and by interpreting the actions and reactions of two of Canada’s major
cultural institutions, I demonstrate that the establishments, while
appearing impartial, inclusive and liberal-minded, were in fact concerned
with fostering and perpetuating a cohesive national Canadian identity. I
also question the degree to which artists are allowed to express their
cultural identities before these identities become threatening to ideas of
nationhood and an acceptable overarching Canadian identity: this level of
permitted cultural expression by artists exploring their individual or a
collective identity, as well as the particular culture they are exploring, can
be problematic for nationally-funded cultural institutions. While I draw
upon theoretical writings and viewpoints of others, the conclusions I make
are my own.
58
The Limits on Cultural Expression at Canada’s National Cultural
Institutions
A selection of biographical details of Jamelie Hassan and a brief
discussion of her art will help to situate her work. The daughter of Lebanese
immigrants Alex and Ayshi, Hassan was born the seventh of eleven children
in 1948 in London, Ontario,11 where she continues to work as an artist and a
social and cultural activist. An assertive member of the London arts
community (she was one of the founding members of the artist-run Forest
City Art Gallery), Hassan is interested in investigating not only her own
cultural heritage but also related issues that affect displaced, marginalized
or persecuted people throughout the world. Through the juxtaposition of
imagery and objects from various cultures, Hassan’s work often highlights
themes such as colonialism, exodus, exile, diaspora and immigration.12
Mireya Folch-Serra, geography professor at the University of Western
Ontario, writes that identity is “constantly contested in [Hassan’s] work:
contested in relation to history, to geography, and to one’s position in the
world.”13
Having grown up in what she describes as “an environment of systemic
racism,” Hassan’s desire to achieve “dialogue, enlightenment, emancipation and community”14 among cultures stems from her personal
experiences and cultural background: her Lebanese Muslim family was a
visible minority in the small, mostly-white, very conservative city.
Consequently, Hassan’s work spans a liminal space between her Arab
ancestry and her present location both spatially and metaphorically.
Folch-Serra acknowledges the interdisciplinary qualities in Hassan’s work:
Whether she thinks of art as a form of departure, or as a bridge
between epochs and cultures. [sic] Her work makes known the
responsibility inherent in carving one’s own space and mapping
one’s own geography, and contributes indeed to the notion of artist
as cultural agent and active participant of political art practice. A
practice where the concepts of pluralism, dialectics and synthesis,
are always problematized at each step of the process, and where the
meaning of boundaries become the open-ended and unfinalizable
circumstance of a polyphonic world where multiple voices have
their homecoming.15
In order to understand how Hassan’s work is perceived within the context
of national cultural institutions, it is useful to step back and examine some
of the specific goals of the cultural policies that govern these institutions.
A collective Canadian culture and concomitant national identity are
notoriously difficult concepts to define. These problems are complicated by
a number of factors. In addition to its Aboriginal population, Canada claims
two European “founding nations”: French and English. Attempts to
reconcile differences between the beliefs and practices of these major
groups are further compounded by an increasingly large population of
immigrants from a multitude of ethnic and cultural backgrounds in a
physically immense and geographically diverse country. Throughout the
59
course of the twentieth century the Canadian government increasingly
realized that no single culture represented all of Canada. As a result, the
government strove to find ways of presenting the country to its citizens
(and abroad) in a manner that would recognize difference without allowing
the country to appear fragmented. One of the strategies that were
implemented was the creation of multicultural policies, in particular,
official multiculturalism, which is overseen by the Department of
Canadian Heritage. Eva Mackey, in “Managing the House of Difference,”
discusses the evolution of multiculturalism in Canada. Instead of creating a
homogenous “melting pot” nation like the United States, the Canadian
government co-opted ethnic and cultural diversity to strengthen national
unity. Mackey writes:
Rather than trying to erase difference and construct an imagined
community based on assimilation to a singular notion of culture,
the state attempted to institutionalize various forms of difference,
thereby controlling access to power and simultaneously legitimating the power of the state.16
Multiculturalism was not developed simply to placate immigrant
minority groups; it was also a response to the growing problems
surrounding English-French conflicts and threats of assimilation into a
much more powerful neighbouring country. Mackey notes that “‘[m]ulticulturalism’ was developed as a mode of managing internal differences
within the nation and, at the same time, created a form through which the
nation could be imagined as distinct and differentiated from external others
such as the United States.”17 Multicultural policy has been criticized by
other writers, like Dot Tuer, who see multiculturalism as a means of
controlling (or managing) minority groups. Tuer pointedly comments that
we live “in an age of identity politics where the fetishization of difference
often mirrors the neutralization of the ‘Other.’”18
In A Border Within: National Identity, Cultural Plurality, and Wilderness, Ian Angus also looks at some of the issues raised by multiculturalism
in Canada. Discussing the “social ideal” of multiculturalism (as opposed to
the official government policy), Angus points out that there is an inherent
tension between the interests of a broadly defined cultural policy (which
seeks to unite through emphasizing similarities) and multiculturalism
(which privileges difference). Angus writes “that there is an either/or
choice between national and multicultural identity. Whichever way one
chooses, one reinforces the underlying presupposition of the opposition.”19
In recent years multiculturalism has come under criticism both as a
policy and as an ideology.20 Two controversial areas concerning multiculturalism are directly relevant to this discussion: its “implicit essentialism,”
and “the ritualization of ethnicity often associated with it.”21 These
criticisms are taking place in numerous countries around the world and in a
variety of areas. As Steven Vertovec points out:
60
Institutions
Essentialized understandings of culture have been observed, over
the past few decades, in multicultural programs and frameworks in
areas such as educational curricula, media images, forums of
“ethnic community leadership,” public funding mechanisms, and
professional training courses and handbooks.
Despite challenges to the culturally essentialist policies and ideologies of
multiculturalism, Vertovec believes that one important aspect of it remains
unchanged: “the expectation of common attachment to the encompassing
nation-state.”22
However, national cultural institutions have been slow to embrace ideas
of “new” multiculturalism or transnationalism, and continue to operate
within the narrow confines of nationally-bounded multiculturalism (what
Vertovec calls the “‘container model’ of the nation state”).23 The
problematic nature of the container model of the nation-state was
highlighted in Britain’s groundbreaking Commission on the Future of
Multi-Ethnic Britain, which published The Future of Multi-Ethnic Britain
(commonly called the Parekh Report). The Report states:
One customary approach, which co-exists with the dominant
version of the national story …, is to see them as bounded,
homogeneous groupings, each fixedly attached to its ethnicity and
traditions. The “majority,” by the same token is imagined to be
fixed, unified settled. This attitude underlies most public policy.”24
At around the same time as the Parekh Report was underway in Britain,
the Department of Canadian Heritage produced several documents
concerning culture in Canada. In 1998 the Department released a report
entitled Connecting to the Canadian Experience: Diversity, Creativity and
Choice.25 This report was published in response to a study begun the
previous year, A Sense of Place, a Sense of Being, in which Sheila Copps,
then Minister of Canadian Heritage, asked the government “to ensure, as
our Government, as a country, and as a Committee … we have the necessary
tools to safeguard our own culture, and to tell our own stories.” The
Department of Canadian Heritage’s response to Ms. Copps clearly stated
the goal of their policy: “to ensure that Canadians have Canadian choices to
connect Canadians to the diverse Canadian experience.” The Department
concluded that they were fulfilling this purpose, explaining, “Over the
years, the Government has developed a comprehensive series of policies,
programs, regulations and institutions to encourage, nurture and support
culture in Canada.” The report goes on to state that, as culture is “central to
our lives” but “not easily compartmentalized,”26 both the public and private
sectors have a responsibility to ensure that these policies and programs are
successfully instituted.
If we examine the wording of these statements it becomes evident that the
role of the Department of Canadian Heritage is to promote Canadianness;
61
indeed, in the aforementioned goal, the words “Canadian” and
“Canadians” are used repeatedly, reinforcing a sense of inclusion in a
national project that is bounded by political boundaries. What is
Canadianness, though, and how do our national cultural institutions
respond to the diversity of Canada’s population? What happens when
artists wish to explore cultural backgrounds or express opinions and beliefs
that are not those of the dominant groups? Furthermore, in a time of
unprecedented migration between countries, what degree of national
loyalty is expected from immigrants, and what constitutes disloyal
behaviour? Although governmental policies like that of multiculturalism
nominally accord all of Canada’s citizens equal recognition, this
recognition continues to be shaped by the ideology of the dominant groups.
Official cultural policies, while appearing inclusive, privilege the cultures
of the two “founding nations” (and to a lesser extent Aboriginal cultures)
over those of other “ethnic” minorities.27
In recent years the government has reacted to demands by minority
groups for recognition by placing an increased emphasis on diversity and
choice in its policies. In Connecting to the Canadian Experience, the
government explicitly states what it saw as its role:
The Government of Canada supports a broad range of Canadian
cultural activities because they give expression to our values and
our way of life. Therefore, it matters that what is supported be
about the Canadian experience in some way. It matters that the
ideas, books, paintings, music, films, Internet content — the
results of creative and innovative thought and endeavour —
reflect Canada to Canadians, in all its richness and diversity.
Nurturing, enhancing and supporting what we have come to call
“Canadian choices” is what the role of the federal government in
support of culture is all about.28
Do statements like this mean the government is becoming more
accepting of cultural difference, or is difference being co-opted as a
defining feature of Canadian identity? Although it clearly makes reference
to Canada’s “richness and diversity,” there is an overall emphasis in this
report on a unified vision of Canada. It is not a multitude of Canadian
experiences (or “Canadian choices”) that are being nurtured, enhanced and
supported by Canadian cultural policy but, rather, the Canadian
experience.29 Many critics of multiculturalism point out that despite
attempts to recognize all citizens equally, multicultural policy is doomed to
failure because, at its most basic level, it fails to break free of an entrenched
Eurocentric cultural hegemony. Consequently, there is an uneasy
coexistence of cultures within Canada. In “Cultures of Conquest, Cultures
in Context,” Tuer writes, “Canada becomes a meeting place of cultures,
where race and history and myth, frozen into a white WASPsnow, clash and
conflict.”30
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Institutions
What is the role of national cultural institutions in all of this, and is the
promotion of multiculturalism anything more than a strategy to bolster
national unity? Joyce Zemans writes that the concepts of nationhood and
identity “have been at the heart of Canadian policies designed to support
cultural development, and the national institutions have been Canada’s
principal instruments for the creation and delivery of cultural policy.”31
Zemans points out that this nation-building agenda exposes fundamental
ideological tensions between artists and national cultural institutions;
whereas for artists “the intrinsic value of the arts … is the motivating
factor,”32 this is not the case for the governments that fund these cultural
institutions.
The CMC is Canada’s largest and most commercially successful
museum.33 Billing itself as “one of the premier cultural facilities of the
twentieth century,”34 the museum is part of the Canadian Museum of
Civilization Corporation (CMCC),35 which in turn is part of the federal
Department of Canadian Heritage. The CMCC’s official statement of the
CMC’s institutional purpose appears inclusive and innocuous at first
glance:
As the national museum of human history, the Canadian Museum
of Civilization is committed to fostering in all Canadians a sense of
their common identity and their shared past. At the same time, it
hopes to promote understanding between the various cultural
groups that are part of Canadian society.36
The wording of this statement is noteworthy: it emphasizes the collective
nature of a common Canadian identity among people with a “shared past”
while downplaying the role of “various cultural groups” as merely a “part of
Canadian society.” Clearly, there is the desire to promote and reinforce an
overarching common identity that takes precedence over any cultural
divisions within a larger Canadian society.
The official mandate of the corporation further stresses the importance of
promoting a unified sense of Canadian nationalism. The mandate has two
main aims: First, it defines its role as “preserving and promoting the
heritage of Canada and all its peoples throughout Canada and abroad and in
contributing to the collective memory and sense of identity of all
Canadians”; second, it “is a source of inspiration, research, learning and
entertainment that belongs to all Canadians and provides, in both official
languages, a service that is essential to Canadian culture and available to
all.”37 The rhetoric of the mandate is strongly pluralistic (as the wording of
the “Institutional Purpose” was), and homogenizing: all of the people in
Canada will develop a collective memory and common sense of identity
through the collecting, curating and exhibiting of materials that belong to,
and are freely available to, all Canadians.
63
As Canada’s most frequently visited museum, the CMC is the perfect
venue to disseminate a nationalistic ideology to a wide audience.38 In
discussing attempts by national cultural institutions to mount exhibitions
that confront Canada’s growing diversity, Tuer categorizes their attitude as
a schizophrenic imperialism that infects the Canadian cultural
millieu [sic]. On one hand, Canada prides itself on its racial
tolerance, its policies of multi-culturalism, its ethnic diversity. On
the other hand, its cultural institutions, such as the ROM, are the
depositories of deeply entrenched, and uncritical, colonial
attitudes.39
Recognizing their ability to bring information to a large public, the CMC
has begun to make attempts to broaden its focus to include more exhibitions
on specific cultural groups in Canada and elsewhere.
The CMC has been aware for some time that museums of human history
face increasing challenges as Canada’s population becomes more diverse.
In 1992 George F. MacDonald, former director of the CMC, wrote, “It is
vital that they [museums] be responsive to their social environment in order
to remain relevant to changing social needs and goals.”40 MacDonald noted
the didactic function of museums like the CMC, whose collections of
“material remnants of the past — are of value, and are worth preserving,
primarily for the information embodied in them.”41 He believes that the
information provided by objects in a museum of human history is important
because it gives people a greater understanding of their place in society.42
Through exhibitions about various aspects of the many different groups
that make up the larger “cultural mosaic” of Canadian society, the national
identity of Canada can be strengthened: learning about the multiplicity of
cultures that exist in Canada is intended to solidify a sense of unity through
tolerance and acceptance.43 MacDonald wrote, “Mutual appreciation and
cooperation among the cultural groups that make up Canadian society is
seen as a necessary foundation for Canada to remain a single nation”44; he
envisioned a “global society in which all peoples can participate while
preserving specific cultural heritages and identities.”45
However, allowing individual ethnic and cultural groups to exhibit in the
CMC does not necessarily mean that they are being accorded the right to
freely express ideas that may conflict with the dominant discourse.
Although it appears to be progressive and responsive to change, the CMC’s
exhibition policy continues to demonstrate the ethnographic and
anthropological focus that the CMC has traditionally held.
In 1989 the CMC moved from its cramped quarters at the Victoria
Memorial Museum Building on Metcalfe Street to a sprawling site on the
shores of the Ottawa River.46 The new building, designed by Métis architect
Douglas Cardinal, occupies a prime location in Hull, Quebec directly
across from the Parliament buildings.47 Significantly, one of the most
64
Institutions
visited sections of the museum is the permanent Canada Hall, which
features a walk-through tour of the official European history of Canada
from its earliest European activity (ca. 1000 AD) through the periods of
early French settlement (1560–1760), the British conquest (1760) and up to
the present.48 The museum’s second main permanent installation, the
Grand Hall, is situated in a separate section, on the ground floor. The Grand
Hall portrays the history of the First Nations of the Northwest Coast through
the use of dioramas and site recreations incorporating a mixture of genuine
artefacts and replicas.49 In addition to the permanent displays that present
Canada’s official histories (and, by inference, officially recognized
cultures), the museum has several exhibition spaces that feature a number
of exhibitions that change regularly. It is in these temporary spaces that
aspects of “other” cultures are exhibited,50 and where the exhibition The
Lands within Me: Expressions by Canadian Artists of Arab Origin (in
which Jamelie Hassan was a participant) was placed.
The museum’s history and position as a national cultural institution
places a considerable ideological burden on any of its exhibitions, as the
curator of The Lands within Me found out. Despite Aïda Kaouk’s valiant
efforts to convey the idea of “métissage, or cultural intermixing”51 rather
than portray a homogeneous portrait of an “exotic” Arab culture, there were
several aspects that created the impression that the individual artists in the
exhibition were more closely allied than they actually were. There was also
a widespread assumption fostered by the CMC’s reaction that the artists in
the exhibition not only were of Arab descent but also shared a religious
belief in Islam.52 Muslim identity does not stand outside time, however; it is
constructed in the present across time and space.53 The events of 9/11
produced a particular vision of Muslim identity that was predicated on “the
discourse of an irreconcilable and unbridgeable cultural, if not racial, gulf
between ‘Islam’ and ‘the West.’”54
The significant press coverage that was generated by the proposed
postponement of the exhibition had a profound effect on the exhibition’s
reception. In the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attacks on the United
States, the museum was obviously fearful that the public would
misinterpret the work of a group of diverse artists not as the work of
“Canadian artists of Arab descent” but as the expression of political beliefs
by Islamic artists (who by extrapolation might be considered religious
extremists). This led the CMC to act in a manner that had unwanted
consequences: instead of mitigating any potential problems, it actually
focused attention on the political content of the works and the common
ancestry of the artists rather than the artistic merit of the works (supposing
that politics and art could actually be separated).55 The museum’s
precipitous actions highlighted the very thing that it wished to downplay,
and indelibly conditioned the public’s reactions to the exhibition. As one
critic wrote, “The exhibition is going ahead as originally scheduled, but its
65
chances of fostering better understanding among Canadians of all origins
are now compromised.”56 Jayce Salloum, one of the artists in The Lands
within Me, claims that the museum’s reaction was responsible for creating
its own problem; he believes that the CMC’s “need for ‘spin-doctoring’ and
repackaging of the artworks backfired, inflaming the sensitive content of
the works and bringing the issues into a context of sensationalism, hysteria
and managerial hubris.”57
Having been largely responsible for the furore that surrounded the
exhibition’s potentially problematic reception, the CMC rapidly took steps
to try to mitigate any further controversy by stressing the fact that it was an
art exhibition by individuals with common ancestry rather than an
exhibition about a particular cultural group. Defending his decision to “add
context,” Victor Rabinovitch, director of the CMC, claimed:
It was an art show, not the kind of thing we usually do. We’re a
social-historical museum, and after Sept. 11, we saw right away
that the public would want to do more than look at these paintings.
They’d want to know about the countries these artists came from.
So we decided to do what a museum should do: Research the
countries, have essays written, prepare texts to accompany the
works of art.58
It was also misleadingly reported that The Lands within Me was not
curated by museum staff.59
Despite last-minute attempts by the CMC to downplay the collective
nature of the artists in the exhibition, and despite the curator’s desire that the
exhibition “not attempt in any way to emphasize the ‘exoticism’of the work
produced by Canadian artists of Arab origin,” there were a number of
aspects to the exhibition that strongly reinforced a sense of commonality.
One of the problems with a group exhibition organized around a loose
theme like “Arab origin” or the “immigrant experience” is that it takes a
group of heterogeneous individuals with complex identities who may
belong to overlapping communities and creates the false sense that they are
more closely allied than they actually are.60 The sense of commonality that
was “flagged” in the press coverage before the opening of The Lands within
Me was reinforced by the overall exhibition design and installation of the
show. An integral component of a successful exhibition is a visually
appealing presentation of works, particularly when mounting an exhibition
of works of various media by numerous artists; however, there are pitfalls
inherent in using a strong overall design. In order to create a sense of
coherence among the works in The Lands within Me the exhibition
designers at the CMC used several strategies that perpetuated stereotypical
images of cultural essentialism and reinforced a false sense of homogeneity
among the artists. These strategies are consistent with the CMC’s position
as both a site of populist entertainment and with its historical function as an
anthropological and ethnographic museum. From the entrance to the end of
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Institutions
the exhibition, the idea of “Arabness” was maintained through the use of
design elements and organizational strategies.
As mentioned earlier, The Lands within Me featured a selection of works
by twenty-six contemporary Arab-Canadian artists who used different
media including photography, mixed media, video, textiles, painting,
calligraphy, printmaking, installation works, furniture, pottery and
jewellery. The exhibition consisted of several adjoining rooms throughout
which the various artists’ works were displayed. Each artist was situated in
his or her own section. Plaques identified the works, and the ethnic origin of
the artist (where they were born, countries in which they lived prior to
coming to Canada and present place of residence) and a short artist’s statement relevant to the pieces accompanied each presentation. Interspersed
among the works was an impressive variety of interpretive materials, the
format and content of which merits consideration.61
Visitors entered the exhibition space through translucent gauze panels
hung from the ceiling, panels that deliberately evoked the symbolism and
exoticism (at least to Western viewers) of the veil in Muslim culture.62
Although the visual and material content of the exhibition was disparate,
there was a unifying central theme clearly explained in a short text at the
entrance to the show. The trilingual text panels (English, French and
Arabic) read, “The Lands within Me: Expressions by Canadian Artists of
Arab Origin is an exhibition about the immigrant experience and cultural
intermixing. The works presented here represent the participating artists’
expressions of their personal experiences and memories.”63
While the works represented the artists’personal experiences, there were
other elements in the exhibition that strove to unify them. A continuouslyrunning videotape produced by the CMC and i4design entitled A Look at
Canadians of Arab Origin and the Arab World was situated in one of the
smaller rooms of the exhibition. Composed of a series of short “maquettes,”
the video featured glimpses of various aspects of the Arab world:
demographics, art, language, immigration patterns and conflict (both from
outside the Arab world and from within) were presented in short segments
with titles such as, “A singular and plural world,”64 “A past with a future,”
and “A world under stress.” The video emphasized the important
contributions that Arab immigrants brought to Canada, especially their
cultural heritage(s). It is through their artistic productions that these
immigrants are generously sharing their cultures with “all their fellow
citizens,” a process that the producers of the video called “intermingling.”65
Another interesting component of The Lands within Me was an entire
wall that featured a series of black and white “portraits” of the artists,
ranging from conventionally posed figural photographs of the artists (in
their studios or with family members) to less conventional collages of
photographs featuring significant locations and items in the artists’
67
environments — things such as their studios, landscape outside their
homes, and artworks. The portraits, which were commissioned at the
request of the organizers of The Lands within Me, were taken by two of the
participants in the exhibition who had travelled to visit the other artists “in
their home provinces in order to make portraits of them with particular
attention given to their surroundings.”66 The organizers noted that “all the
artists generously agreed to share facets of themselves and their daily lives
— lives which are eloquently revealed by the eye of the photographer.”67
The portraits served two obvious purposes: on an immediate level they
were informational — providing documentary evidence of the artists. On
an aesthetic level, they were artworks in their own right. But I believe the
portraits function as more than mere documents or art objects: they work as
a strategy to assimilate a number of diverse individuals into an overall
homogeneous group by contextualizing, explaining and familiarizing
them. Considering the fact that the museum claimed that this was an art
exhibition not merely an exhibition of a culture, and that it was an exhibition
that featured contemporary living artists, the inclusion of artists’portraits is
quite unusual. It is not common curatorial practice in public art galleries,
like the National Gallery of Canada, for example, to include photographic
portraits of artists; indeed, they rarely provide biographical notes on the
artists in the contemporary section. It is, however, more common to see
grouped photographic portraits included in anthropological or
ethnographic museums, which provide historical and analytical studies of
the “other.”68 Each artist’s presentation was already accompanied by a
biographic panel; why then, did the museum feel that such an intense degree
of biographical material was necessary, and why was an entire wall devoted
to this information?
Throughout the exhibition there was a tension between the museum’s
attempts to contain and explain cultural difference and the curator’s desire
to highlight difference and refute notions of cultural essentialism. The final
section of the exhibition featured text panels that discussed the concept of
“mixed space.” Here the curator questioned notions of culture as an
“autonomous whole,” especially in “immigrant countries” like Canada
“where people from around the world meet on a daily basis, where
exchanges and influences multiply.”69 Kaouk believes that modern notions
of culture need to be more inclusive and less constrained by national
boundaries. Instead of using the word “multiculturalism” (which she sees
as a stale term that operates by folklorizing cultures by simply juxtaposing
memories), she introduced the term “interculturalism,” which refers to
“encounters between cultures.”70 Despite the admirable efforts of Kaouk to
broaden our definition of culture, I believe that the CMC imposed
ideological and physical constraints on the exhibition that reflected a less
inclusive notion of Canadianness.
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The main concern the CMC’s administration expressed prior to the
exhibition was that the works might not be contextualized enough for the
public. The implication was that due to the events of 9/11 a lack of
information about the exhibition could result in a hostile reception to the
show. It is hard to conceive what the exhibition might have looked like had
the museum carried through with their revisions.
The existing degree of contextualization of the exhibition was not lost on
the media. One critic wrote:
Halfway through the tour, you might begin to wonder, in light of all
the events of the world, what’s on display, these Arab-Canadian
artists, or their work. As spectacular as The Lands within Me is, it
tries too hard to be inclusive, to demystify, to counter recent world
events and to make it all happily and exquisitely banal. And it
almost succeeds.71
Bowing to pressure from the federal government, The Lands within Me
exhibition went ahead as scheduled. The very fact that there was any doubt
about its suitability highlights problem areas within museum practice. The
initial knee-jerk reaction of the CMC’s administration accentuated the
insecure status of individuals whose cultural and ethnic backgrounds are
not that of the dominant culture. Jamelie Hassan, an artist who until this
point in time had been proudly claimed by the government as a Canadian
artist, became threatening when grouped with others who potentially
shared her cultural background.72 When considered part of a group of ArabCanadian artists, she and her work became problematic: her “Canadian”
identity was believed to be in some way compromised by a collective Arab
identity. This conflict of collective and individual rights was not a problem
six months earlier when she was honoured for her artistic achievement by
another national cultural institution.
As mentioned earlier, in March 2001 Jamelie Hassan received one of the
coveted Governor General’s Visual and Media Arts Awards in recognition
for her “distinguished career achievement in fine arts.”73 This award
marked official recognition of her work by the most prestigious arts
institution in Canada. I contend that the Governor General’s Awards
promote nationhood and identity in a much more subtle, and individualistic
way than the CMC, although no less effectively. This is due in part to their
affiliation with the Canada Council for the Arts. The Council was
developed as an “arm’s-length” institution on the recommendation of the
Massey-Lévesque Commission in 1951 to help foster nationalism and
counter the threat of continentalism.74 The Massey-Lévesque Commission
“emphasized the importance of recognizing the artist’s role in society and
the need to support arts activity through national leadership and to
recognize research in the social sciences, the humanities, and the arts.”75
69
The Governor General’s Awards for both literature and performing arts
have existed for some time, but the Governor General’s Awards in Visual
and Media Arts were only created in 1999 and awarded for the first time in
the spring of 2000.76 A joint venture conceived of by the former Governor
General Roméo LeBlanc and the Canada Council for the Arts, the Visual
and Media Arts awards are presently funded and administered by the
Council (although they are presently seeking a corporate sponsor to
promote the awards).77 Upon initial examination, the criteria for the awards
appear to be relatively simple: in the press release announcing the creation
of the awards Roméo LeBlanc stated, “I am pleased to be able to join the
Canada Council for the Arts in creating these awards to honour Canadians
who have made an extraordinary contribution to the lives of their fellow
citizens through the visual and media arts.”78 While this implies that the
only criteria for eligibility (besides artistic contribution) is that the artist be
a (living) Canadian citizen, it is worth considering that the organization that
administers and presently funds the award fully is the Canada Council for
the Arts, a division of the Department of Canadian Heritage, a department
that explicitly states the promotion of a national Canadian culture as its
main goal. If this is their main goal, why didn’t the Council have a problem
with awarding the honour to Jamelie Hassan, an artist who explores her
cultural heritage in her art and has been a vocal critic of racism and injustice
in a variety of contexts?
As stated, the Governor General’s Awards were developed to publicly
honour artists and individuals whose work has contributed to a
strengthened Canadian identity. The promotion of a collective national
identity through individual artistic achievement can be seen clearly in a
statement made by former Governor General Adrienne Clarkson: “I
congratulate this year’s winning artists for their outstanding work … I
thank them for showing us who we are, and for stirring our awareness and
our consciousness.”79 However, cultural difference, political beliefs and
personal expression are also accommodated more easily within the
Governor General’s Awards. In the artist’s statement that accompanied the
Award’s information package, Hassan wrote:
Over the years, my work has reflected on the complicated nature of
family history and official histories. This often positioned feminist
and cultural identity politics through the concerns of women and
children … I have also examined certain methods that document
the colonial context of history and countered these official texts
with fragmentary texts, parables and personal archives.80
The Canada Council for the Arts did not appear to find Hassan’s cultural
heritage or social and political activism problematic. One of the main
reasons for this is that the Council “evaluates artistic significance rather
than relying on economic impact as the principal criterion for support.”81
Therefore, aesthetic and artistic merit play a more important role than
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cultural heritage in determining who may receive funding from the
Council.
Another significant reason there was no controversy over the decision to
award Canada’s most prestigious visual arts award to a Canadian of Arab
descent is that the honour was awarded in the spring of 2001, six months
before 9/11. March 2001 was a time when anti-Arab (more specifically
anti-Muslim) sentiments and suspicion were not at the forefront of
Canadian public opinion.82 Perhaps a more important reason is that the
Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts is presented for
individual merit, and individualism is a quality that is celebrated in a time of
neo-liberal pluralism. Despite her artistic and political activism, Hassan is
also internationally and nationally recognized for both her artistic
achievements and her support of the London arts community. The
widespread recognition of her artistic and social role reaffirms the Canada
Council for the Art’s choice of Hassan as a suitable laureate. Furthermore,
the cultural affiliations, personal interests, and political activism of a single
artist can be considered much less threatening than a potentially
problematic confrontation with a group of artists believed to be expressing
a collective identity that runs counter to the dominant identity.
By examining these two specific instances, it is plain that there are limits
on the extent to which Canadians are able to explore and express their
cultural heritage within the dominant discourse of Canadian nationalism.
This is particularly true with respect to national cultural institutions, which
are, after all, publicly funded. As Victor Rabinovitch conceded, “At the end
of the day, we are a federal institution. And we can’t ignore our biggest
stakeholders. No museum can.”83 The above instances show that there is a
fine line between the celebration of Hassan’s work (work that explores her
cultural heritage), and a desire to contain difference. The contrasting
reception is not entirely dependent on the institutions’ mandates; both the
Canada Council for the Arts and the CMC are governed by the Department
of Canadian Heritage, which is, as we have seen, deeply concerned with
promoting national unity. The difference lies in part with subtle nuances
between the focuses of the two institutions: the CMC, with its focus on
cultural difference, perpetuates stereotypical depictions of the “other,”
whereas the Council, an institution concerned specifically with “art” rather
than “heritage” or “culture,” celebrates individual merit and artistic
achievement.
It is also clear, though, that much depends upon the timing and overall
political climate within which the aforementioned events occurred. In
times of political uncertainty, intolerance is quickly exposed. As Pnina
Werbner notes, “Global crises such as September 11 … bring out the dark
side of diaspora.”84 Such intolerance, I believe, led to attempts to contain, or
“contextualize,” the degree of cultural expression that Hassan was allowed
to express. How does this affect her identity? Does being a member of the
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Arab diaspora mean “a matter of continually negotiating the parameters of
minority citizenship?”85 Is Hassan only allowed to explore her heritage as
an individual — a homogenizing concept that does not recognize difference? Or is she condemned to express her identity within a “multicultural”
and “managed” framework? Are we only willing to accord people the right
to explore their heritage when it is not inconvenient or problematic? The
questions raised by the surfacing of intolerance will only be answered by
re-examining the policies that govern our national cultural institutions.
While the immediacy of the events in September 2001 has receded in
time, controversy still rages over the handling of the exhibition at the CMC.
Originally organized as a travelling exhibition, the museum latterly
claimed that it did not have the funds to carry this out. Artists and activists
continue to try, without much success, to get the Department of Canadian
Heritage and the CMC administration to admit that racist beliefs underlay
the handling of the exhibition. In addition, the museum has terminated its
Southwest Asian/Middle East program (although there are claims that it
never existed in the first place).86 In the midst of this, Hassan, like the other
artists from The Lands within Me, continues to be actively involved in the
controversy, and continues to make a vital contribution to the arts in
Canada.
How will the institutions like the CMC respond to the growing diversity
of Canada’s population? Can they do so without resorting to exhibitions
that showcase “cultures”? As Monika Kin Gagnon and Scott Toguri
McFarlane point out, the Department of Canadian Heritage is caught in a
paradox; it must perpetuate notions of difference while ensuring
assimilation into the national collectivity. Gagnon and McFarlane claim
that “multiculturalism can never fully assimilate or overcome cultural
differences because it needs them to make sense.”87
Since 2001, efforts have been made by the Department of Canadian
Heritage to address deficiencies in cultural policy and programming. In
April 2003 the Minister’s Forum on Diversity and Culture was held at the
CMC. The forum, co-hosted by then Minister of Canadian Heritage Sheila
Copps and then Secretary of State Jean Augustine (Multiculturalism; Status
of Women), intended to “find ways to better reflect Canadian diversity.”88
After a series of round-table discussions in communities across Canada, the
participants met to examine their findings and formulate a number of
strategic recommendations. They concluded, “Whether dealing with
policy development, program delivery, communications and outreach,
human resources or institutional accountability, we must and will continue
to learn and to change in order to meet the needs of our diverse society.”89
It is not yet clear what impact the “war on terror” and the recent shift
toward neo-conservatism will have on cultural policy in Canada. Will it
create polarization among individuals that prevents any meaningful
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dialogue, and will public institutions like the CMC be reluctant to organize
exhibitions that are potentially problematic? Will they choose to promote
culturally benign, “safe” expressions of identity, or will they grasp the
opportunity to present material that stimulates intellectual debates over
what it means to be Canadian in the twenty-first century?
Notes
*
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
My thanks to Jamelie Hassan for her insightful comments on this paper.
Connecting to the Canadian Experience: Diversity, Creativity and Choice, the
Government of Canada’s Response to A Sense of Place, a Sense of Being, the
Ninth Report of the Standing Committee on Canadian Heritage (Hull, QC:
Minister of Public Works and Government Services Canada, 1998), 4.
The Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts was the second tribute
Jamelie Hassan received from the Office of the Governor General. In 1992 she
received the commemorative medal during the 125th Anniversary of the
Confederation of Canada, an honour bestowed “in recognition of significant
contribution to compatriots, community and to Canada.” Meera Sethi, “Richard
Fung and Jamelie Hassan Speak About Their Recent Honours,” FUSE 24, no. 2
(July 2001): 33.
The other laureates honoured in 2001 were: Douglas Cardinal, Tom Dean,
Russell Goodman, Liz Magor, Alanis Obomsawin and Joan Chalmers. The jury
members were: Alan Dunning (artist and professor), Peggy Gale (curator and
writer), Nan Griffiths (retired professor of architecture), Garry Neill Kennedy
(painter), Lee-Ann Martin (independent curator), Guido Molinari (visual artist),
Jayce Salloum (media artist), and Carol Wainio (painter). Canada Council for the
Arts, http://www.canadacouncil.ca.
Ibid., 29.
The exhibition, which was free to the public, was displayed in the Contemporary
Art Galleries of the National Gallery from 21 March to 21 May 2001. Works of
Dean, Hassan, and Magor (from the National Gallery’s permanent collection)
were featured in the exhibition, along with two films by Obomsawin (on loan
from the National Film Board of Canada) and texts honouring Cardinal,
Goodman and Chalmers. Then Governor General Adrian Clarkson opened the
exhibition in the Great Hall of the National Gallery. National Gallery of Canada,
“Works by Governor General’s Award Winners on Display at the National
Gallery of Canada,” press release, 14 March 2001, Ottawa.
The French title of the exhibition was Ces pays qui m’habitent : Expressions
d’artistes canadiens d’origine arabe.
The flash point that led to this decision appears to have been a video by Jayce
Salloum, one of the twenty-six artists in the exhibition. The video featured
footage of a Palestinian woman calling for resistance against Israeli oppression,
and in the wake of 9/11 the museum deemed the video problematic. Victor
Rabinovitch is quoted as saying that the video “seemed to disseminate aggressive
anger.” Ray Conlogue, “Cheques and Balances: On the Eve of a Controversial
Exhibit by Arab-Canadian Artists, Victor Rabinovitch Talks to Ray Conlogue
About the Ongoing Challenges of Running Canada’s Pre-eminent Museum of
Social History,” The Globe and Mail (Toronto), 16 October 2001. A number of
artists threatened to pull their work from the exhibition if the museum went ahead
with plans to add contextual material such as maps and diagrams (Graham Fraser
73
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
74
and Karen Palmer, “Video Exhibit Decries US, Israel,” The Toronto Star, 28
September 2001). The protests seem to have been effective; Salloum stated that
“the works are being presented as originally planned with the artists.” Jayce
Salloum, “‘Everything and Nothing,’ or Art and the Politics of ‘War,’” FUSE 23,
no. 4 (December 2001): 48.
Salloum, “‘Everything and Nothing,’” 48. Salloum describes how the artists
involved sent out an email letter of protest the same afternoon that the CMC
announced its decision to postpone the exhibition. By the next day the CMC had
received over 200 responses from around the world.
Paul Gessell, “PM blasts museum for halting art show,” The Ottawa Citizen, 27
September 2001. Ray Conlogue states that Victor Rabinovitch, director of the
CMC, bowed to “pressure from Liberal backbenchers of Middle Eastern origin.”
Ray Conlogue, “Cheques and Balances.”
Since I believe they were the result of a variety of factors (cultural, political and
social), I am examining these events from an interdisciplinary point of view.
Mary Malone, “The Hassans: Growing up Arabic in Southern Ontario,” The
London Free Press, 19 November 1986.
Mireya Folch-Serra, “Geography, Diaspora and the Art of Dialogism: Jamelie
Hassan,” Parachute, no. 90 (1988): 11. The following quotation is from FolchSerra, 15.
Folch-Serra. Ibid.,15.
Hassan qtd. in Sethi, “Jamelie Hassan,” 30.
Folch-Serra, “Geography,” 17.
Eva Mackey, “Managing the House of Difference: Official Multiculturalism,”
The House of Difference: Cultural Politics and National Identity in Canada
(London and New York: Routledge, 1999), 50.
Ibid.
Dot Tuer, “Cultures of Conquest, Culture in Context,” Towards the
Slaughterhouse of History: Working Papers on Culture (Toronto: YYZ Books,
1992), 58. Tuer is a writer and cultural critic who teaches Cultural Studies at the
Ontario College of Art and Design in Toronto.
Ian Angus, “Multiculturalism as a Social Ideal,” A Border Within: National
Identity, Cultural Plurality, and Wilderness (Montreal and Kingston: McGillQueen’s University Press, 1997), 145.
Steven Vertovec, “Transnational Challenges to the ‘New’ Multiculturalism,”
paper presented to the ASA Conference held at the University of Sussex,
Brighton, UK, 30 March–2 April 2001.
R.D. Grillo, Pluralism and the Politics of Difference (Oxford: Clarendon Press,
1998), 195.
Vertovec, “Transnational Challenges.”
Ibid.
Although Britain and Canada experience very different concerns related to
multiculturalism, there are some points of convergence, particularly the
ossification of “culture” and the perpetuation of notions of difference. The
Runnymede Trust/Commission on the Future of Multi-Ethnic Britain, The Future
of Multi-Ethnic Britain [The Parekh Report] (London: Profile Books, 2000), 26.
I am using Connecting to the Canadian Experience specifically because it was
published shortly before the Lands within Me exhibition opened. The exhibition,
which took several years to organize, was in the planning stages when this
document appeared. I believe that the ideas expressed in the report are reflected in
the policies of the CMC.
Institutions
26. Sheila Copps, Letter to Mr. Clifford Lincoln, MP, November 1999, Connecting
to the Canadian Experience, 1.
27. The term “ethnic” is problematic: while it can refer a group that has “common
origins, a shared sense of history, a shared culture and a sense of collective
identity” it can also imply “not-Western” or “not-white.” The Parekh Report,
xxiii.
28. Copps, Letter, 5.
29. Monika Kin Gagnon and Scott Toguri McFarlane also question the assumptions
underlying the Department of Canadian Heritage’s terminology, and comment on
a statement that appeared on the Department’s website in April 2002: “Promoting
the creation, dissemination and preservation of diverse Canadian cultural works,
stories and symbols reflective of our past and expressive of our values and
aspirations” (Department of Canadian Heritage, “Mission and Strategic Objectives,” http://www.pch.gc.ca/mindep/egg_text.htm). Gagnon and McFarlane
write, “Who is the ‘our’ that the Department of Canadian Heritage has made the
aim of its strategic objectives?” Monika Kin Gagnon and Scott Toguri
McFarlane, “The Capacity of Cultural Difference,” background paper for the
Minister’s Forum on Diversity and Culture, 23–23 April 2003. Canadian
Museum of Civilization Corporation (CMCC), http://www.pch.gc.ca/special/
dcforum/pubs/ident-self_e.cfm, 23 February 2006.
30. Tuer, “Cultures of Conquest,” 57.
31. Joyce Zemans, “The Essential Role of National Cultural Institutions,” Beyond
Quebec: Taking Stock of Canada, Ed. Kenneth McRoberts (Montreal: McGillQueen’s University Press, 1995), 139.
32. Ibid., 140.
33. For more on the popularity of the CMC, see CMCC, “Ten Million Visitors in
Eight Years Says It All!” Press release, 3 July 1997, http://www.civilization.ca.
34. CMCC, http://www.civilization.ca.
35. “The Canadian Museum of Civilization is a Crown Corporation established
pursuant to the Museums Act (Statutes of Canada 1990, Chapter 3) which came
into force on July 1st, 1990.” The Corporation manages the CMC (which bills
itself as “Canada’s largest and most popular museum”) and its affiliate, the
Canadian War Museum.
36. This was the statement on the CMCC’s website in December 2001.
37. CMCC, “Mandate,” Museums Act, SC 1990, c. 3.
38. For a discussion of the political role of cultural institutions, see Louis Althusser,
“Ideology and Ideological State Apparatus,” Lenin and Philosophy and Other
Essays (New York: Monthly Review Press, 1971).
39. Tuer, “Cultures of Conquest,” 57.
40. George F. MacDonald, “Change and Challenge: Museums in the Information
Society,” Museums and Communities: The Politics of Public Culture, Ed. Ivan
Karp, Christine Mullen Kreamer and Steven D. Lavine (Washington and London:
Smithsonian Institution Press, 1992), 158. MacDonald was the director of the
CMC from 1983 to 1998.
41. Ibid., 160.
42. Ibid.
43. It should be noted that MacDonald’s essay was written at a time in Canadian
history when the possibility of Quebec’s separation was very real.
44. Ibid.
45. Ibid., 176. MacDonald had been interested in the processes of globalization for
several years by this point; in 1989 he published a book about the CMC called
75
46.
47.
48.
49.
50.
51.
52.
53.
54.
55.
56.
57.
58.
59.
60.
61.
76
Museum for the Global Village: Canadian Museum of Civilization (Hull, PQ:
CMCC, 1989).
The CMC, which was called the National Museum of Man until 1986, has a long
history that stretches back to 1841, when Queen Victoria founded the Geological
Survey of the United Provinces of Canada. In 1877 the Geological Survey
expanded its collections from geological and archaeological material to include
botanical, zoological and ethnographic material. In 1905 construction was begun
on the Victoria Memorial Museum Building, and in 1910 the museum hired its
first anthropologist. The museum opened to the public in 1911, and rapidly
expanded throughout the twentieth century. CMCC, Institutional History,
http://www.civilization.ca.
The choice of an architect with First Nations’ heritage was significant, as was the
physical appearance of the building. Regarding the building, George F.
MacDonald wrote, “By breaking free of cultural paradigms of architectural style,
and by speaking of the historical landscape […] Douglas Cardinal’s creation is
appropriate for the global village in which all peoples seek their common
heritage.” MacDonald, “Change and Challenge,” 161.
Although predominantly concerned with British and French contributions to Canada,
the Canada Hall makes some references to minority groups such as the Métis,
Ukrainians and Chinese. CMCC, “Canada Hall,” http://www.civilization.ca.
Among the most impressive artefacts in the Grand Hall are a number of genuine
Northwest Coast totem poles. While the museum has repatriated a number of
Native artefacts in recent years, the totem poles remain in their collection. For
more information on repatriation of artefacts, see the CMCC website.
These temporary exhibition spaces are where various productions of
“multicultures” are exhibited. In the last few years, there have been exhibitions
on such diverse subjects as ancient Egypt, Indian popular art, VietnameseCanadians, and Iroquois beadwork.
Aïda Kaouk, “A Message from the Curator,” The Lands within Me, CMCC,
http://www.civilization.ca/cultur/cespays/pay1_10e.html (12 February 2006).
While the majority of the artists are Muslim, some are not.
Salwa Ismail, “Being Muslim: Islam, Islamism and Identity Politics,” The
Politics of Identity (Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2004), 624.
Pnina Werbner, “Divided Loyalties, Empowered Citizenship? Muslims in
Britain,” Citizenship Studies 4, no. 3 (2000): 306, 309. Werbner notes that this
belief can also be the case from a Muslim perspective.
While it is a commonly held belief that politics and art can exist in separate
spheres, it is not my opinion that the two can, or should be, separate.
Hugh Winsor, “The Politics of Art: What Were They Thinking?” The Globe and
Mail (Toronto), 1 October 2001.
Salloum, “Everything and Nothing,” 48.
Rabinovitch qtd. in Conlogue, “Cheques and Balances.”
Fraser and Palmer, “Video Exhibit Decries US, Israel.” Although Kaouk was not
a permanent museum employee, she had been hired on contract by the CMC for
fourteen consecutive terms. Janice Tibbetts, “Dismissed Arab Curator Calls
Museum Racist: Human Rights Complaint: Syrian Canadian Led Controversial
Arab Art Exhibit After September 11,” The National Post, 26 November 2002.
The idea of overlapping communities was discussed in The Parekh Report, 3.
The CMC’s press release from 26 September 2001 stated, “The Museum decided
to postpone it in order to have time to prepare a more extensive and informative
context for the exhibition. The exhibition team will be working on a more
Institutions
62.
63.
64.
65.
66.
67.
68.
69.
70.
71.
72.
73.
74.
75.
76.
77.
78.
79.
comprehensive presentation on the background and diversity of Canadians of
Arab origins.” Due to protests from the artists involved, it did not proceed with
these changes. See also notes 7 and 8.
For a discussion of the ethical symbolism of the veil, see Ismail, “Being Muslim.”
See also Joseph H. Carens and Melissa S. Williams, “Muslim Minorities in Liberal Democracies: The Politics of Misrecognition,” The Challenge of Diversity:
Integration and Pluralism in Societies of Immigration, Ed. Rainer Bauböck,
Agnes Heller, Aristide R. Zolbert (Aldershot, UK: Avebury, 1996).
Aïda Kaouk, Introductory text panel from The Lands within Me: Expressions by
Canadian Artists of Arab Origin (Hull, PQ: CMCC, 2001). The choice of an
exotic-looking and vaguely calligraphic font for the wall text supported the
notion of “Arabness.”
While this phrase specifically refers to the multitude of different types of Arabs
who make up the Arab world I think that it could also be used to describe
multiculturalism in Canada.
CMC and i4design, A Look at Canadians of Arab Origin and the Arab World,
video accompaniment to the exhibition The Lands within Me: Expressions by
Canadian Artists of Arab Origin (Hull, PQ: CMCC, 2001).
Email correspondence between the author and Camille Zakharia, 9 August 2005.
Camille Zakharia and Rawi Hage took the portraits of the other artists except
Karim Rholem, who created his own self-portrait.
Ibid. The fact that the portraits were commissioned by the CMC is significant.
While the artists had artistic freedom in composing the portraits, they sent the
images to the CMC for feedback and comments.
For an overview of anthropological and ethnographic photography, see
Christopher Pinney, “The Parallel Histories of Anthropology and Photography,”
Anthropology and Photography 1860–1920 (New Haven and London: Yale
University Press, 1992).
Kaouk, “Mixed Spaces,” The Lands within Me.
Ibid.
Denis Armstrong, “Passionate Lands,” The Ottawa Sun, 2 October 2001.
Although I do not subscribe to the idea that an essential “Arab” identity exists
among the artists, I believe that the idea of cultural essentialism that was one of
the tenets of official multiculturalism at its inception is still at work in institutions
like the CMC.
Canada Council for the Arts, “Introduction,” Governor General’s Visual and
Media Arts Awards: Endowments and Prizes, http://www.canadacouncil.ca.
Zemans, “The Essential Role of National Cultural Institutions,” 147.
Ibid.
The 2000 winners of the Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts
were: Jocelyne Alloucherie, Ghitta Caiserman-Roth, John Chalke, Jacques
Giraldeau, John Scott, Michael Snow and Doris Shadbolt.
Canada Council for the Arts, The Canada Council for the Arts Announces the
Governor General’s Awards in Visual and Media Arts, press release, 21 June
1999, Ottawa.
Ibid.
Adrienne Clarkson, “Messages: Adrienne Clarkson,” Governor General’s Visual
and Media Arts Awards: Endowments and Prizes, Canada Council for the Arts,
http://www.canadacouncil.ca (16 December 2001).
77
80. Jamelie Hassan, “Laureates: Jamelie Hassan,” Governor General’s Visual and
Media Arts Awards: Endowments and Prizes, Canada Council for the Arts,
http://www.canadacouncil.ca.
81. Zemans, “The Essential Role of National Cultural Institutions,” 149.
82. This is not to imply that Islamophobia has not existed for a long time prior to 9/11
but, rather, to demonstrate that it had reached new heights at this time.
83. Rabinovitch qtd. in Conlogue, “Cheques and Balances.”
84. Pnina Werbner, “The Predicament of Diaspora and Millennial Islam: Reflections
on the Aftermath of September 11,” http://www.ssrc.org/sept11/essays/
werbner.htm, 11 February 2006.
85. Ibid.
86. “In one of the most bizarre cases of apparent discrimination against Arabs in
Canada the Museum of Civilizations abruptly terminated the Arab world
program. (The decision was a reversal of the announced and articulated
objectives of the Museum’s charter; namely, to foster understanding and
appreciation of Canadian multiculturalism.) The management of the Museum
continues to ignore the calls from Canadians to reverse its decision.” The
National Council on Canada-Arab Relations, “NCCAR Annual Report, 2003,”
http://www.nccar.ca/explore/annual_report03.pdf, 22 March 2005. In March
2002 Kaouk filed a complaint with the Canadian Human Rights Commission
claiming that she was unfairly dismissed from her job at the CMC after many
years of contract work. Tibbetts, “Dismissed Arab Curator Calls Museum
Racist.”
87. Gagnon and McFarlane, “The Capacity of Cultural Difference.”
88. The Minister’s Forum on Diversity and Culture, 23–23 April 2003, CMCC.
89. Ibid.
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80
Heather A. Smith
Concentrated Immigrant Settlement and
Concentrated Neighbourhood Disadvantage in
Three Canadian Cities *
Abstract
Canadian researchers have focused growing attention on the overrepresentation of immigrants in Canada’s poorest and most disadvantaged urban
neighbourhoods. However, less attention has been paid to the fact that the
degree and character of concentrated immigrant settlement in areas of
concentrated poverty and extreme deprivation vary across time, space and
the immigrant population itself. Focusing on Canada’s three largest cities,
this paper explores the changing spatial and statistical relationship between
immigrant settlement and neighbourhood-based disadvantage over the
1991–2001 decade. The paper highlights the evolving and increasingly
divergent cases of Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal, emphasizes the
contextual, temporal and spatial contingency of the relationship between
concentrated urban disadvantage and concentrated immigrant settlement
and considers the continued appropriateness of assessing the immigrant
experience with traditional rather than immigrant specific markers of
deprivation and poverty.
Résumé
Alors que les chercheurs canadiens prêtent une attention accrue à la
surreprésentation des immigrants dans les quartiers les plus pauvres et les
plus défavorisés des villes canadiennes, bien peu d’études portent sur le fait
que le degré et le caractère de l’établissement des immigrants dans des
quartiers où se concentrent la pauvreté et le dénuement extrême varient en
fonction du temps et de l’espace, ainsi que de la population immigrante même.
Le présent article analyse le cours des relations spatiales et statistiques entre
l’établissement des immigrants et les quartiers défavorisés des trois plus
grandes villes du Canada au cours de la décennie 1991-2001 : il souligne
l’évolution des cas de plus en plus divergents de Toronto, de Vancouver et de
Montréal, fait ressortir la contingence contextuelle, temporelle et spatiale du
rapport entre la concentration des désavantages urbains et la concentration
des immigrants et étudie la pertinence d’évaluer continuellement le vécu des
immigrants au regard des facteurs traditionnels plutôt que des indicateurs de
dénuement et de pauvreté propres aux immigrants.
In North American cities the traditional narrative of immigrant social and
spatial mobility has been upward and outward. Throughout the nineteenth
and twentieth centuries when immigrants first arrived in the urban centres
31, 2005
of Canada and the United States, they tended to do so lacking advanced
workplace skills, education and financial and often linguistic resources.
They settled first in concentrated ethnic enclaves central to business and
industrial districts where proximity to employment, affordable housing and
a rich nexus of both formal and informal immigrant support systems could
be found. Residence in the enclave facilitated assimilation processes as
new immigrants learned from those who came before them the cultural,
social and economic expectations and opportunities of their new countries.
Over time languages were learned, skills were developed, education was
furthered and capital was saved, allowing many immigrants to move up the
class ladder and away from the city in a suburban direction.
The restructuring economies and cities of the post-industrial age,
however, coupled with significant shifts in federal immigration policy and
a diversification of immigrant source regions, have challenged this classic
story. In the late 1960s both Canada and the United States “liberalized” their
immigration policies, facilitating a shift away from a largely white
European migrant pool to one quickly characterized as non-white and
predominantly “third world.” Beyond the “changing face” of immigration
in both countries, there was a broadening of the reasons behind migratory
choices and a far wider range of socio-economic backgrounds and
resources accompanying migrants themselves (Portes and Rumbaut 1996).
It became just as likely for an immigrant to arrive highly skilled, educated
and wealthy as to arrive penniless, persecuted and/or without skill and
linguistic advantage.
The increasing number and broadening array of immigrants to North
America at this time also encountered transitioning economies and
restructuring cities. Manufacturing jobs, once a staple of immigrant
employment opportunity and security, were rapidly being replaced by
either high-skill/high-pay or low-skill/low-pay positions in the bifurcated
service sector (Clark 2003). Processes of revitalization or deterioration
were diminishing the availability and allure of central city housing, while
suburbanization of jobs and affordable housing offset some of the
advantages of residence in traditional (and often inner-city located)
immigrant or ethnic enclaves. The diversity of immigrants themselves
meant that in some cases previously established enclaves of shared
ethnicity were non-existent and new immigrants had to carve out new
patterns and practices of settlement and adjustment.
In this context, researchers began to notice trends that ran counter to
expectations drawn from traditional theoretical models. Three such trends
are particularly salient to this paper’s analysis. First, there was the growing
tendency for recently arrived immigrants to bypass pre-existing enclaves
and to settle upon arrival in peripheral public housing or suburban
neighbourhoods proximate to employment and/or educational
opportunities (Murdie 1994; Greene 1995; Muller 1997; Phelan and
82
Disadvantage in Three Canadian Cities
Schneider 1996; Frey 2001; Murdie and Teixeira 2002). In some cases,
these neighbourhoods quickly evolved into entirely new enclaves in
suburban locations. Second, an increasing proportion of immigrants
seemed to be falling behind. In the American case, there was a growing
awareness that immigrants were becoming more likely than the native-born
to receive public assistance (Borjas 2003). In the Canadian case,
low-income rates among immigrants have been rising steadily since the
1980s and growing the most quickly among immigrants who have been in
the country for the least amount of time (Picot and Hou 2003). In both the
United States and Canada there was a growing sense that immigrants were
increasingly represented among the unemployed, and, when working,
concentrated in the lowest paid, lowest skilled, least stable sectors of the
service economy. Third, a strengthening association between immigrant
and “underclass” status was observed. In this regard underclass status for
immigrant populations derived not just from increasing correlations with
socio-economic markers (lone parenthood, prolonged welfare dependency, intergenerational transfer of poverty, etc.) but also from trends
toward residence in highly deprived and isolated communities of
concentrated urban poverty. In Canada, research shows that immigrants,
especially those recently arrived and of visible minority status, are
increasingly overrepresented in Canada’s poorest and most multiply
deprived urban neighbourhoods, leading to concerns about spatial and
social isolation and the development of a permanent “American style
underclass” (Ley and Smith 1997a, 1997b, 2000). Clark (2001, 183–84)
expresses similar concern for the United States:
Given a vanishing, or at least much reduced, safety net, the future
of the inner-city concentrations of the foreign-born, perhaps
disproportionately foreign-born women, is not likely to follow the
upward paths of earlier immigrants. Indeed, a new immigrant
underclass, struggling for the ever scarcer resources available
from local cities and counties, may emerge.
The Canadian Case
By focusing on spatial and statistical relationships that exist between
immigrant settlement patterns, rates of low income, and indices of
deprivation in the census tracts of Canada’s three largest cities (Toronto,
Vancouver and Montreal) over the course of the 1990s, this study examines
the intersection between the trends noted above, and updates earlier
research that addressed the underclass question as it pertained to Canadian
immigrants in earlier decades (Ley and Smith 1997a). In keeping with that
investigation, this study holds that the underclass remains an inappropriate
narrative to apply to the case of Canada’s immigrant populations. Yet, that
said, it also concurs with the growing array of work in both the United States
and Canada that demonstrates increasing connections between poverty,
disadvantage and immigrant status. In all three cities, immigrants in 2001
83
were more likely than in 1991 to reside in high poverty, multiply deprived
census tracts isolated by virtue of either their peripheral suburban location
or spatial embeddedness in far broader swaths of low-income
concentration and disadvantage.
The story of immigrant settlement in Canadian cities and its connection
with neighbourhood-based poverty and deprivation must be recognized as
an evolving and spatially contingent one: a function of the complex
interplay between the distinct urban and neighbourhood contexts in which
immigrant groups settle, the skills and support systems brought with them
and the economic conditions and policy contexts of the time in which they
arrived. In 2001, 62% of all Canadian immigrants lived in Toronto,
Vancouver or Montreal. Recent immigrants, those arriving between 1991
and 2001, had a particular propensity for settlement in Toronto. Whereas
Vancouver accounted for 18% of all recent immigrant settlement in Canada
in 2001, and Montreal for 12%, Toronto accounted for a startling 43%.
Compared to other cities, Toronto receives the largest proportion of
migrants from the Caribbean while Vancouver receives the largest
proportion from Asia. Montreal draws comparatively more immigrants
from Haiti and the francophone countries of Africa. There are differences,
too, in the economic and personal circumstances of immigrants. Toronto
and Montreal receive many more refugees than other Canadian cities and
Vancouver is the primary reception centre for business-class immigrants
who necessarily bring with them substantial capital and entrepreneurial
resources (Hiebert 2000).
As this study reveals, while Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal display
common patterns with regard to the increasing suburbanization of
immigrant residence and strengthening correlations between neighbourhood disadvantage and concentrated immigrant settlement, they also
display unique and at times diverging experiences in terms of how
relationships between immigrants, deprivation and poverty have changed
over time and space. This is particularly the case when the experience of
recent immigrants is evaluated.
After an overview of Canadian immigration policy and the declining
socio-economic position of particular immigrant groups, this paper, using
census tract data from Statistics Canada, maps and analyzes the changing
configuration of immigrant settlement, poverty and neighbourhood
deprivation in Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal in 1991 and 2001. For
each of the three cities, statistical intersections between patterns of general
and recent immigrant settlement and changing levels of concentrated
poverty and deprivation are also explored. In some cases, this statistical
assessment extends back to 1971 to allow for a longer-term view of
transition. The paper concludes by emphasizing the geographically
contingent and dynamic nature of these relationships and the pressing need
for more disaggregated and qualitative study.
84
Changing Policy and Changing Immigrant Experience
In 1967 a recrafting of Canada’s immigration legislation initiated
significant changes in the nation’s immigrant profile. A long-established
system giving preferential treatment to migrants from Europe and the
United States was replaced with a points-based scheme through which
independent migrants from any world region could earn merit based on
educational attainment, workplace skills and language ability. Immigrants
with family already established in Canada were permitted to seek entry
through family sponsorship and those in need of asylum were able to seek
entry on humanitarian grounds as refugee claimants. These new policies
initiated a rapid shift from a predominantly Western to a more global
immigrant stream. In the mid-1960s almost 90% of Canada’s immigrants
came from European source countries; the United Kingdom was the
originating country of almost a quarter of all migrants. Throughout the
1970s and 1980s new arrivals to Canada were more likely than not to have
emigrated from Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, or Latin America (Knowles
2000). In 2001 India and the People’s Republic of China were by far the
leading source countries, representing almost a third of all immigrants
arriving in Canada that year (CIC 2002a).
Legislative changes affecting immigrant source regions were
accompanied by adjustments to the annual number of immigrants permitted
entry. Prior to the mid-1980s the Canadian government adjusted annual
quota figures in accordance with national economic conditions. This
practice was discontinued, however, as the role of immigrants in population
growth and skilled labour supply became more apparent. Declining fertility
rates and economic growth supported arguments to increase the number of
immigrants allowed entry to Canada each year. Since the mid-1980s the
overall number of immigrants permitted entry to Canada has risen steadily
from about 84,000 in 1985 to over 250,000 in 2001. It is estimated that
immigration currently accounts for about 50% of the nation’s population
growth and almost 70% of its labour force expansion (Bourne and Rose
2001). The importance of immigration to the health of Canada’s economy is
reflected in policy initiatives that further prioritize entry (or give more
points) for migrants bringing with them entrepreneurial skills and
investment capital. In the latter part of the 1990s, over half of all immigrants
to Canada arrived under the economic immigrant banner and by 2001 61%
did — almost 10% of those under the business immigrant program that
allows immigrants entry as entrepreneurs, investors or self-employed
persons (CIC 2002b).
These policy changes have not been without complication. Despite a
concerted state effort to attract immigrants with personal characteristics
and skills that would seemingly ensure socio-economic upward mobility,
there is mounting concern that the experience of recent immigrants to
Canada runs counter to expectations for advancement. While it is true that
85
with time most Canadian immigrants achieve personal and inter-generational upward mobility, an increasing number, especially those who have
arrived since 1991 and are of visible minority status, seem to be struggling.
Examining the comparative earnings and employment status of
immigrants and the Canadian-born, Reitz (2001) found that in the early
1980s recent immigrants were just about as likely to have jobs and to earn
80% as much as the Canadian-born. By 1996 recent immigrants were far
less successful than their Canadian counterparts in finding employment and
were earning only 60% as much as the native-born. Reitz cites changes in
the Canadian economy, specifically its shift toward a more post-industrial
profile, rising educational standards and employer confusion/
discrimination about foreign acquired skills and post-secondary qualifications as central reasons behind the steady decline of immigrant earnings
since 1980.
Given the restructuring of national policy and associated shifts in the
racial and ethnic makeup of recent Canadian immigrants, many observers
emphasize that the economic disadvantage of new immigrants intersects
with specific places of origin and visible minority status. Hiebert (2000)
notes that while people of British and northern European descent are
overrepresented in the most well-remunerated occupations, visible
minorities are over-concentrated in those occupations considered less
desirable and poorly paid. Pendakur and Pendakur (1996, 26) find that
“even controlling for occupation, industry, education, potential experience,
(city of residence), official language knowledge and household type, …
visible minorities earn significantly less then native-born white workers in
Canada.” Ley (1999) emphasizes the importance of disaggregating the
visible minority category, as well as immigrant entry class and household
structure, to glean a clearer picture of which immigrant subgroups fare
better or worse than others. Not surprisingly, immigrants from the least
developed source countries, entering Canada as refugee claimants and
without broad household and/or community support, experience the
deepest disadvantage and the longest climb up the socio-economic ladder.
In a study exploring low-income rates among Canadian immigrants,
Picot and Hou (2003) found that while low-income status rose and fell as
expected with economic cycles, rates for immigrants have been rising
steadily since 1980, while rates for the native-born have been falling. They
further conclude that the depth of poverty for newly arrived immigrants
(those arriving in the 1990s) is also increasing. That recent immigrants are
likely to originate from impoverished countries in Asia and Africa (and thus
bring with them limited resources and narrow skill sets) is a significant
factor in these low-income status increases. So, too, is their time of arrival in
Canada.
86
Ley and Hiebert (2001, 123) explain:
The growing poverty rate among immigrants reflects their
changing position in the economy. Earlier periods of rapid
immigration to Canada coincided with buoyant economic times
and a labour market that held out prospects for workers with
relatively little formal education. Since the mid-1980s, these jobs
have been scarce, especially during the recessionary early 1990s.
Immigrants have therefore had to confront a changed labour
market that provides poor jobs for those deemed unskilled.
That said, Picot and Hou (2003) stress three things: one, that the lowincome gap between the foreign and native-born was greatest among the
educated (degree holders); two, that the traditional narrative of upward
mobility over time still holds (as immigrants gain more workplace
experience, linguistic ability, education and so forth, their low-income
rates fall); and three, that compared to recent immigrant cohorts before
them, low-income immigrants who arrived between 1991 and 2001 were
more quickly able to close income gaps between themselves and the
native-born. In other words, while the poverty of current new immigrants
may be deeper and more widespread than among earlier cohorts, their
catch-up rates appear to be much faster.
In their work, Kazemipur and Halli (2001) point out that there are also
ethnic and generational factors that lead to rising levels of low income
among Canadian immigrants. Immigrants of West Asian, Arab,
Vietnamese and Latin American descent have poverty rates that approach
three times the national average. That these groups are strongly represented
among the nation’s most recently arrived migrants likely plays a role in
rising immigrant poverty rates overall. Immigrant children (now adults)
who were brought to Canada before they reached age of ten also showed
slightly higher rates of poverty than immigrants who arrived in their
young-adult years (ages 20 to 29). While Kazemipur and Halli (2001) urge
caution in interpreting this finding, they emphasize that it challenges
models that assume that assimilation and upward socio-economic mobility
automatically come with increased time spent in Canada. If this were
always the case, those who arrived as children of immigrant parents twenty
years ago should show lower rates of poverty than immigrants of the same
age cohort who have only recently arrived. In Kazemipur and Halli’s study,
however slightly, they do not.
Immigrants and Neighbourhood Disadvantage
There is mounting concern that the comparative economic disadvantage of
Canadian immigrants is reflected in a form of spatial disadvantage that sees
them increasingly resident in the nation’s poorest and most multiply
deprived urban neighbourhoods. Following the lead of American research
concerned with the spatial concentration of poverty among African-
87
Americans and other visible minorities, Kazemipur and Halli (1997, 2000a,
2000b) examine the relationship between immigrant settlement and
neighbourhoods with poverty rates in excess of 40%. The authors conclude
that, with only a few exceptions, immigrants throughout the early 1990s
were consistently overrepresented in the poorest census tracts of all
Canadian cities. Vietnamese, Spanish, Chinese, black and Filipino
immigrants were those ethnic groups most likely to reside in the highest
poverty neighbourhoods. Fong and Gulia (1999) show that black
Canadians, many of whom immigrated to Canada after 1970, fare
particularly poorly and reside in “neighbourhoods with less desirable social
environments” in comparison with all other ethnic groups. This remains the
case even when blacks reside in areas with expensive housing. In this case,
less desirable neighbourhoods are those with high levels of low income,
household overcrowding, unemployment, linguistic disadvantage and low
educational attainment. Murdie’s research (1994, 1998) highlights another
variable and emphasizes that high concentrations of black immigrants are
often found in peripheral suburban public housing complexes in
disadvantaged community contexts.
Arguing that neighbourhood-based disadvantage is about more than just
extreme poverty levels, Ley and Smith (1997a, 1997b) evaluate the
relationship between immigrant settlement, multiple levels of census tract
poverty and broader markers of disadvantage. Focusing on Toronto,
Montreal and Vancouver, they demonstrate that immigrants in 1991 were
likely to be overrepresented not only in neighbourhoods at all poverty levels
but also in census tracts with overlapping levels of above-average male
unemployment, reliance on government transfer payments, single- parent
families, public housing, reported criminal activity and low levels of
educational achievement.
Ley and Smith (2000) also demonstrate that the relationship between
immigrant settlement and neighbourhood deprivation has temporal and
spatial variability, that the geography of immigrant disadvantage shifts over
time and space. In Toronto the correlation between concentrated immigrant
settlement and extreme neighbourhood poverty strengthened over the
1971–1991 period, particularly in suburban areas. In Vancouver, correlations between immigrant settlement and neighbourhood disadvantage
declined over the same period and the spatial configuration of both
variables was far less suburbanized than in the Toronto case. In Montreal,
although neighbourhood poverty was correlated more strongly with the
Canadian-born, patterns of both deprivation and immigrant settlement
showed suburbanizing tendencies, a pattern confirmed to extend to 1996
(Langlois and Kitchen 2001).
While these and other studies have established a growing relationship
between certain immigrant groups and deep poverty, there remains limited
understanding of the evolving geography of this relationship throughout the
88
1990s and only partial understanding of how different forms of
neighbourhood-based deprivation are linked to different immigrant
groups. Understanding the extent to which observed patterns have changed
or remained stable between 1991 and 2001 is a critical step forward. While
immigrants to Canada prior to the 1990s experienced sustained economic
stability and growth, those arriving between 1991 and 1996 faced a severe
economic downturn, high unemployment levels and immigrant entry levels
that were higher than any other point in recent Canadian history.
Immigrants arriving after 1996 entered the country at a time of economic
recovery; employment levels rose and real incomes were offered.
Defining Poverty Levels and Deprived Census Tracts
Unlike the most recent Canadian research on neighbourhood disadvantage,
this study examines incidence of low income (or poverty rate) and various
indicators of broader deprivation. At the core of this study is a belief that
disadvantage should be viewed not simply as a lack of income but also as a
lack of adequate education, as distance or exclusion from the formal labour
market, reliance on government assistance, fractured families and, particularly for immigrants, inability to communicate in an official language,
cultural isolation and discrimination, among other things.
Following the convention of American researchers such as Wilson
(1987) and Jargowsky (1992) and the initial Canadian study upon which
this research rests (Ley and Smith 1997a, 2000), poverty tracts are those
with an incidence of poverty among persons in private households in the
20%–29% range, high poverty tracts are those with rates between 30% and
39% and extreme poverty tracts are those with an incidence of low income
in excess of 40%. In their work on the concentration of poverty in urban
Canada, Halli and Kazemipur (2000) also use the 30% and 40% thresholds
to demarcate high and extreme poverty tracts.
In the same way that it is important to look at the geography of poverty
over space by examining the relative location of tracts of varied poverty
levels, it is also instructive to assess various other indicators of deprivation.
In this study, census tracts are defined as deprived based on the degree to
which they show particular thresholds of the following four variables:
1. Percent of census tract population fifteen years and older
without a high-school diploma
2. Census tract male unemployment rate (fifteen years and older)
3. Percent of census tract income from government transfer
payments
4. Percent of all census families in census tracts led by a female
lone parent
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Source: Dr. Heather Smith, Dept. of Geography and Earth Sciences, University of
North Carolina at Charlotte. Cartographer Scott Whitlock, University of
North Carolina at Charlotte. Data Source: Statistics Canada.
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“Deprived” census tracts are those with one to four variables scoring at
least two times the current (1991 or 2001) value for the Census
Metropolitan Area (CMA) and an incidence of low income among persons
of at least 20%.1 For Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal, tracts that qualified
with one, two, three or four indicators were each identified and mapped. It
should be noted that tracts qualifying on all four indicators would
approximate the American standard for an underclass neighbourhood
(Ricketts and Sawhill 1998).
It needs to be emphasized that neither poverty nor deprivation needs to be
extreme and overlapping to begin affecting the persons living in the midst
of deprived areas. Similarly, census tracts and their populations do not exist
in isolation from the neighbourhoods around them. The experience of
poverty and deprivation is very much affected by its immediate and
proximate contexts. Understanding these contextual relationships is
critical to any meaningful discussion of the social isolation and
disconnection that may come with living in a high poverty and multiply
deprived tract.
Mapping Immigrant Settlement: Toronto
Toronto is Canada’s primary immigrant reception centre, home to just over
2 million immigrants representing 37% of the nation’s foreign-born in
2001. The city’s three dominant immigrant source regions were southern
Europe (315,400); Eastern Asia (299,860) and Southern Asia (279,415).
While 61% of the city’s immigrant population arrived in Canada prior to
1991, 39% immigrated more recently. Of immigrants granted entrance to
Canada in 2001 and resident in Toronto, 66% came as economic class, 25%
as family class and 7.6% as refugees (CIC 2002b).
Comparing Toronto’s 1991 immigrant map with that of 2001, the effect
of the overall increase in immigrant presence is clear (Figures 1 and 2).
While immigrants represented about 38% of the CMA population in 1991,
by 2001 that figure had risen to 44%. In both years we see a considerable
number of census tracts with immigrant proportions over 45% but an
explosion in 2001 of the number of tracts with percentages above 45% and
60%. While 33 tracts had immigrant proportions of 60% or greater in 1991,
ten years later there were 150 (out of a possible 924). Ten tracts had rates in
excess of 75%. In 1991, no tract had an immigrant proportion greater than
67%.
Three dominant immigrant settlement areas are evident in 1991: (1) a
broad concentration including several contiguous tracts of very high
immigrant representation in the northern part of Scarborough bordering
Markham, (2) a corridor running northwest from the downtown core to the
edge of Toronto’s old metropolitan boundary,2 and (3) another broad
concentration of settlement in the western suburb of Mississauga
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(Figure 3). Over the course of the 1990s we see that in each of these areas
there has been considerable infilling as well as expansion of the
concentration itself. By 2001, in all three areas very high immigrant
concentrations are embedded within much broader swaths of declining
immigrant presence. In the northwest and Scarborough/Markham
concentrations, the greatest degree of intensification has occurred
surrounding the metropolitan border (and major thoroughfare of Steeles
Avenue), where the old postwar suburbs that surround the affluent and
increasingly gentrified central city meet the new and outlying ones. In
Mississauga the 2001 appearance of a tightly bound collection of 60% and
above tracts pivots around the major intersection of Dundas and Hurontario
Streets and a very eclectic mix of recently arrived immigrant groups
(Teixeira 2003).
At this juncture, it is important to stress that while these maps show very
extensive areas of immigrant settlement, they are not to be read as areas of
single ethnic concentration. While it is true that certain clusters are strongly
associated with particular immigrant and ethnic groups — that is, the
Chinese in north Scarborough/Markham and Richmond Hill; Portuguese in
the southern end of the northwest corridor and blacks of Caribbean descent
in the northern end; South Asians in central East York and the northwest
area of Etobicoke — it is not the case that these areas are the exclusive
domain of any one ethnic or immigrant group. Indeed, while there is a
growing tendency for “visible minorities to live with own group members
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in the same neighbourhood,” and the number of visible minority
neighbourhoods is on the rise, it remains the case that levels of racial/ethnic
homogeneity at the neighbourhood scale are lower still today than they
were in earlier periods of high immigration from Europe (Hou 2004, 1).3
Rates also remain far below levels observed for African-Americans in the
United States.
Beyond the intensification and broadening of pre-existing immigrant
areas, Toronto’s 2001 maps also show the appearance of smaller-scale
immigrant concentrations in the outer and newer suburban reaches of the
city, albeit in locations spinning out from the areas noted above. In
Brampton, Vaughan and Richmond Hill, pockets of contiguous tracts with
immigrant proportions over 45% are evident.
In 1971 Toronto’s pattern of immigrant settlement was far less
suburbanized than it was 30 years later (Ley and Smith 1997a). Indeed, it
was not until 1991 that immigrant settlement beyond the border of
Toronto’s metropolitan boundary began to clearly register. Until this time,
immigrants new to the city settled in pre-existing centrally located enclaves
(some found at the southern end of the northwest corridor) or in suburban
pockets where an abundance of affordable housing in both public and
low-rent private markets could be found (Murdie 1994, 1997).
The 1991 census captured for the first time the rapid development of
immigrant concentrations of over 45% in the outer suburbs of Markham
and Mississauga where recently built housing on large tracts of inexpensive
land and employment associated with peripheral office parks and suburban
services were found. It is important to emphasize that the suburbanization
of immigrant residence in Toronto, and all Canadian cities, is a function of
both the initial settlement of new arrivals and the secondary settlement of
more established and affluent immigrants seeking access to homeownership and the suburban dream. Still, the degree to which recent
immigrants are located in the peripheral suburbs becomes particularly clear
when we disaggregate and map by time of arrival.
Figure 4 illustrates the 2001 distribution of Toronto immigrants who
arrived in Canada between 1991 and 2001. We see the most intensified
settlement spread throughout the older suburb of Scarborough, and
somewhat tighter concentrations in the newer suburbs of Mississauga,
Richmond Hill and Markham. The pattern of recent immigrant settlement
in the northwest corridor is a little more complex: new immigrants
gravitated in a northerly direction (attracted in part by numerous
concentrations of high-rise, high-density low-rent private sector and
clusters of public housing in this area) and bypassed the more established
enclaves of the south. What appears to be a preference for settlement in
suburban areas most distant from the urban core diminishes somewhat
when we assess the map of settlement for immigrants arriving post-1996
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(Figure 5). Focusing on those tracts with more than 45% of the immigrant
population arriving between 1996 and 2001, we see that all but three tracts
are located within the metropolitan boundary and embedded within
Toronto’s aging suburban districts and extensive immigrant concentrations.
It appears, then, that the narrative of outward mobility of immigrants
over time may indeed still hold. Perhaps it is simply the starting place that
has changed. Rather than beginning the settlement process in central city
enclaves, immigrants new to the city begin in the enclaves and/or
communities of the inner ring and aging suburbs where housing is most
affordable and socio-economic, ethnic and commercial transitions are
occurring. From here, perhaps, as time brings more experience, language
and capital, secondary moves are made in an outward direction to new and
possibly more affluent suburban locations.
This research is not only about changing patterns of immigrant
settlement but also about how those patterns correspond with changing
levels of poverty and broader markers of deprivation. Toronto’s incidence
of low income among persons was 14.6% in 1991. Reflecting the early
1990s economic downtown and its recovery in the later half of the decade,
the incidence rose to 21% in 1996 but fell back to 16.7% in 2001. This
overall rise in poverty across the city is starkly apparent in the two maps of
low-income rates (Figures 6 and 7). In 2001 we see many more tracts with
poverty rates at the high and extreme levels (over 30% and 40%
respectively). We also see the intensified presence of poverty at all levels in
the inner suburban areas of Scarborough and the northwestern corridor,
precisely those general areas where immigrant settlement is also
concentrating and expanding. In other words, there is a clear and
intensifying spatial overlap between immigrant settlement areas in Toronto
and areas with concentrations of high and extreme poverty.
While this research methodology does not tell us whether immigrants
residing in these tracts are poverty-stricken themselves, it does tell us that
regardless of their financial status they show a growing propensity for
residence in neighbourhoods of high and extreme poverty — a context that
has undeniable implications for all residents. Considerable research,
especially in the American context, has focused on the effects of residence
in high-poverty neighbourhoods. Beyond the comparatively poor quality of
infrastructure and local resources, there are also issues of weakened social
networks, a lack of working role models and a greater degree of conformism
in which community residents are thought to base their decisions on and
emulate the behaviour of their neighbours (Wilson 1997; Galster, Metzger
and Waite 1999; Halli and Kazemipur 2000; Frenette, Picot and Sceviour
2004).
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A densification of poverty over the decade is particularly apparent in
Toronto’s northwest corridor where a number of tracts that had rates of
poverty in the 20% and 30% range in 1991 were by 2001 registering rates in
excess of 40%. Not immediately apparent is the fact that in 2001, with very
few exceptions, all high and extreme poverty tracts in this corridor were
also tracts with immigrant settlement in excess of 45%.
The association between poverty and immigrant settlement is less
clear-cut in the eastern part of the city. Immediately noticeable is a striking
and overall jump in the number of tracts that qualify as extreme, high or low
poverty in the city’s eastern suburb of Scarborough. But the pattern is
spatially varied, lacking extensive areas of contiguous poverty. This
patchwork pattern is overlaid by an expansive and more complex pattern of
immigrant settlement. In the cluster of tracts bordering north-central
Scarborough and Markham, we see a very dense concentration of high
immigrant settlement enveloping a scattered collection of below average to
extreme poverty levels, suggesting class-based heterogeneity among
immigrant and other groups resident in the area.
Before moving on to assess patterns of deprivation, it is important to
emphasize again how tracts with poverty rates in excess of the CMA mean
have remained largely contained within the old metropolitan core (see also
United Way 2004). While immigrant settlement has clearly continued its
suburbanizing trend throughout the 1990s, high and extreme poverty has
remained bounded by the old metropolitan border.
Recall that this study utilizes a deprivation index that evaluates tracts in
terms of the presence and level of standard markers of disadvantage: male
unemployment, female lone-parent households, dependency on government transfer payments and limited educational attainment. In both 1991
and 2001 we see far fewer deprivation tracts than there are poverty tracts,
reminding us that the roots of poverty are far more complex than those
captured in this fourfold typology (Figures 8 and 9). Also present in both
years is a remarkable tendency for deprivation to remain contained within
central city and older suburban areas and to lie at the centre of much broader
swaths of poverty and immigrant concentration. This, of course, parallels
observed poverty and immigrant settlement patterns with concentrations of
deprivation in central Scarborough and an even tighter overlap in the
northwest corridor. It is in the northwest corridor especially that we see an
infilling of deprivation over the decade akin to what we observe in both the
poverty and immigrant maps.
This corridor is a difficult one about which to generalize in terms of the
immigrant groups settling there. As noted earlier, while the southern end of
the corridor is associated with some of the city’s long-established enclaves
of southern European immigrants, the northern end is associated with a
shifting ebb and flow of a range of immigrant groups. In the northern tip of
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the corridor, the Jane-Finch intersection is the location of several highdensity and high-rise public housing complexes that have long been
associated with migrants coming from the Caribbean. Discussions with a
housing manager in one of these complexes, however, suggested that this
area is in the midst of a significant ethnic/racial transition; migrants from
South Asian (particularly Bangladeshi) backgrounds are becoming more
prominent (Anon., pers. comm. 2003). At the same time, this area lies
adjacent to one of the city’s long-established middle-class ethnic enclaves
associated with Italian-Canadians (Ray 1994).
While there is a continued and clear connection between the spatial
location of immigrant settlement and poverty and deprivation in Toronto,
over the 1990s there is a growing complexity in these relationships. By
2001 both poverty and deprivation remain largely contained within the
borders of the former metropolitan area. On the other hand, immigrant
settlement has very broadly expanded into newer suburban communities,
showing concentrations of tracts with the immigrant population over 60%
most notably in Markham, Richmond Hill and Mississauga. Beyond this,
concentrations of very high immigrant settlement have grown to envelop a
patchwork of high-to-low poverty and varied deprivation levels, especially
in the city’s northeastern suburban edge. Indeed, while immigrant settlement, poverty and deprivation overlap in the northwest corridor, the spatial
convergence of variables is far less clear in the eastern and north suburbs of
Scarborough and Markham.
This finding corresponds with the work of Myles and Hou (2003), who
demonstrate that Chinese migrants (by far the dominant ethnic group in the
north Scarborough and Markham immigrant concentrations) display
relatively low rates of residential segregation between high- and lowincome families, new and established migrants and homeowners and
renters. It is speculated that this is largely a function of linguistic retention
and early homeownership among this group — factors that lead to the
development of enduring, mixed-income, multi-generational ethnic
communities that act as both new immigrant reception magnets and
institutionally/commercially complete communities where co-ethnics are
content to stay even as they move up the socio-economic ladder.
Mapping Immigrant Settlement: Vancouver
Vancouver is Canada’s second leading immigrant reception city. It
contained a 2001 total of 738,555 immigrants representing 13.6 of the
nation’s total foreign-born. Eastern Asia (262,815), Southeast Asia
(88,645) and Southern Asia (75, 945) predominate as immigrant source
regions. Fifty-six percent of the immigrant population arrived in the
country before 1991, while 44% arrived over the course of the 1990s. Of
those granted entrance to Canada and resident in Vancouver in 2001, 55%
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came as skilled workers, 27% as family class immigrants and 5.8% as
refugees (CIC 2002b).
Compared to Toronto, the Vancouver immigrant maps (Figures 10 and
11) contain far fewer tracts with immigrant proportions over 60%. But in
keeping with Toronto’s experience there has been a significant increase in
the number of tracts with clear immigrant majorities. In 1991 only two
tracts had immigrant proportions in excess of 60%. In 2001, there were 28
(out of a possible 386). The magnitude of proportionate immigrant increase
in Vancouver actually exceeds that of Toronto. In 1991 immigrants
represented 29.7% of Vancouver’s total population; in 2001, 37.5%: a
growth difference of about 8% compared to Toronto’s 6%.
In 1991 there was a pronounced containment of the highest immigrant
tracts (over 45%) within the eastern half of Vancouver; the lower levels
were in all suburban tracts. By 2001 not only had this concentration
expanded into the proximate suburbs of Richmond and Burnaby but it had
also developed a tightly bounded core of tracts with proportionately
dominant immigrant populations. This core captures the settlement
locations of a range of immigrant and ethnic groups. In some tracts
immigrants from South Asia are more numerous. In others, immigrants
from Hong Kong or mainland China are more numerous.4
A significant suburban dispersal of immigrant settlement at all levels
also occurred across the city by 2001. In Figure 12, we see that this is
particularly evident in Richmond, where a contiguous concentration of
immigrant settlement extends southwest from an extensive core of tracts in
excess of 60%, straddling the Vancouver/Richmond border. Immigrants in
this concentration are most commonly, though not exclusively, of Chinese
descent.5
In 2001 we also see the appearance of a 60% immigrant tract in the
suburb of Coquitlam; a cluster of several tracts with immigrant settlement
rates closer to, or slightly above, the citywide average (37.5%) in suburban
Surrey (where immigrants hail primarily from South Asia); and a small
collection of 45% to 59% tracts in North Vancouver. Collectively, these
indicate a clear pattern of immigrant suburbanization over the course of the
1990s. In comparing this change to Toronto, however, immigrant
dispersion in Vancouver does not seem to gravitate in the same way to very
distant and newer suburban locations. While there appears to be a strong
immigrant presence in Abbotsford, rates of immigrant settlement in the
other outer suburbs of Maple Ridge and Langley are well below the CMA
average.
Immigrant suburbanization in Vancouver appears largely a function of
the settlement patterns of immigrants arriving post-1991. Figure 13 shows a
clear trend on the part of recent immigrants to reside in areas at the periphery
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of or distant from the centrally located and tightly bound immigrant cluster
so clearly evident on the 1991 map. While tracts in the core of this cluster
show recent immigrant rates of 30%–44%, tracts with higher rates are
consistently found toward the cluster’s edges. In Surrey and Burnaby,
concentrations of recent immigrant settlement overlay pre-existing albeit
moderate proportion immigrant clusters present in 1991.
Immigrants arriving in the city between 1996 and 2001 were also drawn
to the suburbs, particularly to tracts in Coquitlam, South Port Moody and
Burnaby (Figure 14). In Burnaby there are two high immigrant tracts (over
60%; see Figure 11) in which more than 45% of all immigrants resident
there arrived post-1996. It should be noted that the large single tract
encapsulating the peninsula at the western edge of the city is the location of
the University of British Columbia. This tract’s immigrant population is
largely a function of the presence of foreign students who chose to reside
close to the college campus.
As in Toronto, there is overlap between areas of concentrated immigrant
settlement and concentrated poverty (Figures 15 and 16). This is apparent in
1991, when the concentrated area of immigrant settlement in the city’s
eastern tracts mirrors fairly closely a collection of tracts with rates of low
income in the 20%–30% percent range. Overlap is most notable in the
district immediately east of the downtown core where the city’s traditional
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immigrant enclave (Chinatown) is enveloped by a large and contiguous
area of extreme poverty.
Given that Picot and Hou (2003) found that over the 1990s rising rates of
low income among immigrants in Vancouver and Toronto constituted the
primary contributing factor in overall poverty increases, it is unsurprising
that the spatial coincidence between these variables in both cities has
continued to strengthen over the decade. As in Toronto, both poverty and
immigrant settlement in Vancouver have increased,6 suburbanized, and
shown an increasing tendency for overlap between 1991 and 2001. Also in
keeping with the Toronto experience are new areas in Vancouver of high
and extreme poverty embedded in suburban concentrations of high and
geographically broader immigrant growth. This embeddedness is particularly apparent when we compare the 2001 Vancouver map of low income
with the distribution of recent immigrant arrivals (between 1991 and 2001;
Figure 13). In north Richmond, we see a contiguous group of tracts with
high poverty overlapping tracts in which more than 60% of the immigrant
population arrived post-1991. Areas of similar but lesser coincidence are
found in north Surrey, on the border of Burnaby and Port Coquitlam and to
some degree in central Burnaby running toward the central city.
Turning to compare immigrant settlement and poverty with patterns of
multiple and lesser deprivation in Vancouver, we see that, as in Toronto,
deprivation is far less spatially pervasive (Figures 17 and 18). There are far
fewer deprived tracts in Vancouver than there are poverty tracts and far
fewer deprived tracts altogether than in Toronto. The most notable change
in Vancouver’s deprivation maps between 1991 and 2001 is the increase in
deprivation in the city’s downtown East Side. This is an area in which, as a
result of gentrification and revitalization processes, the number of extreme
poverty tracts declined over the 1990s. Still, the spatial coincidence of tracts
that retained extreme poverty status over the decade, and those that rose to
triple deprivation status, is exact. These changes strongly suggest the kind
of impacted and centrally located deprivation that is commonly associated
with American urban landscapes. Correspondence with immigrant
settlement in this area is, however, largely restricted to the presence of the
city’s transitional Chinatown (the tiny single tract that shows over 60%
immigrants in 2001). The maps of recent immigrant settlement show that
this area is not a primary destination for the recently arrived; other tracts of
lesser deprivation, encircled by areas of high and extreme poverty, are.
In northern and central Surrey a swath of high-to-extreme poverty
provides context for a loose collection of singly deprived tracts, all of which
show immigrant populations in excess of 45% arriving since 1991. It should
be noted that while poverty rates of 30% and 39% characterize a
concentration that corresponds with a cluster of recent immigrant
settlement in north Richmond, there is no tract in this suburb qualifying as
deprived on our index. A similar situation exists in Coquitlam, where a
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cluster of tracts showing very high rates of recently arrived immigrants and
low-income rates between 20% and 30% show no evidence in 2001 of
deprivation as defined in this study. If the poverty reflected in these tracts is
a function of the personal poverty of the new immigrants residing there (and
this is not a given), it may well be that factors other than unemployment,
lone parenthood, welfare dependence and low educational levels are
responsible. Expectations for involvement in the labour force (regardless of
remuneration levels), acceptable forms of household formation and family
structure, and expected levels of minimal education vary between different
ethnic and cultural groups. As such, a possible reason for the lack of poverty
and deprivation overlap might be a shared ethnicity or cultural perspective
between the newly arrived immigrants that mitigates against high levels of
traditional deprivation markers.
In neither 1991 nor 2001, then, do we see in Vancouver quite the same
degree of spatial overlap between immigrant settlement and patterns of
deprivation and poverty observed in Toronto. We do, however, see evidence
of spatial coincidence between tracts with significant concentrations of
recent immigrants and high-to-extreme levels of poverty. Neighbourhood
deprivation remains highly concentrated in the city’s downtown Eastside
with the presence of occasional single and multiply deprived tracts popping
up in the city’s outlying suburbs amid broader swaths of poverty.
Mapping Immigrant Settlement: Montreal
Montreal, Canada’s third largest city, had in 2001 a foreign-born
population of 621,890, representing 18.4% of its total population. In terms
of national representation, Montreal’s immigrants only represented 11.4%
of the nation’s total foreign-born.7 Sixty-five percent of Montreal’s
immigrants arrived in Canada prior to 1991 and 35% arrived between 1991
and 2001. Given that Montreal’s immigrant profile reflects Quebec’s
ability to select most of its own immigrants, dominant source regions
convey the province’s preference for immigrants with French-language
ability. While most of the city’s immigrant population hail from countries
in southern Europe (19.1%), immigrants from the French-speaking
countries of Africa and the Caribbean follow closely behind (representing
11.8% and 10.6% respectively). Of those immigrants arriving in Canada
and settling in Montreal in 2001, 60.5% were economic class, 22.4% were
family class, and 16.3% were refugees (CIC 2002b).
The geography of immigrant settlement in this city, and its relationship to
both poverty and deprivation, is strikingly different from that of Toronto
and Vancouver (Figures 19 and 20). The immigrant maps for 1991 and 2001
show the development trajectory of two distinct immigrant clusters: one, an
extensive district of high immigrant settlement extending northwest of the
downtown core, curving around Westmount, stretching to Laval and arcing
south to extend into Saint-Laurent and Dorval;8 two, a cluster of lesser
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immigrant concentration lying more or less directly north of the centre city
(Figure 21). Between 1991 and 2001 both these districts experienced
accentuated immigrant settlement and spatial infill as immigrant
percentages rose within and beyond borders established prior to 1991.
While there has been some suburbanization of immigrant settlement over
the ten years, this outward dispersal has not been as pronounced as in
Toronto or even Vancouver. Montreal’s pattern is more firmly
characterized by infilling and intensification of pre-existing immigrant
concentrations.9
However, this changes markedly when we look at the distribution of
recent immigrants (Figures 22 and 23). Those who arrived between 1991
and 2001 show a clear tendency for residence in very peripheral suburban
tracts that do not have high total immigrant levels. Immigrants in these
tracts are more likely to have the company of the native-born than they are
fellow immigrants who arrived before 1991. The suburbanization of new
immigrants in Montreal is contrasted by relative stability in the poverty
pattern across the city over the 1990 decade (Figures 24 and 25). Unlike
Toronto and Vancouver, Montreal shows a remarkable number of extreme
and high poverty tracts in 1991 and 2001 and a general similarity in their
geographic location across the decade. With the exception of poverty
clusters in Longueuil and Saint-Jérôme, high and extreme poverty tracts
have remained largely contained to the Island of Montreal.
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And what of the spatial correspondence with immigrant settlement
overall? Whereas extensive areas of immigrant settlement seem to envelop
smaller areas of poverty in both the Toronto and Vancouver cases, the
opposite appears to be so in Montreal. Not only does the city have more
poverty tracts at high and extreme levels but also there are broad areas of
poverty wholly enveloping smaller immigrant clusters. The experience of
neighbourhood-based poverty in Montreal is one more commonly felt by
non-immigrants.
That said, attention should be focused on the change that has occurred
across the decade. In 1991, there was very little correspondence between
the immigrant and poverty maps. Areas of very high and extensive poverty,
such as those surrounding and immediately northeast of the downtown
core, had immigrant settlement rates well below the city average. The two
areas of concentrated immigrant settlement (one wedged between the areas
of Saint-Laurent, Mont Royal and Westmount, and the other, of lower
immigrant proportions, in Saint-Leonard) showed a varied collection of
income levels with only a few tracts indicating high levels of both poverty
and immigrants. By 2001, the overlap between these variables had
intensified in both areas. In Saint-Léonard, a core collection of census tracts
with immigrant rates above 45% were also tracts with rates of low income
above 30%. Acorrespondence between concentrated immigrant settlement
and rising poverty levels also appears in a cluster of tracts in Longueuil.
Whether these intensifications are a function of the in-migration of new
low-income immigrant residents or a function of the deepening poverty of
residents already living is there is largely unknown. At least one study sees a
role played by increasing rates of out-migration on the part of affluent
professionals and young families leaving the Island of Montreal in favour
of the outer suburbs (Langlois and Kitchen 2001).
Turning again to the map of immigrant settlement between 1991 and
2001 (Figure 22), an even stronger association with poverty surfaces. Four
areas of particularly concentrated settlement appear on the map: in the area
surrounding the downtown core, in the area immediately north of the core
along the St. Lawrence River, in the outlying suburb of Saint-Jérôme and
embedded within the pre-existing immigrant concentration noted earlier
around Saint-Laurent, Mont Royal and Westmount. In all cases these areas
are ones in which poverty has been characteristic since 1991 and in which it
has become particularly intensified over the course of the decade. In
Montreal, the highest concentrations of new immigrants are found in areas
of intensifying poverty. That said, these areas are not ones in which the very
newest immigrants (those arriving since 1996) comprise a clear majority of
the foreign population (Figure 23). The handful of tracts in which this is the
case are scattered throughout the CMA, and none but those located in
Saint-Jérôme register rates of poverty in excess of 29%.
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Like its map of poverty, Montreal reveals a fairly stable map of
deprivation (Figures 26 and 27). While new deprivation tracts appear in the
suburbs of Saint-Jérôme and Saint-Léonard, the map is remarkably stable
over the 1991 to 2001 period with limited expansion and infilling in
pre-existing deprivation areas. While there was virtually no overlap
between immigrant settlement and deprived tracts in 1991, ten years later
that correspondence can be seen quite clearly. After years of being more
strongly associated with the Canadian-born, residence in Montreal
neighbourhoods of poverty and deprivation is increasingly common
among the foreign-born as well (Ley and Smith 2000).
Moving Beyond Cartography
As a means to confirm the cartographic patterns outlined above, a set of
simple regressions were run for each city to determine the extent to which
immigrant settlement acted as a predictor of census tract poverty.
Regressions were run for 1991, 1996 and 2001, allowing for an assessment
of change over periods of both economic decline and recovery. In all years,
and in all three cities, there is a clear positive (and statistically significant)
relationship, suggesting that as a census tract’s immigrant population rises
there is also likely to be a rise in the rate of low-income incidence. That said,
there are notable variations between the three cities and significant changes
in these relationships over time.
In Toronto, whereas immigrant settlement explained 28% of the
variance in poverty rates in 1991, five years later it explained 45%. By
2001, the r2 had fallen to .399. Adifferent story exists for Vancouver, where
a strengthening relationship exists between the two variables over the
course of the 1990s. While the r2 is much lower in all years for Vancouver
than for Toronto, the change between the years steadily rises from .14 in
1991 to .31 in 1996 to .33 in 2001. The predictive relationship between
immigrant settlement and poverty is far less strong in Montreal than in the
other two cities. This is consistent over all three years and not surprising,
given the cartographic evidence. Still, as in both Toronto and Vancouver,
immigrant settlement explains considerably more of the variance in census
tract poverty levels in 2001 compared to five and ten years earlier. With an
r2 of .07 in 1991, .14 in 1996 and .20 in 2001, we see a tripling of explanatory
power. In both Vancouver and Montreal the relationship between
neighbourhood poverty rates and immigrant population ratios
strengthened over the 1990s to a greater degree than in the nation’s largest
immigrant reception centre.
With a strengthening statistical connection between poverty and
immigrant settlement established for all three cities, what of the
relationship between immigrants and deprivation? The cartographic
analysis above has already emphasized that compared to poverty there is a
lack of spatial overlap between immigrant settlement and areas of
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concentrated or multiple deprivation in all three cities. But it has also
indicated that this correlation may be increasing. Understanding the
evolving nature of this three-way relationship over time is especially
important in the context of changing policy and economic conditions that
have radically altered the cultural and economic profiles of Canadian
immigrants. As the characteristics of immigrants to Canada have become
less “traditional,” we might expect the immigrant experience of and
response to deprivation to also become less traditional.
The variables in the fourfold deprivation index utilized in the cartographic
components collectively address the most common paths to poverty and
disadvantage in American and Canadian cities and, as such, in this analysis
are considered traditional markers of deprivation. Female lone parenthood
captures the challenges of rearing children alone and on a single income;
dependence on government transfer payments reflects an inability to make
ends meet through labour force engagement or other means of income
generation; male unemployment captures the effects of skills mismatch in the
new economic downtown and associated job loss and the challenges
associated with non-engagement in the workforce; low levels of educational
attainment among adults reflect an inadequacy of workplace skills in both the
long and short term. Significantly above-average levels for each, or all, of
these variables in neighbourhoods can create additional levels of hardship not
just for the people directly implicated but also for the broader communities in
which they live (Wilson 1987; Fong and Gulia 1999; Galster, Metzger and
Waite 1999; Frenette, Picot and Sceviour 2004).
However, as noted above, as immigrants themselves have changed so too
has the nature of their deprivation. What follows is an analysis of basic
correlations between traditional deprivation indicators and immigrant
settlement, as well as a selected set of “immigrant specific” deprivation
markers. The aim is not only to understand the changing nature of
association between the traditional variables and census tract concentrations of immigrants over time but also to gain insight into their strength as
markers of poverty as compared to immigrant specific “disadvantages”:
inability to understand/speak French or English; visible minority status;
and recency of arrival. To provide for a longer view of change, data for
Toronto and Vancouver are shown for each decennial census year,
beginning in 1971. Montreal captures correlations for 1991 and 2001 only,
given the prohibitive cost of custom data runs.10
Table 1 shows correlations of immigrant settlement against traditional
deprivation indicators for each of the three cities. It is important to stress
that these correlations are spatial, not individual. These statistics tell us
whether concentrations of immigrants are increasingly or decreasingly
likely over time to be found in census tracts that also have high levels of the
deprivation markers. In Toronto and Montreal, while we see declining
correlations over time between high levels of high-school incompletion in a
115
census tract and immigrant settlement, we see growing correlations
between unemployment, welfare dependency and low-income economic
families.11 Supporting the findings of the maps, there is, in these two cities,
a growing tendency for groups of immigrants to be found in areas with high
rates of conventionally defined deprivation.
Table 1. Correlations of Immigrant Settlement against Deprivation Indicators: Toronto,
Vancouver and Montreal CMAs, Census Tracts, 1971, 1991, 1996, 2001
Toronto
Vancouver
Montreal
1971
1991
1996
2001
1971
1991
1996
2001
1991
1996
2001
n=442
n=801
n=804
n=924
n=176
n=297
n=298
n=386
n=732
n=756
n=846
Lack of
high-school
Diploma
.43
.44
.45
.39
.14
.22
.26
.27
-.11
-.067
-.004
Male unemployment
.38
.56
.61
.52
.53
.27
.39
.36
.26
.35
.39
Government
Transfer
Payments
.24
.39
.53
.53
.50
.23
.26
.32
.11
.23
.34
Female-led
Families
.25
.34
.44
.39
.42
.26
.21
.23
.08
.10
.19
Low-Income
Economic
Families
.49
.53
.70
.67
.43
.36
.62
.69
.28
.39
.46
Indicators
Table 2. Correlations of Period of Immigrant Arrival against Deprivation Indicators: Toronto,
Vancouver and Montreal CMAs, Census Tracts, 2001
1971-1981
1981-1991
1991-2001
Toronto
Vancouver
Montreal Toronto
Vancouver
Montreal
Toronto
Vancouver Montreal
Lack of
high-school
Diploma
-.15
.05
-.08
.13
.37
.55
.13
.01
.08
Male unemployment
-.24
-.08
-.28
.13
.16
.10
.56
.33
.49
Government
Transfer
Payments
-.37
-.05
-.24
.07
.18
.09
.41
.13
.34
Female-led
Families
-.23
-.11
-.26
.23
.28
.16
.48
.28
.47
Low-Income -.39
Economic
Families
-.29
-.30
.20
.24
.15
.72
.64
.55
Indicators
Source: Statistics Canada profiles of census tracts for CMAs of Toronto, Vancouver
and Montreal, 1971, 1981, 1991, 1996, 2001. Calculations by author.
In Vancouver, the reverse is true. Correlations between high-school
incompletion and low-income families are consistently on the rise, while
correlations between unemployment, government transfer payments and
female-led families are weakening. Again, this corresponds with the
cartographic analysis. Recall that while poverty and immigrant settlement
were more likely to overlap in more places in Vancouver in 2001 than in
116
1991, the coincidence of both variables with the deprivation index was far
from automatic. The changing degree to which high levels of immigrant
settlement correlate with high poverty levels in the three cities is also
instructive in emphasizing the distinction of the Vancouver case. Over
1991 to 2001, while Toronto’s correlation rose by .14 points and Montreal’s
by .18, Vancouver’s rose by .33.
Table 2 assesses correlations of period of immigrant arrival against
deprivation indicators. The first thing to point out is the clear overall
trajectory in all three cities of upward mobility (decreasing correlations
with deprivation) with increased time spent in Canada. In fact, measuring
twenty years of residence in the country, in all cities and with all indicators,
correlations show negative relationships. Over time, concentrated
immigrant settlement shows a decreasing likelihood to overlap with high
levels of conventional deprivation markers. In Toronto and Montreal
significant drops in correlations are made after just ten years. Again, the
story in Vancouver is a little more complicated. While correlations between
high immigrant settlement and concentrations of unemployment and low
income fall precipitously after ten years in Canada, correlations with
government transfer dependence does not. In Vancouver, concentrations of
immigrants who have been in the country ten to twenty years are more likely
to reside in census tracts with high levels of welfare dependence than are
immigrants who have been in the country ten years or less. To some degree
this might be explained by Picot and Hou’s (2003) finding that while
immigrants arriving in Canadian cities between 1991 and 2001 initially
showed the greatest depth and incidence of poverty, in comparison to the
immigrant cohort ten years ahead of them they also showed faster rates of
movement out of low-income status.
One of the central findings of the initial study upon which this research
builds (Ley and Smith 1997a, 2000) was that in terms of their association
with poverty, immigrant indicators of deprivation fell quite short of
traditional indicators. In other words, concentrations of unemployment,
lone-parent families, government transfer dependence and high-school
incompletion were consistently stronger predictors of high poverty tracts
than were concentrations of immigrants. This result contributed in no small
part to our argument that an American-style immigrant “underclass” did not
exist in Canadian cities at that time (1991). Ten years later things have
changed.
Tables 3 and 4 compare the correlations of incidence of low income for
persons in private households against both traditional and immigrant
specific deprivation markers for both 1991 and 2001.While there is much
more that could be said about these tables, four key points stand out in terms
of their direct relevance to this study. First, in 2001, in all three cities, high
percentages of immigrant settlement were far more strongly correlated with
poverty concentration compared to 1991. At .63 for Toronto, .58 for
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Vancouver and .45 for Montreal, these levels approach the scores of the
strongest traditional deprivation indicators of welfare dependency and
male unemployment (hovering in the .70 range).
Table 3. Correlations of Incidence of Low Income (Persons, Private Households) against
Traditional Deprivation Indicators and Immigrant Specific Deprivation Indicators: Toronto,
Toronto
Vancouver
Montreal
n=924
n=386
n=846
Traditional Indicators
Lack of high-school Diploma
.45
.42
Male unemployment
.67
.73
.47
.75
Government Transfer Payments
.76
.71
.78
Female-led Families
.76
.55
.74
Immigrant Specific Indicators
Percent Immigrant
.63
.58
.45
Immigrant Arrival 1981–1990
.16
.17
.16
.70
.57
.61
.54
.39
.35
.66
.53
.55
No Knowledge of French/English
.52
.60
.45
Visible Minority
.60
.53
.59
Table 4. Correlations of Incidence of Low Income (Persons, Private Households) against
Traditional Deprivation Indicators and Immigrant Specific Deprivation Indicators: Toronto,
Toronto
Vancouver
Montreal
n=798
n=298
n=736
Traditional Indicators
Lack of high-school Diploma
.47
.35
Male unemployment
.74
.85
.54
.79
Government Transfer Payments
.76
.77
.82
Female-led Families
.84
.69
.79
Immigrant Specific Indicators
Percent Immigrant
.53
.37
.24
.10
.02
.004
.61
.45
.61
No Knowledge of French/English
.58
.42
.45
Source: Statistics Canada profiles of census tracts for CMAs of Toronto, Vancouver
and Montreal, 1971, 1981, 1991, 1996, 2001. Calculations by author.
Second, as immigrant correlations between immigrant specific markers
and poverty rose between 1991 and 2001 in Toronto and Montreal,
correlations between poverty and traditional markers fell. In Montreal, for
example, while the correlation between government transfer dependency
and poverty concentration was .82 in 1991, by 2001 it had fallen to .78. This
118
is a small difference to be sure, but the fact that this change is occurring
while immigrant specific associations with poverty are rising is worthy of
attention and further research.
Third, in 2001 Toronto and Montreal correlations between recent
immigrants (arriving between 1991 and 2001) and poverty are notably
stronger than those for immigrants in general. In fact, in Toronto they
exceed male unemployment’s correlation in the same year. In Vancouver,
the correlations between immigrants in total, immigrants arriving between
1991 and 2001 and immigrants arriving between 1996 and 2001 are very
closely matched, indicating that recent immigrants are no more likely to be
concentrated in high poverty areas than immigrants overall. In Montreal,
correlations between recent immigrants and poverty concentrations in both
years were identical, showing no increase over time.
Fourth, a considerable array of research highlights visible minority
status and inability to speak either French or English as two key barriers for
immigrants as they seek social and spatial mobility. These two variables
were added to the correlation matrix as a way to further test the comparative
association of traditional versus immigrant specific deprivations with
poverty. As Table 3 illustrates, in all three cities the variables show high
correlations with poverty. In 2001, census tracts with high proportions of
visible minority residents or persons lacking knowledge of the country’s
two official languages were likely also to be tracts with high levels of
poverty.
Discussion and Directions for Further Research
This research has outlined a growing complexity in the relationship
between Canadian immigrants, poverty and deprivation over the course of
the 1990s, a decade over which both economic slowdown and recovery
were accompanied by high rates of immigration and continued changes in
the ethnic and entry class profiles of immigrants themselves. Compared to
previous studies examining these relationships between 1971 and 1991
(Ley and Smith 1997a, 2000), the research suggests a convergence between
the trajectories of Canada’s three largest immigrant reception centres as
they relate to the intersection between immigrant settlement, poverty levels
and markers of traditional neighbourhood disadvantage. In all cities,
concentrations of immigrants more commonly overlap with concentrations
of poverty and traditional deprivation in 2001 than they did a decade earlier.
There is also evidence that immigrant specific markers of deprivation have
strengthened their association with poverty at the same time that traditional
ones have declined.
Despite these commonalities, this study points to the distinctiveness of
each city’s individual experience. Cartographic and statistical evidence for
Toronto suggest a deepening relationship between poverty and immigrant
119
status and conventional indicators of deprivation. Beyond this, we see
concentrations of high immigration growing to envelop a tapestry of census
tracts with varied income levels. Even where the ethnicity of an immigrant
group is fairly homogenous, the socio-economic status is highly diverse.
This is most certainly the case in Toronto’s north Scarborough/Markham
immigrant ethnic cluster, where Canadian and foreign-born Chinese are
creating a flourishing and expanding suburban enclave in which all classes
and associated opportunities and amenities are present. There is a tendency
to assume that concentrated immigrant or ethnic settlement correlates to a
significant degree with disadvantage, measured economically or socially in
terms of isolation and lack of mainstream integration. But as Wang (1999,
33) emphasizes in a study of Chinese commercial activity in the city, what
is unfolding in Toronto’s northeastern suburbs is not a function of blocked
mobility:
Nowadays, Chinese commercial activities go far beyond merely
providing low-order goods and primary services; they have
expanded to include high-order goods … and sophisticated
services requiring high job skills (such as business, medical, and
legal services). They have also expanded to include the preserving
and fostering of the Chinese culture — functions that Chinese
bookstores, records/video stores, and theatres perform. As more
and more goods and services required by the Chinese are provided
by their co-ethnics, the Chinese community has been moving
towards higher levels of institutional completeness.
The development of multiple and institutionally complete Chinatowns
across the suburban landscape of Toronto is, however, only one of the
stories that help illuminate the patterns and relationships evolving between
immigrant settlement, poverty and deprivation in this city. In the northwest
corridor, expanding and deepening overlays between deprivation and
immigrant settlement belie a complicated pattern of ethnicity, race, class
and immigrant status that includes the original enclave areas of the city’s
Italian and Portuguese communities but also several scattered
concentrations of high-density, aging public housing and the very poor
visible minority and recent immigrants who live within them (Murdie and
Teixeira 2002).
For Vancouver, cartographic evidence indicates a growing but uneven
relationship between immigrant settlement areas and traditional
deprivation markers. While there is isolated overlap between a handful of
single and doubly deprived tracts in suburban Surrey, Burnaby and the
eastern side of the Vancouver, in locations where poverty rates have
emerged as the most extreme, and overlap with deepening concentrations
of immigrants occurs, deprivation (at least as measured here) is absent.
Statistical evidence, on the other hand, unequivocally indicates a
relationship between poverty and immigrant status that appears to be
120
strengthening to a greater degree than in Toronto. This paper has already
speculated that the cultural practices of particular immigrant groups may
help explain these patterns (i.e., lone parenthood as taboo, high-school
incompletion as discouraged), but another explanation may be found in the
fact that many immigrant families combine their financial resources to
ensure a higher level of household income. Ley (1999, 11) points out:
There is too ready a tendency to see those who arrive in Canada
poor and with limited capital as passive and dependent. The truth
may well be the opposite, for the many hands in a family seek, and
in most cases find, employment of virtually any sort. The result is
that while personal earning may be low, overall household income
may be surprisingly higher.
The use of individual rather than household poverty measures may
obscure strategies that allow poor immigrants to avoid residence in
deprived neighbourhoods, a strategy that if widely used may well help
explain the spatial disconnect between deprivation, poverty and immigrant
settlement in Vancouver. That some of the tracts in Vancouver with the
highest immigrant and poverty levels are also tracts with the highest rates of
homeownership indicates another possible reason for this disconnect.
Immigrants here may be “cash poor” but “house rich” (Hiebert 2000).
Clearly, sorting out the explanatory mechanisms for different parts of the
city should be an important aim for any future research that flows from this
study.
In Montreal the trajectory of change is also increasingly complex and
distinct from the experiences of Toronto and Vancouver. Here, although the
predictive relationship between immigrant settlement and poverty is
increasing — as is the concentration of immigrants in multiply deprived
tracts — economic and broader measures of neighbourhood disadvantage
are still far more strongly associated with persons born in Canada. That
said, statistical associations between concentrated immigrant settlement
and neighbourhood-based disadvantage are increasing and areas of
broadening and deepening disadvantage over the decade also tend to be
ones with growing immigrant populations. Bauder and Sharpe (2002) offer
insight into why these particular areas are found on the Island of Montreal
rather than in outlying suburban locations. They argue that the
comparatively low incomes of immigrants restrict their housing choices to
apartments rather than more expensive single-family homes. In Montreal,
while detached housing is predominantly found in the newer and more
outlying suburbs, both low-rise and high-density multi-family housing is
largely contained to the city centre and adjacent older suburbs. The
geography of housing then plays a critical role in the neighbourhood
choices of immigrant groups and explains in no small part why immigrant
settlement in Montreal has suburbanized to a lesser degree over the decade
than in Toronto and Vancouver.
121
The location of affordable housing and its role in shaping immigrant and
poverty maps is not restricted to Montreal. Ley and Smith (1997a, 1997b)
found that in 1991 in both Vancouver and Toronto, census tracts with higher
than average immigrant proportions were also often tracts with clusters of
publicly assisted and/or private sector low-income housing (see also
Murdie 1994, 1998). Given the extent to which the spatial pattern of
immigrant settlement, poverty and deprivation have all shifted since then,
and the lack of new social housing built in these cities over the same amount
of time, a critical issue for future analysis is affordable housing and the
extent to which diminishing access and location translate into the
development of alternative housing and coping strategies on the part of
immigrant residents themselves or an exacerbation of the deprivation
experience altogether.
Research also needs to the address the ways in which immigrant
concentration, and immigrant response to that concentration, offsets the
disadvantages of residence in extreme poverty neighbourhoods with
overlapping disadvantage. Do the networks developed, the support given,
the cultural expectations made in ethnic enclaves, override the influences of
a neighbourhood’s socio-economic comparative disadvantage? While
“growing up in poor neighbourhoods is not good for one’s socio-economic
health …” Borjas (1999, 168) cautions that “ethnic capital might still
matter, above and beyond neighbourhood effects, if contacts within an
ethnic group in a particular neighbourhood are more frequent or more
influential than contacts across ethnic groups in that neighbourhood.” At
what scale, though, does concentration need to occur to have this effect?
Site visits to Toronto census tracts with high immigrant, poverty and
deprivation concentration revealed a frequent and overlooked microgeography. In the city’s northwestern corridor, for example, within a single
census tract, several large-scale, high-density, housing complexes were
located. In one complex, immigrant residents were primarily of South
Asian descent; directly across the street was a public housing community in
which the resident immigrant population was largely Caribbean. On an
even finer scale of analysis, in a single public housing complex with three
buildings, one building had a clear concentration of Somalis. Why this
building and not the other two? Is it steering? Self-selection? And to what
extent does same-group concentration at this microscale offset the
pressures of living in highly deprived and poverty-stricken neighbourhoods? To what extent does it foster seclusion and decreased contact
with community neighbours of different citizenship and cultural
backgrounds? How do these microgeographies affect the experience of
poverty and deprivation for both groups and immigrant individuals?
At the centre of this research is the recognition that neighbourhoodbased disadvantage cannot be understood without addressing both poverty
and broader measures of deprivation. But are the measures used in this
122
study truly appropriate to the immigrant experience? Even though
statistical correlations between tracts with high proportions of immigrants
and high levels of traditional markers increased over the years in both
Toronto and Montreal, those in Vancouver did not. It may well be that for
particular immigrant groups, lone parenthood, unemployment, low
education and welfare dependency are not germane to the ways in which
disadvantage is caused, experienced and manifested in the communities in
which they live. An example can be taken from Portuguese, Greek and
Italian immigrants in Toronto. These groups have among the lowest
education levels of all immigrants in the city, yet they also have “higher
income and a lower incidence of poverty than many better educated groups.
In part, this reflects the occupational niches they have found, and,
especially for the Italians and Greeks, a peak period of immigration some
time in the past” (Ornstein 2000, 126). In addition, as already mentioned in
this paper, high levels of education among immigrants do not necessarily
translate into salaries that place individuals and their families above the
poverty line (Statistics Canada 2004). The same, of course, is true for
employment.
Reconfiguring the deprivation index as used in this and previous studies
is a central aim of the next phase of this research. In addition to language
ability,12 recency of arrival and visible minority status, family structure,
place of birth, degree of household overcrowding, housing tenure and type
(public versus private sector), service availability and accessibility, and
degrees of spatial isolation are among the variables that will be assessed as
we move toward the necessary work of re-evaluating the meaning and
measurement of immigrant-based deprivation at the neighbourhood scale.
It is also important to disaggregate the immigrant group itself. How
exactly does the experience of neighbourhood-based disadvantage differ
between distinct immigrant groups? While this study has emphasized that
associations between neighbourhood poverty and deprivation are strongest
among recently arrived immigrants, in each city greater specificity should
be sought by disaggregating further. Ethnicity, place of birth, visible
minority status and family structure are variables of focus for future work.
While this paper has focused on comparisons across Toronto, Vancouver
and Montreal, its findings have relevance beyond the triad of cities
examined. The need to reconsider the ways in which we measure and assess
immigrant poverty and disadvantage applies to the United States and other
Western immigrant receiving nations as well. Far too often the immigrant
experience of disadvantage has been uncritically intertwined with the
underclass narrative (Waldinger 2001). While it may be true that “we are on
the brink of fundamental changes in the social fabric of America’s urban
immigrant regions, approaching a point at which inner city black poverty
may be replicated by a new pattern of foreign-born poverty” we need to
think carefully and cautiously about the unique ways in which immigrants
123
come into and become trapped by deprivation and how that differs from the
experience and trajectory of African-Americans (Clark 2001, 183).
A final lesson to be taken from this work must be the recognition that the
relationship between poverty, immigrant settlement and neighbourhood
deprivation is spatially contingent at multiple scales of analysis.
Researchers have long touted the myth of the North American city and this
research has demonstrated the importance of comparing and contrasting
experiences between individual cities in the Canadian context alone. But it
goes beyond this. In the same way that it seems no longer possible to
describe a singular Canadian experience, it also seems ill-advised to
describe a quintessentially inner city or suburban one. The experience of
poor immigrants embedded and potentially isolated in the affluent suburbs
of northeastern Toronto is likely to differ significantly from the experience
of poor immigrants concentrated in the high-density public housing
complexes in the northwestern suburban reaches of the city. Researchers,
Canadian and American alike, need to avoid generalizing about the
relationship between immigrants and concentrated disadvantage and
instead explore the subtle and not-so-subtle ways the dynamic differs both
temporally and spatially across national, inter-urban, intra-urban and
neighbourhood levels.
Of course, this will require moving beyond the comfort zone of census
tract analysis and thus taking the research to immigrants and
neighbourhoods themselves. It is only through qualitative assessment that
we are likely to understand what makes immigrant poverty and
neighbourhood deprivation unique from that experienced by the Canadianborn and distinctive among different immigrant groups. Perhaps most
important, it is only through asking immigrants about the experience and
negotiation of a poor life in a disadvantaged neighbourhood that we will be
able to address the often mentioned, but poorly understood, experiences of
social isolation and entrenchment associated with blocked mobility and the
evolution of underclass populations and neighbourhoods.
Notes
*
1.
124
This research was generously funded through the Canadian Embassy Research
Grant Program, 2002–2003. The additional support of the Vancouver Centre of
Excellence for Research on Immigration and Integration in the Metropolis
(RIIM) is gratefully acknowledged, as is the assistance of the Toronto Centre of
Excellence for Research on Immigration and Settlement (CERIS) and the
University of North Carolina at Charlotte Junior Faculty Grant Program. An
earlier version of this paper is available through RIIM as Working Paper No.
04-20.
Virtually all tracts that qualified on one or more of the deprivation indicators (two
times CMA mean) had incidences of poverty 20% or more and, as such, qualified
as “deprived.”
2.
On 1 January 1998, the six local municipalities of Metropolitan Toronto: York,
East York, Etobicoke, Scarborough, North York, and Toronto were amalgamated
into the new City of Toronto. The City of Toronto is the urban core of the Toronto
Census Metropolitan Area.
3. In his study, Hou (2004) defines minority neighbourhoods as census tracts with
over 30% of the population coming from any single visible minority group.
4. See Hiebert (1998) for an extensive and highly detailed study of Vancouver’s
changing social geography.
5. This refers to Hong Kong, Taiwan, and mainland Chinese.
6. In 1991 the Incidence of Low Income Persons for the Vancouver CMA was 17.4.
By 2001, it rose to about 20.4.
7. Across the range of Canadian CMAs, Montreal ranked tenth in 2001 in terms of
the proportion of its population that was foreign-born. CMAs such as Hamilton
and Abbotsford ranked higher, with immigrant population proportions of 37.5%
and 21.8% respectively. Also ranking above Montreal were the CMAs of
Windsor, Kitchener, Calgary, London and Victoria (Statistics Canada 2001).
8. This arc of immigrant settlement includes, among others, the communities of
Côte-des-Neiges, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce and Côte-Saint-Luc.
9. Montreal’s Atlas of Immigration (Archambault et al. 2003) shows associations
between these concentrations and particular immigrant groups. In the core of the
northwest area extended out from the city centre, tracts show location quotients
highest for immigrants of northern and western European origin (with the
exception of the United Kingdom). Overlapping and extending northeast to the
southern shore of Laval and over the river to Saint-Laurent, location quotients
show concentrations of Algerian, Egyptian, Libyan, Moroccan and Tunisian
immigrants. In the area of concentrated immigrant settlement lying north of the
centre city, immigrants from Central and South America are more prominent,
while those from the Caribbean and Bermuda are most notably concentrated in a
line of tracts running along the northeastern edge of the Island of Montreal, across
from Laval. In Longueuil, Southeast Asian immigrants reveal a measure of
concentration.
10. 1971 data for Toronto and Vancouver were custom tabulated by Statistics Canada
for Ley and Smith (1997a).
11. In contrast to the mapping analysis, Tables 1 and 2 use incidence of low income
among economic families rather than incidence per person to allow for
comparison with 1971 data.
12. The importance of language is illustrated particularly well by Truelove (2000,
144) who, although focusing her research on service provision, makes the often
overlooked point that “having a residential location near an agency that offers a
service … does not necessarily mean that the new immigrant can access that
service. There are various barriers to use of a service … if one does not speak
English and the service is not offered in one’s language, then the service cannot
be accessed.”
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128
Janusz Przychodzen et Vijaya Rao
Écrire l’Inde au Québec : Mythes et réalités de
l’Ailleurs
Suivi de la Table ronde : Écrire l’Inde au Québec
Résumé
L’article est une présentation critique de la table ronde « Écrire l’Inde au
Québec » (2004). Après avoir mis en valeur le fait que la construction de
l’identité moderne au Québec se fait régulièrement en rapport avec la donnée
orientale, ses auteurs se penchent sur la question de l’influence de la pensée
moderne dans la représentation québécoise de l’Inde. Ainsi, l’image de l’Inde
qui ressort des propos des écrivains, et qui se caractérise par « la dimension
temporelle hors le temps », expression à la fois d’un choc culturel et d’une
fuite vers le mythe, lieu exceptionnel de l’écriture, se complète étonnement et
paradoxalement par la présence d’une conscience plus contemporaine, cause
même d’un syncrétisme identitaire.
Abstract
This article is a critical review of the proceedings of the round table “Écrire
l’Inde au Québec” (2004). After having submitted that the construction of the
modern identity in Quebec takes place normally in conjunction with the
oriental fact, the authors address the issue of the influence of modern thought
on the manner in which Quebeckers represent India. Thus, the image of India
that emerges from the observations of the writers, one that is characterized by
the “temporal dimension outside of time,” which is at once a reflection of
cultural shock and of escape into myth, that little grotto of writers, culminates
astonishingly and paradoxically in the emergence of a more contemporary
awareness, indeed one that is at the very root of identitary syncretism.
À chacun son Inde, dit-on en raison de la richesse extraordinaire de
l’histoire et de la culture du pays, de la complexité et de la variété de sa
société, mais aussi en raison de sa différence souvent difficile à approcher.
Comment et dans quelle mesure peut-on s’inspirer de cette civilisation en
tant qu’écrivain, poète ou romancier? Quel rôle y jouent l’expérience
directe et l’imagination? Quels sont les obstacles et les solutions qu’un
homme ou une femme de plume rencontre en prenant le chemin d’un
dialogue interculturel? Quelle est, finalement, la place qu’y occupent la
mythologie, la philosophie, la religion et la société moderne?
31, 2005
Sans que l’on en soit tout à fait conscient encore aujourd’hui, l’histoire de
la littérature québécoise moderne a été marquée dès le début par l’image de
l’Orient. Il suffit de penser seulement à Bengalis d’Arthur de Bussières ou
au Paon d’émail de Paul Morin, même si ces visions du début du XXe siècle,
rêvées, ont plus à voir avec la spécificité de la culture locale qu’avec les
cultures et les sociétés asiatiques proprement dites. L’orientalisme
québécois se révèle également influencé par une mode de la littérature
française, fortement attirée à cette époque par les pays et les cultures d’Asie.
Il n’en reste pas moins que la modernité et l’Orient se chevauchent
régulièrement au cours de l’histoire de la littérature québécoise. Ainsi, le
conflit entre les régionalistes et les exotiques, tels que de Bussières et
Morin, donne naissance à un phénomène récurrent, dont la logique de la
modernisation de la littérature par l’orientalisation de celle-ci1 marquera
plusieurs étapes et aspects décisifs de l’évolution de la culture au Québec.
L’Orient, par-delà son exotisme, semble en fait jouer dans ce contexte le
rôle d’un catalyseur qui provoque la remise en question de la tradition et
l’élargissement des frontières de la perception du soi et de l’autre.
Est-ce d’ailleurs le fruit du hasard si le premier recueil important de
poésie moderne, celui d’Alain Grandbois, a été publié à Hankou en Chine?
Comment expliquer également le fait que l’un des plus importants
manifestes québécois, Refus global, signé par Borduas et les automatistes
au lendemain de la Seconde Guerre mondiale pour s’opposer, à l’instar des
surréalistes français, à la déchéance morale de la civilisation occidentale,
s’en rapporte en contrepartie à l’Orient, comme le suggère déjà le titre de la
couverture écrit à l’orientale, de manière verticale, et comme le confirme le
système de valeurs dont le texte fait l’apologie : spontanéité, magie,
sensibilité? « N’y aurait-il pas deux formes de l’amour, l’une occidentale
qui isole l’objet aimé dans une forteresse, l’autre orientale où l’objet de
l’amour est l’occasion de mieux sentir l’univers? », s’est demandé Borduas
lui-même dans une de ses lettres à Noël Lajoie2.
Est-il alors vraiment étonnant que dans les années 80, au moment même
où la littérature et la société québécoises connaissaient un autre virage
identitaire et s’ouvraient à des écrivains d’origines ethniques, l’apparition
d’artistes asiatiques tels que Ying Chen, Aki Shimazaki et Ook Chung ait
été reçue avec une attention particulière par la critique et le public? Il serait
alors utile d’explorer en profondeur la place de l’esthétique moderniste
dans l’écriture qu’ont pratiquée ces nouveaux venus, comme les autres
écrivains dits migrants.
Dans tout ce dialogue interculturel, quelle est la place exacte qu’occupe
l’Inde? Quel est le rôle que joue l’héritage moderne dans l’imaginaire orientaliste, dans la représentation d’un pays oriental? La rencontre de quatre
écrivains autour du thème « Écrire l’Inde au Québec » organisée en 2004 à la
Maison des écrivains québécois (et dont la transcription suit la présentation
que voici) a permis de constater qu’aujourd’hui, indépendamment de la
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Écrire l’Inde au Québec : Mythes et réalités de l’Ailleurs
multiplicité des expériences, de la diversité des motivations et du degré
divers de la connaissance de la société et de la culture indiennes, la
découverte de ce pays a été déterminante tant sur le plan personnel
qu’esthétique. La valeur de cet évènement se mesurera tout d’abord et avant
tout dans sa force libératrice, pour ne pas dire libérante, puisque
l’expérience de la liberté, telle qu’elle se manifeste ici, a peu à voir, à dire
vrai, avec la jouissance de l’indépendance individuelle au sens occidental
du terme.
C’est que cette liberté devient souvent le synonyme d’une
métamorphose qu’engendre le choc causé, d’une part, par le dépouillement
extrême d’une bonne partie de la population indienne et, d’autre part, par un
enrichissement spirituel, difficile à exprimer, dont profite sans aucun doute
le voyageur. Le dénuement des gens (frappant à la fois par sa dimension
humaine, son indifférence joyeuse et son absence de tragique), l’inégalité
des conditions de vie, la présence de l’infirmité et de la mort, entremêlées de
manière surprenante pour un étranger, prisonnier des divisions du monde
catégoriel, ainsi que le pouvoir générateur spirituel exceptionnel de cette
civilisation — civilisation qui a donné naissance à nombre de religions
(qu’elle a abritées) — mènent à la découverte d’une partie insoupçonnée de
l’humanité et de soi-même. Yvon Rivard rencontre ainsi en Inde son
enfance, « le temps propre de l’enfance », qui rapidement devient une
« sensation même du temps », sinon de l’éternité. Monique Juteau y voit,
entre autres choses, une manière « ancestrale » de vivre, qui concorde avec
les sensations d’arrêt pour ne pas dire d’abolition du temps qu’observe
Yolande Villemaire. Larry Tremblay sera surpris, pour sa part, par le
phénomène de « l’étirement sinueux » du temps. Une telle perception,
bouleversant évidemment le rapport au monde, provoque immédiatement
une ouverture et une sensibilité exceptionnelles à la réalité, et cela entraîne
un débordement de l’expérience du sensible. Suspendue en dehors de la
mémoire (telle qu’elle fonctionne en Occident), sinon plongée dans un syncrétisme temporel inouï, où diverses époques se côtoient quotidiennement,
l’Inde offre l’occasion d’identifications inattendues sur le plan social et
même national, identifications qui semblent justifiées du côté du Québec,
ne serait-ce que par l’expérience commune de la colonisation et de tout ce
qu’il en résulte au chapitre de l’identité et de l’autonomie et en ce qui a trait à
la perception de l’altérité. Dans ce rapport entre les cultures, les liens
s’avèrent beaucoup plus complexes et profonds que l’on ne pourrait le
croire.
C’est alors que l’art d’écrire, comme tout acte créateur, prend des
proportions et des significations différentes. L’étirement et la suspension
du temps, éprouvés par les écrivains, ont un effet incontestable sur leur
manière de percevoir et de pratiquer l’écriture. Le ralentissement de la
plume que connaît Monique Juteau, éprise auparavant de l’idéal d’un
Kerouac d’« écrire très vite » sans y revenir, correspond à la complexi-
131
fication et à l’approfondissement du monde observé, qui obligent à porter
toute son attention sur l’essentiel. L’en-dehors du monde habité rend aussi
l’artiste plus attentif et plus conscient de l’incidence du « JE si
compromettant », lui fait sentir tout le poids et tout l’artifice du langage et
l’oriente, inévitablement, ne serait-ce que par les conditions du voyage et
du déplacement, vers la dimension ontologiquement poétique, essentielle,
de la parole : « Sous l’influence de la lenteur indienne, je rédigeais chaque
paragraphe comme un poème. »
Le besoin d’écrire, qui prend souvent sa source dans l’angoisse, se fait
soudainement absent en tant qu’urgence ou nécessité et se transforme
naturellement en art de l’inévitable. Dans le cas de Yolande Villemaire, une
enquête documentaire devient un voyage à travers le temps et l’histoire, une
écriture qui procède à l’envers, par une reconstruction d’une image
quasiment archétypale, une réflexion, finalement, sur un des dieux, et un
des mythes les plus anciens de toutes les civilisations. Ce n’est pourtant
qu’une manière (et une voie) d’aborder sa propre identité, sa propre
condition. S’éloigner de soi-même pour pouvoir mieux s’appréhender.
Tout comme dans le Mahâbhârata ou le Râmâyana, son roman Le Dieu
dansant3 repose sur une suite de mises en abyme qui conduisent vers
l’énigme de l’existence.
C’est qu’écrire en Inde, sur l’Inde ou après l’Inde (comme dans le cas
d’Yvon Rivard) est une expérience qui relève et qui témoigne de l’unité
exceptionnelle de l’être et du monde, du monde et de l’imaginaire, de
l’imaginaire et de l’art. La fascination de Larry Tremblay pour l’art
statuaire, chrétien et hindou, uni d’un seul coup par l’aspect érotisé des
figures, nous permet de nous rendre compte que l’Inde se pose comme un
écran qui, paradoxalement, abolit les distances et les frontières. C’est en
Inde que Villemaire verra donc le noir du a rimbaldien et sentira, quand elle
chantera ses mantras, « la texture même de la réalité » dans la sonorité de
chaque lettre. Devenue une matérialité difficile à dénier, l’écriture prend de
vastes proportions qui impliquent totalement l’artiste dans ses actes
créateurs. Larry Tremblay, malgré toutes les apparences qui pourraient
nous faire croire que l’Inde n’occupe qu’une place négligeable dans sa
création littéraire, nous rappelle fort pertinemment que la culture, la pensée
et les mythes indiens font partie, dans son cas, d’une autre écriture, d’une
écriture corporelle. L’esthétique relève ainsi plus qu’ailleurs de
l’expérience tout à fait physique, de ce que l’on pourrait appeler aussi
l’imaginaire vécu, soit, aux dires de Rivard, « l’imaginaire le plus pur ».
L’Inde, elle-même, apparaît dans l’écriture comme le fruit d’un
processus complexe, résultat d’une difficile négociation entre « la crainte
de trahir » et l’effort soutenu dans le but de franchir les mécanismes
d’autocensure et les préjugés, et dans celui, finalement, de réfléchir sur la
vérité et le mensonge à la fois du lieu commun, du stéréotype. L’Inde
132
s’installe alors dans la représentation avec tous ses avatars. Il n’est
nullement surprenant qu’elle puisse générer des récits différents tant dans le
style que dans la manière d’aborder et de représenter le pays. À l’exception
du Dieu dansant (1995), dont l’auteure nous avoue ouvertement : « c’est
très difficile pour moi de parler de l’Inde contemporaine », la dimension
autobiographique semble jouer une part déterminante dans cette rencontre.
Tel est le cas de Poudre de kumkum (2002), journal de voyage, qui rend
compte de deux expériences critiques de la vie d’un homme visitant l’Inde.
Tel est aussi le cas de Silences du corbeau (1986) d’Yvon Rivard, rédigé à la
suite d’un séjour de l’auteur à Pondichéry. Cet aspect d’écriture se révèle
particulièrement important chez Monique Juteau, dont les multiples
voyages ont façonné l’écriture, l’ont imprégnée des odeurs, des rêves, des
gens rencontrés en Inde. Ces derniers, transformés en personnages,
prennent par ailleurs le relais de l’autobiographie en lui attribuant une
nouvelle dimension et en évacuant en quelque sorte le voyageur. C’est que
la préoccupation d’écrire l’Inde véritable est un point de départ central des
projets esthétiques, sans pour autant que ce pays soit dévoilé au terme de ces
explorations. L’Inde, cette « grande émettrice », comme l’a saisi Juteau,
oblige, envoûte, rebute, dépasse, mais condamne à une certaine forme de
silence. Elle inspire, complète et dépasse l’écriture.
On emporte peu de choses en Inde, qui apparaît d’ailleurs comme un lieu
hermétique, énigmatique. Il y a cependant dans les œuvres de nos écrivains
un jeu subtil et complexe de représentations, d’influences, d’identifications, de séductions, de fascinations, de jugements, de distanciations
et d’appropriations, tout cela opérant sur le fond de dialogue culturel où le
rôle de la modernité (québécoise) n’est pas du tout négligeable.
Poser la question sur la modernité dans le contexte de l’œuvre de
Villemaire peut paraître saugrenu à première vue, le texte étant
littéralement saturé de références à l’histoire indienne ancienne. Situé au
XIe siècle dans l’Inde méridionale, à l’époque de l’empire Chola, le roman
met en scène le drame du personnage de Shambala, épris de passion
(interdite aux hommes) pour le Bharata Natyam, une des danses classiques
les plus anciennes de l’Inde. Même si le choix du lieu de l’action, la ville de
Chidambaram, (appelée autrefois Tillai, connue pour son légendaire
temple à mille colonnes dédié à Shiva, où l’un des avatars du dieu, Nataraj,
aurait dansé la danse cosmique) met en valeur l’aspect mythique et
historique du récit, le conflit entre la tradition (surveillée par les puissants
gourous) et le personnage central ressurgit très vite, presque dès les
premières pages du roman. L’œuvre pose ainsi ouvertement, par une sorte
d’anachronisme idéologique, les assises pour un antagonisme de valeurs,
dont la nature et l’étendue se révèlent plutôt appartenir aux temps
modernes. Ainsi, la révolte de Shambala est déterminée tant par son
aveuglante passion pour un art qui lui est interdit que par les valeurs
modernes d’égalité et de justice, qui alimentent l’insoumission du
133
personnage. Autrement dit, l’individualité de Shambala s’inscrit dans la
complexité d’un je à tendance moderniste, dont l’identité est à vrai dire
scindée, non pas en soi comme on aurait pu le croire, mais plutôt entre deux
époques, l’une contemporaine, l’autre historique. La volonté de dégager le
texte de son contexte historique est visible aussi sur le plan lexical,
dépourvu de termes spécifiques.
Cette dualité, sinon un déchirement tragique (caractéristique absente de
la culture indienne), se manifeste également à un autre niveau. Le sacrifice
que fait le personnage de son corps en décidant de dépasser l’interdit au prix
de l’infirmité que causera la violence du père s’inscrit dans la logique d’un
mythe originel, cependant que l’éthique du pardon, qui imprègne la fin du
récit, semble venir du monde judéo-chrétien. Il en naît une tension qui
stigmatise l’évolution ambivalente du personnage, qui accepte son sort,
sans l’avoir véritablement assumé. « Or, si son intelligence et son cœur
avaient déjà pardonné, Shambala savait fort bien que son corps, lui, ne
pardonnait toujours pas. Son corps était ivre de ressentiment.4 » La question
est toutefois de savoir dans quelle mesure la valeur de la figure fondatrice du
mythe est véritablement affectée par l’aventure de Shambala, car dans une
perspective critique différente, qui proposerait d’aborder le récit non pas
comme un texte subversif, mais plutôt comme un texte instaurateur du rituel
dans sa forme toute primaire, c’est-à-dire sacrée, il serait permis de lire le
roman autrement, comme une œuvre postmoderne, en tenant compte de son
questionnement du bagage culturel et social rattaché aux pratiques
rituelles. D’autant plus qu’à bien y regarder, on pourrait, d’un point de vue
indien, trouver dans le dilemme de Shambala l’écho d’une des plus grandes
questions de la philosophie hindoue, présente dans l’épopée Mahâbhârata,
débattue par Krishna face aux hésitations qu’a Pandavas à l’idée de
participer à une bataille sanglante contre ses ennemis, mais aussi ses
cousins. La supériorité éthique du dharma, qu’explique Krishna en tant que
loi générale, immuablement fixée — soit l’ensemble des règles et des
phénomènes naturels régissant l’ordre des choses, des sociétés et des
hommes et permettant ainsi d’accepter l’inacceptable —, est présente en
tant que problématique dans le roman de Villemaire, qui recourt par ailleurs
aux effets du merveilleux quant à la mort de Shambala. Le dieu Shiva
descend chercher le corps du danseur pour l’emporter à Kailash, sa demeure
sur les cimes de l’Himalaya. L’intervention du dieu prête l’élément
mystérieux au récit : « On ne retrouva jamais le corps du danseur.5 » Est-ce
la justice divine? L’enfant du ciel, Shambala, serait-il délivré du cycle de la
mort et de la naissance par Shiva? Son châtiment terrestre imposé par son
père parce qu’il a failli à son dharma deviendra-t-il prodigieusement sa
délivrance?
Le scepticisme, l’ironie et la distance que cultive Alexandre,
protagoniste des Silences du corbeau d’Yvon Rivard seraient-ils également
propres à la posture moderniste? Sans aucun doute, tout ce que l’homme
134
représente, par sa quête infinie et mal définie de l’identité, relève de
l’esthétique moderne. Décrit en tant que caricature de Faust, le
cheminement du nouvel apprenti de la philosophie hindoue, réfugié dans le
Guest House de la Sri Aurobindo Society à Pondichéry, est aussi révélateur
de la nature du personnage que de la spécificité de son monde ambiant.
Faisant partie tant bien que mal d’un groupe disparate d’individus arrivés
de tous les coins du monde pour suivre les enseignements d’une jeune fille
considérée comme une incarnation de Mère (la réelle compagne de Sri
Aurobindo), Alexandre s’interroge sur sa propre existence et sur la valeur
de l’expérience indienne qu’il est en train de vivre. Sa naïveté, l’expression
de la spontanéité de son esprit, est toutefois souvent trompeuse, car elle
ressemble à plusieurs égards au questionnement d’un maître bouddhiste.
L’ambivalence, qui se traduit essentiellement par le fait que la
désacralisation (ou du moins la subversion sinon la remise en question) du
statut sacro-saint du gourou, viendrait d’une logique qui tire ses origines
dans ce qu’elle conteste. Ce paradoxe est propre à l’ensemble du récit qui
converge inévitablement vers le renversement de sa situation initiale.
Pour Rivard, l’Inde devient un prétexte pour interroger le concept global
de l’Orient, tel qu’il circule en Occident, d’où la présence implicite, dans le
roman, de références à d’autres cultures asiatiques, dont surtout les cultures
japonaise et chinoise. Le Yi King, « recueil divinatoire chinois dont les
soixante-quatre “hexagrammes” constituent une image complète du
monde puisqu’ils reproduisent toutes les combinaisons possibles des
énergies primordiales que sont le yin et le yang », prête ses figures pour
marquer l’évolution circulaire du roman. L’Occident, tel qu’il est décrit : en
perte de repères, en quête de transcendance, semble halluciner une Inde,
tenter vainement de se l’approprier et de s’identifier à sa pensée lointaine
(malgré la portée universelle que Sri Aurobindo désirait lui donner). Il
confond le plus souvent la spiritualité avec une performance, toute
moderne, de l’âme. « J’essaie de résister à la grâce contagieuse qui menace
ici tous les pèlerins occidentaux et plus particulièrement ceux qui ont le
bonheur ou le malheur d’approcher un maître6 », dira Alexandre. Mais dans
cette posture, ce qui compte n’est pas vraiment la question de l’identité,
mais celle de la vérité. Rivard rejoint par cette préoccupation
épistémologique le modernisme du Dieu dansant. Dans le cas des Silences
du corbeau, on ne peut toutefois pas parler de conflit, du déchirement
tragique propre à l’œuvre de Villemaire. Le roman est plutôt construit
autour d’une tension qui résulte du caractère instable, plus que jamais
dynamique et même obscur de la vérité spirituelle. La littérature se pose
dans cette quête comme le garant absolu du non-savoir et oblige à une
certaine forme de silence. Dans cette perspective, l’énigme du texte sacré,
tel que la Bhagavat Gita, fondateur de la pensée philosophique et sociale
hindoue, reste entière, nonobstant la portée morale et même pédagogique
de cette leçon légendaire de Krishna en Inde.
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Dans le renversement des paramètres qui se prépare, certains
personnages indiens, tels que Mitra ou Chitkara et contrairement aux
Occidentaux venus en Inde chercher leur salut aléatoire dans une quête
spirituelle utopique, sont tourmentés par le désir de savoir comment on
devient « blanc, riche et libre ». L’image de l’Inde contemporaine,
partageant les déboires d’une société en développement, court-circuite
l’image idéale du pays que portent en eux les protagonistes venus de
l’étranger. Ce chassé-croisé de représentations témoigne autant d’un
transfert paradoxal de valeurs que de la contradiction de la nature humaine.
Il n’en reste pas moins que, dans ce contexte, le statut du sacré ne sera jamais
garanti. Le spectacle de la spiritualité qu’offre la jeune fille de 17 ans,
accompagnée d’un escroc (l’est-il vraiment?), qui sera dénoncé rapidement
par la presse locale, sème le scepticisme chez les pèlerins. La communauté
se dissipe définitivement face à ce qui devrait plutôt l’unir : la mort
accidentelle et tragique d’un des leurs. Le thème de la mort, associé
symboliquement au temps, émerge alors comme le véritable enjeu. Il
stigmatise l’écriture dès les premières pages du roman. (« Je me serais sans
doute aussitôt rendormi, si je n’avais pas cette manie de consulter ma
montre à propos de tout et de rien. Est-ce pour me libérer un peu de cette
tyrannie que j’ai changé, avant de partir, ma vieille Timex au cadran
lumineux contre une Bulova aveugle et sans chiffres?7 ») Dans ce duel
inégal dont le but, pourrait-on dire métaphoriquement, est de faire taire le
corbeau — l’oiseau annonciateur de la mort —, l’auteur, sans pouvoir
éliminer le temps dans une quelconque transcendance, réussit à opérer un
renversement majeur des identités, et donc, de manière oblique, un
renversement de la temporalité. Mère, adulée, se transforme alors en enfant
et dans ce re-devenir, Alexandre, mandaté pour reconduire la fille dans son
village natal, agit d’une certaine manière en tant que père. Tout semble donc
rentrer dans l’ordre et pareillement à l’idéal confucéen du langage qui
repose sur l’impératif de « rendre correctes les dénominations » agissant en
remède contre la corruption des mœurs, le désordre social, l’abus du
pouvoir, le langage esthétique chez Rivard, malgré l’échec évident du
commerce de la spiritualité, retrouve soudainement une dimension
virginale du monde. Mais il y plus, car la redécouverte du temps de
l’enfance (dont l’écrivain parle dans la table ronde), cette victoire
inespérée, peut apparaître aussi comme l’expression du désir latent de
conserver l’image d’une Inde lointaine, édénique, atemporelle et utopique,
lieu non pas (non plus) de salut mais de refuge8.
Les nouvelles formes narratives, explorées dans les récits de Monique
Juteau et de Larry Tremblay, ont-elles une incidence significative sur la
représentation contemporaine de l’Inde? Curieusement, on pourrait
affirmer que Des jours de chemins perdus et retrouvés et Poudre de kumkum
publiés respectivement en 1998 et en 2002, se nourrissent subrepticement
de l’expérience d’Alexandre dans la mesure où les personnages se disent
ouvertement agnostiques et apparaissent comme les héritiers tant du
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modernisme compromis du siècle dernier que du désenchantement face au
monde contemporain :
Croire? En Brahma? En Vishnou? En quelque chose? En quoi
croyez-vous? Me demandent les hindous à chaque heure du jour. Je
ne crois pas. Je leur explique, qu’au fond de moi, il y a un cadenas
qui verrouille le temps, l’enferme dans un XXe siècle d’où je ne
peux plus sortir.9
Et Tremblay précise en tant que praticien d’une des plus anciennes formes
de théâtre dans le monde :
Il est arrivé souvent que certains de mes étudiants ou de mes
collègues croient que je séjourne en Inde pour des raisons
mystiques. […] Le kathakali n’est pas une branche de
l’hindouisme et celui qui l’exerce peut être athée ou chrétien,
mangeur de bœuf, de porc ou végétarien. Je n’ai jamais adhéré à
aucune forme de religion en Inde.10
Le refus du religieux et, partant, de la transcendance, exaspère toutefois
la dérision identitaire. Le narrateur de Poudre de kumkum, dans la première
partie de l’ouvrage, s’engage allégrement dans des dialogues philosophiques avec des fourmis, ce qui met en valeur le caractère souvent absurde
et insignifiant de l’appréhension humaine de la réalité. La crise se fait sentir
de façon beaucoup plus aiguë dans le texte de Monique Juteau. Le style
hermétique, fragmenté, découpé, brouillé à l’extrême quant aux références
et à l’énonciation est surtout porteur de la marque d’un traumatisme que le
langage exprime par la perte presque totale de repères. Dans ces récits, très
individualisés, fondés sur la perception sensible, minimaliste et subjective
(intérieure) du monde, où le biographique prend déjà des proportions
décisives, l’Inde, fortement intériorisée, transparaît moins en tant que
produit de la fiction que comme produit de l’autofiction.
La cristallisation du malaise survient de manière surprenante dans le cas
de deux écrivains, par l’entremise du même évènement : la disparition
douloureuse et irrémédiable de la mère. Cette dernière figure prend
toutefois dans le récit de Tremblay des significations plus larges,
puisqu’elle est aussi associée à la belle image de la mer qui ouvre le récit et
le termine en tant que métaphore. « Regarder la mer : seul sacre que ma
présence sur terre accepte », écrit le voyageur. Ressenti comme la fin d’un
monde, le tragique évènement est mis en parallèle avec la violence et la
haine hindou-musulmane, qui éclate en 1992 à Ayodhya pour se propager
dans tout le pays. Ce sera donc aussi la fin d’une Inde (autant pour le
voyageur que pour l’habitant), l’évènement ayant été décrit comme le plus
grave depuis l’assassinat de Gandhi. Toutefois malgré ce double deuil,
l’Inde continue à enchanter et à exercer sa magie extraordinaire. Troublante
à plusieurs égards, elle dévoile aussi toute sa force thérapeutique comme
dans le récit de Juteau, car dès que le voyage se déplace sur la terre indienne,
le langage retrouve sa cohérence et l’espoir renaît. C’est alors que le sens du
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titre Des jours de chemins perdus et retrouvés se dévoile. La
transformation sémantique s’opère au moyen du passage de la
représentation de la catégorie essentiellement spatiale, chemins perdus et
retrouvés, à une nouvelle dimension de la réalité qu’expriment les jours
(lumière) perdus et retrouvés. Chose importante, ce changement
provoquera finalement la métamorphose de la nature du voyage
lui-même. Chez Tremblay, qui désavoue ouvertement l’héritage
moderne (« L’homme moderne? […] Tu veux vraiment savoir ce que je
pense de l’homme moderne? Vraiment?11 »), la résolution du deuil
adviendra dans une rencontre inattendue avec le sacré. À Pushkar, une
des sept villes saintes de l’Inde, la participation simulée, toute théâtrale,
au rituel brahmanique (sans y croire vraiment à cause du caractère
touristique de l’évènement), non pour soi-même, mais uniquement pour
l’offrir à la mère perdue, devient un sacrifice de l’incroyance, qui
investira la cérémonie d’une signification personnelle pour redonner à la
cérémonie, dans la sincérité et la spontanéité de l’âme, une dimension
originelle, mythique et vraie.
La réalité indienne émerge donc des textes retenus par une dynamique
complexe, marquée avant tout par le patrimoine de la culture occidentale
(y compris son orientalisme), indépendamment des rapports (de plus en
plus ambivalents) qu’entretiennent les écrivains avec cet héritage. Si, de
l’autre côté, le degré d’adhésion, d’identification à l’Inde peut varier, la
représentation elle-même semble être soumise à une constante
ambivalence. L’image en rapport avec l’Inde semble se moderniser de
plus en plus dans le récit (à ne pas confondre avec la modernité indienne, à
peu près absente en tant que problématique), surtout sur le plan formel,
dans l’importance que les écrivains accordent à la valeur esthétique du
langage et à l’amplification et même à l’exaspération de ce que l’on
pourrait appeler le dilemme de l’identité moderne, alors que la
modernité, surtout en tant qu’idéologie, devient de plus en plus
inactuelle, réprouvée et même reniée. Si cette désillusion frappe aussi en
bonne partie la perception même de l’Inde (surtout dans le rapport à ce
que nous avons appelé le spectacle de la spiritualité), l’Inde semble
néanmoins sortir victorieuse de l’épreuve de l’altérité, malgré l’échec
évident du moderne idéologique dans les romans de Villemaire et de
Rivard et le refus, sinon la condamnation du même modernisme, dans les
récits de Juteau et de Tremblay. C’est que dans le spectre élargi de sa
représentation, elle s’offre avant tout généreusement en tant que
possibilité, ouverture (malgré son hermétisme), lieu mythique de passage
vers soi-même et vers l’autre. Il n’en reste pas moins qu’une telle Inde est
aussi condamnée en bonne partie à rester accidentelle, distante, en dehors
du temps, muette, donc mystérieuse, dans la barrière de ses langues, de
ses cultures et de ses langages. Le double visage de l’Inde serait d’ailleurs
traversé par sa propre ambiguïté, sa capacité d’actualiser l’archaïque qui
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tend parfois à se manifester au-delà de certaines formes périmées, dans ce
qu’il a de plus moderne12.
Notes
1.
L’idée de l’influence orientale sur la modernité occidentale est à prendre
toutefois dans une perspective générale. Dans la peinture, la question a été
traitée par Kirk Varnedoe (A Fine Disregard: What Makes Modern Art
Modern, New York : Harry N. Abrams, 1990). Voir aussi « Bouddhisme et
critique de la modernité en francophonie » (dossier sous la direction de James
W. Brown et Raphaël Liogier), dans Dalhousie French Studies, no 46, Spring
1999.
2. Paul-Émile Borduas, Lettre à Noël Lajoie, 4 janvier 1958, in Gilles Lapointe,
L’Envol des signes : Borduas et ses lettres, Montréal, Fides, 1996, p. 15. Cité
par Boris Chukhovich dans « L’orientalisme dans l’art du Québec. Du mythe de
l’Autre vers l’art de l’Autre », dans Orient et orientalisme au Québec. Identités
hybrides, Benalil, Mounia et Janusz Przychodzen (dir.), Montréal : Presses de
l’Université de Montréal. À paraître en 2006.
3. Yolande Villemaire, Le Dieu dansant, Montréal, L’Hexagone, 1995.
4. Ibid., p. 191.
5. Ibid., p. 228.
6. Yvon Rivard, Les Silences du corbeau, Montréal, Boréal, 1986, p. 14.
7. Ibid., p. 11.
8. Graham Huggan dans son étude « Orientalism reconfirmed? Stereotypes of
East-West Encounters in Janette Turner Hospital’s The Ivory Swing and Yvon
Rivard’s Les Silences du corbeau » (Canadian Literature, no 132, Spring 1992)
va plus loin en affirmant : « While both writers undertake a critique of
stereotypical Western (European) attitudes towards the Orient, thereby
implying their dissociation from the colonialist practices of Orientalism, the
dissociation is by no means as complete they might wish. […] The ironic
treatment of this quest backfires: the real irony resides not in the two writers’
critical exposure of Western suprematism but in their tacit acceptance of the
intrinsic superiority of Western values. What sets out, in other words, as a
critique of Orientalism eventually becomes its reconfirmation: the journey East
is duly identified as the pretext for a specious rationalization of Western
anxieties », pp. 45-46.
9. Monique Juteau, Des jours de chemins perdus et retrouvés, Trois-Rivières,
Écrits des Forges, 2000, p. 89.
10. Larry Tremblay, Poudre de kumkum, Montréal, XYZ, 2002, p. 63.
11. Ibid., p. 21.
12. En témoigne cette description, combien juste, de la ville sainte de Bénarès :
« Cette ville, lorsque j’y suis allé la première fois, m’a profondément remué.
Bénarès n’est pas faite de maisons, de rues, de temples, d’hommes, de femmes
et d’enfants. C’est dans une matière uniforme, dont les principaux ingrédients
sont le bois, la boue, l’eau, la mort, que nous pénétrons quand nous franchissons
les frontières de cette ville où les principales activités, avec celle d’adorer Dieu,
consistent à mourir et, pour les vivants, à brûler les morts. Bénarès est l’endroit
le plus proche du mystère de la mort, celui où on la respire, celui où on la sent se
déposer sur notre peau moite et salie par les cendres des bûchers allumés sur les
ghats. Je me souviens de la boue de Bénarès, de cette sensation intime de coller
à cette ville au point de se croire avalé par elle. On ne marche pas, là-bas, on
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nage. On est à l’intérieur d’une émotion qui transcende les cultures, les cultes.
Observer les corps disparaître dans les flammes, les crânes exploser sous l’effet
de la chaleur, ne provoque ni nausée ni frayeur. Regarder une vache manger les
fleurs déposées sur un cadavre qui « attend son tour » ne provoque ni scandale ni
révolte. La mort, à Bénarès, possède la force de pénétration d’un parfum. La mort,
à Bénarès, ne se recouvre pas du masque de la hideur. Elle rappelle la naissance
des mondes accomplis par le mélange de la terre, de l’eau, du feu et de l’air »,
Ibid., p. 53.
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Écrire l’Inde au Québec
Table ronde
(Maison des écrivaines et des écrivains québécois,
Montréal, le 21 juin 2004)
Participants
Monique Juteau, écrivaine
Yvon Rivard, écrivain
Larry Tremblay, écrivain
Yolande Villemaire, écrivaine
Organisateurs
Vijaya Rao, Javaharlal Nehru University
Janusz Przychodzen, Université York
[Transcription : Anne Thibeault-Bérubé]
Janusz Przychodzen — J’ai le grand plaisir avec Vijaya Rao, professeur à
la Javaharlal Nehru University (en Inde) de souhaiter la bienvenue aux
quatre écrivains ici présents : Yolande Villemaire, Monique Juteau, Larry
Tremblay et Yvon Rivard. Ils ont accepté avec beaucoup d’enthousiasme
de prendre part à cette rencontre pour partager avec nous leurs expériences
de la société et de la civilisation indiennes. Je salue également le public qui a
démontré en plein été (quelqu’un ajoute : « l’été indien », rires) que l’intérêt
pour les cultures orientales dans la littérature québécoise est de plus en plus
grandissant.
Cette table ronde a été organisée avec le concours du Conseil de recherche
en sciences humaines du Canada et grâce à l’hospitalité de la Maison des
écrivaines et écrivains québécois. À cet égard, je tiens à remercier Ginette
Major et Pierre Lavoie, directeur de l’Union des écrivaines et des écrivains
québécois. Cette soirée, la toute première du genre, est un évènement
historique, qui s’inscrit dans la suite du colloque international et
interdisciplinaire « Proche, Moyen, Extrême. Représentation de l’Orient au
Québec » tenu à l’Université McGill au début de mars 2004. C’est cet
évènement qui a permis la formation d’une petite communauté d’artistes,
d’écrivains, de chercheurs intéressés par les cultures orientales au Québec.
La participation de Vijaya Rao est cruciale dans cette communauté. Et cette
table ronde à laquelle elle a invité quatre écrivains, parmi lesquels se
retrouvent ses amis de longue date, en est la meilleure preuve.
Vijaya Rao — Il est quand même étonnant qu’une Indienne présente des
écrivains québécois à un public québécois! Je vais tâcher de présenter les
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quatre écrivains uniquement dans le contexte de leur création portant sur
l’Inde. Commençons par Yvon Rivard, professeur à l’Université McGill.
Son livre Les Silences du corbeau lui a valu le prix du Gouverneur général
en 1986. Situé à Pondichéry, le roman suit l’aventure de jeunes
Occidentaux épris d’une jeune femme appelée Mère et vénérée en raison de
ses présumés pouvoirs spirituels.
Notre deuxième invitée de la soirée est Yolande Villemaire. À son retour
d’Inde, elle publie Le Dieu dansant, qui a gagné le prix Edgar-Lespérance
en 1995. Histoire passionnante de Shambala, un jeune danseur de Bharata
Natyam, Le Dieu dansant se déroule au XIe siècle, au cœur de l’Inde du Sud,
c’est-à-dire dans la ville sacrée de Chidambaram. Yolande Villemaire a
également signé un recueil de poésie La Lune indienne.
J’ai maintenant le plaisir de vous présenter Monique Juteau, dont Des jours
de chemins perdus et retrouvés, un recueil de poèmes, lui a valu le prix
Gérald-Godin. Et je viens de recevoir aussi son récit, intitulé
Paris-Bombay : quatre chambres et une antichambre, qui a gagné le prix
littéraire de Radio-Canada.
Et enfin, Larry Tremblay, dramaturge, metteur en scène, comédien, bref,
homme de théâtre, et un ami de longue date. J’ai rencontré Larry Tremblay
pour la première fois à l’UQAM en 1989, parce qu’on m’avait dit qu’un
professeur québécois faisait du kathakali! Comme vous le savez, Larry
Tremblay est beaucoup joué en ce moment sur la scène montréalaise. Son
œuvre a été traduite en plusieurs langues : anglais, portugais, tamoul, etc.
Poudre de kumkum, son dernier ouvrage, est un récit émouvant issu du
journal tenu lors d’un passage en Inde.
Après ces quelques mots d’introduction, je vais demander à Janusz
d’amorcer cette séance avec quelques questions préliminaires.
J. P. — J’inviterais tout d’abord les écrivains à nous offrir à tour de rôle ce
rare plaisir, il faut le dire, de les entendre parler de vive voix de leurs
principales aventures et expériences avec l’Inde — pays, société, culture,
civilisation, philosophie et religion. Le plaisir sera d’autant plus grand que
ces voyages et séjours en Inde ont mené à la création d’œuvres fort
intéressantes.
Yolande Villemaire — Alors, voilà, Le Dieu dansant, ç’a d’abord été une
image. J’ai vu l’image de la scène finale du roman et d’après ce que je
voyais, ça semblait être un danseur indien. Ça semblait se passer en Inde et
je n’étais jamais allée en Inde. Et je me suis dit : « Je ne peux pas écrire ça.
Ç’a l’air de se passer il y a très longtemps. Et bon, je n’connais pas l’Inde »,
et tout ça.
Alors, j’ai d’abord résisté au roman de façon intensive pendant tout un été et
finalement j’ai décidé d’aller en Inde et de l’écrire. Et je suis partie avec
l’intention d’écrire ce livre. Je m’en allais faire de la méditation, je faisais de
la méditation indienne depuis un certain temps déjà. Et je m’en allais dans
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un ashram de méditation. Je me suis dit « Je vais partir, je vais voir, je vais
me laisser porter et puis peut-être que je commencerai le roman, au bout
d’un certain nombre de semaines ou de mois. »
Je partais pour un an et finalement je suis restée plus longtemps, je suis
restée un an et demi. Et je suis arrivée le 5 octobre et je raconte l’anecdote
parce qu’en parlant avec Vijaya, que j’ai rencontrée très récemment, je suis
arrivée en Inde le 5 octobre — je suis partie le 3, je suis arrivée le 5, c’est un
assez long trajet, n’est-ce pas? — et j’ai commencé à écrire le roman le 9
octobre 1989, et c’est ce jour-là que Vijaya est arrivée à Montréal pour la
première fois. C’est une coïncidence amusante. Donc moi, j’étais en Inde,
je faisais des pouja au Shiva dansant parce qu’au début, le titre du roman,
c’était « Nataraja », le « dieu » dansant. Et j’ai commencé à écrire le roman.
Et voilà. Ç’a été une expérience fascinante. J’ai passé un an et demi là-bas et
cinq ans en tout à écrire le roman et je l’ai publié en 1995. Voilà.
Larry Tremblay — J’ai fait 13 voyages en Inde, j’espère en faire un
quatorzième bientôt. Souvent, on associe l’Inde avec la quête. Comme si on
partait à la recherche de quelque chose. On se cherche. Ou, à l’inverse, on
veut se perdre. En ce qui me concerne, je n’étais habité par aucune quête, ni
motivé par aucune enquête. Je suis allé en Inde, en fait, par hasard. J’avais
21 ans. Je venais d’être engagé comme acteur au sein d’une troupe de
théâtre expérimental, un peu visionnaire. Enfin, c’était l’époque! Je suis
donc parti en Inde avec cette troupe. Ce n’était pas mon idée, mais un projet
qui émanait de la troupe. Nous amenions dans nos bagages un spectacle de
théâtre.
C’était en 1975, l’année internationale de la femme. Je ne sais pas s’il y en a
eu d’autres! Nous avions préparé, pour l’occasion, un montage autour de la
figure de la femme à partir des Belles-sœurs de Michel Tremblay, des
Bonnes de Jean Genet et d’Andromaque de Racine. Nous sommes allés
jouer ça en Inde avec l’audace et la naïveté de nos 20 ans! Nous avons même
intégré des acteurs indiens au spectacle à Delhi et à Srinagar au Cachemire.
Ce premier voyage a duré quatre mois. À l’époque, je ne savais rien de
l’Inde, je n’avais jamais rien lu sur l’Inde. Je n’étais contaminé, si j’ose dire,
par aucun préjugé, ou encore attiré par aucune image. J’avais sans doute
emmagasiné un ou deux clichés, comme tout le monde. L’Inde ne possédait
pas, pour moi, de valeur symbolique spécifique, ne suscitait pas chez moi
d’interrogation. J’avais vécu mon adolescence plongé dans la philosophie,
la psychologie, la sociologie, la psychanalyse. Mes références intellectuelles étaient plutôt européennes. Comme beaucoup de jeunes gens de
cette époque, je fréquentais très peu la littérature québécoise. Et ce jeune
homme, dont la tête bourdonnait de concepts et de théories, pose le pied sur
le sol de l’Inde. Boum! Je dis boum, mais au fond, je n’ai pas vécu l’Inde
comme un choc ou une coupure ou une rafale. Non! Je me souviens très bien
de mes toutes premières minutes passées en Inde. Sans réaliser ce qui
m’arrivait, je venais de me transformer. Quelque chose — une porte? une
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fenêtre? un œil? — quelque chose en moi — dans mon corps? mon esprit?
— quelque chose, donc, s’ouvrait du simple fait que je venais de poser le
pied sur le sol de Delhi. Je n’ai aucune explication. Ça s’est passé comme ça.
Sans que je le demande ou le recherche. En douceur. Comme l’apparition
d’un sourire. Sans effort.
J’ai ressenti alors la joie très pure d’exister. Simplement. Comment
nommer cela? Pourquoi aussi vouloir le nommer? Je peux appeler ça un
mystère, mais je ne rattache pas cette expérience à un élan mystique ou
religieux. À la fin de ce premier voyage où j’ai sillonné l’Inde et le Népal,
j’ai suivi un stage en kathakali, une danse-théâtre classique du Sud de
l’Inde. Je ne savais pas que j’allais passer, au cours des années suivantes,
des milliers d’heures à étudier cet art exigeant, martial et théâtral. J’ai eu la
chance de l’enseigner par la suite. Ç’a amené beaucoup de rigueur dans mon
travail d’acteur, de metteur en scène et d’écrivain.
Et tout récemment, j’ai publié Poudre de kumkum dans une collection que
dirige, d’ailleurs, Yolande Villemaire. C’est un récit autobiographique
composé de deux journaux de voyage. Il y a 17 ans qui les séparent. Le
premier journal relate les pensées d’un jeune homme de 22 ans qui fait
parler les fourmis, omniprésentes en Inde. Le second fait entendre la voix
d’un homme mûr qui vient de perdre sa mère et qui retourne en Inde se
confronter à son deuil.
Yvon Rivard — D’abord, les circonstances de ma découverte de l’Inde. Je
connaissais l’Inde par les livres et par les personnes qui y étaient allées. J’y
suis allé pour la première et la seule fois en 1979 pour un court séjour de trois
mois. J’ai donc découvert l’Inde en 1969 par un poète québécois, Guy
Lafond, qui, lui, avait déjà séjourné longuement en Inde, d’abord à l’ashram
de Sivananda à Rishikesh dans les années 50 et à l’ashram de Shri
Aurobindo dans les années 60 et 70. C’est donc par lui que j’ai découvert
l’Inde et Pondichéry. Même si je n’y suis allé qu’une fois, je crois qu’il s’est
passé véritablement quelque chose, là-bas. Essentiellement, je dirais que
j’y ai redécouvert, à une certaine profondeur que je ne connaissais pas, ma
propre enfance. Quand j’ai publié Les Silences du corbeau, Gilles Marcotte
avait écrit, faisant référence à mes livres précédents, que j’étais plus à l’aise
en Inde que dans les forêts de la haute Mauricie. Je ne suis pas tout à fait
d’accord, mais je dirais qu’il avait un peu raison. C’est l’Inde en quelque
sorte qui m’a révélé non pas tant les forêts de la haute Mauricie que ma
propre enfance, plus précisément le temps propre à l’enfance.
Essentiellement, je dirais que l’Inde pour moi ç’a été une sorte de
redécouverte de mon enfance et du temps particulier à l’enfance. Même si
j’avais des amis qui me parlaient de l’Inde depuis 10 ans, je ne savais pas
trop pourquoi j’y allais, mais quand j’ai mis le pied sur le sol indien, je
savais très bien que, d’une certaine façon, ç’a l’air idiot de dire ça, que
j’étais chez moi. J’étais de retour dans l’enfance (d’ailleurs ne dit-on pas en
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Inde « notre mère l’Inde »?), j’étais enfin de retour dans un temps qui
m’était naturel.
Monique Juteau — C’est le voyage qui m’a emmenée en Inde, après
m’avoir fait parcourir l’Amérique de l’Alaska au lac Titicaca; l’Europe en
mobylette, de camping en terrain vague, à la manière des gitans; l’Afrique
du Nord naïvement, sans avoir lu Flaubert. Puis un jour, le voyage a dit :
« On s’en va en Inde ».
Heureusement, j’avais atteint l’âge de la comparaison, passé l’âge des
égarements, à gauche de la trentaine. J’avais accumulé dans le cœur et dans
les yeux une foule de données qui pouvaient me permettre de comparer une
réalité à une autre. Ainsi, à force de jeux de réflexions et de dialogues avec le
voyage, j’en suis venue à aimer l’Inde parce qu’elle m’offrait une part de
l’Homme que je n’avais pas retrouvée ailleurs. L’Homme, l’organisation
des clans, l’importance de la famille (en Amérique latine, la fuite du père, la
meute abandonnée m’avaient grandement impressionnée). L’Homme,
celui qui a des règles d’hygiène corporelle beaucoup plus subtiles que nos
douches quotidiennes. L’Homme écologique, celui qui mange dans des
feuilles de bananier, n’utilise pas de papier hygiénique, enveloppe les
denrées dans du papier journal, vend le yogourt dans des petits contenants
en terre cuite qu’il retourne à la terre après usage. L’Homme, celui qui boit
sans jamais toucher des lèvres le contenant qu’il porte à sa bouche.
Technique ancestrale qui, de prime abord, peut paraître insensée aux yeux
de certains touristes pressés, mais si seulement le voyageur savait, il
s’éviterait bien des ennuis. L’Homme si familier avec la mort que, nous
Occidentaux, avons du mal à suivre la gestion de leurs cadavres.
J’y suis allée à quatre reprises, pour des séjours de trois à six mois. J’ai tenté
de dire ce pays par l’entremise de la fiction, dans les premiers chapitres de
En moins de deux. J’ai ensuite raconté, dans L’Emporte-clé, l’Inde vue par
César et Tristanne, enfin, ce qu’il en reste, une fois qu’on n’y est plus : des
rêves, des nostalgies, des traces, des odeurs. Et j’ai réussi enfin à écrire
l’Inde au JE, sans personnage, à l’aide de la poésie dans la deuxième partie
de Des jours de chemins perdus et retrouvés ainsi que dans Le voyage a dit
(à paraître), en compagnie de la prose. Chaque séjour en Inde était complété
par des échappées en Asie : le Viêt-nam, le Laos, la Thaïlande, l’Indonésie,
mais chaque fois, je revenais et je disais : « La prochaine fois ce sera encore
l’Inde ». L’Inde, c’est un peu comme chez nous. Après tout, on a eu le même
colonisateur : l’Anglais. On retrouve d’ailleurs des traces de cette
colonisation dans nos semblables goûts et désirs d’indépendance et de
liberté. Et le temps a filé, et j’ai vieilli, et c’est sans doute l’âge qui m’a
incitée à retourner en Inde une quatrième fois. Pas l’âge de la comparaison,
cette fois-là, mais l’âge de la compréhension.
Un jour, on comprend. On comprend que l’on n’aura jamais la tête à lire le
Mahâbhârata, récit épique d’environ 120 000 versets; qu’on ne réussira
jamais à apprendre l’hindi ou l’arabe entre deux tâches de survie; qu’on
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n’aura peut-être pas le temps de retourner à Vãrãnasi ou à Dwarka; qu’on ne
pourra pas tout voir, tout expérimenter… Et l’on se met à vouloir repartir au
plus vite parce qu’on a l’impression que l’écriture, malgré ses richesses, ne
nous apprend plus, ou pas assez sur l’Homme, cet animal très proche des
grands singes.
J. P. — Merci. Pour approfondir, j’aimerais vous poser une autre question.
Pourquoi l’Inde? Pourriez-vous mettre l’Inde en perspective? Tout d’abord
du point de vue biographique. Ensuite, par rapport à l’ensemble de votre
création littéraire, puisque, bien sûr, vous n’êtes pas des écrivains qui
écrivent uniquement sur l’Inde. L’Inde occupe probablement une place
spéciale, joue un rôle tout à fait particulier dans votre imagination. Je suis
curieux de savoir quelle place vous accordez à l’Inde dans votre écriture et
également dans votre vie.
Y. R. — Pour moi, je crois que ç’a été déterminant. Ça ne peut pas qu’être
accidentel, il n’y a jamais rien d’accidentel dans la vie. Dans mon œuvre, il y
a vraiment avant et après l’Inde. Avant l’Inde, je dirais que le peu que j’avais
écrit relevait de l’imaginaire. Un imaginaire qui était nourri de l’espace
québécois, y compris celui des forêts de la haute Mauricie, mais, pour moi,
jusqu’à ce moment-là, écrire ça consistait essentiellement à laisser se
déployer l’imagination. Juste pour vous donner une idée de ces romans qui
sont, je crois sans doute à tort, loin de moi : je pouvais très bien imaginer
qu’il y avait un bordel tibétain au fond d’une rivière au nord de La Tuque ou
bien imaginer que quelqu’un découvrait un jour être né non pas d’une
femme, mais de la parole des immortels!
Écrire, pour moi, c’était cela, ça venait comme ça, tout seul. Quand je suis
arrivé en Inde, c’était comme si tout le réel devenait imaginaire. Comme si
tout le réel, je le voyais pour ainsi dire du seuil de la mort, du point de vue de
l’éternité en quelque sorte et, ainsi, la chose la plus quotidienne
m’apparaissait miraculeuse de surgir là, à l’instant même, sous mon regard.
Cela est sans doute rattaché à ce que je vous disais tout à l’heure à propos du
temps, sorte de temps arrêté, d’instants suspendus, presque l’éternité. Et ça,
c’était presque physique, ce n’était pas intellectuel, c’était un temps
palpable, c’était un instant, la sensation même du temps. À chaque instant,
je vivais dans l’instant. C’est pour ça que je rattache le temps découvert ou
retrouvé en Inde au temps de l’enfance. Chaque instant, je contemplais
l’apparition et la disparition du monde. Et à partir de cette expérience, je
n’ai plus jamais été capable d’inventer ou de vivre l’imaginaire comme je le
vivais auparavant. Le simple fait de décrire quelque chose qui est, c’était
cela maintenant l’imaginaire.
Est-ce que c’est l’Inde qui a ainsi changé mon écriture et ma vision des
choses? Ou bien n’était-ce pas parce que j’étais déjà dans cette nouvelle
vision des choses que je suis allé en Inde, un peu comme on dit que « lorsque
le disciple est prêt, le maître apparaît »! Sans doute que l’Inde est apparue
parce que j’étais prêt à passer d’un imaginaire à un autre.
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Ainsi, quand j’y pense aujourd’hui, je constate que pour écrire j’ai dû
d’abord sortir du bois, littéralement passer de la forêt à la ville, puis sortir du
Québec pour aller vivre en Europe. Et c’est dans cette première période que
l’écriture a été associée, pour moi, à l’imaginaire, à la capacité d’invention.
Puis, dans un deuxième temps, qui commence avec le voyage en Inde, je
dirais que j’ai dû m’éloigner de moi pour pouvoir enfin me rapprocher du
Québec et de mon enfance, réalité non plus fantasmée, mais saisie telle
quelle comme l’imaginaire le plus pur.
Y. V. — Je vais poursuivre si vous le permettez. Tantôt, quand Yvon Rivard
disait que c’était le retour à l’enfance, j’ai établi un lien. Pour moi, l’Inde a
été une sorte de catalyseur qui m’a ramenée aussi à l’enfance, et aussi à mon
identité. C’était ma deuxième tentative d’exil. J’avais tenté l’exil à New
York en 1985 pendant un an et bon, j’étais revenue. Et là je partais pour
toujours quand je suis partie pour l’Inde et finalement j’ai fini par revenir
aussi. Et l’impact que ç’a eu dans mon écriture, c’est surtout que ça m’a
ramenée à mon identité.
Le livre que j’ai écrit à la suite du Dieu dansant, en 1997, c’est Céleste
tristesse qui est un livre sur l’identité québécoise, et c’est peut-être d’être en
contact avec le peuple indien, Monique le disait aussi, qu’on se sent chez
nous, c’est aussi le sentiment que j’ai eu. Par exemple dans l’ashram où je
vivais, on travaillait parfois avec des intouchables et ce qu’on appelait les
« Adivasi », c’est-à-dire les gens qui étaient là avant même le système de
castes. Et je trouvais une telle grandeur d’âme chez ces gens-là, ça
m’étonnait tellement. Des gens qui étaient totalement démunis. On les
voyait à l’occasion d’une opération pour la cataracte et leur sérénité m’a
complètement restitué une dimension de mon identité. Moi qui vivais dans
un pays d’abondance, en fait, par rapport à l’Inde.
Ç’a été un choc culturel très grand pour moi. Ç’a été difficile. La rue
Saint-Denis m’a quasiment semblé le faubourg Saint-Honoré. C’était
difficile cet aspect-là. Puis en même temps, une sorte de… justement
l’éternité, comme vous disiez si bien aussi.
Puis aussi une dimension presque intemporelle. Moi, je vivais dans une
vallée qui est à deux heures et demie de Bombay à peu près. C’était comme
en dehors du temps. C’était vraiment comme en dehors du temps et mon
roman se passait au Moyen Âge, c’était pas tellement difficile d’imaginer le
Moyen Âge parce qu’il y avait quelque chose d’intemporel dans la façon
dont les paysans vivaient dans la vallée autour de l’ashram. Et je me
rappelle, quand je partais très tôt de l’ashram le matin et qu’on voyait les
feux, les gens qui faisaient cuire leurs chapatis, il y avait des feux partout
dans la vallée et c’était magique. C’est un pays magique. Je pense.
L. T. — Dans Poudre de kumkum, j’ai écrit cette phrase: « L’Inde génère le
temps le plus proche de l’éternité. » C’est sans doute cet étirement sinueux
qui me donne l’impression qu’en Inde, je voyage plutôt dans le temps que
dans l’espace. Tout coule, nous avec. Comme un fleuve de temps qui nous
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calme et, en même temps, nous rend étranges à nous-mêmes. L’Inde
bouscule l’ego, le questionne, le talonne. Cette contraction d’identité,
souvent fausse, qui nous rend anxieux, on a l’impression qu’elle se relâche
en Inde. J’ai souvent l’image d’un poing fermé, têtu, habitué à affronter le
réel en cognant dessus. Soudain, le voilà qui s’ouvre. La main apparaît alors
sans le besoin d’arracher ou de prendre. Sartre décrivait l’ego comme un
objet perçu par la conscience. Il appelait cela la transcendance de l’ego.
C’est en Inde que cette transcendance s’est révélée à moi dans toute sa
clarté. Pourquoi? Je ne sais pas. C’est comme ça.
L’Inde effrite l’ego et rapproche la conscience d’un courant existentiel qui
voyage emmêlé à celui du monde. L’Inde redéfinit ce qu’on entend par
individu. En Occident, nous sommes évidemment très individualistes. En
Orient, l’individualité est vécue différemment. Un exemple : en Inde, la
foule ne m’a jamais fait peur. Je la trouve liquide. Je ne ressens pas de
panique. La même foule, à New York, m’oppresserait. L’Inde positionne le
corps, en fait, comme matière et énergie sans l’opposer à l’esprit. Nous ne
retrouvons pas la dualité corps/âme, mais plutôt celle de shakti/maya,
c’est-à-dire d’énergie/illusion.
J’ai aussi vécu l’enfance en Inde. L’enfance à travers l’excitation de la
féerie. Grâce au kathakali que je pratiquais dix heures par jour, j’étais
plongé dans les grandes épopées de l’Inde, le Mahâbhârata, et le
Râmâyana : des histoires de dieux, de démons, de héros mythiques. J’ai eu
la chance de personnifier Shiva, Krishna, Hanuman. En Inde, finalement,
j’ai trouvé un corps. Et je me suis aperçu que je ressentais moins d’urgence à
créer. Ça rejoint ce que disait Yvon tout à l’heure : en Inde, on est déjà
tellement, en quelque sorte, dans l’imaginaire que notre soif de création
diminue sans nous apeurer ou nous faire douter de notre inspiration. On
prend une pause. Et, en général, rentré au pays, la machine à idées se remet
en marche avec une énergie renouvelée.
Pour répondre de façon plus précise à la question de Janusz, j’ai peu écrit sur
l’Inde. Quelques poèmes. Des journaux de voyage dont Poudre de
kumkum, dont j’ai parlé. Quelques courts essais sur le kathakali.
L’importance de l’Inde, en rapport avec les livres que j’ai publiés, pourrait
ainsi paraître négligeable. Mais ce n’est pas le cas. L’Inde fait partie de ma
vie et, donc, nourrit mon œuvre de façon substantielle. Je dirais même que
j’ai un accent indien, un accent corporel qui me vient de mon apprentissage
du kathakali. Ce théâtre dansé est en fait une écriture corporelle. À travers sa
pratique, j’ai installé une partie de l’Inde mythologique dans mes muscles,
mes ligaments, mes os. Et peut-être aussi dans ma façon de penser.
M. J. — J’ai toujours voulu écrire très, très vite, comme Jack Kerouac, sans
jamais m’arrêter. Je croyais en l’écriture presque automatique sur laquelle
on ne revient pas. Il y a un âge pour ça. Aussi, quand je suis arrivée à Delhi,
pour écrire l’Inde, j’ai dû ralentir la main qui pousse le crayon.
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Je ne voulais surtout pas trahir l’Inde, passer à côté de l’essence même de ce
pays par manque de culture, d’intuition ou d’ouverture d’esprit. J’ai
commencé à rédiger En moins de deux en me fabriquant un personnage à
l’image de cette touriste rencontrée dans un café. Elle était désemparée, ne
réussissait pas à comprendre le désordre des rues, l’anarchie des bazars.
Elle est retournée dans son pays au bout de trois jours. Sans le savoir, elle est
devenue, par le pouvoir de l’écriture, un personnage derrière lequel je me
suis mise à l’abri, loin du JE si compromettant. Sous l’influence de la
lenteur indienne, je rédigeais chaque paragraphe comme un poème. L’Inde
m’apprenait à m’asseoir et me répétait : « Prends ton temps pour écrire.
Regarde les femmes au champ. Observe les hommes sur la route. Prends
beaucoup de temps pour faire ce que tu as à faire. » De plus, un jour, après
avoir rencontré un groupe de femmes assises par terre en train de réduire, à
la main, à l’aide de marteaux, de grosses pierres en petits cailloux pour en
faire de la garnotte, de la pierre concassée, je me suis dit que c’était
peut-être ça l’écriture : faire de la garnotte avec les mots, concasser la
phrase, la réduire en fins moments d’existence.
Dans un autre ordre d’idées, lors de mon dernier voyage, ce n’est pas
l’enfance qui m’a interpellée, contrairement à Madame Villemaire, mais
bien la vieillesse. On nous a fait rencontrer beaucoup de personnes âgées
qui, par-delà certaines incapacités, nous ont légué un regard, une façon de
composer avec le présent tout en mémorisant le passé quotidiennement
pour ne pas l’oublier, pour construire des portions de réel afin de toujours
avoir sous la main des idées pour demain et le jour suivant. Et tous ces
jeunes qui prenaient soin de nous! C’était vraiment déroutant de les voir
respecter nos rides et le nombre magique d’années que l’on traînait dans nos
sacs à dos. Cela nous a donné le goût d’avancer en âge avec plus de
confiance.
V. R. — J’ai retenu quelques mots-clés. Peut-être pour provoquer un débat,
je voudrais lancer quelques idées : l’Inde vis-à-vis du temps qui se présente
comme une éternité; le manque d’individualité; le retour à l’enfance
quelque part. Ou comme Larry l’a dit, il y a trouvé un corps.
Y. R. — J’aimerais revenir sur la chose que Larry a dite, à savoir que là-bas,
il n’avait pas ressenti le désir de créer ni d’écrire. Ça m’a fait penser que
c’est sans doute la seule fois de ma vie où je suis parti loin de chez moi, sans
écrire et sans avoir l’intention d’écrire, parce que ma méthode pour écrire
consiste à partir, à aller vivre ailleurs pour écrire. C’est une méthode qui
coûte de plus en plus cher. (rires) Et c’est pourquoi j’écris de moins en
moins ou que j’apprends à écrire au Québec. Mais là-bas, pendant trois ou
quatre mois, je n’ai pas écrit une ligne et, ô miracle, ça ne m’a pas manqué.
M. J. — Malgré les nuits blanches, les repas improvisés, les fatigues de la
route, j’écris tous les jours, ou presque. Je crée sur place, mais je
reconstruis, retravaille tout au retour. J’aime consacrer du temps à
l’écriture, c’est une façon de renouer avec soi, de se recomposer
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physiquement, de questionner le présent. Quand on voyage en Inde, on
reçoit beaucoup, on se fait remplir d’images, de voix, de visages, de trains,
de bagages, de paysages fascinants et, à un certain moment, on devient trop
plein, on déborde, on ne voit plus ce qu’on devrait voir parce qu’on n’en
peut plus d’accumuler, parce qu’on s’habitue à l’exotisme.
L’Inde est une grande émettrice. Sans cesse, elle communique, envoie des
messages. Alors, le matin quand j’écris, c’est à mon tour de transmettre, de
prendre la parole ou de faire le vide tout simplement. J’aime accomplir ce
rituel du matin. Je me lève tôt dès que les Indiens se mettent à brasser leurs
paniers, leurs casseroles, leurs champs. Je travaille jusqu’à midi, mon
compagnon de route aussi. Artiste, il dessine, tente à sa façon de se dessaisir
des couleurs vives des saris pour mieux plonger dans les noirs denses de la
vie. Les Indiens ne nous ont jamais demandé pourquoi nous restions ainsi
dans la chambre, le matin. Jamais, ils ne nous ont donné cette impression
qu’il fallait sortir dehors pour voyager à tout prix. Les Indiens sont très
intuitifs, comprennent très vite, sans grands discours. Dès qu’ils sentent que
vous êtes heureux dans leur pays, ils vous accompagnent, veillent à ce que
vous ayez toujours un tchai pour accomplir vos rêves les plus chers.
Ailleurs, en Asie, ces moments d’arrêt et de travail étaient souvent perçus
comme des comportements anormaux, étranges. Comme si les gens de
l’Extrême-Orient avaient de la difficulté à différencier un voyageur d’un
touriste… ce que l’Indien sait faire avec tout le flair et l’élégance d’un
citoyen du monde.
L. T. — J’aimerais ajouter quelque chose. On me pose souvent ces
questions : « Comment fais-tu pour retourner là-bas? Un pays où règnent la
pauvreté et la saleté. Comment fais-tu pour supporter cela? Quelle est ton
action politique? » Des questions, j’imagine, que je me suis aussi posées,
mais je les ai sûrement formulées autrement. Des questions souvent
confuses qui ne supportent pas une analyse objective. Il y a une certaine
malhonnêteté intellectuelle, et aussi une facilité ou une paresse de la
pensée, à réduire un pays comme l’Inde à pauvreté et saleté. Les médias
n’offrent sans doute que cette image négative de l’Inde aux gens.
Je ne nie pas la problématique sociale de ce pays avec ses énormes
contradictions, son gouffre d’inégalités, les stigmates de son ancien
système de castes, mais quel pays ne souffre pas de pauvreté? Ou, sinon,
d’obésité? De consumérisme? Ou d’anorexie? Ou encore d’idéologies
sclérosées de droite ou de gauche? Bref, c’est sur place, en Inde, que le
voyageur constate qu’il vient d’arriver dans un pays où les extrêmes se
côtoient sans cesse dans la rue. Il existe une grande visibilité en Inde : la vie,
la mort sont dans les rues. C’est parfois insupportable pour certains. Mais,
avec un œil exercé, cette détresse tout aussi bien que cette ivresse d’exister
se remarquent aussi dans les rues de Montréal.
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L’Occident a de plus en plus de difficulté à cacher ses morts, ses malades,
ses marginaux. Mais bien des gens préfèrent porter le regard sur un malheur
lointain plutôt que de constater une déroute trop proche.
On pourrait me demander : « Est-ce que, par exemple, tu te sens coupable de
ressentir un bien-être existentiel en Inde alors que tu sais que tant de gens
souffrent? » On voit bien que cette question pourrait s’appliquer au monde
entier, surtout à l’heure de la mondialisation, de l’Internet et du clivage
grandissant entre Nord et Sud. En fait, j’ose dire que, malgré la précarité de
leur vie, je rencontre plus de gens heureux en Inde qu’ici.
Y. V. — Il y a une scène qui me revient. Pour moi, le contact, le premier
contact avec l’Inde, après 24 heures d’avion, a été un choc très très très fort.
J’avais voyagé en Afrique du Nord, mais les bidonvilles autour de Bombay
pendant deux heures et demie, c’est extrêmement difficile, ça ouvre les
yeux à une dimension humaine, de désarroi humain que je n’avais jamais vu
à Marrakech ou ailleurs. Et ça m’a pris quatre mois et demi avant de revenir
à Bombay. Je restais dans mon ashram plein de fleurs et de singes et de
paons et j’essayais d’apprendre le marathi pour découvrir que les gens
parlaient hindi ou bengali, alors j’ai renoncé. Je me suis mise à parler
anglais finalement.
Mais au bout de quatre mois et demi, il a fallu, je ne sais plus pourquoi, il a
fallu que je retourne à Bombay. En traversant les bidonvilles, cette fois-là,
c’était le matin très tôt et c’est toujours un peu sinistre, quand c’est encore
gris. Par contre, j’ai vu une scène qui m’a vraiment permis d’accepter toute
cette misère. Parce que c’est vraiment difficile à accepter. Je pense, en tout
cas, que ç’a été un choc vraiment difficile. Il y avait une petite fille d’à peu
près un an qui commençait à marcher. Elle avait une petite robe toute grise,
délavée. Elle était nu-pieds. Et il y avait deux petits garçons de cinq ou six
ans qui la tenaient par la main. Et elle riait. Elle était en train de faire un
immense pas pour l’humanité. C’était simplement une petite fille qui
apprenait à marcher dans un bidonville. Et les enfants étaient pleins de joie.
Malgré tout ce qu’il y avait autour. Et je me suis dit que : « Bon ben c’est
comme ça. » Juste, être témoin de cette scène-là, c’est une grâce.
Mais c’est constamment des épiphanies comme ça, l’Inde. Moi, je vivais
constamment des moments insupportables où je ne voulais pas voir ce que
je voyais. Ou des fois, je ne voulais pas sentir ce que je sentais. Et puis aussi
toute la richesse, Larry parlait d’Hanuman, tantôt, le Râmâyana, toute cette
magie de la culture indienne. Moi, j’étais dans une démarche spirituelle et la
dévotion des Indiens était quelque chose qui m’allait droit au cœur. C’est
extraordinaire. Autant dans les temples de Shiva ou de Vishnou, c’est
extraordinaire. Je n’ai jamais assisté à une Khumbamelâ où l’on voit des
foules extraordinaires.
Mais cette dimension de la dévotion, on peut la voir dans un temple, au
temple de Mahalakshmi à Bombay, par exemple. Les gens y font des
offrandes à l’océan, tout simplement. Et c’est toujours extrêmement
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touchant. Et ça permet d’accepter la poussière, les détritus, les lépreux, les
culs-de-jatte. Ce sont des choses que je n’avais jamais vues, même en
Égypte, j’avais vu un peu ça, mais pas à une telle échelle… C’est comme si,
en Inde, on avait toute la réalité d’un coup. Alors que dans nos vies, par
exemple juste la réalité de la mort, ici, c’est tellement camouflé, dans nos
salons funéraires et tout ça. Et en Inde, on a directement prise sur la mort. Et
c’est peut-être une des dimensions les plus importantes de l’Inde, la mort, je
pense.
L. T. — Oui, l’Inde est le pays des extrêmes qui cohabitent de façon parfois
scandaleuse, parfois loufoque ou surréaliste. C’est un pays où la mort est
tangible, non niée, omniprésente. Mon séjour à Bénarès m’a fortement
impressionné. C’est une ville où on respire la mort, où la fumée âcre des
bûchers funèbres pénètre profondément à l’intérieur de notre angoisse.
Et c’est vrai, en Inde, il y a cette prodigieuse capacité d’adoration. On adore
quantité de dieux et déesses dans une atmosphère bruyante de joie, dans un
bric-à-brac de rituels. Les dieux du panthéon hindou sont hauts en couleur,
possèdent des attributs sexuels évidents. Même la statuaire chrétienne, en
Inde, s’est métamorphosée. Les anges affichent des seins voluptueux. Les
extrêmes, encore!
Y. R. — Un petit mot sur les clichés. Je pense qu’il ne faut pas avoir peur des
clichés. Si un cliché est quelque chose qui vous permet de mieux vivre et
même d’approfondir votre relation aux autres et à vous-même, eh bien ce
cliché devient une vérité. Je pense que c’est par une sorte de censure que les
gens disent : « Ah, c’est des clichés tout cela! » L’épreuve d’un cliché est la
suivante : est-ce qu’un cliché re-transplanté dans votre réalité devient le
germe d’une nouvelle vie ou d’un nouveau regard? Si oui, ce cliché est
devenu une vérité qui vous conduit à la réalité.
Ainsi, il y a des images frappantes en Inde, comme celle de la pauvreté, sur
laquelle je reviendrai plus tard, des images qui restent, qui marquent. Tout
le monde a une collection de ces images qui les accompagnent, qui les
aident à vivre. Une de ces images que tout le monde a vue, c’est cette
pratique des femmes et des enfants qui font des dessins sur le trottoir, devant
leur maison, avec des craies de couleur et qui, le soir, lavent ces dessins à
grande eau. Cette image m’accompagne depuis 25 ans. Je trouve cela
absolument incroyable. Bon, c’est un cliché, bien sûr, mais ce cliché
m’accompagne, me permet même, je dirais, de surmonter de grandes
épreuves. « Lave ton ardoise, me dit cette image, pour que le temps y circule
à nouveau. » Ainsi, ce cliché, pour moi, a passé le test. Cette image est
devenue, pour moi, porteuse d’une vérité.
L. T. — Ce qui me frappe aussi en Inde, surtout dans les villages, c’est la
joie. Elle se rencontre tous les jours dans le regard des gens, leur démarche,
leur curiosité envers vous, la facilité qu’ils ont à vous offrir leur temps
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comme si c’était la moindre des choses. Alors que, vous le savez tous,
donner du temps en Occident, ce n’est pas à la portée de chacun.
Y. R. — Juste un dernier mot sur la question de la pauvreté, qui a été
soulevée tout à l’heure. Dans Les Silences du corbeau, il y a une page qui
m’a vraiment coûté. Je me suis dit : « Est-ce que je l’écris? Je vais me faire
lapider si j’écris cela, parce qu’on va dire : eh bien, voilà un autre Occidental
qui ne veut pas voir la misère, qui la banalise. » Je l’ai écrite quand même,
cette page, même si je suis bien conscient que je n’ai pas vu l’Inde que vous
avez vue, que je ne connais pas vraiment l’Inde. J’avais un ami indien à
Pondichéry qui me disait constamment : « Yvon, Pondichéry, tu sais, c’est
pas l’Inde. » Bon, j’ai entrevu un peu Bombay et New Delhi, et je devine un
peu à quoi cet ami faisait référence, mais il y avait quand même à
Pondichéry de la pauvreté, de la misère, et la page que j’ai écrite finalement,
c’était ma perception de cette misère.
J’avais l’impression, par exemple, que les mendiants faisaient bien leur
travail de mendiants et que tu leur donnes ou non quelque chose, jusqu’à un
certain point, ça leur était égal. Leur fonction, c’était de mendier. Je dirais
que leur fonction, au fond, c’était d’accepter, je ne dirais pas leur pauvreté,
mais d’accepter d’être.
Cette façon presque désintéressée de mendier me rendait cette pauvreté-là
non pas supportable, mais je dirais, pour utiliser un grand mot, presque
nécessaire, ontologiquement valable. Ça m’a beaucoup frappé quand vous
disiez tout à l’heure que ça vous a ramené à une sorte d’identité québécoise.
Ça ne m’avait jamais frappé, mais quand vous l’avez dit, j’étais d’accord
avec vous, car je crois que le fond de la culture québécoise repose sur une
expérience de la pauvreté. Ce n’est donc pas uniquement l’expérience du
temps, de l’instant suspendu, en Inde, qui m’a ramené à l’enfance, mais
probablement aussi la reconnaissance d’une pauvreté qui était, sinon la
mienne, celle de ma propre culture ou de mes ancêtres. Ce qui explique
peut-être que je n’étais pas plus choqué par l’extrême pauvreté en Inde que
par la pauvreté ici. Au contraire, j’y retrouvais comme une sorte de valeur
profonde : c’était comme une pauvreté débarrassée du désir de devenir
riche, ce qui est différent de l’acceptation de l’exploitation. Bon, c’est une
grande histoire, on n’entrera pas là-dedans, ce soir.
Y. V. — Ça me rappelle des réflexions que je me suis faites. Parce que je
vivais dans un ashram où il y avait une communauté internationale, où il y
avait des Australiens, des Canadiens anglais, beaucoup d’anglophones de
différents pays, qui avaient tous été colonisés, donc, par les Anglais, et je me
retrouvais là comme Québécoise francophone, donc avec un accent,
souvent avec un statut d’intouchable par rapport aux Australiens ou… Et ça
me faisait beaucoup brûler, comme on disait dans mon ashram, ça travaillait
l’ego.
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J. P. — Si je résume ce qui a été dit jusqu’à maintenant, je dirais, à la lumière
de vos réminiscences, que l’Inde apparaît comme une expérience critique,
complexe, totale, libératrice, mais en même temps créant une certaine
forme de dépendance. Après, on n’est plus le même. Pourrions-nous
peut-être parler maintenant de la question du comment. Comment écrire
l’Inde?
V. R. — Je voudrais vous ramener, en fait, à votre écriture, mais à partir des
sensations. Tout à l’heure vous avez évoqué l’idée des extrêmes. Je vais
citer une phrase qui se trouve dans l’œuvre d’Yvon Rivard, et aussi dans
celle de Larry Tremblay. « L’Inde est un pays de merde et d’encens. » Ou
prenez une phrase de Monique Juteau. Je la cite : « Elle ne pensait pas que
huit cents millions d’habitants ça donnerait tant de monde, tant d’autobus,
tant de traces de doigts sur les murs, tant d’usures. » À partir de ces
sensations, quelle est la fonction de la censure au moment où vous passez à
l’écriture? Parce qu’il y a évidemment le trouble de l’exotisme. On a parlé
des clichés tout à l’heure. Ce qui m’intéresse, c’est de connaître le processus
de l’écriture, qui vous oblige à choisir certaines choses, et à en éliminer
d’autres.
Y. V. — Je ne sais pas si devant l’Inde, on a le luxe d’inventer autre chose,
parce qu’on est débordé par toutes les sensations, justement, qui sont très
vives. Je me rappelle une sensation que j’ai essayé de décrire dans un texte,
mais qui s’échappe, c’est la sensation des pétales de fleurs dans un vent
chaud. Et ça, il n’y a qu’en Inde que j’ai eu ça et c’est une sensation exquise
et en même temps très très difficile à décrire, mais il me semble que tout le
réel est comme ça. Une succession de sensations qui peuvent être aussi
moins agréables.
J’évoquais les bûchers funéraires tantôt et cette odeur très très difficile à
supporter. En même temps des odeurs exquises, simplement. Je me rappelle
le parfum des fleurs en Inde, c’est comme nulle part ailleurs. La dimension
des roses aussi.
M. J. — Moi, c’est écrire les pauvres de l’Inde. Je me suis dit non, ça va faire
trop cliché! Mais je tenais à ce texte, je l’ai recommencé dans trois villages,
refait dans trois villes. Toujours le même constat d’échec : non, ce n’est pas
correct, ce n’est pas ça. Au début, je croyais qu’il fallait que je sois fidèle,
noire, sans espoir. Tantôt je devenais trop abstraite pour un sujet aussi
concret, tantôt j’allais du côté du déjà dit. Puis, un jour, j’ai compris ce qui
n’allait pas : je me censurais trop. Je me décide alors à écrire ma vision, ma
propre perception des pauvres, advienne que pourra. Il y a parfois certains
sujets, comme ça, qu’on hésite à explorer parce qu’on n’a pas tous les
papiers requis. Mais quand on est poète, à défaut d’avoir des papiers, on a
certains droits. Droits d’errer, de se perdre, de se tromper et de se retrouver.
L. T. — J’ai voulu réfléchir au système des castes. De ne pas, au départ, le
juger à partir de ma propre culture. Même si le gouvernement indien l’a
aboli depuis longtemps, il demeure actif dans la vie de tous les jours. On ne
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peut pas effacer d’un coup de plume des siècles d’habitudes et de
comportements sociaux. J’ai compris, après plusieurs séjours en Inde, que
ce système ne trouve pas son origine dans l’hindouisme, comme on le croit
facilement, mais plutôt dans le brahmanisme, qui a structuré la société
indienne en profondeur. Bien sûr, ce fonctionnement social a ordonné,
orienté les classes sociales et définit les relations entre les gens et même
prescrit les fonctions, les emplois, les droits. Les croyances religieuses se
sont greffées autour de cette armature. A posteriori, on pourrait ainsi penser
que la croyance à la réincarnation n’est qu’un effet du système des castes
puisque celui-ci indique à l’individu, dès sa naissance, sa place dans la
société en lui rappelant que sa conduite lui procurera, selon qu’elle respecte
ou non les droits et les devoirs de sa caste, une amélioration ou une
dégradation au cours de sa prochaine vie. Cette sensation de « naître à sa
place » est si forte qu’on la retrouve même chez les chrétiens en Inde qui
reproduisent, à leur façon, la hiérarchie des castes.
Cette systématisation, on la retrouve bien sûr au cours de l’histoire en
Occident sous différentes formes qui se sont passablement modifiées. Ce
qui m’a frappé au début en Inde, c’est la lenteur des changements sociaux.
Mais, depuis une dizaine d’années, c’est de moins en moins vrai. L’Inde
bouge. À chaque nouveau voyage, j’en vois les bienfaits et les méfaits. Qui
maintenant peut échapper à la suprématie de l’automobile et à l’appétit de
consommation? La classe moyenne en Inde prend de l’ampleur. On sent
une activité économique bourdonnante. Et on se demande comment l’Inde
va conjuguer croyances séculaires, comportements sociaux et une
économie qui se distancie des valeurs traditionnelles.
Malgré ces changements sociaux et économiques, l’Inde, le pays, la terre, le
ciel, la lumière, le temps, cette qualité particulière de l’air, cette façon qu’a
le son de se propager, le cri incessant des corneilles, cette sensation unique
que nous procure le fait d’être en Inde perdure. Et à cette sensation
existentielle se rattache une perception particulière du corps. En Inde, le
corps en cache un autre qui en cache un autre. Chacun de ces corps est une
porte qui s’ouvre sur une autre dimension. Il n’y a pas cette dualité
cartésienne qui crée un fossé entre la matière et l’esprit. L’ascèse, des
pratiques respiratoires et énergétiques, sexuelles, ou encore la danse
permettent de comprendre cette superposition de corps, cette profondeur
qui fait du visible une simple couche de l’invisible.
En Occident, on accorde beaucoup d’importance à la performance sportive,
à l’éclat, au changement apparent. Alors qu’en Orient, on tend vers un
meilleur contrôle intérieur, une meilleure maîtrise du souffle, par exemple.
Cette différence, on la remarque facilement dans le domaine de la danse. La
danse classique indienne sculpte le temps en le divisant grâce à une
mathématique rythmique complexe et rigoureuse. Le danseur établit un
rapport incessant avec le sol. Alors que le ballet classique, en Occident, n’a
qu’un fantasme : s’envoler, quitter le plancher, défier les lois de la gravité.
La profusion de gestes du danseur indien, livrés avec une précision vive
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comme l’éclair, cache donc le désir d’atteindre la pureté d’un temps rare,
divisé jusqu’au calme, jusqu’à l’éternité. De même, l’expression religieuse
en Inde, avec ses innombrables ramifications et son labyrinthe de pensées et
de symboles, peut se voir comme un corps multiple, agitant des bras
surnuméraires et des rangées de têtes. Cependant, pour l’œil exercé, cette
multiplicité protège le secret d’une pensée unifiée.
V. R. — J’ai une question pour Larry Tremblay. Cela fait quand même 20
ans depuis votre premier voyage en Inde, et vous y êtes retourné plusieurs
fois. Comment expliquer le fait que l’Inde n’a jamais figuré dans votre
écriture avant Poudre de kumkum, qui est quand même une œuvre très
récente?
L. T. — J’ai l’impression, en fait, d’avoir beaucoup écrit sur l’Inde mais pas
avec du papier et un stylo. Je l’ai plutôt fait dans l’espace avec mon corps en
pratiquant le kathakali qui, je le répète, s’apparente à une écriture gestuelle
grâce à son langage des mudras. Cependant, je ne nie pas qu’il y ait, chez
moi, une pudeur à écrire sur l’Inde. Peur des clichés? Ou peut-être,
j’accumule sans le savoir, une matière indienne qui va un jour prendre
forme dans un livre…
V. R. — Oui, mais je voudrais que vous en parliez.
L. T. — Eh bien, j’aurais envie de faire parler une vache, par exemple.
(rires) Sans blague, la liberté des vaches qui se promènent dans les rues des
grandes villes indiennes, mêlées au trafic, mangeant n’importe quoi, du
plastique au papier journal… c’est quand même fascinant. J’ai le sentiment
qu’une vache indienne aurait d’étonnantes choses à raconter. Sans oublier,
évidemment, toute la charge symbolique que possède la vache dans
l’imaginaire indien. J’ai aussi souvent imaginé comment pourrait se
comporter une vache québécoise égarée par magie dans la circulation de
Calcutta!
Y. R. — D’abord sur la question de la censure, je vais reprendre ce que
Monique disait. Je ne crois pas qu’un écrivain doive se censurer. Il est
redevable de la vérité de sa perception. Je n’ai pas l’impression que je
connais l’Inde. Tout ce que je connais, c’est une part de réalité qui m’a été
révélée par l’Inde. Je n’ai absolument pas la prétention de connaître l’Inde,
mais mon ambition à moi, ce ne serait pas de faire parler les vaches, ce serait
plutôt de faire parler les Indiens, parce que j’ai eu finalement très peu de
contact avec eux, sauf des contacts usuels, quotidiens.
Et je trouve que cette difficulté de communiquer avec les Indiens, le côté, je
dirais, imperméable des Indiens fait aussi partie de mon expérience de
l’Inde : c’est comme si en leur présence, j’avais été renvoyé à moi-même,
comme si les Indiens étaient un miroir qui me réfléchissait. Je ne connais
pas les Indiens, je ne connais pas vraiment l’Inde. Tout ce que je connais, je
le répète, c’est ce que l’Inde m’a révélé, ce qu’elle a déposé en moi, et, à ce
niveau-là, c’est sûr qu’il ne faut pas se censurer. Si j’ai perçu telle chose de
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telle façon, je n’ai pas la prétention que ce soit la vérité, mais je dois dire
cette chose, je dois dire la vérité de ce que j’ai perçu ou la vérité de ce que j’ai
cru percevoir, sinon, on n’écrit plus, on fait un reportage soumis à la
rectitude politique, on écrit ce qui va être accepté par un public qui sait déjà
ce qu’il veut entendre.
M. J. — Mais, plutôt que de parler davantage de censure, je préfèrerais
parler de cette crainte de trahir, par ignorance, ce que je voyais. Combien de
voyageurs trahissent l’Inde parce qu’elle n’a pas répondu à leurs attentes de
bipèdes pressés! J’aimais tellement l’Inde que je ne voulais pas en faire un
mauvais croquis. De plus, j’ai vécu l’Inde du seul point de vue de la rue.
C’est comme tenter de raconter une montagne en ne la regardant que d’en
bas; de décrire un géant en ne restant que sur son gros orteil. Certains d’entre
nous ont découvert l’Inde en s’installant dans un ashram ou en passant par
une école selon leur passion, ainsi chacun a son point de vue, sa perception.
Mais pour en revenir à ce point de vue de la rue, j’aimerais le lier à mon
incessante quête du dire. C’est la rue indienne, le volet intime de la vie
publique dans la rue qui m’a aidée à vraiment me confier, à me débarrasser
de cette pudeur occidentale envers les choses intimes.
Les romans écrits en Inde m’ont souvent éloignée de ce JE si
compromettant, de cette voix de l’intime qui n’est parvenue à s’affirmer
que dans Des jours de chemins perdus et retrouvés ainsi que dans Le voyage
a dit. Grâce à la rue indienne, j’ai appris à m’étaler, à parler de mon corps et
de celui de mon compagnon. Dans la rue indienne, on entre constamment
dans la vie intime des gens par le marchand de thé, prolongement de la
cuisine dans la rue; par les barbiers et les masseurs, prolongement du corps
dans la rue; par le sari, prolongement de la femme dans la rue; par l’enfant,
prolongement de la famille dans la rue; par les charpoy (lits indiens en
corde) prolongement de la chambre à coucher dans la rue. On vit si près des
gens qu’on a l’impression d’être dans leur maison, tantôt comme invitée
spéciale, tantôt comme membre de leur grande famille.
L. T. — C’est l’Inde des villages que je préfère. J’ai eu la chance de vivre
dans un village, Cheruthuruthy, là où se trouve le kalamandalam où
j’étudiais le kathakali. C’est dans le déroulement des jours, au sein d’une
pratique quotidienne, qu’on arrive peu à peu à pénétrer l’Inde. Mais, au
début, il y a beaucoup de choses qui nous échappent. Nous ne savons pas
comment interpréter les attitudes, les regards… les gens ne vont pas dire ce
qu’ils pensent ou on croit les avoir saisis et puis, surprise! Ils pensaient juste
le contraire. Par exemple, ce mouvement de la tête que les Indiens font à tout
moment, j’ai pris des années avant de saisir si ça voulait dire oui ou non.
Pour atteindre l’autre dans sa subjectivité, il faut d’abord passer par la
couche sociale et familiale, très importante en Inde. Le quant-à-soi est
difficile. Il y a beaucoup de non-dits. Des secrets? Sans doute. Des tabous?
Certainement. Je crois que plus la foule nous entoure, plus le besoin est
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grand de trouver en soi un lieu où brûle, juste pour son propre regard, une
bougie.
Y. V. — Ce geste-là est tout à fait extraordinaire. Ce mouvement qui n’est ni
oui ni non.
L. T. — Juste de savoir si c’est oui ou non. Si on peut le faire ou ne pas le
faire. Vaut-il mieux se présenter en retard ou à l’avance? Ou bêtement à
l’heure? Bref, les codes culturels… mais c’est Vijaya qui devrait prendre la
parole pour nous expliquer le côté obscur des Indiens.
V. R. — Enfin, vous avez droit à vos impressions, bien sûr. (rires) Ce qui est
plus complexe, c’est ce rapport, enfin ce pont-là d’une culture à une autre. À
cause des raisons historiques, nous sommes plus ouverts à l’Occident que le
contraire. En arrivant ici, le choc culturel pour un Indien urbain éduqué est
beaucoup plus dans les nuances, beaucoup plus dans les subtilités. Ce n’est
pas le grand choc auquel vous, vous avez à faire face quand vous venez en
Inde pour la première fois.
Vos réactions sont compréhensibles, car nous nous exprimons plus avec
des gestes. Dans une civilisation qui a perfectionné le rationalisme, est-ce
qu’il y a de la place pour l’ambiguïté? Je ne sais pas. C’est une question que
je vous pose. Est-ce qu’il y a de la place pour l’ambiguïté sauf dans
l’imaginaire? Aux dires des Occidentaux, les Indiens vivent dans une
ambiguïté complexe. Il faut comprendre qu’il y a des cultures où les
questions n’ont pas de réponses. Et ce constat, que toute question n’a pas de
réponse, est inacceptable selon le rationalisme occidental. Sans vouloir
tomber dans le piège de l’essentialisme, puis-je constater que l’Indien
s’incline devant le grand mystère? Nous sommes peut-être dans l’autre
extrême : dans un état de résignation.
L. T. — Je dis souvent que la ligne droite n’existe pas en Inde. Ça résume
peut-être ce que tu veux dire. On ne doit pas s’attendre à une réponse parce
qu’on pose une question. Ce serait trop simple ou pas assez compliqué!
Y. V. — C’est une culture très féminine, comparée à la culture occidentale,
qui est encore très patriarcale et qui se transforme un peu. Mais la culture
indienne est vraiment une culture du féminin. Toute cette dimension du
panthéon indien, où il y a beaucoup de dieux, mais il y a aussi cette Shakti
qui est derrière tout et qui anime tout et toute cette dimension (Larry parlait
des différents corps tantôt) et toute cette myriade de mystères, en fait, vous
en parlez bien, Vijaya, je pense, de tout cet inconnu, en fait, ce mystère
profond de la réalité que l’Inde reconnaît et que les Indiens reconnaissent
dans leur vie quotidienne et avec lequel nous, on a encore beaucoup de mal.
Je pense qu’au Québec, on n’est pas très rationalistes, on a quand même un
petit fond amérindien assez fort qui nous rend...
V. R. — Je généralise aussi.
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Y. V. — Oui c’est ça. Mais l’Occident, en général, je pense que c’est encore
marqué par le patriarcat, la ligne droite et tout ça. Et je pense que l’Inde,
vraiment, échappe à ça, dans cette dimension très féminine de la culture.
Membre du public (voix d’homme) — Merci beaucoup pour ces
magnifiques récits. Je voudrais vous poser une question. À mon avis, quand
on sent une autre réalité, on sent que cette réalité est autre, cela passe
souvent par un tiers, comme disait Bakhtine. C’est très important dans les
récits orientalistes. J’aime beaucoup cette observation d’un orientaliste qui
voyageait à travers l’Égypte, et qui a écrit dans son carnet : « Quand tu
traverses l’Égypte avec un guide, c’est le guide qui voit l’Égypte. Et vous,
vous voyez le guide. » C’est capital, cette figure intermédiaire qui présente
une autre culture. Est-ce qu’il y a eu une telle figure dans votre cas?
J. P. — J’imagine qu’Yvon Rivard pourrait répondre longuement à cette
question. Je pense surtout à l’importance donnée à cet égard à la figure de
mère dans Les Silences du corbeau.
Y. R. — Oui, la figure de mère, et plus précisément celle de Mère, la
compagne de Sri Aurobindo. Vous parliez de la capacité d’accueil de
l’Inde, d’assimiler une autre culture, de la digérer. Je trouve que le
philosophe Aurobindo est un très bel exemple de ça, non seulement parce
qu’il a étudié en Angleterre, mais surtout parce qu’il a parfaitement assimilé
la culture grecque, qui est la source même de notre culture. Héraclite, entre
autres. Il a écrit un petit livre merveilleux sur Héraclite. Et toute sa pensée
consiste à faire une sorte de synthèse de l’Occident et de l’Orient, de la
pensée grecque et de la pensée indienne. Donc, pour moi le tiers dont vous
parlez, le guide, que j’avais lu pendant dix ans avant d’aller en Inde, c’est
bien sûr Aurobindo, qui avait un pied dans l’Occident et, pour rester dans le
nonsense, deux pieds en Orient. C’est lui qui a été mon guide.
Vous avez raison : il y a toujours un guide, que ce soit un philosophe, un ami
qui nous accueille là-bas, sinon ce serait sans doute cacophonique et
dangereux de découvrir seul une culture et d’être projeté dans une culture
sans aucun guide, comme vous dites. Et c’est sans doute pourquoi, au fond,
on découvre d’autant mieux une autre culture si on y a accès par quelqu’un
qui l’a découverte avant nous, qui nous la redonne d’une certaine façon.
Surtout quand il s’agit d’une culture complètement autre. Ce qu’on entend
dire souvent, contre les gens qui sont allés en Inde, ou contre les produits
d’une certaine contre-culture, c’est que ces gens-là étaient noyés dans une
culture très riche qu’ils n’arrivaient pas à assimiler, faute d’un guide ou
faute d’y être resté assez longtemps, ou, je dirais, faute d’une culture-mère
assez forte. Quand j’ai lu le petit livre d’Aurobindo sur Héraclite, ça me
révélait Héraclite et ça me révélait l’Inde. Alors là je me dis que, oui, il y a
possibilité d’abattre les pseudo-frontières entre les cultures, mais que ça
prend beaucoup de travail; je ne sais pas, par exemple, combien de temps
Aurobindo a mis pour assimiler la culture grecque. Et sans doute, si on veut
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faire la même chose, il faut faire beaucoup plus que lire quelques livres ou
passer quelques mois en Inde.
Y. V. — J’avais aussi un tiers dans mon rapport avec l’Inde. J’ai été disciple
d’un gourou indien pendant neuf ans. C’était une femme qui venait de la
tradition du shivaïsme du Cachemire. Et ç’a été pour moi une occasion
extraordinaire d’apprendre, de découvrir la culture par l’entremise de sa
philosophie et aussi de ses pratiques de yoga. Et ç’a été la découverte par
exemple de nombreux mantras et de toute une culture. On avait, par
exemple, des (transcription approximative) pandits qui venaient de
Varanasi qui nous apprenaient le Rudram, qui est un texte vieux de 4 ou
5000 ans.
Et c’était très impressionnant pour moi de voir des gens qui, par la tradition
orale, ceux de la caste des Brahmanes, se transmettent de génération en
génération leur savoir, depuis des siècles. Et on avait accès… Il y avait…
c’était un côté Disneyland spirituel, bien sûr, que j’ai vu et qui fait que je me
suis éloignée de ça, mais j’ai appris beaucoup.
J’ai appris beaucoup à travers cette démarche-là et ça m’a donc permis de
saisir un aspect de cette culture indienne parce que la réalité est tellement
multiple qu’effectivement, il faut avoir un guide qui nous aide à cerner
certains éléments.
Y. R. — Juste un tout petit mot. Un autre exemple de ça. Tout à l’heure, j’ai
mentionné que j’avais découvert l’Inde par Guy Lafond. Ce poète vient de
terminer la traduction de Cavitri. Je ne sais pas si vous savez ce que cela
représente, c’est l’épopée d’Aurobindo, des centaines de pages! Lafond a
donc consacré dix ans de sa vie à traduire Cavitri. À ce niveau, il est clair que
les échanges entre cultures ne sont plus du tourisme. C’est là-dessus, au
fond, qu’on doit tabler si on veut avoir une véritable connaissance de
l’autre.
J. P. — Je constate que les expériences avec l’Inde sont souvent
débordantes. Il est difficile d’en discuter en se situant uniquement sur le
plan esthétique, puisqu’elles touchent également à d’autres dimensions
(philosophiques, sociales, culturelles) de l’existence.
J’aurais toutefois une question « littéraire » pour Yolande Villemaire. Cette
question porte sur l’influence du modèle épique indien dans votre écriture.
J’ai relu, il y a quelques jours, votre roman magnifique, Le Dieu dansant et
ce qui m’a frappé, c’est la présence du style épique dans ce texte. Il s’agit
d’un roman, c’est vrai, mais on peut lire aussi cette œuvre plus
profondément en faisant attention à sa dimension épique. Quand on parle
des épopées dans le contexte indien, on pense tout de suite aux légendaires
Râmâyana et Mahâbhârata. Des références directes à ces deux monuments
littéraires se retrouvent d’ailleurs dans le roman, mais l’idée d’intertextualité est plus généralisée, il me semble, allant jusqu’à la reproduction
de la structure de ces épopées elles-mêmes. D’ailleurs, ce qui fascine la
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critique, surtout occidentale (puisque de son point de vue ce phénomène est
beaucoup moins évident que pour un lecteur indien), c’est ce fameux
emboîtement incessant de récits dans ces œuvres qui constitue peut-être, à
un niveau plus élevé, un trait tout à fait spécifique de la culture et de la
pensée indiennes.
Larry a fait mention de l’existence de plusieurs couches du corps, mais il y a
aussi des couches de conscience. Il existe des écoles philosophiques
hindoues qui en décèlent un bon nombre, en fait on n’en finit plus. Par
rapport à votre texte, ceci donne un effet de lecture, dirais-je, paradoxal, car
il oblige le lecteur à une certaine forme de silence dans la réception de
l’œuvre, qui témoigne simultanément d’une grande richesse du monde
représenté.
Y. V. — Cet emboîtement des récits est la structure même des Mille et une
nuits de la culture orientale, en effet, et cet enchâssement, cette mise en
abyme est une figure qui m’a toujours fascinée. J’ai trouvé au cours de mon
séjour en Inde des clés d’écriture qui m’ont permis d’approfondir mon
travail sur le texte comme objet sonore, en prose comme en poésie.
Rimbaud l’a écrit dans son « Sonnet des voyelles », le a est noir. Je l’ai vu, à
force de chanter des mantras en sanscrit, pendant des heures. Le a est bel et
bien noir! Je me rappelle du cours d’un vieil érudit sur les voyelles du
sanscrit. Il expliquait qu’on peut arriver à voir dans la lettre a l’essentiel de
la réalité. Alors, toute la théorie de la « Matrikashakti » (la Mère du langage)
est une théorie qui vient d’un texte du Viveka Chudamani. Je ne le prononce
peut-être pas correctement là, ça fait quelques années.
Et c’est que… vous parlez des récits dans les récits, c’est une fascination
pour le Râmânaya, qui a imprégné tout le livre. Je suis totalement fascinée
par le Râmânaya. Je l’ai lu à plusieurs reprises. Je l’ai joué. Je l’ai raconté.
J’en ai fait des décors, etc. Et j’envie Larry qui a dansé « Hanuman ». C’est
un personnage que j’adore, le grand singe blanc, il est tellement
extraordinaire. Donc la « Matrikashakti » est la clef même de
l’enchâssement. Ce que ça dit, c’est que — ça veut dire la mère, la mère du
langage —, c’est que dans chacune des lettres de l’alphabet réside la texture
même de la réalité. J’ai toujours été fascinée par l’enchâssement depuis La
Vie en prose, en 1980, un de mes premiers romans, c’est cette dimension de
l’enchâssement qui m’intéresse, mais dans la langue. Alors je ne parle pas le
sanscrit, je le chantais, mais de là à le parler, c’est pas la même chose. C’était
des répétitions surtout. C’était une langue qui m’a fascinée, j’ai quand
même étudié certains textes parlant de cette langue-là. Alors, c’est cette
dimension-là, peut-être plus que la dimension épique, c’est la dimension de
l’enchâssement dans la technique de la langue même, et du sanscrit en
particulier.
M. J. — Merci bien pour cette réponse. Je m’aperçois que le temps file…
Avant de vous quitter, j’aimerais vous offrir un présent. Je suis une païenne
de la poésie, parce que, chaque fois que je récite des poèmes, j’utilise des
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objets qui résument le dire et conduisent directement au cœur du poème. Je
crois que c’est une influence de l’Inde, de son côté tactile et tangible, qu’on
retrouve dans les rites et cérémonies, comme mouiller le museau de la vache
en bronze; installer des petits lits pour les dieux dans un recoin d’un temple,
déshabiller le dieu, ouvrir le lit lors d’une cérémonie, le matin, rhabiller le
dieu, fermer le lit lors d’une autre cérémonie; pousser la balançoire de
Krishna inlassablement. J’ai donc apporté, en guise de cadeau, des verres
pour tous ces thés bus dans des verres.
V. R. — Vous voulez les poser sur la table?
M. J. — Dans chaque verre vous trouverez des petits riens : un bout de tissu
fleuri pour résumer les saris colorés des femmes; un animal en plastique
pour vous rappeler l’importance des animaux en Inde; une odeur, une
pincée de garam masala (épices mélangées); un carré de sucre, symbole de
partage, pour évoquer ce goût universel des hommes. Ce cadeau, que je
vous offre à la manière simple et poétique des Indiens, est inspiré d’un fait :
un soir, je parle avec une petite fille aux longues nattes. Parler est un bien
grand mot, car en réalité, je ne parviens qu’à prononcer un mot en
hindi bandar (singe), puis je compte jusqu’à cinq : ek, do, teen, char,
panch… mais, c’est comme si on avait parlé toute la nuit. Le lendemain, la
petite fille m’offre un bout de tissu enroulé dans un ruban, puis elle s’en va
heureuse, et moi aussi… (elle distribue les cadeaux aux participants et au
public).
V. R.— Une dernière question avant de clore la séance. Si vous aviez à
écrire votre prochaine œuvre sur l’Inde, est-ce que vous adopteriez une
autre approche? Quels sont vos projets d’avenir concernant l’Inde?
L. T. — J’aimerais écrire un film qui se passe en Inde. Ou une pièce de
théâtre. Ou les deux. Pourquoi pas?
Y. V. — J’aimerais bien écrire sur l’Inde contemporaine, enfin, celle que
j’ai connue il y a une dizaine d’années, parce que ça se passe au Moyen Âge
indien, mon livre. C’est très difficile pour moi de parler de l’Inde
contemporaine. C’est plus difficile.
V. R. — Monique, vous avez quelque chose à ajouter?
M. J. — Je ne sais pas. Chose certaine, je trouve que la poésie est beaucoup
plus adaptée au voyage. On travaille le poème pendant une semaine ou
deux. Ensuite on a l’impression d’avoir fini. Et ce sont des instants qu’on
transporte. Tandis qu’avec le roman, on transporte des personnages.
Parfois, les personnages deviennent trop lourds. Parfois, ils deviennent
paresseux. Ils ne veulent pas rencontrer les Indiens. (rires) Ça devient
vraiment malcommode. Malgré ses difficultés, le roman est tentant parce
qu’il permet de sortir de l’autofiction pour aller vers l’Autre. Et si je
retournais en Inde, ce serait pour explorer un aspect culturel : la nourriture,
les premiers contacts avec le tchai indien, le sucre, le lait, les grains de
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cardamome. Le marchand de thé pourrait m’ouvrir des portes en ce sens. Il
ne me reste plus qu’à repartir, qu’à le suivre pour en savoir plus long sur sa
vie.
Y. R. — Oui, j’aimerais retourner en Inde. Et si j’écrivais à nouveau sur
l’Inde, j’aimerais laisser davantage la parole aux Indiens, si j’avais
l’occasion de mieux les connaître et de percer ce mur dont on parlait tout à
l’heure. Sinon, j’aimerais amener un Indien dans les forêts au nord de La
Tuque et écrire ce qui risque de lui arriver. (Rires).
V. R. — Nous tenons à remercier les quatre écrivains invités pour cette table
ronde d’avoir consacré la soirée pour ce premier évènement littéraire sur
l’Inde. Espérons que le succès de cette tentative nous encouragera à
organiser d’autres rencontres de ce genre afin de poursuivre ce véritable
dialogue de cultures.
Applaudissements.
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Research Note
Note de recherche
Serge Granger1
La recherche historique sur les relations
entre l’Asie et le Canada d’avant 1850
Résumé
Cette note de recherche souligne le manque de recherches historiques sur les
relations entre l’Asie et le Canada d’avant 1850 malgré les liens établis par le
colonialisme franco-britannique. Par ces liens tissés au cours de l’histoire,
plusieurs domaines de l’activité humaine ont accentué la mondialisation de la
culture rapprochant l’Asie au Canada. Peu d’études historiques abordent les
relations entre le Canada et l’Asie dans les domaines religieux, commercial,
politique et/ou littéraire. L’auteur vise donc à exposer les différentes facettes
des relations Canada-Asie et comment ce vaste terrain d’étude demeure
relativement inexploité.
Abstract
This research note underscores the lack of historical research on the
relationship between Asia and Canada prior to 1850, in spite of the ties
formed by Anglo-French colonialism. Because of these historical links, many
spheres of human activity are now influenced by a globalized culture that has
drawn Asia closer to Canada. Few historical studies have dealt with
Canada-Asia relations with regard to religion, trade, politics and/or
literature. The aim of this research note is to explore the various aspects of
Canada-Asia relations and the extent to which this vast field of enquiry has, to
date, remained largely unexplored.
Les recherches historiques sur les relations entre l’Asie et le Canada
d’avant 1850 sont pratiquement inexistantes. À quoi peut-on attribuer ce
manque flagrant de recherches sur un sujet tout aussi étonnant que
passionnant? Plusieurs raisons s’offrent à nous : les sources éparpillées aux
quatre coins du monde rendent la recherche impraticable ou fortement
périlleuse, les connaissances des sources asiatiques nécessitent des compétences linguistiques extraordinaires, le nombre restreint d’Asiatiques au
Canada avant 1867 a laissé peu de traces écrites et l’historiographie
canadienne sur l’Asie se penche naturellement sur l’histoire de
l’immigration asiatique apparente après la Confédération. Néanmoins,
l’Asie était bien présente au Canada avant 1850, soit par l’entremise du
colonialisme franco-britannique, soit par celle de la mondialisation de la
culture.
31, 2005
Le colonialisme franco-britannique en Asie et ses répercussions
au Canada
Comme le mentionne Alice Jean E. Lunn dans sa thèse de doctorat,
Développement économique de la Nouvelle-France 1713-1760 (1986), le
statut colonial de la Nouvelle-France limitait les échanges commerciaux
entre le Canada et l’Asie. Le mercantilisme, une caractéristique de la
politique coloniale française, restreignait les visées économiques des
colonies et entraînait plutôt leur subordination à la métropole parisienne
(237). Lorsqu’ils avaient l’occasion d’échanger avec l’Asie, certains
marchands français et canayens répondaient avec enthousiasme, comme
dans le cas du ginseng, mais la plupart des lois restreignaient la fluidité des
échanges entre l’Amérique et l’Asie.
Aucune étude historique n’examine le rôle de la Compagnie des Indes
orientales au Canada. Fondée en 1664 par Jean-Baptiste Colbert
(1619-1683), ministre de Louis XIV, Roi de France, la Compagnie des
Indes possédait des comptoirs à travers le monde, y compris le Château
Ramezay à Montréal et Pondichéry en Inde. De l’Inde, les navires
voguaient sur Canton dans le sud de la Chine. La ville de Lorient en
Bretagne fut créée pour devenir le centre opérationnel du colonialisme
français dans le monde, surtout l’Asie. En 1719, John Law introduisit le
papier monnaie en France et fusionna la Compagnie d’Occident (Montréal)
avec la Compagnie orientale des Indes. Des efforts louables furent entrepris
pour accroître le commerce entre l’Asie et la France, une exposition se tint à
Lorient en 1738, mais, signe des temps, la Compagnie mit fin à ses activités
en 1769 après la guerre de Sept ans (1756-1763), coupant ainsi la
Nouvelle-France du réseau colonial français. La presque totalité des études
sur le commerce se limite à la compagnie des Cent associés ou bien au
commerce de la fourrure (Jean Hamelin, Économie et société en
Nouvelle-France, 1960). Aucune étude n’indique comment les produits
asiatiques se rendaient en Nouvelle-France. Par contre, Pierre Berthiaume
(Relation des avantures de Mathieu Sagean, Canadien, 1999) a examiné le
coureur des mers, Mathieu Sagean (1655-1710?), qu’on croit être le
premier canayen à s’être rendu en Inde et en Chine (138-155). Sagean aurait
quitté Surat (Inde) le 14 mai 1698 et serait parvenu à Tainan (Taiwan) et
Xiamen (Fujian) trois mois plus tard. Berthiaume suggère que Sagean
aurait inventé ses voyages au fil de rencontres avec des marins portugais et
espagnols.
Le commerce entre la Nouvelle-France et l’Asie demeura relativement
restreint durant la période coloniale française, puisque l’élite, peu
nombreuse, importait en petite quantité les produits asiatiques. À titre
d’exemple, de la porcelaine de la Compagnie des Indes, appartenant à
l’épouse du seigneur de Terrebonne fut offerte à Madame Elizabeth de
Ramezay en 1743, propriétaire du Château Ramezay qui le vendit à la
Compagnie en 1745. Les principaux produits asiatiques importés étaient la
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soie, le thé, la porcelaine, les laques et le papier peint de Chine. Plusieurs
plantes, notamment les fleurs ornementales d’Asie, pénétrèrent le
continent nord-américain. Le coton, les toiles imprimées et les épices, dont
le poivre, provenaient du sous-continent indien. Malgré tout, si le
monopole des importations de produits luxueux était restreint, il n’en
demeurait pas moins une prérogative évidente, comme l’atteste un édit
royal de 1733 prohibant tout navigateur, marchand et marin de rapporter
des textiles et tissus asiatiques en Nouvelle-France. (Arrest du Conseil
d’Estat du Roy le 9 mai 1733).
Curieusement, le réseau jésuite favorisait le commerce entre la
Nouvelle-France et la Chine. En 1715, à Caughnawaga (Kahnawake) près
de Montréal, le père jésuite François Lafitau (1681-1746) découvrit du
ginseng, qui fut exporté vers la Chine. Lafitau écrivit son Mémoire présenté
à son Altesse Royale Monseigneur le Duc D’Orléans, Régent de France,
concernant la précieuse plante du gin-seng de Tartarie, découverte en
Amérique par le père Joseph- François Lafitau de la Compagnie de Jésus,
missionnaire du Sault St-Louis (1718) en signalant que les Mohawks se
servaient du ginseng depuis des siècles. Lafitau fit parvenir des spécimens à
Pétrus Jartoux (1668-1720), qui, à ce moment, était employé par
l’empereur chinois Kangxi (1654-1722). La Compagnie des Indes
sous-estimait l’importance du potentiel économique du ginseng comme
produit d’exportation vers la Chine. C’est pourquoi, jusqu’aux années
1750, la Compagnie des Indes permit à ses officiers et marins d’apporter du
ginseng à Canton à titre privé. De 1749 à 1751, les commerçants français de
La Rochelle ordonnaient à leurs associés du Québec d’acheter du ginseng
pour l’exporter vers la Chine. Les propos de l’académicien suédois Kalm
furent recueillis dans le livre d’Hospice Verreau sur le mémoire de Lafitau :
« During my stay in Canada, all the merchants at Québec and Montréal,
received orders from their correspondents in France, to send over a quantity
of gin-seng, there being an uncommon demand for it in this summer. » (41)
Le commerce s’épanouit jusqu’en 1754, moment où le prélèvement
démesuré du ginseng fit pratiquement disparaître la plante. Des profiteurs
commencèrent à envoyer du ginseng de mauvaise qualité, ce qui mena les
Chinois à mettre fin à leurs achats.
La présence britannique au Canada (1760-1867) accrut les possibilités
de commerce avec l’Asie. Premièrement, l’Angleterre remplaça les
politiques de la France par des politiques commerciales plus libérales,
moins restrictives. Deuxièmement, ce changement multipliait les
occasions de contact entre le Canada et l’Asie, car l’empire britannique
possédait un réseau colonial imposant pour le commerce et le transport.
Comme le souligne R. T. Taylor dans Canada in the European Age
1453-1919 (1987), l’empire britannique, déjà bien établi en Orient, intégra
le Canada (476), qui bénéficiait des traités que signait l’empire ou que
celui-ci imposait aux pays asiatiques, à son réseau colonial.
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La ville de Québec occupait une place stratégique dans le développement du transport vers l’Asie avant le milieu du XIXe siècle. Sans
chemin de fer, les navires devaient la plupart du temps accoster à Québec
pour décharger les produits et les passagers qui arrivaient d’Asie. Avec
l’accroissement de l’élite d’origine britannique à Québec et dans le reste du
Canada, les produits asiatiques furent popularisés, ce qui fit monter la
demande. En 1824, le commerce du thé, à lui seul, transforma l’East India
Company en un puissant lobby qui cherchait à obtenir des gouvernements
du Haut et du Bas-Canada le monopole de l’importation du thé afin de
contrer la contrebande américaine. Une bonne partie des cargos en
provenance d’Asie furent acheminés plus tard au nouveau quai East India
Wharf (1847), situé à l’embouchure de la rivière St-Charles dans le port de
Québec.
Les liens militaires qui protégeaient les possessions franco-britanniques
dans le monde rapprochaient également le Canada et l’Asie.
Malheureusement, aucune étude dans le domaine de l’histoire militaire ne
s’est penchée sur les relations entre l’Asie et le Canada avant 1850. Au
lendemain de la guerre de Sept ans (1756-1763), une multitude de
bataillons et de militaires purent quitter le Canada et se rendre en Asie ou
vice versa. Ce fut le cas du 60e régiment, qui participa à la prise de Québec et
qui servit en Inde, lors de la première guerre du Punjab (1845-1846) et de la
révolte des Cipayes. Dans le sens contraire, le 76e régiment, surnommé
l’Hindoostan, quitta l’Inde pour se rendre à Chambly, en 1814, durant les
guerres napoléoniennes. Plusieurs autres militaires firent la navette entre
l’Asie et Québec durant les guerres de conquêtes britanniques en Inde ou en
Chine. Des navires de la flotte marchande, comme le Cornwall de la Somes
Lachlans & Co et le Java de Pirie Pirie & Co, partirent de Québec pour se
rendre à Canton, en Chine, afin d’épauler les forces britanniques durant la
première guerre de l’opium (1839-1841). Également, des natifs de Québec,
comme le capitaine Mountain (1799-1856) et le major Montizambert
(1813-1848), s’embarquèrent sur les mers d’Orient. Mountain servit dans
la première guerre de l’opium et succomba à la maladie à Cawpore, en Inde,
tandis que Montizambert s’enrôla dans le 30e régiment britannique et servit
en Afghanistan. Plus extraordinaire encore fut l’aventure d’EdmondGustave Joly de Lotbinière (1823-1857), frère du premier ministre
québécois Henry Joly (1878-1879). Il s’était enrôlé dans l’armée
britannique dès 1849 et partit faire la guerre en Crimée et au Cachemire,
nouvellement acquis des autorités sikhs par les Britanniques. Posté
pendant cinq ans (1850-1855) dans les environs de Peshawar afin de
protéger la passe de Khyber d’une invasion afghane, il retourna en Inde en
1857 pour rejoindre son 32e régiment, assiégé à Lucknow pendant la
révolte des Cipayes. Ayant succombé pendant le siège de Lucknow, ce
Canadien français anglican devint le seul francophone du Canada décoré
de la médaille de la Mutinerie indienne.
170
La mondialisation de la culture
Évidemment, des livres parvenaient au Canada, et les œuvres d’écrivains et
de penseurs orientalistes furent largement diffusées, comme le souligne
Marcel Trudel dans sa thèse de doctorat, L’influence de Voltaire au Canada
(1945). « Puisqu’on goûte à ce point les œuvres de Voltaire, on a dû
inévitablement se rapprocher des goûts et des idées de Voltaire. Est-ce à lui
qu’il faut attribuer cette habitude de définir longuement les qualités et les
vices : amitié, flatterie, préjugés, opinions? La préférence pour certains
sujets historiques : la Chine et ses empereurs qui sont toujours des sages,
Pierre Le Grand? Les contes à l’orientale dont Bagdad forme l’arrièrescène? Voltaire avait mis tout cela à la mode. » (84). Nous pourrions
répondre à Trudel, qui ne bénéficiait pas, à l’époque, des technologies de
recherche électronique, qu’un recensement exhaustif des publications
orientalistes parvenues au Canada depuis sa fondation démontre que
presque tous les classiques orientalistes européens y sont présents en
version originale. Du premier Coran traduit en langue française par sieur de
Ryer aux classiques d’Anquetil Duperron sur le Zoroastrisme, la
bibliothèque orientale de Herbelot, la morale de Confucius et la découverte
de l’Hindoostan, les bibliothèques de Montréal conservent plus de 200
publications sur l’Orient datant de 1650 à 1850. Un dictionnaire
français-chinois (1740?) écrit à la main se trouve même aux Archives
nationales du Canada.
Le réseau jésuite permettait aux missionnaires d’œuvrer en
Nouvelle-France et en Asie. L’historien Li Shenwen mentionne dans
Stratégies missionnaires des jésuites français en Nouvelle-France et en
Chine au XVIIe siècle (2001) que les relations des jésuites permettaient la
création d’un véritable réseau mondial unissant la Nouvelle-France et
l’Asie. Le collège La Flèche en France produisait un nombre important de
missionnaires, qui créèrent un réseau international d’information sur le
monde non occidental. Dans les premiers moments de la colonisation, un
jésuite français quitta la Nouvelle-France pour se rendre en Chine en 1650.
Adrien Greslon (1618-1696), qui vécut 43 ans en Chine, écrit Histoire de la
Chine sous la domination des Tartares. Il peut être considéré comme le
premier sinologue à fouler le sol canadien. Par contre, Li Shenwen passe
sous silence l’influence philosophique de ce réseau sur les premières
polémiques religieuses au Canada. Monseigneur Laval autorisa la
circulation du livre Défense des nouveaux chrétiens et des missionnaires de
la Chine, du Japon et des Indes (1687) du père jésuite Le Tellier tout en
permettant à Alexandre Noël de critiquer, dans son Apologie des
Dominicains missionnaires de la Chine (1700), les pratiques jésuites sur les
rites chinois. Jusqu’en 1715, la querelle du Pape et de l’empereur chinois au
sujet des rites de ce pays eut des répercussions littéraires en NouvelleFrance. Un bon nombre des publications qui en résultèrent font partie de la
collection des Archives nationales du Québec. À titre d’exemples,
mentionnons Mémoires pour Rome, sur l’état de la religion chrétienne
171
dans la Chine (1709); Lettre à messieurs du Séminaire des missions
étrangères sur ce qu’ils accusent les jésuites de ne s’être pas soumis
sincèrement au nouveau décret touchant les affaires de la Chine (1710);
L’État présent de l’église de la Chine adressé à monseigneur l’évêque de
*** (1710); Commandement de N. S. P. le pape Clément XI : d’observer
pleinement, ... ce qui a été décidé par Sa Sainteté dans l’affaire des cultes ou
des cérémonies de la Chine (1715). En ce sens, les missionnaires
contribuèrent à la mondialisation de la culture entre le Canada et l’Asie,
comme ce fut le cas de Pierre d’Incarville (1706-1757), professeur en
humanités et rhétorique en Nouvelle-France, de 1730 à 1739, qui devint
botaniste directeur des jardins impériaux de Beijing en 1742 et
correspondant chinois de l’Académie des sciences de Paris.
En plus de permettre le culte des ancêtres au sein de la pratique
catholique, ces jésuites de la cour de Pékin avaient créé tout un émoi
philosophique en traduisant des annales chinoises plus vieilles que le
déluge. Leurs travaux étaient souvent censurés à Paris avant que leurs
textes puissent prendre le chemin des Lettres édifiantes et curieuses et
ensuite être distribués en Nouvelle-France. Même le premier livre à tenter
d’expliquer la présence amérindienne en Nouvelle-France fut contraint
dans son cadre méthodologique par la chronologie chinoise. En 1724,
Lafitau publia Mœurs des sauvages amériquains comparées aux mœurs des
premiers temps (1724), où il expliquait que les Amérindiens de la
Nouvelle-France étaient originaires de la Tartarie chinoise. Vingt ans plus
tard, François-Xavier de Charlevoix écrivit Histoire et description
générale de la Nouvelle-France avec le Journal historique d’un voyage
(1744) après avoir publié Histoire et description générale du Japon (1736),
et confirma la thèse selon laquelle les Amérindiens étaient originaires
d’Asie.
Le lien jésuite demeura également présent dans la littérature publiée au
Canada, malgré la dissolution de la compagnie de Jésus. Parmi les jésuites
les plus célébrés se trouve François Xavier (1506-1552), missionnaire au
Japon et qui finit ses jours en Chine. À lui seul, plus de 30 neuvaines, parfois
plus de 400 pages, seront rééditées, ce qui s’avère une présence continuelle
depuis l’arrivée de la presse au Canada. Les premières presses de Brown &
Gilmore imprimèrent la première édition en 1772, et d’autres livres
touchant le christianisme en Orient parurent au milieu du XIXe siècle.
L’édition contribua substantiellement à faire connaître et à organiser des
œuvres caritatives comme la Sainte-Enfance introduite aux indulgences.
Ainsi, la Sainte-Enfance poussa les Québécois à investir dans les missions,
notamment celles de la France en Chine, protégées plus tard par le traité de
Tianjin (1858). Ce mouvement explique en partie l’action massive des
missionnaires québécois en Chine et dans le reste de l’Asie, sous protection
française ou anglaise et parfois sous celle des deux pays.
172
Les philosophies asiatiques passèrent également la frontière du Canada.
Libéraux, républicains et ceux qui s’opposaient au monopole du clergé sur
l’éducation lisaient abondamment les Encyclopédistes, comme Voltaire
(1694-1778), et ceux qu’ils avaient fortement influencés, comme
LaMennais (1782-1854). On peut aussi affirmer que l’orientalisme fit son
entrée au Canada avec l’arrivée de l’imprimerie à Montréal. Fleury
Mesplet, un voltairien convaincu, dirigea la première presse montréalaise
avec La Gazette littéraire pour la ville et district de Montréal (1778). La une
du premier numéro portait sur l’orientalisme. En octobre 1835, L’Écho du
Pays, un périodique axé sur l’éducation, fut parmi les premiers journaux à
citer Confucius : « Si le prince veut conduire ses peuples uniquement par
des ordonnances, et les contenir par les châtiments, ils sauront éviter le
châtiment; mais ils ne sauront pas rougir du vice. » La publication de
l’éthique confucéenne reflétait une partie du lobby séculaire de la société
québécoise des années 1830 et celle qui s’opposa au clergé dans la
gouvernance du peuple.
Conclusion
Nous avons brièvement exposé les relations qu’entretenaient l’Asie et le
Canada avant 1850 pour démontrer l’effet du colonialisme européen sur le
pays et la contribution de la mondialisation de la culture dans l’histoire
internationale. Puisque le nombre d’études historiques sur cette relation
demeure limité, il reste encore beaucoup à faire pour comprendre ce vaste
sujet. Il va de soi que cette relation était mineure, mais elle a, somme toute,
été bien présente dans la construction du Canada et dans sa mondialité avant
l’arrivée d’Asiatiques au pays. Finalement, la relation Asie-Canada n’a pas
fait qu’intégrer la mondialisation : elle en est aussi devenue un diffuseur.
Note
1.
Serge Granger enseigne l’histoire canadienne au Centre d’études françaises et
francophones de l’université Jawaharlal Nehru. Il a publié Le Lys et le lotus. Les
relations du Québec avec la Chine de 1650 à 1950 (2005).
Œuvres citées
Arrest du Conseil d’Estat du Roy le 9 mai 1733 « Qui fait deffenses à tous Armateurs,
Négocians: envois des étoffes et toiles peintes des Indes, de Perse, de la Chine, ou
du Levant. »
Berthiaume, Pierre. Relation des avantures de Mathieu Sagean, Canadien, Montréal:
Les Presses de l’Université de Montréal, 1999.
Charlevoix, Pierre-François-Xavier. Journal d’un voyage fait par ordre du roi dans
l’Amérique Septentrionale, Paris : Chez Rollin Fils, Libraire, 1744.
Hamelin, Jean. Économie et société en Nouvelle-France, Québec : Presses de
l’Université Laval, 1960.
Lafitau, François. Mœurs des sauvages amériquains comparées aux mœurs des
premiers temps, 4 tomes, Paris: Compagnie de Jésus, 1724.
Li, Shenwen. Stratégies missionnaires des jésuites français en Nouvelle-France et en
Chine au XVIIe siècle, Québec : Les Presses de l’Université Laval, 2001.
173
Lunn, Alice Jean E. Développement économique de la Nouvelle-France 1713-1760,
Montréal: Presses de l’Université de Montréal, 1986.
Neuvaine à l’honneur de S. Francois Xavier, de la Compagnie de Jésus, apôtre des
Indes et du Japon, Québec: Brown & Gilmore, 1772.
Taylor, R.T. Canada in the European Age 1453-1919, Vancouver: New Star Books,
1987.
Verreau, Hospice. Nouvelle édition du mémoire de Lafitau adressé au Duc D’Orléans,
Montréal : Typographie de Sénécal, Daniel et Compagnie, 1858.
174
Open-topic Articles
Articles hors-thème
Daniel Chartier
« Au-delà, il n’y a plus rien, plus rien que
l’immensité désolée1. »
Problématiques de l’histoire de la représentation des
Inuits, des récits des premiers explorateurs aux
œuvres cinématographiques 2
Résumé
Dans cet article, l’auteur trace l’évolution historique de la représentation
culturelle des Inuits, à partir des récits des premiers explorateurs arctiques
au début du XIX e siècle, jusqu’aux œuvres cinématographiques
documentaires, ethnographiques et de fiction qui en ont permis la
cristallisation et le renversement à la fin du XXe siècle. Il démontre que cette
image des Inuits relève de siècles de discours, dont une partie seulement — et
transmise récemment dans l’univers occidental — a été produite par les Inuits
eux-mêmes. Les premiers discours européens la situent dans une dimension
mythologique à la source de laquelle se trouvent les hyperboréens de
l’Antiquité. Alimentée par la méconnaissance des territoires arctiques — le
pôle n’a été atteint qu’autour de 1910 — et par une superposition de textes
issus de diverses cultures, la figure de l’Inuit traverse les XIXe et XXe siècles,
d’abord dans les premiers récits des explorateurs, puis dans les ouvrages
encyclopédiques du XIX e siècle, les recherches ethnographiques, et
finalement dans les œuvres cinématographiques, en passant par la publicité
et les arts visuels. Peu à peu, soutenue par une prise de parole postcoloniale,
la figure de l’Inuit s’est dégagée de ces représentations pour permettre au
personnage d’accéder pleinement, dans les œuvres, au statut de sujet.
Abstract
In this paper, the author traces the historical development of the cultural
representation of the Inuit based on the writings of the first Arctic explorers at
the dawn of the 19th century, as well as on the documentary films,
ethnographic studies and fictional works that both helped crystallize its
history and reverse its direction at the close of the 20th century. The author
demonstrates that our vision of the Inuit stems from centuries of views and
opinions held concerning this people, of which only a part — and that only
recently transmitted to the western world — has been produced by the Inuit
themselves. The first European thinking on the Inuit accords them mythical
status, which they share with the Hyperboreans of Antiquity. Fed by a lack of
knowledge of the Arctic — the North Pole was not reached until around 1910
— and by the accretion of texts emanating from different cultures, the vision
we have of the Inuit wended its way through the 19th and 20th centuries,
starting with the first writings of the explorers, and gradually expanded upon
in 19th century encyclopaedic works, ethnographic research, and also in
31, 2005
films, advertising and the visual arts. Ever so slowly, and strengthened by
finding their voice in our post-colonial age, a clearer vision of the Inuit has
emerged from these representations to allow this people to take centre stage,
with its own voice, in works of fiction.
Le Grand Nord, décrit par les géographes, les ethnologues et les
scientifiques, appartient, dès qu’on le considère du point de vue de la
représentation culturelle, au domaine du discours. En tant que tel, il est
constitué de textes, d’images et de figures dont on peut retracer l’histoire
dans différentes œuvres, issues elles-mêmes de traditions formelles
distinctes. De manière générale, ce Nord (ou cette idée du Nord, comme le
présente Sherill E. Grace3) constitue un espace tant imaginé qu’imaginaire
qui propose une structure matricielle inspirée à la fois du mythe et de la
fiction. Pour autant que les contraintes de l’éloignement, de la difficulté
physique et de la rareté puissent être respectées, le romancier ou le
scénariste peut développer des histoires qui s’inscrivent dans une trame qui
fait fi du temps historique, des référents géographiques et, dans une certaine
mesure, de la réalité de ceux qui y vivent. En contrepartie, la liberté que
permettent les figures et éléments du Nord (la blancheur, l’immensité et la
désolation arctiques, par exemple) réduit la possibilité des genres et des
types de fiction qui peuvent y prendre place : on y trouve peu de drames
psychologiques, peu de théâtre, de rares ascensions sociales, mais souvent
des romans d’aventures et de science-fiction4, des récits ethnologiques et
scientifiques, ainsi que des contes populaires. De la même manière,
rapidement, la tradition littéraire et filmique a fixé les traits d’un petit
nombre de figures caractéristiques du lieu, parmi lesquelles se trouvent peu
de femmes5.
Dans les œuvres cinématographiques, nous retenons cinq figures
dominantes du monde imaginaire polaire : le prospecteur, la « police
montée », le monstre, le père Noël et l’Inuit. Tous ces personnages se
manifestent très tôt dans l’histoire du cinéma et ils perdurent au cours du
XXe siècle. Si l’imaginaire du prospecteur renvoie au Klondike, à l’Alaska
et au Yukon, il a trouvé son illustration railleuse dans la figure de Charlie
Chaplin dans The Gold Rush en 1925. La figure bonasse et bienveillante de
la « police montée », issue du cinéma western américain et de son confrère
canadien-anglais, a trouvé dans la série télévisée Due South6 son
persévérant descendant. Quant au père Noël, il s’appuie sur une tradition
européenne ancienne, et les paramètres de sa représentation sont définis en
fonction à la fois d’un postulat mercantile états-unien et d’un respect des
tonalités chromatiques — entre le bleu froid de l’extérieur et le rouge chaud
de l’intérieur bourgeois — associées aux espaces arctiques. Le monstre7
polaire, inspiré par la découverte au tournant du XIXe siècle de corps entiers
de mammouths congelés dans les glaces8, apparaît dès les débuts du
cinéma, notamment dans À la conquête du pôle de Georges Méliès en 1912,
puis dans des productions de série B de l’après-guerre9. Enfin, la présence
178
premiers explorateurs aux œuvres cinématographiques
de l’Inuit est marquée par de grandes œuvres qui sont autant de balises dans
l’histoire du genre : Nanook of the North, en 1922, et le premier long
métrage de fiction inuit, Atanarjuat, en 2001. Ces cinq personnages
(auxquels on pourrait en ajouter quelques autres : le travailleur minier,
l’infirmière, le chasseur, l’explorateur, l’artiste de la nature, etc.)
constituent à leur manière une chronique de l’évolution des récits littéraires
et filmiques qui concernent l’Arctique.
L’objectif de cet article est de tracer l’évolution historique de la
représentation culturelle des Inuits à partir des récits des premiers
explorateurs arctiques au début du XIXe siècle jusqu’aux œuvres
cinématographiques documentaires, ethnographiques et de fiction qui en
ont permis la cristallisation et le renversement à la fin du XXe siècle. Il s’agit
donc moins d’analyser les œuvres dans la spécificité formelle du genre
auquel elles appartiennent que d’identifier les marques de l’évolution de la
figure de l’Inuit dans ces mêmes œuvres.
Cette image des Inuits relève de siècles de discours, dont une partie
seulement — transmise récemment dans l’univers occidental — a été
produite par les Inuits mêmes. Les premiers discours européens la situent
dans une dimension mythologique à la source de laquelle se trouvent les
hyperboréens de l’Antiquité. Alimentée par la méconnaissance des
territoires arctiques — le pôle n’a été atteint qu’autour de 191010 — et par
une superposition de textes issus de diverses cultures, la figure de l’Inuit
traverse les XIXe et XXe siècles d’abord dans les premiers récits des
explorateurs, puis dans les ouvrages encyclopédiques du XIXe siècle, les
recherches ethnographiques et finalement dans les œuvres cinématographiques, en passant par la publicité et les arts visuels.
Pour les auteurs et les lecteurs au sud de l’Arctique, la rigueur du climat
fait de l’Inuit un personnage qui rejoint les valeurs de l’ascèse; « ces naïfs
spectateurs d’un stoïcisme instinctif11 », comme les décrit un auteur du
XIXe siècle, auraient naturellement et naïvement atteint un niveau spirituel
que l’Européen tente culturellement d’atteindre. L’opposition entre la
nature et la culture est caractéristique de toute cette conception du Nord, un
territoire qui tend, à mesure que l’on s’approche du pôle, à une désolation
graduelle, qui exclut pour les sudistes12 toute idée de culture. Aussi n’est-il
pas surprenant que le stoïcisme prétendument naturel des Inuits soit encore
repris aujourd’hui. Par exemple, le philosophe Michel Onfray écrit en 2002
dans un essai sur l’Esthétique du pôle Nord que, d’un point de vue
philosophique, la dureté du climat arctique, la nécessité de vivre au jour le
jour sans capitaliser et, surtout, le mode de vie austère des Inuits les
rapprochent d’un idéal occidental :
Depuis toujours, l’objectif philosophique existentiel se propose de
réaliser ce qui, au pôle, fonctionne d’évidence : la concentration
sur le seul nécessaire, la conjuration du superflu, la réduction du
179
besoin à sa possible satisfaction, la mise en perspective du désir et
de la réalité impérieuse, le modèle de l’idéal ascétique, la passion
pour le renoncement et le contentement du peu, la morale prenant
ses leçons dans la nature. L’Inuit connaît naturellement les joies
éthiques proposées culturellement, en réaction aux logiques
d’abondance, par la philosophie occidentale.13
Même si les liens entre les Groenlandais et les Scandinaves se sont
maintenus dans le millénaire et que quelques expéditions ont établi de
premiers contacts14, les Inuits ont conservé, du point de vue de la culture
européenne, leur statut de peuple inaccessible et mystérieux. Aussi, quand
en 1818 John Ross découvre le premier, sur la route qui tend vers le pôle,
ceux qu’on appelle alors les Esquimaux polaires, il soulève une curiosité
tant scientifique que culturelle qui ne cessera de croître tout au long du
siècle, alimentée par la quête du pôle Nord — qui prendra plus d’un siècle
— et par l’encyclopédisme et le positivisme qui feront des Inuits un objet
ethnographique de premier choix.
Les illustrations que rapporte Ross15 servent à documenter un imaginaire
qui fixe rapidement les figures partagées ensuite par le discours
scientifique, littéraire et visuel. Accompagné de son guide sud-groenlandais, John Saccheus, Ross part à la rencontre de ces Inuits de l’extrême
arctique, ce qu’illustrent des lithographies et des aquarelles largement
diffusées, dont certaines sont réalisées par Saccheus et Ross : la scène de la
première rencontre [Figure 1], qui situe majestueusement les bateaux
amarrés à la banquise et des personnages bienveillants; le portrait d’Ervick,
le premier Esquimau polaire rencontré par Ross, qui pose pour
l’aquarelliste comme Nanook posera pour la caméra, et enfin ce village
inuit composé d’igloos superposés par le regard exotique dans un
assemblage qui ressemble à une banlieue londonienne. Celui-ci est sis au
Figure 1 - Scène de la première rencontre avec les Esquimaux polaires.
Lithographie d’après une aquarelle de John Saccheus (1818)
180
pied d’une montagne sur laquelle on peut deviner le protecteur drapeau
anglais, dont les effets bénéfiques sont manifestés par les bras ouverts du
personnage de l’explorateur.
Les expéditions à la conquête du monde polaire, puis de l’Antarctique, se
multiplient au XIXe siècle et soulèvent un intérêt soutenu du public, puis
des États; toutes s’inscrivent dans une trame narrative tragique, où les
hommes luttent contre le froid, le désespoir, la rareté et parfois, la
désillusion. La plus connue de ces équipées est celle qu’entreprend Sir John
Franklin dans les années 184016 et qui s’avère un cruel échec pour tout
l’équipage. Dans les années, puis les décennies qui suivent sa disparition,
des dizaines d’expéditions se lancent vers l’Arctique canadien dans l’espoir
de retrouver les survivants17 ou leurs restes, alimentant du même coup le
mythe du Grand Nord et de sa rudesse impossible à surmonter. Ce n’est
qu’un siècle et demi plus tard, en 1984, que l’on retrouve gelés et presque
intacts les corps des marins de Franklin. La glace et le froid, qui tuent sans
ménagement, suscitent l’effroi par leur pouvoir de stopper jusqu’au temps,
arrivant à momifier naturellement l’homme entouré de ses équipements.
Peu de femmes participent aux voyages polaires et moins encore à la
trame narrative du monde arctique. Pourtant, quelques années seulement
après le voyage de Ross paraît à Londres un étonnant recueil de poèmes
intitulé A Peek at the Esquimaux18, suivi d’une « pastorale polaire », signé
« ALady » et accompagné de magnifiques illustrations en couleurs qui déjà
esthétisent les images rapportées par Ross et réifient les types inuits. On
retrouve dans ces illustrations la pureté des formes des personnages et une
tonalité chromatique qui sera invariablement reprise par la suite : un décor
aux tons pastel, qui insiste sur le bleu, le violet et le blanc, et des
personnages aux chaudes couleurs brunes et rouges [Figure 2]. Le signe du
froid arctique et son opposé, la confortable chaleur, trouvent ainsi leur
expression figée, qui pourra ensuite être utilisée dans le vocabulaire du
système discursif du Nord.
À ces images réifiées s’articule un discours textuel teinté d’un
scientifisme qui n’exclut toutefois pas les stéréotypes, le racisme et les
applications colonialistes. En parallèle des récits des explorateurs, souvent
aussi richement illustrés, paraissent à la fin du XIXe siècle plusieurs
synthèses encyclopédiques du monde polaire, qui assouvissent dans des
récits parfois élégants une curiosité ethnologique et géographique. Ces
sommes condensent le discours sur le Nord en général et les Inuits en
particulier19. Parmi celles-ci, on retient dans la « Bibliothèque des
merveilles » de la Librarie Hachette l’ouvrage de Lesbazeilles Les
merveilles du monde polaire, paru en 1881, avant la découverte du pôle.
Quand il décrit les Inuits, ces « hyperboréens par excellence20 »,
Lesbazeilles souligne que, compte tenu de la rudesse du climat, « on
s’attendrait à trouver en eux des êtres […] dénués de toutes les qualités »,
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Figure 2 - Homme inuit. Tiré de A Peek at the Esquimaux, by A Lady (1825)
alors qu’au contraire, « on rencontre chez ces pauvres gens des traits de
caractère, des dispositions morales qui partout feraient honneur à
l’humanité21. » Cependant, le portrait que trace Lesbazeilles des Inuits est
loin d’être mélioratif; il en relève d’abord le caractère répugnant : « Il faut,
écrit-il, être décidé à surmonter une forte impression de dégoût pour entrer
dans la demeure d’un Esquimau. Une malpropreté extrême y offense la vue
et l’odorat22. » L’auteur relate la réaction du lieutenant Bellot alors qu’il
pénètre pour la première fois dans un igloo :
Un de ses compagnons lui montra une ouverture, haute de deux
pieds à peine, cachée par une peau : c’était la porte. Comme il s’en
approchait, des émanations chaudes et fétides arrivèrent jusqu’à
lui, il sentit faiblir son courage, mais enfin il prit son parti et il entra
après avoir rampé, sur une longueur de deux mètres, dans une sorte
d’égout aux murailles humides : ses pieds s’enfonçaient dans une
boue détrempée d’eau, de sang, d’huile et de graisse. Il se croyait
préparé à tout par ce qu’il avait lu, par ce qu’on lui avait dit de ces
sordides habitations; il se trompait, il n’avait supposé rien de
semblable à ce qu’il vit.23
La description qu’il trace de l’Inuit s’apparente à celle d’un monstre, ce
dont témoignent bien les illustrations qui accompagnent le texte, dont celle
d’« Un jeune esquimau » représenté sous les traits d’un affreux petit homme
[Figure 3].
Ils ont une grosse tête, écrit l’auteur, un visage large, aplati et
même creusé à la racine du nez, des pommettes saillantes, de petits
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Figure 3 - « Un jeune esquimau ». Tiré des Merveilles du monde polaire
(1881)
yeux noirs, une grande bouche laissant voir des dents qui, à force
de servir à racler et à couper des peaux, à tirer sur des courroies,
sont tout usées, des cheveux raides et peu abondants, pendants
chez les hommes, relevés en chignon chez les femmes, peu ou
point de barbe.24
Autre figure dominante du monde polaire, les missionnaires, qui
prennent au tournant du siècle le relais des explorateurs auprès des Inuits,
accentuent cette vision défavorable, qui rejoint leur désir d’œuvrer comme
des martyrs auprès de ces déshérités. Leur apport négatif à l’image des
Inuits relève d’une stratégie discursive qui leur permet de justifier un projet
évangélique. Dans son roman missionnaire intitulé L’épopée blanche,
Louis-Frédéric Rouquette écrit : « Ce sont les plus misérables, les plus
pauvres, les plus abjects. Ils errent de la corne de l’Alaska au Labrador, des
îles Herschell à la Terre de Baffin. Leur domaine est désolation. […] C’est
pourquoi les oblats devaient tenter le salut de leurs âmes. »25 Décrits par les
missionnaires comme superstitieux, orgueilleux, menteurs, sales, immoraux, cupides et cruels26, les Inuits auraient cependant besoin d’être
protégés des Blancs et mis en apartheid dans des quartiers isolés27. Peu à
peu, la rencontre avec l’Inuit devient un geste tabou et les mouvements de
dialogues illustrés par les figures de Ross s’évanouissent. Alors qu’il
séjourne en Alaska au début du siècle, l’un de ces missionnaires, le père
Lacouture, décide de briser cet interdit et d’aller à leur rencontre. Toutefois,
il est vite ramené à sa réalité, où l’Inuit ne peut prendre place aux côtés des
Blancs. Il consigne l’aveu de cette rencontre dans son journal :
Ce qui m’intéresse surtout, c’est d’aller les voir dans leur quartier
spécialement réservé pour eux. […] J’avoue qu’ils m’ont fait
bonne impression : j’ai découvert que c’était du monde comme les
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autres et qu’ils ont de l’esprit s’ils ne sont pas instruits. J’ai peur de
les aimer.28
Au tournant du XXe siècle, une autre image des Inuits aura cependant
raison de cette défaveur dans l’imaginaire littéraire et visuel, et c’est
d’ailleurs celle qui donnera à cette figure sa plus vaste extension, allant du
discours publicitaire aux premières œuvres cinématographiques. Stimulés
par l’expansion coloniale à laquelle le débat sur le récit de la conquête du
pôle par l’Américain Peary donne un réel enthousiasme, inspirés par
l’émergence d’un modèle du héros américain masculin et guidés par le
sauf-conduit de l’ethnographie, qui leur donne droits et privilèges, les
publicistes, cinéastes et muséologues américains remodèlent au début du
siècle la figure de l’Inuit. Ce dernier devient alors un homme téméraire et
ingénieux, quoique naïf, près de la nature et infantilisé qui, à l’opposé des
peuples qui se querellent et des Amérindiens qui commencent à réclamer
des terres, entretient avec les Blancs un rapport de soumission bon enfant.
Les Inuits, ou « Esquimaux », commencent alors à jouir d’une bonne
presse, notamment dans les musées, les cirques et les œuvres pour la
jeunesse. Ils ne tarderont pas non plus à faire leur entrée au cinéma muet.
L’un des événements emblématiques de cette période est le transport par
Robert Peary d’un groupe d’Inuits à New York, en 189729. Exhibés aux
foules avec l’assistance des scientifiques du American Museum of Natural
History, ces hommes succomberont cependant rapidement aux maladies
qui leur étaient inconnues, sous les yeux attristés des milliers de visiteurs.
Alors qu’ils meurent les uns après les autres, leurs cerveaux sont disséqués
et leurs os exposés dans les salles attenantes aux survivants. L’un d’entre
eux, Minik, survivra cependant à ses compatriotes et réclamera jusqu’en
1993 la translation du corps de son père des vitrines du musée à sa
sépulture. Il écrira dans son journal en parlant des ethnologues et
muséologues : « You’re a race of scientific criminals. »30
Au début du siècle, d’autres transports d’Inuits seront ainsi organisés et
des expositions en carton pâte sont construites dans les foires pour les
exhiber au public. On voit dans une photographie de 1909 un « village
eskimo » construit pour montrer les Inuits dans leur décor [Figure 4]. À
l’intérieur, ces derniers « jouent » en fonction des images stéréotypées qui
leur donnent sens dans la culture populaire. On retrouve dans les archives
de la Bibliothèque du Congrès américain trois vignettes cinématographiques de Thomas A. Edison réalisées en 1901 lors de la Pan American
Exposition de Buffalo, qui donne idée de ces jeux. Ces courts films31 font
voir des Inuits s’amusant comme des enfants à saute-mouton dans un décor
de faux glaciers.
Peu à peu, l’Inuit devient dans l’imaginaire populaire un personnage
sympathique pour les enfants32, notamment parce que sa figure épurée
reprend les principales caractéristiques associées à l’idéal américain :
courageux, travailleur, ingénieux, libre, pacifique, honnête et ayant le sens
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Figure 4 - Photographie de « Eskimo Village » à l’Exposition Alaska-YukonPacific (1909)
des responsabilités familiales33 : « Les Sauvages sont de grands enfants34 »
comme l’écrit en 1927 Alexandre Huot dans un roman d’utopie politique de
réconciliation entre les Blancs et les Autochtones. C’est cette figure de
personnage adorable, toujours heureux malgré les difficultés, qui est
reprise dans le cinéma naissant35 et qui trouvera son expression en 1922
dans le « documentaire36 » de Robert Flaherty, Nanook of the North, tourné
sur la côte de la Baie d’Hudson, dans le nord du Québec37. Le succès
mondial du film est tel38 que Nanook devient rapidement la figure type de
l’Inuit au cinéma et dans la culture populaire. Dans son analyse des suites de
Nanook dans la culture américaine, Shari Huhndorf constate que :
Nanook of the North became a kind of watershed, the point after
which no imagination of the Far North was without the full
panoply of stereotypes born in the later nineteenth century,
developed in the 1900s and 1910s, and brought to fruition in
Flaherty’s work. The film also spawned what one prominent
observer has labeled “Nanookmania”, a marketing craze that
produced dozens of trademarks including Eskimo Pie ice cream. A
few years later, two major Hollywood studios capitalized on
Eskimos’ popularity, producing two feature films with Arctic
themes: Universal’s Igloo (1932) and MGM’s Eskimo (1934)39.
Dans la publicité du film Nanook of the North, les personnages sont
décrits comme des enfants, qui aiment glisser sur les icebergs, jouer avec
leurs chiots et prendre leur bain à la mode esquimaude. L’anthropologue
Asen Balikci remarque que ce film intensifie les caractéristiques associées
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à la représentation de l’Inuit, issues de la littérature de la période
victorienne40.
Comme le veut l’usage, le film s’ouvre sur une carte géographique du
Nord canadien. Ce dispositif visuel n’a pas pour effet de situer le lieu de
l’action, mais il permet au contraire, une fois la carte remplacée par les
scènes filmées, de faire abstraction de toute référence toponymique. Le
procédé est caractéristique des films de l’Arctique : une fois énoncé le fait
que le territoire où se situe l’action est loin et inhospitalier, le cinéaste est
affranchi de toute contrainte historique ou topologique et il peut glisser dans
un temps universel et cyclique, dominé par le passage des saisons. Pour
Nanook of the North, l’intertitre du départ énonce les particularités du lieu et
de la figure de l’Inuit : « Aucun autre peuple ne pourrait survivre dans la
désolation des terres et à la rigueur du climat; pourtant, bien que dépendant
des animaux, sa seule source de nourriture, vit en cet endroit le peuple le
plus heureux du monde — le téméraire, l’adorable, le nonchalant peuple
inuit. » [Figure 5] Dans ce contexte, malgré la volonté affichée de Flaherty,
la réalité des Inuits41 a cédé le pas devant le spectacle — réussi — d’une
figure qui rejoint l’imaginaire populaire42.
Dans les décennies subséquentes, quelques productions filmiques
tentent de se défaire du regard exotique sur les Inuits, avec cependant plus
Figure 5 - Extrait de Nanook of the North (1922)
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ou moins de succès. C’est le cas de l’étonnant film couleur Eskimo Summer
de 1944, l’un des premiers documentaires arctiques réalisés par une femme,
Laura Boulton. Le commentaire du film, sans laisser la parole aux Inuits —
sauf pour leurs chants —, tente de se jouer des stéréotypes qui en fondent la
figure. Le documentaire s’ouvre une fois encore sur une carte, et son
commentaire insiste sur la distance qui sépare le spectateur des Inuits.
Cependant, une fois cette précaution énoncée, le propos tombe tout de suite
dans le temps cyclique des saisons, qui fait fi de toute historicité possible
pour le peuple inuit. Ici, la naturalisation du mode de vie inuit passe par des
comparaisons qui visent à neutraliser les différences; l’une d’entre elles, le
fait de manger de la viande crue, reprise sans cesse dans toute construction
discursive sur les Inuits pour sa nature profondément aculturelle, se veut
banale : bien sûr, les Inuits mangent cru, mais comme vous le faites
vous-mêmes avec les huîtres.
Au cours des années 1950 et 1960, l’Office national du film du Canada
tourne bon nombre de documentaires sur le mode de vie des Inuits de
l’Arctique. L’objectif est en partie politique : pendant la Guerre froide, le
Canada voit sa souveraineté menacée par le grand nombre de soldats
américains dans l’Arctique, alors que le pays lui-même n’occupe pas le
territoire. La solution préconisée sera radicale pour le peuple inuit : le
déplacement forcé de populations vers l’Extrême-Nord en 1953 et une
violente sédentarisation dans des villages à partir de 1962. Les effets de ces
mesures ont profondément bouleversé la vie inuite. Comme le constate
Asen Balikci, pendant cette période, les films se veulent objectifs dans leur
volonté de présenter la réalité inuite telle qu’elle est vécue, mais ils gardent
sous silence tous les problèmes liés à son mode colonial, comme le taux très
élevé de mortalité infantile, les épidémies et la violence43. Balikci,
anthropologue de formation, a choisi dans les années 1960 de réaliser une
série de documentaires s’inspirant de la technique de « reconstruction
culturelle » où il situe les Inuits dans le contexte qui était le leur avant
l’introduction du fusil en 1919. Sa série, intitulée Netsilik Eskimos
(1963-1965) a permis de redéfinir la figure de l’Inuit d’un point de vue
culturel. Il reprendra ce travail, cette fois en illustrant la vie contemporaine
des Inuits, dans un film intitulé The Netsilik Eskimo Today, réalisé en 1972.
Dans les années récentes, des productions réalisées par de jeunes
cinéastes ont tenté de documenter et d’interpréter le rapport des Inuits à
l’histoire. Ces films, à la fois ethnographiques et politiques, n’ont
cependant pas le succès populaire des productions exotiques. Le film Les
exilés du Nouveau- Québec, réalisé en 1995 par Patricia Tassinari, donne la
parole aux survivants du déplacement de 1953 où sept familles du Nunavut
ont dû s’exiler à 1 500 km plus au nord dans des postes désolés pour lesquels
ils n’étaient pas préparés. Cette action coloniale tardive du gouvernement
fédéral est dénoncée dans ce film comme une profonde injustice : le cinéma,
en donnant la parole aux Inuits dans une perspective historique permet de
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déconstruire la figure passive d’homme des glaces et il prend la forme d’une
prise de position politique. « La terre de Baffin, écrit le philosophe Michel
Onfray, ressemble à s’y méprendre aux pays pauvres, naguère dévastés par
les Occidentaux, ravagés, occupés, exploités, réduits à rien.44»
Peu à peu, des cinéastes inuits produisent des films documentaires, dont
Mon village au Nunavik45 et Si le temps le permet46, qui s’intéressent tant à
la vie sociale d’un village qu’au rapport de la jeunesse face à l’héritage
préchrétien de la première moitié du XXe siècle. En parallèle, on note
pendant la période la parution en 2002 du premier roman inuit du Nunavik
chez un grand éditeur, Sanaaq de Mitiarjuk Napaluk47 et, dans certaines
œuvres d’auteurs québécois, une exaltation des Inuits qui évoque parfois
une survalorisation mythique48. Dans ce travail de réintroduction de
l’Histoire dans le monde inuit49, les films produits par une compagnie de
production autochtone, Isuma, sont vite devenus une référence et un
modèle. La série Nunavut. Our land (1994-1995) présente l’histoire du
village d’Igloolik en 1945 et 1946. La simple mention de cette période, au
début de la série, permet de situer le mode de vie inuit dans une trame
historique.
La sortie en 2001 du premier long métrage de fiction inuit, Atanarjuat,
produit par Isuma et réalisé par le cinéaste Zacharias Kunuk, a désigné un
changement fondamental dans la représentation des Inuits, puisqu’elle
signifie un renversement du pôle d’observation et un élargissement des
objectifs de la production filmique. En effet, non seulement le film
cherche-t-il à développer un point de vue inuit au cinéma, mais son projet
déborde l’œuvre cinématographique et vise tout autant à instaurer un mode
de production communautaire, à préserver et à renforcer la culture inuite, à
défendre un projet social, à prendre la parole dans le monde extérieur des
communications, à proposer une remise en question des caractéristiques de
la représentation des Inuits, mais aussi une réécriture d’un récit qui se veut,
pour la première fois, inscrit dans une historicité propre au peuple inuit.
Cette temporalité permet de faire référence aux bornes historiques qui
constituent les moments propres du déroulement du monde valorisé par la
culture et l’histoire des Inuits.
Les critiques ont noté que l’un des traits novateurs de ce film est qu’il
cherche à présenter la culture inuite de l’intérieur50. Toutefois, comme le
remarque Thierry Roche, l’un des problèmes des « films de la production
amérindienne courante » est que, « hormis la nature du discours, plus
militant, et le fait que certains sujets sont traités de “l’intérieur” », ils
s’apparentent, « d’un point de vue formel […], aux productions
occidentales.51 » Atanarjuat se distingue cependant par la nature de son
projet esthétique qui déborde vers des applications sociales, historiques et
médiatiques. Il se différencie aussi par la tradition filmique dans laquelle
son réalisateur a voulu l’insérer : alors que les sources historiques du
cinéma américain relèvent davantage du spectacle populaire, et que celles
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du cinéma européen, du moins nordique, remontent à la photographie52,
Kunuk a tenu à ce que le cinéma inuit soit fidèle à une ascendance
sculpturale. L’anecdote veut que Kunuk, lui-même d’abord sculpteur, ait
vendu ses sculptures dans les galeries de Montréal pour pouvoir s’acheter
sa première caméra vidéo, un geste de métamorphose — de la sculpture au
cinéma — dont le récit s’apparente aux légendes mêmes qui feront la trame
de ses films. Au-delà de ce geste, son film s’appuie sur les techniques de la
vidéo numérique pour « renforcer la sensation d’être sur les lieux pour le
public, malgré l’exotisme de l’environnement53. » Le directeur de la
photographie de ce film, Norman Cohn, explique que la caméra numérique
« permet aux gens d’oublier toute la distance et de s’identifier à notre
histoire et à nos personnages comme s’ils étaient simplement comme
nous.54 »
« Like a sculptor who makes images with stones, I wanted to make
images with a camera55 », disait Zacharias Kunuk. Au moment clé
d’Atanarjuat, alors que l’une des femmes du héros le trahit en invitant les
autres à l’accompagner pour cueillir des fruits de manière à laisser l’homme
seul face à ses ennemis, on note d’abord la simplicité des dialogues et de
l’humour, mais aussi le rôle de la caméra, qui donne aux personnages une
stature qui s’apparente à des sculptures humaines entre lesquelles le
spectateur se sent familier.
Le projet social et esthétique d’Isuma, qui vise essentiellement une prise
de parole des Inuits, n’est pas étranger aux autres prises de parole
postcoloniales : le projet a sollicité tout un village — celui d’Igloolik
— dont la légende se veut l’histoire et la voie de survie et de rayonnement. À
l’image de la culture traditionnelle, les producteurs ont insisté pour
impliquer le plus possible la communauté56 : sur les lieux de tournage,
[…] les artisans du film ont créé, selon les mots du producteur, une
« culture de production » inuite caractérisée par sa bonne humeur,
son audace, sa patience et sa flexibilité. En 1999 pendant les six
mois de tournage en extérieur dans la région d’Igloolik, les acteurs
et techniciens ont vécu dans des campements et des conditions
semblables à celles des personnages du film. Ils vivaient dans la
toundra comme leurs ancêtres il y a plusieurs centaines d’années.57
La distribution et l’équipe de production presque entièrement inuites ont
permis de poser les bases d’une industrie cinématographique locale, tout en
donnant des emplois à un village exposé à un taux de chômage très élevé et à
un désœuvrement malfaisant. Le film a aussi permis une renaissance du
savoir traditionnel, nécessaire aux reproductions historiques des costumes,
outils et pratiques des personnages, tout en l’illustrant dans une œuvre
contemporaine qui puisse servir aux générations futures. Le film a aussi
permis une nouvelle approche du chamanisme et des croyances sacrées
inuites, qui font l’objet de tabou dans les villages, où l’effet des
missionnaires catholiques et protestants se fait encore lourdement sentir.
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Kunuk admet ainsi : « Je n’ai jamais assisté aux manifestations du
chamanisme. J’en ai seulement entendu parler. Filmer ce phénomène est
une façon de le rendre visible58. »
Si le film renverse certaines des représentations sudistes sur les Inuits, il
s’appuie paradoxalement sur ces dernières pour arriver à retrouver le passé
de ce peuple jusqu’à récemment sans écriture, mais doté d’une culture
orale. Pour retrouver les costumes anciens, les artisans ont étudié les
dessins laissés dans les journaux de l’expédition navale britannique de
l’Admiral William Parry à Igloolik en 1822. Les artistes ont aussi un
rapport ambigu face aux productions documentaires du début du XXe
siècle, dont Nanook of the North, puisqu’ils y voient tant une image
stéréotypée de leurs ancêtres que l’une des seules sources pour arriver à
reconstituer leur passé.
La cohorte culturelle de Zacharias Kunuk, qui est aussi celle de la
chanteuse et cinéaste Elisapie Isaac, de l’écrivaine Mitiarjuk Nappaaluk et
du cinéaste Bobby Kenuajuak, appartient à une première génération
sédentaire et lettrée chez les Inuits. Le saut générationnel, de grandsparents nomades et chasseurs à de petits-enfants urbains et cinéastes, est
considérable59, et il ne se fait pas sans heurt. D’ailleurs, Kunuk a plusieurs
fois dénoncé les difficultés administratives posées par les organismes qui
financent la production cinématographique au Canada60.
La reconnaissance internationale du film Atanarjuat au Festival de
Cannes en 2001 a permis une prise de parole postcoloniale nouvelle dans
un système de représentation du Nord qui donnait à voir des Inuits sans
qu’on puisse les entendre. La méconnaissance des territoires arctiques et de
leur population a longtemps permis une distance imaginaire qui, si elle a
suscité des figures fantastiques, — des monstres sortis des glaces et du père
Noël jusqu’à l’Inuit souriant dans son igloo —, a aussi produit des
stéréotypes tenaces. « Nobody, even in southern Canada, dit Kunuk, knows
this part of the world. » Le succès populaire du film, tant à Igloolik61 que
dans le monde, tend à une réévaluation de la figure de l’Inuit, qui ne peut
passer sans une dénonciation politique de colonialisme culturel et
économique. En ce sens, la représentation des Inuits au cours des deux
derniers siècles témoigne éloquemment des avancées, des reculs et des
silences de l’histoire culturelle occidentale. La figure de l’Inuit, d’abord
issue de la culture européenne et inscrite dans une dimension mythique, est
tributaire tant des changements méthodologiques en ethnographie que de
l’évolution des discours politiques sur les Autochtones. Aussi, n’est-il pas
étonnant qu’il ait fallu attendre un renversement postcolonial pour arriver à
dégager l’imaginaire de la réalité, alors que la figure culturelle de l’Inuit
s’est lentement détachée de l’Inuit lui-même, enfin devenu sujet.
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Notes
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
Louis-Frédéric Rouquette, L’épopée blanche, Paris, J. Ferenczi et fils, éditeurs,
1926, p. 195.
Cet article s’inscrit dans le cadre d’un projet de recherche, « La constitution et la
réception d’un imaginaire nordique comparé dans la littérature québécoise »,
financé par le Fonds québécois de recherche sur la culture et la société (FQRSC),
le Conseil de recherches en sciences humaines du Canada (CRSH) et l’Université
du Québec à Montréal. Il est rendu possible grâce à des recherches menées au sein
du Laboratoire international d’étude multidisciplinaire comparée des représentations du Nord. Je remercie Maude Paquette et Amélie Nadeau pour leur travail
de soutien à la préparation de cet article. Une version préliminaire a été présentée
sous forme de communication lors du IIIe Congrès des canadianistes polonais et
de la IIIe Conférence internationale des canadianistes d’Europe centrale, tenus à
Cracovie (Pologne) en mai 2004, sur le thème « Lieu et mémoire au Canada :
perspectives globales ».
Sherill E. Grace, Canada and the Idea of North, Montréal et Kingston,
McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2002, 341 p.
On peut considérer le roman fantastique de Mary Shelley, Frankenstein, or the
Modern Prometheus (1817) comme un précurseur de cette veine en ce sens qu’il
joue avec l’espace arctique comme lieu de l’éloignement d’où peut advenir
l’étrange. Dans la littérature québécoise, pensons au roman de science-fiction Les
voyageurs malgré eux (1994) d’Élisabeth Vonarburg, qui pose un Nord irréel,
contrôlé par des forces mystérieuses.
L’examen du corpus d’œuvres dont l’action se situe dans le Nord (défini de
manière plurielle) permet de constater la faible présence des femmes, non
seulement parmi les personnages, mais aussi parmi les figures caractéristiques du
lieu (l’infirmière dans les chantiers et les mines, la tenancière de bordel au Yukon
et en Alaska, la femme convoitée dans les postes isolés peuplés d’hommes) et
même parmi les écrivains qui écrivent ces œuvres. Dans la plupart des cas, la
femme fait figure d’exception et la narration joue avec ce statut pour en
particulariser la présence dans le Nord.
Fred Gerber [et coll.], Due South (Canada, 1994-1998).
« L’abominable homme des neiges », issu de la haute montagne (l’un des trois
lieux de la « nordicité », selon Louis-Edmond Hamelin), est le proche parent de
ces monstres. On le retrouve au cinéma dans Jerry Warren, Man beast
(États-Unis, 1956), Val Guest, The Abominable Snowman (Angleterre, 1957) ou
plus récemment, dans Docter, Peter et Silverman, David, Monsters Inc. (ÉtatsUnis, 2001).
Sur ces monstres gelés, qui ont inspiré des scénarios de cryoconservation, on lit
dans Les merveilles du monde polaire de E. Lesbazeilles : « Une autre découverte
encore plus étonnante est celle qui fut faite plusieurs fois, non plus seulement de
débris de squelettes, mais d’animaux entiers, avec la peau et la chair, conservés
dans la glace pendant des séries de siècles impossibles à évaluer. En 1799, c’est
Cuvier qui raconte le fait, un pêcheur tongouse remarqua sur les bords de la mer
Glaciale, près de l’embouchure de la Léna, au milieu des glaçons, un bloc informe
dont il ne put reconnaître la nature. L’année suivante, il s’aperçut que cette masse
était un peu plus dégagée, mais il ne devinait pas encore ce que ce pouvait être.
Sur la fin du troisième été, le doute n’était plus possible : le flanc de l’animal et
l’une des défenses étaient tout à fait sortis des glaçons. Ce ne fut que la cinquième
année que, les glaces ayant fondu plus complètement que de coutume, l’énorme
191
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
192
bête vint échouer à la côte sur un banc de sable. Au mois de mars 1804, le pêcheur
enleva les défenses, qu’il vendit cinquante roubles. Ce fut seulement deux ans
après, et la septième année de la découverte, qu’un membre de l’Académie de
Saint-Pétersbourg, M. Adams, qui se trouvait à Yakoutsk, fut informé de ce fait et
se rendit sur les lieux. Il y trouva le corps du mammouth, mais malheureusement
fort mutilé. » (Paris, Hachette, coll. « Bibliothèque des merveilles », 1881, p. 80.)
Parmi ceux-ci, mentionnons : Christian Nyby et Howard Hawks, The Thing from
Another World (États-Unis, 1951), Eugène Lourie, The Beast from 20,000
Fathoms (États-Unis, 1953), W. Lee Wilder, The Snow Creature (États-Unis,
1954) et Nathan Hertz Juran, The Deadly Mantis (États-Unis, 1957).
Les débats sur cette question persistent toujours, mais la découverte du pôle est
réclamée par l’Américain Robert E. Peary en 1909. Il publie le récit — contesté
— de sa découverte dans un livre intitulé The North Pole (New York, Cooper
Square Press, 2001 [1910], 385 p.). Sur les débats concernant cette découverte,
voir Dennis Rawlins, Peary at the North Pole. Fact or Fiction?, Washington et
New York, Robert B. Luce, 1973, 320 p. et Jean Malaurie, Les derniers rois de
Thulé, Paris, Plon, coll. « Terre Humaine/Poche », 1989, 840 p.
Eugène Lesbazeilles, Les merveilles du monde polaire, Paris, Hachette, coll.
« Bibliothèque des merveilles », 1881, p. 212-213.
C’est ainsi que Louis-Edmond Hamelin désigne les habitants du Sud, en
opposition aux « nordistes ». « Sudistes : citoyens qui portent peu d’intérêt au
Nord. Vivent généralement dans le sud des pays froids ou au sud du Nord »
(Louis-Edmond Hamelin, Le Nord canadien et ses référents conceptuels, Ottawa,
Secrétariat d’État, coll. « Réalités canadiennes », 1988, p. 42.
Michel Onfray, Esthétique du pôle Nord, Paris, Grasset, 2002, p. 73-74.
L’importance de ces contacts fait l’objet de débats, dont les implications
politiques demeurent considérables. Dès 1963, l’ouvrage de Tryggvi J. Oleson,
Early Voyages and Northern Approaches 1000-1632 (Toronto, McClelland and
Stewart, 1963, 211 p.) propose une hypothèse en ce sens. Auteur amérindien,
Bernard Assiniwi tente de resituer le contexte historique de la rencontre entre
Autochtones nord-américains et Vikings dans La saga des Béothuks (Montréal,
Leméac et Arles, Actes Sud, coll. « Babel », 1996, 517 p.).
Sir John Ross, A voyage of discovery, made under the orders of the Admiralty, in
His Majesty’s ships Isabella and Alexander, for the purpose of exploring Baffin’s
Bay, and inquiring into the probability of a North-West passage, Londres,
J. Murray, 1819, 252 p.
Le roman récent de Sten Nadolny, La découverte de la lenteur (Paris, Grasset,
coll. « Les Cahiers Rouges », 1998 [1983], 359 p.) présente l’aventure arctique de
Franklin.
Knud Rasmussen fait ainsi état de sa découverte des restes de Franklin : « À un
endroit indiqué par les Esquimaux, je trouvai une masse d’ossements blanchis qui
étaient indubitablement les derniers vestiges de l’expédition Franklin. Il est
certain qu’aucun Blanc n’avait visité ces lieux avant nous. Ce fut pour nous un
pieux devoir de rassembler ces ossements, de les recouvrir d’un petit monticule
de pierres sur lequel furent hissés deux pavillons, l’anglais et le nôtre. » (Du
Groenland au Pacifique. Deux ans d’intimité avec des tribus d’Esquimaux
inconnus, Paris, Plon, 1929, p. 295.)
[A Lady], A Peek at the Esquimaux; or, Scenes on the Ice, Londres, H. R.
Thomas, 1825, 58 p.
François Trudel propose dans son article intitulé « Le “Noble Sauvage” est inuit :
la construction d’une figure de l’Ungava au XIXe siècle » (Études inuit Studies,
20.
21.
22.
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
vol. 2, n° 2, 1996, p. 7-38) une analyse d’un personnage inuit, Caghannack, repris
comme figure littéraire dans le roman de R.M. Ballantyne, Ungava. A Tale of
Esquimau Land (1857).
Eugène Lesbazeilles, 1881, p. 149-150.
Eugène Lesbazeilles, 1881, p. 195.
Eugène Lesbazeilles, 1881, p, 149-150.
Louis-Frédéric Rouquette, 1926, p. 165.
Le révérend père Duchaussois écrit en 1921 : « L’orgueil, le vol, le mensonge, le
goût de l’homicide, ajoutons l’immoralité, ne seraient cependant pas les plus
grands obstacles à l’évangélisation des sauvages riverains de la mer glaciale. La
barrière jusqu’ici infranchissable a été la superstition avec la sorcellerie. » (Aux
glaces polaires. Indiens et Esquimaux, Lyon, Œuvre apostolique de Marie
Immaculée et Ville La Salle, Noviciat des Oblats de Marie Immaculée, 1921,
p. 438.)
Le père Lacouture s’en désole : « Les Esquimaux doivent vivre dans un quartier
séparé et protégé par des soldats… contre les vices des Blancs! C’est une honte
pour notre civilisation païenne! » (Père Onésime Lacouture, s.j., Mon séjour en
Alaska, 1910-1913, [Québec], [s.é.], vol. 1, 1978, p. 64.)
Père Onésime Lacouture, s.j., 1978, p. 65. Je souligne.
« In the fall of 1897, a ship called Hope docked in New York City harbour; its
arrival changed forever the lives of its passengers and captivated an entire nation.
On board were six Polar Eskimos – one woman (Atangana), three men (Qisuk,
Nuktaq and Uisaakkassak) and two children (Minik and Aviaq) – brought by
Arctic explorer Robert Peary at the behest of anthropologist Franz Boas and other
officials of the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH). […] On a single
day following the Hope’s arrival, twenty thousand people visited the ship,
anxious to glimpse the elaborate furs expected by curiosity seekers. Nor did New
Yorkers’ attention soon wane. Housed in the museum’s basement, the Eskimos
drew throngs of eager visitors who crowded around a ceiling grate installed above
their living quarters. » (Shari M. Huhndorf, « Nanook and His Contemporaries :
Imagining Eskimos in American Culture, 1897-1922 », Culture Inquiry, vol. 27,
no 1, automne 2000, p. 122-123.)
Il poursuit : « I know I’ll never get my father’s bones out of the American
Museum of Natural History. I am glad enough to get away before they grab my
brains and stuff them into a jar! » (cité par Shari M. Huhndorf, automne 2000, p.
146, repris de Kenn Harper, Give me my father’s body. The Life of Minik, the New
York Eskimo, Iqaluit, [s.é.], 1986, p. 142.)
Chacune dure environ 30 secondes. Thomas A. Edison : Esquimaux Game of
Snap-the-Whip (États-Unis, 1901), Esquimaux Leap-Frog (États-Unis, 1901),
Esquimaux Village (États-Unis, 1901).
« In elementary schools all across America, children were taught that the Eskimos
were lovable, happy-go-lucky people : theirs was a kindergarten culture. America
loved the Eskimos, and teachers could capitalize on this sentiment to provoke
curiosity and empathy among children. » (Asen Balikci, « Anthropology, Film
and the Arctic Peoples. The First Forman Lecture », Anthropology Today, vol. 5,
no 2, 1989, p. 5.)
Asen Balikci en donne une description complète, avec toutefois cette réserve qui
avait choqué les puritains américains : l’Inuit, ce « primitive protestant », chasse
le caribou, qui a le malheur, pour les enfants, d’être très près du personnage
193
34.
35.
36.
37.
38.
39.
40.
41.
194
« Bambi » de Walt Disney. « The confrontation was immensely cruel […]. The
American public could not accept such a senseless contradiction. » (1989, p. 7.)
Alexandre Huot, L’impératrice de l’Ungava, Montréal, Édouard Garand, coll.
« Le roman canadien », 1927, p. 17. Réédité en 2005 : Montréal, Imaginaire Nord,
coll. « Jardin de givre ».
Voir à ce sujet Ann Fienup-Riordan, Freeze Frame. Alaska Eskimos in the
Movies, Seattle et Londres, University of Washington Press, 1995, 234 p.
Dans son analyse de deux séquences du film, Gianfranco Bettetini soulève
l’ambiguïté du genre et de la perspective de ce film, qui ont toutes deux des
implications esthétiques et politiques : « S’il est vrai que les choix idéologiques
du réalisateur visent, dans le cas de ce film, à réinsérer le mythe du “bon sauvage”
dans la dimension anthropologique et géographique d’Esquimaux qui étaient ses
contemporains, l’analyse des premières séquences nous amène à suspecter la
disponibilité de son discours de chercheur » (Nanook of the North [G. Flaherty].
« Analyse de deux séquences », Cinémas et réalités, travaux XLI, Centre
interdisciplinaire d’études et de recherches sur l’expression contemporaine,
Saint-Étienne, Université de Saint-Étienne, 1984, p. 137). Gianfranco Bettetini
juge de plus que la clef de lecture du film « n’est pas celle de la désignation
documentariste, mais celle d’un divertissement subjectif élaboré ici à partir d’un
matériau qui réduit son rapport de signification avec l’objet, pour l’essentiel, à un
acte de dénotation. » (p. 141).
Au moment où Flaherty séjourne à la Baie d’Hudson, le capitaine Joseph-Elzéar
Bernier, le plus illustre des explorateurs du Québec, navigue dans l’Arctique pour
établir la souveraineté canadienne sur ce territoire. Dans ses voyages des années
1920, Bernier est accompagné de George H. Valiquette, qui capture le territoire et
les Inuits en photographie et sur pellicule cinématographique. Les films qu’il
produit pour le Canadian Government Motion Picture Bureau présentent l’un des
rares témoignages de cette période : Arctic Expedition (1922 et 1925), Back to
Baffin (1925), Hudson’s Strait Expedition (1927), etc. Sur Bernier, voir : Kenn
Harper, « Bernier, Joseph-Elzéar », Mark Nutall [éd.], Encyclopedia of the Arctic,
vol. I : A-F, New York et Londres, Routledge, 2005, p. 239-240.
Parfois présenté comme à l’origine du documentaire au cinéma, le film est
l’occasion de préséances historiques. Peter Ian Crawford note que « la Finlande
se vante également de posséder un film classique comparable à Nanook, Images
de l’Arctique de Sakari Pälski (1917) qu’on crut perdu et qui fut retrouvé par
hasard en 1970. C’est un film sans son sur les Tjukts de la péninsule Tjukotka,
Nord Est de l’Union soviétique. » (« L’œil nordique. Le film ethnographique dans
les pays nordiques », Journal des anthropologues, vol. 47-48, 1992, p. 34.)
Shari M. Huhndorf, « Nanook and his contemporaries. Imagining Eskimos in
American culture, 1897-1922 », Critical Inquiry, vol. 27, no 1, automne 2000,
p. 124-125.
« Several attributes of the Eskimo stereotype, already present in the Victorian
literature, were dramatically intensified in this way in Nanook. More than ever,
the Eskimos emerged as happy, lovable, clean, courageous, family people
endowed with great ingenuity. » (Asen Balikci, 1989, p. 7).
De même, on a tenté de saisir les réactions des Inuits au film de Flaherty : « In
Nanook Revisited, a 1990 documentary exploring Flaherty’s relationships with
“his” Eskimos, some contemporary Inuit people give their own accounts of the
explorer’s expeditions, suggesting alternative (anticolonial) ways for interpreting
particular scenes in the film. » (Shari M. Huhndorf, automne 2000, p. 144.)
42. En 1994, une coproduction franco-canadienne, Kabloonak (Claude Massot,
1994) tentera de décentrer l’action de Nanook en présentant le rôle du cinéaste
dans l’élaboration de cette image, devenue une icône du cinéma. Toutefois, le
film n’arrive pas à se dégager du fait divers, et il ne constitue pas encore la
réponse postcoloniale qui arrivera par d’autres moyens.
43. Asen Balikci écrit : « […] in the 1950s, filming in the North started in earnest.
Amongst the wide variety of documentaries produced at this time, two of the most
important were Angoti and Land of the Long Day, directed by Doug Wilkinson
for the National Film Board of Canada. These films were shot in bright daylight
and were constructed around strong storylines implying how well the primitive
Eskimos were adapting to encroaching modernity. […] The Eskimos in these
films emerged as fully content. Not a word was uttered about the hidden aspects
of colonialism, the extremely high infant mortality rate, the ravages of the
tuberculosis epidemics taking place at the time, or the deaths from starvation that
had taken place near the filming location only a few years before. » (1989, p. 7-8.)
44. Michel Onfray, 2002, p. 128. Pour lui, le drapeau canadien est inapproprié sur
cette terre : la « feuille d’érable, écrit-il, [est] inconvenante et incongrue dans ce
pays où il ne pousse plus un seul arbre depuis au moins trois mille kilomètres au
sud. » (2002, p. 124.)
45. Réalisé par Bobby Kenuajuak en 1999.
46. Réalisé par Elisapie Isaac en 2003.
47. Montréal, Alain Stanké, 2002, 303 p.
48. C’est le cas de certaines œuvres de Jean Désy, ou encore des livres pour la
jeunesse publiés dans la collection « Grande nature » chez Michel Quintin ou aux
Éditions du Soleil de minuit. Par exemple, Daniel Beauvais écrit dans Ajurnamat!
On n’y peut rien! : « J’avais bien des raisons d’éprouver une attirance certaine
pour le peuple inuk : un peuple qui avait migré courageusement pendant des
centaines d’années, à travers tout un continent. » (Saint-Damien, Éditions du
Soleil de minuit, 2002, p. 41.)
49. Voir à ce sujet Daniel Chartier [éd.], « Les modernités amérindiennes et inuites »,
Globe. Revue internationale d’études québécoises, vol. 8, no 1, 2005, 253 p.
50. Zacharias Kunuk disait en entrevue en 2003 : « With Atanarjuat, we wanted to do
it because our culture has never really been exposed from the inside. » (Kimberly
Chun, « Storytelling in the Arctic Circle. An Interview with Zacharias Kunuk »,
Cineast, vol. 28, no 1, janvier 2003.)
51. Thierry Roche, « Le cinéma des Indiens d’Amérique. Réflexions II. Temps,
espace et langage », Journal des anthropologues, no 57-58, 1994, p. 149.
52. « The thing that these two outstanding directors [Alf Sjöberg et Ingmar Bergman]
have in common, however, not only with each other but with most of the other
directors and actors connected with Swedish film-making, is their theater
background: and this is a significant key to the high artistic standards (and
occasional over-theatricalization) of the industry. Whereas Hollywood had its
roots at least partly in the tradition of vaudeville and circus entertainment,
Swedish film-making developed from the efforts of photographers, particularly
Charles Magnusson who became head of Svensk Filmindustri, and from adult
theater. » (Anne Morissett, « Sweden: Paradise and Paradox », Film Quarterly,
vol. 15, no 1, automne 1961, p. 23.)
53. [Igloolik Isuma Productions], [Dossier de presse], Igloolik Isuma Productions,
2001, p. 6.
54. Norman Cohn cité dans [Igloolik Isuma Productions], 2001, p. 6.
55. Dimitri Katadotis, « Northern Exposure », Hour, 18 octobre 2001.
195
56. « Atanarjuat, though, is more than merely a first; its creation amounted to a
collective cultural endeavour for Kunuk’s community. Local artists and elders
were mobilized to construct the film’s set and props from such household items as
oil lamps to hunting implements and dogsleds. » (Dimitri Katadotis, 2001.)
57. [Igloolik Isuma Productions], 2001, p. 6.
58. [Igloolik Isuma Productions], 2001, p. 4.
59. « The film’s director, Zacharias Kunuk, now 44, was the first of his family to live
in a permanent settlement – the community of Igloolik, population 1,200 – and he
belongs to the first generation of Inuit to read, write and make films. In just one
generation his culture has gone from oral storytelling to cinema: a leap that for
European cultures is bridged by centuries of literature. » (SF Said, « Northern
Exposure », Sight and Sound, vol. 12, no 2, février 2002, p. 22.)
60. Kunuk dénoncé ces politiques : « How oppressed can a race of people be?
Because you’re in English, you get a bigger budget. Because you’re French, you
get a bigger budget. Because you’re an aboriginal, you get the lowest budget. In
the land of freedom, that doesn’t sound right at all. » (Kimberly Chun, 2003.)
61. Norman Cohn témoigne du succès du film dans le village où il a été tourné : « We
had three showings. 1,500 people came and there are only 1,200 people in town.
So they loved the film. If your parents were continually represented as the
drunken Indians in the John Wayne movies, it would be a great relief to see them
represented in a dignified way, as you know they really were. » (SF Said, 2002,
p. 25.)
196
Daniel McNeil
Finding a Home while Crossing Boundaries:
Black Identities in Halifax and Liverpool
That there is an African people, that there is a
West Indian people, this I do believe … [but]
when someone talks to me about that “Negro
people,” I try to understand what is meant. Then,
unfortunately, I understand that there is in this a
source of conflicts. Then I try to destroy this
source.
Frantz Fanon (1955)
The blacks here haven’t even learned to come
together and that’s the main problem here in
Nova Scotia — we’re not together. They don’t
have a leader because all the leaders in Nova
Scotia is looking out for their self. Make me a
leader and I’ll holler for you as long as I’m
trying to make it, but after I make it, I’m looking
out for me …
There’s a couple of people [in Nova Scotia],
Wanda Barnard and Carolyn Thomas and them
fellas talking the African whatdoyoucallit … but
I’ll walk down this street with you now, we’ll
see an African and he won’t speak to me. I don’t
know what it is. Now when I look at him, he’s
10 times blacker than me, so we’re all the same.
It’s the same as West Indians. All my life I knew
West Indian people … but they don’t socialize,
we don’t socialize as people, we’re different.
We discriminate amongst our own, so why can’t
the white man discriminate? Even in Toronto,
they’re not getting along.
Billy Downey (2002)
Abstract
Numerous historians have insisted that black Baptist churches were
invaluable institutions for people of colour rooted to rural North American
31, 2005
communities. This paper focuses on the politics of blackness in Nova Scotia
after the provincial government — in the pursuit of integration, slum
clearance, and prime waterfront land — bulldozed Africville and its Baptist
church. I document how black intellectuals inspired by the memory of
Africville have fashioned an “Africadia,” and attempted to offer individuals
in urban areas access to mythic, revolutionary heroes who can condemn a
national religion based on white “fakelore.” Yet alongside the literary
productions of established artists and activists like George Elliott Clarke, I
review oral history sources that show how working-class women and men in
urban areas have engaged with rural black communities shaped by the
Baptist church and Afro-Americocentrism. I conclude by comparing the
narratives of black Scotians with those of Liverpool-born blacks, making it
clear that a black identity rooted to marginalized communities in the United
Kingdom and Canada has room for 1,001 colours of blackness, especially
when individuals can care for “brown babies” and point to “tantalizingly
tan” intellectuals drawing on Frantz Fanon in order to demand national
cures for the outcast masses. Nonetheless, I also note how figures who claim
to represent the oldest black communities in their nations can remain tied to
the masculinist theories of Otto Rank, a wandering Jew from a working-class
district of Vienna whom Fanon critiqued in Black Skin, White Masks, and
provoke dreams of an exotic foreign identity somewhere else in the New
World. Moreover, they can mirror Harold Cruse, a black intellectual
obsessed with Jews, and interrogate the racial politics of Fanon’s West
Indian and African people.
Résumé
Bien des historiens ont insisté sur le fait que les églises baptistes noires ont été
d’inestimables institutions pour la population noire enracinée dans les
communautés rurales nord-américaines. Pour ma part, je m’intéresse à la
politique de la négritude en Nouvelle-Écosse après la destruction d’Africville
et de son église baptiste à coup de bulldozer, par un gouvernement provincial
qui cherchait à favoriser l’intégration, à supprimer l’habitat insalubre et à
acquérir des terres primées situées au bord de l’eau. Dans mon article, je
décris comment des intellectuels noirs, inspirés par le souvenir d’Africville,
ont façonné une « Africadie » et tenté de donner aux gens vivant en milieu
urbain accès à des héros mythiques, révolutionnaires, capables de
condamner une religion nationale basée sur une falsification du passé par les
Blancs. À côté des productions littéraires d’artistes et de militants établis
comme George Elliott Clarke, je passe cependant en revue des sources
d’histoire orale qui montrent comment des femmes et des hommes de la classe
ouvrière en milieu urbain ont tendu la main aux communautés noires rurales
façonnées par l’Église baptiste et l’afro(américo)centricité. De plus, je
conclus en comparant les récits de Noirs néo-écossais à ceux de Noirs nés à
Liverpool, et je prends le temps de montrer clairement que dans une identité
noire enracinée dans les communautés marginalisées du Royaume-Uni et du
Canada, il y a de la place pour mille et une couleurs de négritude, surtout
lorsque des individus sont bien capables de se soucier des « bébés bruns » et
d’attirer l’attention sur des intellectuels « terriblement basanés » qui
prennent appui sur Franz Fanon afin de demander des traitements curatifs
nationaux pour les masses d’exclus. Néanmoins, je constate également
comment des personnages qui prétendent représenter les plus vieilles
communautés noires dans leur pays peuvent rester liés aux théories
198
masculinistes d’Otto Rank, un juif errant issu d’un quartier ouvrier de Vienne
que Franz Fanon a critiqué dans Peau noire, masques blancs, et provoquer
des rêves d’identité étrangère exotique quelque part ailleurs dans le Nouveau
Monde. Qui plus est, ils peuvent ressembler à Harold Cruse, un intellectuel
noir obsédé par les juifs, et interroger la politique raciale des populations des
Indes occidentales et de l’Afrique dont parle Fanon.
Frantz Fanon did not get to know many working-class people in Paris
during the 1950s, but he was convinced that the few he met were
unconcerned with the greatness of a black past:
They knew they were black, but, they told me, that made no
difference in anything. In which they were absolutely right … It is
not because the Indo-Chinese has discovered a culture of his own
that he is in revolt. It is because “quite simply” it was, in more than
one way, becoming impossible for him to breathe.1
Billy Downey, like various other working-class people in Nova Scotia,
knows that he is black,2 but he is unwilling to commit to black power and
revolutionary violence because he has learned to put up with “hidden
prejudice,” just like the “Asian groups and the Chinaman.”3 Nonetheless,
Downey reflects other aspects of Fanon’s masculinist vision: whereas
Fanon employed the term “fellah” to describe “peasants” that needed to be
filled with ideas rather than fed heroes that act as leaders, Downey uses
“fella” to describe his mates from rural areas and female leaders of a native
middle class who hope to manage, rather than liberate, the outcast masses.
Like contemporary guardians of Negro-ism in Nova Scotia, immigrants
to Toronto in the 1960s and 1970s often claimed to honour Fanon’s
Caribbean and African people by talking about poor “fellahs” from the
Maritimes. For example, when David Trotman read about the destruction of
Halifax’s most prominent black settlement in the name of integration and
slum clearance, he didn’t ask whether the city council craved prime
waterfront land. Instead, the Caribbean Canadian student told the Chair of
the Ontario Human Rights Commission that black Nova Scotians were
victims in need of responsible guides.4 Even when Caribbean-born writers
like Odimumba Kwamdela believed that the Ontario Human Rights was a
“white man’s trick,” they still emphasized how Scotian-born blacks needed
to learn new skills to cope in an urban environment.5 Like Robin Winks,
who derided Nova Scotia’s “conservative aristocracy of the faith” in The
Blacks in Canada,6 and Canadian anthropologists under Frances Henry,
who used tests designed for children to evaluate black adults who chose to
stay in rural Nova Scotia,7 such Toronto-based writers tended to ignore
honest intellectuals in Nova Scotia who were using the words of
Afro-Americans like Malcolm X to formulate a war of position.8
As the twentieth century drew to a close, Winks stored his archival work
on black Canadians in New York City, a place Kwamdela now calls home,9
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while Trotman and Henry focused their research on a Caribbean diaspora
and obtained tenure at York University in Toronto. Alas, Toronto-centric
commentators not only failed to critique their earlier work on indigenous
black Canadians, but also ignored the continuing battles Nova Scotians
waged against institutional racism. Indeed, Jeffrey Reitz, a full-time
sociologist at the University of Toronto and part-time contributor to the
Globe and Mail, told readers of the International Migration Review that
“the absence of a divisive immigration debate in Canada avoids racial
polarization … enabling Canada to address its race problems in time to
prevent serious social marginalisation of racial minority groups.10
Moreover, after journalists like Lawrence Hill asked middle-class blacks in
North America to think about the tragic plight of individuals who aren’t
invited to enter middle-class black communities,11 lead writers at the Globe
and Mail continued to collapse any difference between “visible
minorities,” “ethnic minorities,” and “immigrants.”12
Black Nova Scotians of mixed racial origins can easily expose the
limited visions of such Canadian authorities and construct professionals of
African descent, as well as white social commentators, as alien forces. To
display how, this paper reviews George Elliott Clarke’s Odysseys Home
and oral history sources that juxtapose rural black communities rooted to
the Baptist church with contemporary desires to package black culture as
“urban.” To conclude, I compare the narratives of black (American) Nova
Scotians with those of Liverpool-born blacks influenced by Afro-Americocentrism, making it clear that a black identity rooted to marginalized
communities in the United Kingdom and Canada can continue to take
inspiration from Frantz Fanon and produce “tantalizingly tan” intellectuals
willing to demand a healthier nation for the wretched of the earth.13 I also
note how figures that claim to represent the oldest black communities in
their nations can also remain tied to the masculinist theories of Otto Rank, a
wandering Jew from a working-class district of Vienna whom Fanon
critiqued in Black Skin, White Masks,14 and who told his American
students, “When the neurotic woman gets cured, she becomes woman.
When the neurotic man gets cured, he becomes an artist.”15 Moreover,
black Scotians and Scousers can mirror Harold Cruse, a black intellectual
obsessed with Jews, and interrogate the racial politics of Fanon’s West
Indian and African people while provoking dreams of an exotic foreign
identity somewhere else in the New World.
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I
Unless it has some collective or social basis —
for instance, in religion … artistic creation is
impossible.
Otto Rank, Art and Artist (1932)16
The basic impulse behind all creativity is
national or ethnic-group identity.
Harold Cruse, Crisis of the Negro Intellectuals
(1967)17
Just as New Negroes in Harlem inspired Otto Rank’s vision of a New
World,18 black icons born in the United States conveyed freedom dreams to
George Elliott Clarke’s “little community” in Nova Scotia. Yet when he
went into self-imposed exile in North Carolina in the early 1990s, Clarke
realized that “African America … is, like the American mainstream, solely
self-absorbed,” and, rather than wander anywhere else, he returned to
Canada and worked to unearth a literature that could be termed “‘African
Canadian’ … Black Nova Scotian — or ‘Africadian.’”19 Ultimately, Clarke
considered his archival work and creative artistry a “God-deemed task”20
— much like the “bounden duty” of Burckhardt’s cultural historian,
DuBois’ New Negroes and Fanon’s native intellectual21 — to free his
people from the apostles of death in the social sciences.22 And, in contrast to
the sociologists who found no more than 30 people regularly attending
Africville’s Baptist church,23 Clarke reminded his readers that “nothing in
the province reflected me or mine save for the two dozen or so churches of
the African United Baptist Association (AUBA).”24 Nonetheless, he has
also penned missives designed to celebrate the secular deeds of B.A.
“Rocky” Jones — “an Africadian community leader and proud black
intellectual who has never shrunk from debate or controversy”25 — and the
masculinist creeds of Harold Cruse.
Very little has been written about Rocky Jones and his commitment to
anti-racist work in North America. So, in order to move beyond the snippets
of information his daughter has stored at the Halifax North End library, I
interviewed Rocky and recorded his memories of movements committed to
civil rights and black power. Like Clarke, he pointed out that the Baptist
church has always been at the centre of the black community, and went on to
remark that it was “sort of schizophrenic because on the one hand it’s
responsible for religious life but on the other hand the church was
responsible for … [political] leadership.”26 Thus, Rocky moved from the
interracial “brotherly love” of the Student Non-violent Coordinating
Committee to black cultural nationalism led by neo-Marxist revolutionaries willing to adapt the style and content of black preachers. He
became friends with Stokely Carmichael and, after Stokely elaborated on
the concept of black power at the Black Writers Congress in Montreal in
201
1968 by drawing on Fanon,27 other Black Panthers came to Nova Scotia in
an organized visit where they discussed Fanon’s work at a black family
meeting held at Halifax’s North End library.28 Not surprisingly, traditional
intellectuals who sought to represent responsible blacks did not welcome
the Panthers and Rocky. Rev. W.P. Oliver, minister at the “mother church”
of the AUBA, Cornwallis Street Baptist Church, denounced foreign,
un-Canadian, or American demagogues.29 Or, to be more precise, Oliver
attacked ideas that seemed radical since he represented the Nova Scotia
Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NSAACP), modelled
on the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People
(NAACP), and, after the black family meeting, he signed on to a Black
United Front (BUF) “similar to the one … operating in the United States”
when he was assured that his son would be able to run the organization.30
Disappointed that BUF had become a “buffer between the [black]
community and the government and industry,”31 Rocky continued to
develop various projects, inspired by black cultural nationalism, that were
funded by “white allies” in the peace movement, many of whom were
Quakers.32 Yet since journalists in the late 1960s lampooned black power
movements in Canada when they worked with white individuals, Rocky
rebuked Quakers when they applauded his speeches, and only asserted his
support for white revolutionaries who would “shoot their own mothers”
when blacks were not present.33 Bluntly put, he was all too aware that
“coloured” Nova Scotians could tie a black community to questions of skin
tone rather than radical politics when Rev. Oliver could be portrayed as a
“true race man”34 and recent racial mixing was viewed with suspicion or
outright contempt. After the black family meeting — and Sidney Poitier’s
adamant defence of interracial marriage in Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner
(1967) — Rocky still finds it difficult to talk about the ways in which the
events of the 1960s may have affected biracial individuals.
There was a lot of concern that we were going to divide the
community by black and white, so there were many women —
white women — married to black men who didn’t know how this
would affect them. Or many black women with white men who
didn’t know how this would affect them. There were children of
these relationships who didn’t know how — I mean, it created a
certain instability in the whole community, because people had not
called this before.35
Thus it should come as no surprise that Harold Cruse was also unable, or
unwilling, to talk about children raised by parents deemed to be black and
white in The Crisis of the Negro Intellectuals (1967). Just as Rocky saw
class as a central issue in Nova Scotia36 and emphasized how a lightskinned person born in Nova Scotia would be more accepted than someone
who was “dark-skinned from the Caribbean or Africa,” since he “had never
heard the term mulatto” in the province,37 Cruse emphasised how a
202
suburban upbringing would play a greater role in obtaining cultural capital
than “light-skin and European facial features,” and used the “mulatto
question” to embark on one of his many attacks on intellectual work that
seemed to reflect conditions in Africa or the Caribbean rather than America.
He wrote:
The strong tendency within the Black Nationalist movement
towards black skin chauvinism … cannot work politically in the
United States. It has never worked in the West Indies either; it can
only work in Africa, it seems. But, in the United States, the
American Negro group is too large and mixed with too many racial
strains for the ideology of black-skin supremacy to function within
the group … The blacker the skin does not always denote the
deeper racial pride. In fact, some of the darkest Negroes are the
most “white-minded.” In America, the Negro group is more of an
ethnic than a racial group — meaning a group of mixed African,
Indian and white strains … Of course, the American-West Indian
fusion of Black African-nationalists prefer their converts to be
truly “black” both in pigmentation and ideology, and look rather
doubtfully at others … [but] Mrs Garvey, a racial hybrid, was just
as much a Black Nationalist as the great redemptionist. And in our
own time, the two leading exponents of Black Power and Black
Nationalism have been racial hybrids – Adam Clayton Powell and
Malcolm X.38
Although Cruse went on to rebuke American blacks who romanticized
“Ancient Egypt … Africa and pre-feudal tribalism,” contemporary Afrocentrists have excused Cruse’s attacks against Egyptocentrism in order to
claim him as a cultural hero alongside Malcolm X.39 In contrast, Cruse’s
attempts to portray Caribbean writers as “black Jews” have been the subject
of an extended critique by Winston James,40 just as Rocky Jones’ verbal
assaults on “an intellectual elite from the Caribbean” who took leadership
positions and served their own interests at the expense of the (indigenous)
black community were questioned.41
In a fashion similar to that of his black idols, George Elliott Clarke has
questioned the racial politics of Caribbean and African immigrants that
treat mulattoes as fifth columnists rather than black comrades.42 At a push,
readers of Odysseys Home can also find Clarke sympathizing with
Afro-Americocentrists who resist any droll wit in favour of preaching: “We
must not only look to [scholars of Caribbean descent in] Birmingham,
England, but to Birmingham, Alabama, as a site of historical struggle and
contestation.”43 Yet many Caribbean Canadians who jeer Clarke’s nativism
have somehow ignored the organic intellectuals available from both
Birmingham camps.44 Moreover, even as Rinaldo Walcott considers
Clarke’s “African Canadian” approach a means for black intellectuals to
distance themselves from working-class blacks — clearly combining the
insights of various scholars of Caribbean descent, most notably Hazel
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Carby and Paul Gilroy (scholars who have worked at the Centre for
Contemporary Cultural Studies in Birmingham and Ivy League universities) and Lewis Gordon45 — he doesn’t report on the ways in which they
drew on Fanon’s concept of a native intellectual.46 Nor did he seek out Otto
Rank’s commitment to working-class creative artists that could break the
spell of the Freudian idea.47 Instead, he flirted with the bourgeois comforts
of Freud in order to project an image of George Elliott Clarke as a nativist
hangman, executing West Indians so as to save African-Canadian culture
from a living death.48
To borrow one of Walcott’s favourite expressions, his own attempts to
portray Clarke as a nativist are both wrong and right. Clarke clearly has
room for an expansive vision of a polyconscious and multinational Canada
that is home to various immigrant groups where, for example, he can be
considered Portuguese in the Canadian battlefield of Waterloo, Ontario.
Much like Rocky Jones, Clarke also feels that his travels throughout North
America can inspire a connection with the African diaspora and a
community beyond his family.49 Yet Clarke and Jones also reflect Cruse’s
dreams of masculine chivalric heroes like Malcolm X, cool warriors who
can venture forth to fight various demons and protect maidens, safe in the
knowledge that they may return to a reinforced fort or, perhaps, a Maroon
Hill.50 Whereas Clarke asks, “Are African Canadians always and only
marginals and transients?”51 one might add, “Are African-Canadians
doomed to quixotic adventures and exotic window dressing?” Moreover,
Rocky Jones acknowledges that programs for the indigenous black and
Mi’kmaq communities had to be imposed by white patrons52; can
Africadian people establish effective alliances with other Native groups by
simply acknowledging various racial “strains” and insisting that they didn’t
just “arrive off the boat”?53
To provide ways in which we can think about answering such questions I
return to the comments of Nova Scotians who were kind enough to share
their time with me in the summer of 2002. As part of my research work, I
talked with a wide variety of individuals in order to reflect the
polyconsciousness within a black (American) Nova Scotia.54 Along with
Rocky Jones and male figures who lived during the 1960s,55 I interviewed
younger women and men of mixed racial origins who harnessed visions of
the 1960s in order to develop a sense of self and a black community.56 The
next two sections focus on the comments of Barbara Hamilton-Hinch,
Leslie Reid, Kevin Koshinsky and Nicole Gardiner. All four individuals
acknowledge that they have ancestors of different “races” and intimately
express their knowledge of the ties that bind predominantly Christian rural
communities. Read together, they also illuminate the ways black urban
politics can be reduced to appearance rather than honouring black
ancestors. Some readers may want to twin Leslie and Kevin because both
are “white-skinned” African-Canadians who, in the summer of 2002, were
204
without paid employment and felt uncomfortable about obtaining jobs
through “race.” One may also associate Barbara with Nicole since they
have both obtained employment through their supervisory roles in a black
community. The next section, however, contrasts Barbara with Leslie
because they grew up after the 1960s and began to play activist roles in a
post-1972 environment. Thus, their narratives offer a useful link between
the desires of Jones and Clarke for chivalric heroes and the attempts of
Nicole and Kevin to engage with identity politics in the 1990s and the early
21st century.
II
People rightfully take pride in their race and
ethnic origin; they find their identity in their
colour and sex.
Justice McLachlin, Miron v. Trudel, Supreme
Court of Canada (1995)
You don’t necessarily focus on these [racial]
things on a day to day basis when you are
carrying out your life … all the things you might
do in a day normally if you are a healthy person
not normally preoccupied with your racial
identity. It would drive you crazy. And who
needs that?
Lawrence Hill, qtd. in Donna Bailey Nurse,
What’s a Black Critic to Do? (2003)57
Barbara Hamilton-Hinch, one of George Elliott Clarke’s many cousins, is
director of the Black Student Advising Centre (BSAC) at Dalhousie
University. Our interview took place in her office. In various leadership
roles she has pointed out the ravages of environmental racism and the need
for alliances with (other) Native groups.58 Nonetheless, she still feels like an
outsider:
I can’t claim my little bit of Mi’kmaq, I can’t say my grandmother
was half-Indian; they’ll look at me and say, so what? It doesn’t
mean anything, it doesn’t give me status, due to the fact that I’ve
been culturalized black and look black, so I can’t even fake the
aboriginal — some of my sisters can. I can’t relate to the Native
issues. I can appreciate them, but it wouldn’t be fair for me to join
them in a march or protest that they put on, claiming that I’m
Native and Aboriginal.59
Barbara’s desire to connect sufficiently dark-brown skin tones to black
culture and politics can also explain her fears surrounding the rise of “light
brown babies.”
205
Just on the weekend I was at a birthday party for an older woman in
the community, and she has eleven children; and of her eleven
children, two of them married black; and all of her grandchildren,
all are mixed; and of the mixed grandchildren, those who are able
to marry, married white; and of those children who married white,
their children now look pure white. So then where do they see the
issues of racism and discrimination? And I’m seeing a lot of that,
my poor husband said to me the other day, just look around, you
don’t see any dark-brown babies any more in Nova Scotia, and you
don’t, you truly don’t. You’re seeing a lot more mixed, and perhaps
it’s helping to eliminate some racism. To a degree that’s
happening, but it’s also creating another level of discrimination
that a lot of these kids are facing, especially when it comes to their
[racialized] identity.60
As a result, Barbara claims the reality of American television shows like
Law & Order when they depicted white parents who were unwilling to raise
a biracial child,61 and worried on behalf of light-skinned friends and family
who may not always think in terms of race. In other words, she wants to side
with Justice McLachlin’s vision of pride in colour and sex rather than
Lawrence Hill’s desire to escape racial identity for a “normal” or “healthy”
life. Yet while she reduces Hill’s comments to his white mother and
middle-class upbringing in order to question interracial relationships that
“water down” blackness,62 she also echoes Hill’s desire to show how a
cultural connection to African people can trump visual markers used to
signify race. So, on one hand, Barbara admonishes her own failure to help
Beechville (the rural community of her youth, which is now surrounded by
two industrial parks) and the Cultural Awareness Youth Group of Nova
Scotia (an organization credited with saving her from an “identity crisis”).63
On the other hand, she finds legitimacy for her role as an educator by
insisting on her connections to Mother Africa and a black North American
culture rooted to the church, much as Lawrence Hill asks AfricanCanadians to save the continent of Africa and creates fictional alter egos
that can serve as bourgeois role models for African-Americans.64
Leslie Reid’s narrative can usefully be read next to the attempts of
Lawrence Hill and Barbara to justify their position in a black middle class.
Although Leslie grew up in a rural Nova Scotian community in which most
of the people were white, poor and “primarily” — but not “devoutly” —
Christian, her Africadian father had a secure job as a cartographer and was a
committed atheist who didn’t tolerate talk of race in their home. As a result,
Leslie and her sister were first exposed to the illogic of race at school. They
were read as “white” by their fellow students and were expected to laugh at
racist jokes or were “punished for not being white, and that was really
crazy-making. If you’re going to damn me, I want to be what it is you’re
damning me for!”65 Yet because the Nova Scotian government considered
206
one of their parents “black,” they were also offered cheques when they
passed each grade.
And this was supposed to be some kind of incentive, like we were
supposed to have a harder time at school because of that, and if we
were offered the $50 reward we’d work a little harder. We were
extremely offended by it, and when we were older we even did
things like refuse to cash the cheques. At first it was, “Yay, free
money,” but after a while it was insulting, really insulting … So
coming up on the last year of high school someone, I think
probably from Dalhousie, came to our high school to approach the
small black population there and say, you know, anyone who is
interested in getting involved in our foundation course at
Dalhousie, you can qualify for a scholarship and at least get the
first year for free, the rest of it maybe if you do well. I considered it,
and knew that I could get in on a scholarship, but I didn’t feel like I
would have belonged, it was not my right to be there because my
skin wasn’t brown. I felt like if I were to take advantage of that
program I would be taking away from someone else who should be
there, because the program really was for students that were
disadvantaged in the first place, and my parents could afford to
send me to school. I felt like I would have been lying to go, and if I
did go, I wouldn’t be accepted by people who had brown skin, so
after thinking about it I declined. All my white friends said, “Are
you crazy? If someone offered to pay for my first year of
university, I don’t care what for, I’d go,” you know? They saw
having a black parent as some kind of meal ticket, you can cash in
on this, you can get your school paid for, you can get all kinds of
things. I just, I couldn’t sleep with it at night if I did that; I felt like I
would have been doing something really, really wrong.66
When Leslie wanted to assert herself as an adult she continued to tick the
visible minority box on governmental forms because “checking off white
would have been a bigger lie.”67 Nonetheless, she has shied away from
joining black community groups and tries to “classify people in terms of
gender and money rather than colour.” She even felt uncomfortable in
meetings for a black community group committed to helping low-income
women because a black man asked her:
“Are you sure you’re in the right room?” … The guy actually
looked right at me and said, “Are you in the right room?” It’s that
reaction; it’s you’re white, why do you even want to be here? …
There was also another white woman in the class, so I actually felt
like laughing at him, but on other days it’s made me angry. And I
understand why it happens: because of the way I look, they assume
both of my parents are white, and therefore I’m going to have a
problem with anyone who isn’t. And you know, seven times out of
ten that’s true, so I have to temper my anger with a little bit of
understanding, but it still does hurt, to be viewed that way.68
207
Consequently, Leslie displays her creative artistry by actively
contributing to an Internet discussion group that discusses “multiple
personality disorder” and Rank’s psychology of difference, finding a home
in an online community beyond questions of colour. She also finds solace in
MAD TV and Saturday Night Live, American sketch shows that are willing
to pair individuals from different “races.”69 Yet as a parent she can still
invest her hopes in having a brown-skinned baby.
I guess I never forgot the genetics in my head, it doesn’t happen if
my skin is white, it doesn’t matter if my partner’s white, the baby
can still be brown. Because [my partner] comes from a family
that’s horribly, horribly racist that he was crossing his fingers with
me hoping that his child would be brown just to spite his family,
and say “see, you know, this person’s of your blood too, and look.”
Of course, she turned out to be pale as a ghost, just like the both of
us.70
Leslie’s comments clearly expand on Lawrence Hill’s glib comparison
of people longing to find acceptance in a middle-class black community
with the human desire to bring a child into the world. The next section also
exemplifies and complicates Lawrence Hill’s description of the ways in
which he entered a black community through his work, while his sister
became black “by having a black child.”71 To do so, I contrast Nicole’s
emphasis on a black identity that can protect brown-skinned children with
Kevin’s dreams of emulating black male leaders, and compare how the two
indigenous Nova Scotians in working-class areas — who cannot hide their
mixed racial origins and have no formal ties to African-Canadian churches
or community groups — can assert a black identity by defining themselves
against middle-class individuals of African and/or European descent.
III
My mother supports me 100%; at 26 years old
it’s embarrassing and humiliating, but I’m in
school so she doesn’t care. My mom always,
always wanted us to do better than what she did
… People ask me who I am. “I’m black.” I don’t
really identify with a mixed identity or a biracial
identity. I know my mother’s white, but I’m not.
I’m black. It’s my mom who’s white. It’s not me.
Nicole Gardiner (2002)
Every failure, I can hear Mom saying, you’re not
going to be any good, you’re not going to be any
good, you’re not going to be anything.
Sometimes I think I set myself up to be a failure,
because sometimes I don’t think I deserve to
succeed … Every success that I do, like getting
my grade 12, going to university, that was a big
208
“too bad for you, Mom, because I’m succeeding,
look at me now, look how I’m succeeding.” But
I’m doing it for me, not to spite her. I’m doing it
for me because I want to be the best I can be,
because I deserve it as a person, as a black man,
as a member of the global community; I deserve
success and I’m bloody well going to take it.
And I put myself out there and I take that risk
every day.
Kevin Koshinsky (2002)
Like Leslie, Nicole had turned down a scholarship for students of African
descent that would have financed her first year of study at Dalhousie
University. However, she did so in order to go through the Transition Year
Program (TYP) — a program Rocky Jones had established to provide black
and Native students with the support to be successful in a university
environment — and have them finance the entire period of undergraduate
study.72 Nicole did not end up enjoying her experiences in the TYP program
but she was able to find solace in the BSAC and, during our interview in
their lounge, she described the sense of security she felt among black
Scotians and her desire to look out for other black people.73 This did not
mean that she made time to join her brother, who is “actively involved in
community [groups]”;74 she believes many black Scotians are unwilling to
commit to formal organizations,75 and criticizes organizations when they
pursue religious objectives that cannot be achieved in the short-term.76 In
contrast, her vision of a black community primarily revolves around
protecting materialistic youngsters who are confronted by a police force
that is unable to keep them away from drugs and violence.77
To do her part in an informal network of people committed to black
youngsters, Nicole reprimands children who
say things like, “that black crispy critter.” I’ll say, “Come here for a
minute. Who you calling a black crispy critter? You wouldn’t be
here if it wasn’t for black crispy critters like that. Just because your
mother’s light because her father was white — you don’t be like
that.”78
Such determined opposition to colourism honours her father:
My dad always taught me that I was black. That’s the one thing … I
know my father overheard me — when I was really young, really
stupid, I didn’t even know what I was talking about, really — he
overheard me saying how I was brown, I wasn’t black; I’d rather be
around brown people than black people. All of a sudden I got a
slap, and he sat down and explained no matter what shade of black
— just because I’m brown, somebody might be darker, darker
brown so I think they’re black — it makes no difference, no matter
how much colour you have, what features you have.79
209
Nicole goes on to offer various pieces of evidence that can be made to fit
stereotypes about light-skinned radicals who are only able to assert a black
identity by disassociating themselves from a white “mentality.” Aside from
desiring a darker skin tone,80 Nicole defines herself as a role model for black
kids because, “you know, I guess I can do stuff that white people, I guess,
could never, and I can identify with these children in ways that others
can’t.”81 Yet the repetition of “guess” is significant, not simply because
Nicole worries about her light-brown skin tone — as she reminded me, “the
majority of Scotian people are light-skinned. My neighbourhood is full of
black people with blond hair and blue eyes, and black people who are
mistaken for white constantly”82 — but because she is wary about erasing
white women like her mom from “the bosom” of “the [black]
community:”83
My mom’s not good with black history, but anything she saw might
have interested in, she’d pick that up. TV specials, she tried, I can
say, she actively tried. I mean my mother didn’t have to raise me
and my brother in a black community, but she did, you know. She
said, “You know why I do not want to bring them up round white
people? They’re not going to teach them anything.” Even after she
kicked my dad out, she could have moved, but she didn’t.84
In this manner, Nicole praised her mom’s decision to stay in a black
community for the sake of her children, rather than presenting her mother as
an individual who had no desire to leave the multiracial community she had
lived in all her life. Nicole also ignored the popularity of interracial
relationships in the 1960s and 1970s so that she could contrast her mother
with “white girls” in the 1990s who only enter black neighbourhoods to
hunt down black men and obtain exotic babies.
When my mother dated and my father dated, it wasn’t popular, they
had issues, you know. To me, it’s the popular thing to do, I listen to
young white girls say, “I’m going to have a baby from a black
man.” And I say, “Why?” “Oh the kids are so cute.” “What are you
going to do with the kid’s hair?” “I don’t know.” “Then maybe you
shouldn’t have no kids, because if you don’t know what to do with
the kid’s hair you going to have a kid with nappy hair. You’re going
to have kids because they’re cute? White kids are cute too!”
Put bluntly, Nicole claims that the “whitest-looking person” can be
accepted in a black community so long as he or she was raised in a
working-class community with a sufficient number of black people and that
he or she are not “complete idiots about race.” Yet her emphasis on the ways
in which blackness is constructed is not used to build alliances with whites
as much as it is used to distance herself from brown-skinned individuals
who are not from working-class areas or who teach their children about the
relations of power that enforce a one-drop law outside the home. So, despite
claiming that there is no difference between working-class blacks of
different skin tones, Nicole feels entitled to opine, “I grew up in a black
210
neighbourhood, ’round black people; I imagine it’s different for black
people who are brought up in a white neighbourhood: they’re always a little
bit different, they’re less concerned about racism in general, they see less
racism.”85 She also denounces a
young mother of two [who is] raising her children to believe that
they are biracial … She believes she’s raising her children to
believe that there’s no such thing as racism in this world, there’s no
such thing as prejudice in this world. I feel sorry for her kids ’cause
one of these days her kids are going to wake up and her daughter’s
going to go to school and someone’s going to tell her, “You’re not
half, you’re black.” She’s going to get her feelings hurt, she’s going
to go somewhere else and it’s going to happen again. And then her
mother’s going to have her heart broken because her daughter’s
heart is broken, all because she wants to believe that, you know,
there’s no racism, there’s no prejudice, that didn’t happen because
of white people. I think the girl’s crazy; she grew up in a black
neighbourhood, you’d swear she knew better but instead she’s got
this idea [that] because she’s not racist or prejudiced nobody else in
the world is, [that] there’s no such thing as systematic racism, the
police aren’t racist, the police just do their job, black people do not
get below-average health care, that’s just something we think.
There’s seriously something wrong with that girl. Her girl, she’s
my complexion and she’ll tell you, “I’m half-white,” and I feel so
bad for this girl because she’s going to find out, “You’re half-white
in your mother’s eyes, [but] you are black in everybody else’s
eyes.” It’s going to be a shame, but I guess some people got to learn
the hard way.86
Nicole’s construction of a black identity is clearly tied to her own
experiences at a predominantly white school where, like Leslie, she faced
racism, and was told that she was a “burned piece of toast.” Yet she also
believes that individuals from countries with a “black majority” cannot
quite understand the impact of Canadian-style racism “with a smile on its
face.”87 Revealingly, she declares, “I’m black. No African nothing, it’s not
Canadian, I’m just black,”88 and makes no real effort to include children
with African-born parents into her vision of a black Nova Scotian family.
Well, I know in my neighbourhood Africans, I find, honestly, they
tend to stay with themselves, like Africans will meet up with other
Africans and have African babies, you know. But some of them
will involve their kids in activities in the community and that helps
us get to know the family better. But besides that, I don’t know; I
got to know some of them so now I speak to them, talk to them, play
with their kids or something, tell them if there is a special event in
the community. Recently we’ve been trying to include them more,
by showing the children in the neighbourhood different aspects of
black culture, so we’ll have people from the neighbourhood come
around and give a presentation on where they’re from, be it Dallas,
211
Cleveland, Shelbyville, that’s been pretty good so far. As far as
making them part of the community, I don’t know how much of the
community they feel they’re a part of, ’cause I know, in our
neighbourhood anyway, the Africans stick together, Africans stick
with the other Africans who stick with the other Africans.89
So while Nicole argues that it “makes more sense that kids are going to be
interested more in their own history than history that’s taken place, you
know, 500 years ago in maybe a place they will never see,”90 she cites
presentations on Dallas, Cleveland and an area that could pass as Bart
Simpson’s hometown. In other words, Nicole turns her back on meeting
new people in Nova Scotia and consumes the antics of the yellow-skinned
Simpsons, representations of blackness in the all-American Bernie Mac
show, comedies like Frasier with predominantly white casts, and
interracial relationships depicted in the multicultural milieu of Ally
McBeal.91 She even draws on televised images of New York in order to
imagine how she might be perceived in Toronto.
Spanish people — depending on how attractive you are — try to
claim you. I’ve noticed that. I get my hair done and the Puerto
Ricans would be like, “Oh, you look Puerto Rican,” the Cubans
would be like, “You look Cuban,” the Dominicans would be, “You
look Dominican” I tell them “I’m just black.”92
Nevertheless, Nicole can still use a biracial lens to tell Spanish-speaking
individuals in Nova Scotia that they are “black.” Just as her “Spanish”
boyfriend becomes “black” so that she can remind others, “I’ve never
[really] dated outside my race,” one of her Spanish girlfriends obtains
“black person’s eyes.”93 Even when a black/non-black binary fails, Nicole
simply refuses to explore Spain’s Moorish history and defines Spanish
people in the Americas against a European identity she equates with
whiteness:
Sometimes I like to think that I am Spanish. I like Spanish culture,
I’m extremely interested in Spanish culture … People of colour
Spanish, people from Central/South American Spanish … black
people. Not even just black, not-Spaniards, not from actual Spain,
not European Spanish.94
Kevin’s narrative also explores the tension between a biracial American
lens and a coloured community in the Americas. However, whereas Nicole
felt comfortable in the BSAC and used her private dreams of South
American colour to serve a black public, Kevin did not feel that he was
accepted by members of BSAC and hoped to forge a biracial community
that could compete with black icons.
Kevin’s early life story conforms to many of the patterns established in
Freud’s family romance, in which the child could negotiate Oedipal guilt by
mimicking the tales of “lower class servant girls” and exalting his father95,
212
as well as Rank’s Myth of the Birth of the Hero, in which the hero could
negotiate birth trauma by finding — or inventing — a distinguished father
and winning the love of his people.96 To begin our talk, Kevin described
how he was placed in foster care as a young child, shifted about from home
to home and, when taken up by a family, never adopted. Kevin even
presents his foster mother as “quite a brutal lady” and, while fondly
remembering a male father figure of uncertain ethnic ancestry, he
acknowledged that “when you get older and you get to that rebellious stage
that closeness doesn’t really do you any good, because your dad’s friends
know and they’ll call your father; no matter what you’re always watched. It
really wasn’t that comfortable.”97 Thus, Kevin went to Vancouver, BC:
[He] bought a fake ID, and joined the [armed] forces. I loved it. I
got to learn more about different people, different cultures,
different religions, different communities. I seen the rich people,
and really poor. Some of the poorest sites I’ve seen are in Tahiti,
you see the people there in little more than shacks. They’re so poor
that they can’t even afford clothes. You want to save them all, to
stop that kind of life. It’s dirty, they’ve got more diseases, there’s
starvation. I couldn’t even sleep, I have memories of them. I mean,
these are your people, you can’t do anything about it. I mean, I was
in a position of power, working for the government, yet I couldn’t
do anything to help my own people out. I was so frustrated.98
Yet when he returned to Nova Scotia, Kevin didn’t work to mentor children.
Instead, he confronted his “real mom,” a sex worker in Halifax, about the
ethnic ancestry of his “real dad.” She had told him that his dad might have
been “Latin.” Kevin describes:
We got into a really big argument, I confronted her and she finally
admitted, “Yes, you have a black father.” “Thank you, that’s all I
wanted to know.” Ever since then I’ve been trying to learn more
about who I am, my heritage, my people. It’s weird because my
attitude towards my people had never really changed, I never did
see skin colour; you’re just another human being to me, and that’s
the way I always thought. So when I found out I was half black,
although it did fill in a couple blanks, it gave me an impetus to learn
more as to who I was as an individual, and sent me on a journey as
to who I am as a black man, what’s my role in my community.99
On discovering his African roots, Kevin adopted a “dark-skinned”
advisor at Henson College as a role model and went on an “immersion
course” into black culture.100 Part of this venture included learning about
Kwanzaa — a celebration founded by the African-American cultural
nationalist Karenga101 — and standing up to men he constructs as uber-masculine dark-skinned “others.” He says:
In the Derby 95% of people who go in there are extremely
dark-skinned black. What had happened was, I was working as a
waiter, and when I was putting beer down it spilled onto a black
213
lady’s jacket. She was extremely upset, her boyfriend who was like
6 something, like 300 pounds solid muscle. I was extremely
intimidated. I’d never had an error like that happen before; I was
thrown off my stride. I apologized, I said, “Send the bill to me, I’ll
pay for the jacket.” They seen the fact that I wasn’t going to back
down; I wasn’t intimidated by them. I made an error, and I stood up
like a man. I didn’t go over to the bouncers and seek cover, I stood
there, whatever was going to happen was going to happen, but I
was going to face it on my own. This guy saw that, and said,
“Accidents happen, don’t worry about it.” For me that was a major
success, because even though I made a mistake I was willing to pay
the consequences, so I earned their respect.102
In trying to present the veneer of strength to dark(er)-skinned black
males, Kevin clearly constructed “them” as foreign forces that can become
allies. Yet he longed for love as much as respect, and resented dark(er)skinned blacks who continued to keep him at a distance, as well as “white
girls that … desire black men” and refused to see him as a swarthy Don Juan
let alone a Moorish Othello worthy of marriage.103
To resolve his dilemma as a “black man in a white man’s body” without a
“cultural identity,” Kevin hoped to “create a third category of ‘other’ …
opening the doors to allow an uncategorized, unsubjugated individual to
emerge and prosper.”104 His choice of words reveals how he has drawn on
decolonization movements of the post-World War II era in a manner similar
to Deleuze and Guattari’s vision of schizoids, subject groups and
subjugated individuals.105 Yet while Deleuze and Guattari combined the
popular images of American blacks that influenced Rank with the warnings
of Frantz Fanon and Richard Wright about enclaves of blacks who were
“just as capable of nourishing a modern fascism as of freeing a revolutionary charge,106 Kevin hopes to fulfill Martin Luther King’s dreams of
“being one people under one nation. The biracial community has to stand
out and say, we are everything that you guys are not, we are the culmination
of that dream.”107 Consequently, Kevin has difficulty committing to a
multicultural, rather than a biracial, enterprise:
There are people that are like me that are Asian and white, Asian
and black, you know, there’s so many cultures out there … white
and Asian, black and Asian, black and white, anything; so long as
it’s two different cultures blended together, you belong to us. We
want to be a global biracial community … It doesn’t matter where
you are, you still face the exact same obstacles, in Portugal, in
Madrid, in Russia, in China, as you do in Canada. It’s not a struggle
of location; it’s a struggle of personalities. It’s the black culture
versus the white culture versus the biracial community. We’re not
fully black; we’re not fully white. We’re not fully this culture or
that culture. We’re a blend of two or more cultures blended
together.108
214
Ultimately, Kevin’s international hopes can be traced to a working-class
community in Dartmouth. Toward the end of our talk he emphasized his
self-identity as a (straight) man’s man. Indeed, while Nova Scotian
institutions are often caricatured as conservative and insular, Kevin
believed that his provincial government had conceded too much to a gay
lobby and was “so eager to be an open door for the rest of the world [that]
they keep forgetting about the people that are already here.”109 In this way,
he could question black men who steal from him by tying his working-class
male identity to “white niggers” fighting colonization or a class war, rather
than his African ancestry.110 In addition, Kevin concluded our talk with an
interesting example of how he feels “race” is lived through “class”:
Do you feel you’ve experienced racism in Halifax?
Oh God, yes. I’ve experienced it in several different ways, being a
biracial man. I’m rejected by the white people because I’m too
dark.
Can you give me some examples?
If I go to a restaurant, and there was a yuppie white couple versus a
poor black man, and I was in between them, then they would take
the white couple first.
But would you say that is based on race or socio-economic class?
It’s a combination of both, because I’m biracial.111
IV
Nova Scotia is more class conscious than race
conscious, although race plays a major part. If
you’re a professional, a black professional, then
the larger community sees you different, or
differently than the masses of black people … So
when the West Indians came to Nova Scotia they
were part of a certain class, and with that class
there was a certain acceptance. Now, on the
other side, I mean, I’ve no doubt that they faced
racism, too, but not the kind of oppressive racism
that we Nova Scotians faced, so when the jobs
were available they had the qualifications, and
coming from the same class as the people giving
out the jobs, they got the jobs.
Rocky Jones (2002)
Thus far, this paper has emphasized the voices of indigenous Nova Scotians
who often associated my facial features, hairstyle, skin tone and clothing
with forms of blackness that were both local and North American, until my
accent betrayed my ties to Liverpool, Merseyside rather than Liverpool,
215
Nova Scotia. As a result, our conversations often probed the idea of the
nation as well as notions of race, class, sexuality and gender. After insisting
that I had “more African features than not,” Barbara claimed that I would
have more difficulty being accepted by the white race than the
black. They’d accept your British accent, but that just comes down
to ignorance because they don’t believe there are black people in
England. I think you’d have more difficulty going into a white
community thing.112
In contrast, Leslie used my British citizenship to confront the prejudices
of her Africadian father,113 and both Nicole and Kevin discussed how my
accent seemed to represent a suspiciously “posh,” effeminate or queer
lifestyle because they were not used to thinking about a black British
culture, and linked Europe to whiteness.114
Yet in the course of my research I also talked to people who had
immigrated to Nova Scotia from former British or French colonies. They
did not ignore questions of race but tended to emphasize my connection to
members of a Caribbean or African people who were able to become
responsible national citizens. During our conversation in his law office, the
Jamaican-born Gus Wedderburn announced:
You’re the first PhD black kid that has come here to talk to me. I
don’t know if we have any here in Halifax. The majority of black
students in those universities are still West Indians, and Africans.
The indigenous guy is not down. How you change that scenario, I
do not know … I look at the Jews and I look at us from the West
Indies, and your father from St. Vincent — they never sat back and
wallowed in their poverty. That’s why you’re here today, doing
your PhD. I have relatives in the West Indies, they were poor, [but]
they never sat back. They decided, “I want a profession.”115
I met with Gus on many other occasions, often in suburban locations, and
he continually discussed the need to shepherd black communities into
respectability. For example, he presented the Africville community as a
dump, just as he had done when he led the NSAACP in the 1960s.116 In
addition, when he condemned television shows and “pimps” that
encouraged young black men to “chase white girls,” he continued to call on
white liberals to help solve black problems in a respectable Judeo-Christian
manner — the same discourse he had employed in his paper to the New
Brunswick Human Rights Agency in 1968.117 Thus, after resisting the
simplistic binaries used by Canadian writers in the 1960s to promote
Caribbean immigrants when they were “radical” and domestic blacks when
they could be “submissive,” in its final section this paper not only addresses
contemporary attempts to pit responsible African and Caribbean
immigrants against blacks indigenous to Britain but also returns to the
debate between Rinaldo Walcott and George Elliott Clarke in Canada.118
216
V
[M]y mother deplored any “Uncle Tom”-ism,
denouncing the Las Vegas “Rat packer” Sammy
Davis Jr., as “nothing but a white man’s
monkey.” But black U.S. cultural influences
were usually irresistible for us. When James
Brown brought his show to Montreal in 1970,
my mother took the overnight train ride up from
Halifax and brought me along … So I grew up
“black (American) Nova Scotian,” really.
G.E. Clarke, Odysseys Home (2002)
James Brown never said, “Say it loud, I’m
mixed-race in a satellite of the US and proud.”
Wayde Compton, Performance Bond (2004)119
You’re all influenced by black musicians from
America, which kept our identity in tact [sic]
because when you study black music it usually
entails the study of racism as well.
J. Nassy Brown, Dropping Anchor, Setting Sail:
Geographies of “Race” and Identity in the Port
City of Liverpool, England (1994)
C.L.R James is widely celebrated for his insights into the Caribbean and
England during the early twentieth century. Nonetheless, when
interviewed by the Jamaican Journal in the 1980s he said that there were no
black people in Britain in the 1930s.120 James may have forgotten the people
of colour documented in Britain in the 1920s and 1930s,121 or he may have
ignored them to present himself as a pioneer. Yet it is also possible that
James remembered that there were “coloured” individuals in Britain but
simply linked them to a lumpen proletariat served by white religious
paternalism, awaiting enlightenment from a synthesis of Marxist ideals and
Garveyite racial pride. To be sure, when Caryl Phillips — a writer who has
labelled James “the outstanding West Indian of the century” — couldn’t
ignore individuals who claimed to represent the oldest black community in
the UK, he just presented them as pitiable creatures.122 In a similar vein,
Mike and Trevor Phillips gave respectable members of The Windrush
generation an opportunity to pronounce, “No black person in Liverpool
ever made anything of their lives.”123
Black Liverpudlians of mixed racial origins do not have a longestablished Baptist church to call their own but have actively challenged
Caribbean immigrants who seek to exclude them from respectable venues.
For example, when “dark-skinned” professionals like Frederick Reese,
director of the Merseyside Caribbean Community Centre, used light skin
and racially mixed features to signify a lack of culture rather than cultural
217
capital,124 Liverpool-born blacks dismissed his “West Indian slave
mentality,”125 and he was soon dismissed from his post. Yet Jimmy
McGovern, a prominent white writer from Liverpool whose dramas are
often deemed “gritty” because they are set in working-class areas, has only
been able to present mixed-race individuals as victims. For McGovern,
Liverpool 8 is “the Harlem of Britain” because it represents a multicultural
ghetto filled with dilapidated homes and exploited residents, not because its
cultural vitality can mould various creative artists.126 In a similar fashion,
the second series of Cracker, McGovern’s popular TV crime series,
depicted a mixed-race rapist as a victim of white racism. Not only does
McGovern introduce us to Floyd Malcolm as he overhears a joke about the
sexual prowess of black men, but he also describes how Floyd was driven to
erase any sign of his blackness and bleach his skin. In doing so, McGovern
treats the stigma of Floyd’s “race” in “Men Should Weep” as he had used
Abbie Kinsella’s “class” in the previous episode (“To be a Somebody”).
Just as Floyd sings African-American songs and affects a Jamaican accent
when he performs the role of the black buck that white psychologists fear
will rape their wives, Abbie becomes the racist skinhead journalists used to
caricature working-class Liverpool football fans. While McGovern’s
Freudian-lite approach highlights a sick society, it fails to unravel the
dynamic ability of a mulatto culture to traverse borders and inspire creative
artistry in the style of The Commitments (1991).127 In short, TV executives
in the United States needed to do more than change the title of McGovern’s
show to Fitz when they bought the rights to the show.128
Paul Gilroy, professor of social theory at the London School of
Economics, is well versed in transatlantic communication and has offered
his readers a means to condemn “racial conservationists who veer between
a volkish, proto-fascist sensibility and the misty-eyed sentimentality of
those who would shroud themselves in the supposed moral superiority that
goes with victim status.”129 Nonetheless, his glib comment — “‘You’ll
never walk alone” [the anthem of Liverpool Football Club] would always
eclipse the strains of ‘Abide With Me,’[the song played for the royal family
before the Football Association Challenge Cup final] never mind the pieties
of ‘God Save the Queen’” in Merseyside130 — reveals his lack of empirical
knowledge about Merseyside since it relies on Bill Shankley’s maxims
about Liverpool and Liverpool reserves constituting the only two teams in
the area, and fails to note the agency of Everton fans that vote with their feet
and leave Christian churches that use “You’ll never walk alone” as a song of
praise. Blacks who support Everton, Liverpool, or Tranmere were also able
to remind J. Nassy Brown, an American anthropologist influenced by
Gilroy’s vision of a Black Atlantic, how race mixing is only considered a
national religion when it takes place in London.131 Nonetheless, she was
still “blown away” by visiting London and finding a black woman “in a
sharply tailored suit, briefcase in hand … dressed in a way that belies such a
confident, gracefully employed air … effortlessly.”132 Alas, even when a
218
popular mixed-race novelist such as Zadie Smith reminds her interviewers,
“I barely know England. I’ve never been north of Cambridge,” reviewers
continue to reduce multicultural Britain to Smith’s vision of London, and
vice versa.133
Consequently, it is not surprising that Liverpudlians of mixed racial
origins can turn to American sources as much as intellectuals tied to
London. Some researchers who face the “objective social reality of not
being white” have even refused to move beyond a biracial world view and
simply imbibed the lectures of Molefi Asante in order to denounce Gilroy as
“too intellectual” or not wanting to be a “Black intellectual.”134 Asante’s
Afro-Americocentrism has also been influential with figures in Nova
Scotia,135 much to the chagrin of “Edson,” a “quintessential callaloo” from
the Caribbean. Whether we talked at his home, at the BSAC or at a café,
Edson repeatedly drew on Fanon’s manifesto to critique Egyptocentricism
and Afrocentricism:
One of these Afrocentric types was giving a lecture about black
nationalism and stuff like that. So, you know, like, “Egypt had
planes,” and “black people had planes,” and all this trash. So I ask,
“Brother, don’t you realize that what you’re doing is mythical, and
replacing white nationalism with black nationalism? You’re just
reversing not, as you said [earlier], reconceptualizing. The guy —
the place is packed with brothers and sisters, eh — the guy says,
“Well, they’ve had white nationalism for 500 years, can’t we
brothers and sisters have a little bit for a little while?” And the
crowd broke up and laughed … it’s astounding, people can look at
Ghana, then Mali and Songhai, as the quintessential black empires,
but everyone glosses over the fact that it’s black people conquering
black people and they gloss over the cleavages. These are not
societies that I necessarily want to replicate, whether in terms of
the class hierarchies, the patriarchy and all this kind of stuff, and
then you begin to go down into essentialisms.136
After condemning a “native bourgeoisie” that blindly followed an
American society for people of black cultures, Edson outlined their failure
to create a mythic African Nova Scotian community that could reach the
people:
On a fundamental level, people are more tied to their community
identity, Preston, Lincolnville. A few individuals might transcend
that, but there exists no pan-African Nova Scotian identity. If you
ask people, if you see how they act, they identify by being a
member of East or North Preston, Cherrybrook, Whitney Pier
(which is more working-class area, because it’s a very different
community); they’re more tied to these communities. When
Mandela was released there was a big party that transcended all of
that.137
219
Rather than dismissing Gilroy’s “mulatto consciousness” as out of tune
with the African-American experience à la Asante, Edson reflected
Gilroy’s insights about a black Atlantic in which Mandela suspends and
refocuses “differences that might prove difficult and even embarrassing in
other circumstances.”138
Yet whereas Mandela’s flamboyant shirts symbolize freedom in a black
Atlantic, Malcolm X’s image is usually captured in the tight suits that James
Bond — or Sidney Poitier — might wear to an interracial soirée rather than
the loudly loose zoot suits he wore while serving the illicit fantasies of white
men and women. Thus, Asante claims Malcolm in the hopes of regulating
black youth,139 just as Jesse Jackson used Malcolm’s life story to talk about
infantile citizens:
Today the life of Malcolm Little, Malcolm X, Haj Malik El
Shabaaz, is instructive in three poignant ways. His academic
studiousness is a brilliant example to youth who, in many cases,
define what is “cool” as non-academic. As we seek to reclaim our
youth as a nation, we must transform their values to embrace
academic excellence and civil participation … Second, Malcolm’s
rejection of destructive behaviour is instructive as a set of values
which places dignity above designer clothes … Lastly, Haj Malik
El Shabaaz is a glowing example of the individual need to seek a
higher understanding.140
Similarly, African African Nova Scotians influenced by televised
images of Malcolm X can call for a messianic leader who can win over the
hood from ignorance and “nihilism.” He must be
somebody who smoked a lot of drugs, fought around, shot guns,
ended up getting out of that, became a successful, educated person
who can talk to these people and say, “Look,” you know, who
understands exactly what’s going on. He can provide leadership
and education but he must work with successful immigrants in
order to do that, and explain these things to these people. I don’t see
why some people think that I sold them as slaves, I never sold
anyone as slaves because my grandfather worked in plantation too
… Yes, the leader could be a woman, it could be a man, but I for
some reason I just think that — I’m not sexist or anything — I think
women are more likely to listen to me than men are to listen to
women in society. If some girl goes down to Gottingen and calls
out everybody and starts preaching, I don’t know, I don’t know if
she’s going to get as much audiences as the guy, not because — my
point is the leader has to get as many people interested as
possible.141
Such desires to find mythic leaders can be linked to chivalric norms of
medieval Europe,142 but one also needs to note how attempts to arouse mass
attention are transformed to meet hegemonic norms of African-American
220
masculinity. One of Nassy Brown’s informants in Liverpool linked
conscious blacks in Britain to African-American men able to liberate “their
women” from bondage to white civilization. To do so, Scott brazenly
removed the term “half-caste” from its origins in the British Empire’s
Indian adventures, or its apolitical and derogatory use by blacks born in the
Caribbean or Africa,143 and related it to the ways white men in America
defined sinful “high yellas”:
In New Orleans, women were slaves so that they [whites] could put
light-skinned, nice-looking black women in brothels in their own
clubs … Then they [whites] classified these people — half caste,
quarter caste, octoroons … it is only in recent years in these places
we [blacks] have now begun to understand and say NO. If white
people are white regardless of their skin colour, because amongst
white races I see many different shades of white and yet white
people turn around and say “we are white,” then we say “we are
black” regardless of the different shades that we have — we say
“we are black people.”144
Even when Karen, another one of Nassy Brown’s informants in
Liverpool, asserted black female agency she ended up turning to AfroAmericocentric visions rather than decolonization movements in Africa or
the Caribbean:
I affiliated black Americans as being more kin to me than Africa. I
joined the black women’s liberation group and I joined the Angela
Davis march in this country, and was very political in my sense as a
black person. Anything that emanated from there — from music to
culture — was part of my culture!”145
Black women in Nova Scotia can also take pride in iconic AfricanAmerican images from the 1960s. Amanda Carvery “just loved the pictures
of these women [in the Black Panthers] with guns protecting
themselves.”146 Moreover, after asserting her cultural connection to
“modest” women in Africa and “underdogs” in Nova Scotia, Barbara takes
solace in documentaries that show that women in the Black Panther
movement “weren’t domestics.”147 She praised Viola Desmond as the
“Canadian version of Rosa Parks,” reflecting crusades to empower black
youth and tell them to venerate respectable citizens rather than question
why they are told about Rosa Parks rather Claudette Colvin, “an ‘A’student,
quiet, well-mannered, neat, clean, intelligent, pretty and deeply religious”
who was also dragged off a bus by white racists but ignored by the NAACP
because she was carrying a child outside of wedlock, “working poor” and
dark skinned.148
Consequently, debates about skin tone in Nova Scotia and Liverpool are
not only feminized but ushered away from the public sphere as masculine
creative artists seek to build a native black community of 1,001 colours.149
The main issue for Rocky Jones is the need to develop mentors of African
221
descent — whatever their skin tone — who can help the indigenous
community compete with the immigrants coming from “countries where
they have black role models, in the bank, the President of the country, police
officers, whatever.”150 Similarly, Ray Costello, a former school teacher in
Liverpool, hopes to develop “positive imagery” that is local, not from “the
United States or … remote African kings or other, often too distant,
role-figures.” Nonetheless, in calling for black youngsters to be given
positive “role models of their race,” Costello relies on a one-drop law
associated with the United States so that he can claim the “African genes” of
Albert Edwards Jones, a Buckingham Palace guard who was not “visibly
black.”
Since torturous attempts to match colour with culture continue to
characterize attempts to establish role models with sufficient amounts of
melanin, I end with six degrees of separation that we might use to connect
Kevin Koshinsky’s biracial vision to consumers of multiracialism.
Whereas Kevin seized Halle Berry (1) as a biracial spokesperson to meet his
own personal needs in Nova Scotia,151 Ray Costello (2) considered her a
representative of black Liverpool.152 Following Costello, Sir Peter Blake
(3) and the Liverpool Culture Company also chose to omit the fact that
Judith Berry, Halle’s white mother, left the city when she was six years old,
and enlisted the iconic image of Judith’s daughter and the famous face of
Mike Myers (4) in their successful bid to become Europe’s city of culture
for 2008. Yet George Elliott Clarke (5) has used the anglophile comic to
symbolize Canadian whiteness in Hollywood, along with Keanu Reeves
(6), an actor who identifies as multiracial (albeit one who is comfortable
inhabiting the role of a Geordie (meaning from Newcastle-upon-Tyne, UK)
exorcist casually talking about “half-breeds” in Los Angeles).153
When scholars stumble across multiracial “fellas” trying to make sense
of American drinking games and Hollywood stars, they may find it
tempting to use Freud and Fanon in order to ridicule an “intoxicating” North
American media or question an American society for people of black
cultures.154 Yet when the ghosts of America’s mulatto-minded culture
continue to haunt those who travel within a black Atlantic, it is also the
bounden duty of honest intellectuals to reorient Freud by updating Rank’s
study of mythic heroes, Cruse’s list of crimes committed in the name of a
black people and, last but not least, Fanon’s conversations with workingclass blacks.
Notes
1.
2.
222
Frantz Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks (New York: Grove Press, 1991), 224.
“I know I’m black. There’s nothing white about me. I know I’m black and I know
[the white students] talked about me the same way they’d talk about any other
black.” Billy Downey, TS, 106. [TS refers to the transcripts of conversations I had
with Nova Scotians in the summer of 2002. The transcripts, along with the tapes,
are stored at the Nova Scotia provincial archives.
3. Ibid., 111.
4. “[L]ife in Africville for the Canadian black is terrible. But coming to Toronto
only brings minimum alleviation for his ills. It is here he realizes that while
physical amenities in Toronto may be better than what is available in Nova
Scotia, he is faced with the same social situation and restrictions compounded
now by the inadequacy of his educational preparation.” David Trotman, “Blacks
and Portuguese in Downtown Toronto (City of Toronto Archives, RG 76-3-0-942
47 [1971], 5).
5. Odimumba Kwamdela, Niggers, This is Canada (New York: Kibo Books, 2000),
26–30.
6. Robin Winks, The Blacks in Canada: A History, 2nd ed. (Montreal and Kingston:
McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1997), 346.
7. Francis Henry, Forgotten Canadians: The Blacks of Nova Scotia (Don Mills:
Longman, 1973).
8. Like Robin Winks, many Africadians were not aware of Gramsci’s writings in
The Modern Prince and Other Essays (first translated into English in 1957) or
Fiori’s biography of Gramsci (first translated into English in 1970) in the 1970s,
but Gramsci’s description of a “war of position” usefully describes the ways
“people’s intellectuals” tried to fashion a better world for their children.
Moreover, the spirit of Gramsci’s ideas were often channelled via Malcolm X’s
calls for people of African descent to create “a generation of young Black people
who will know what they want … [who] will create a generation who will know
how to get what they want.” Osei Amoah, A Political Dictionary of Black
Quotations: Reflecting the Black Man’s Dreams, Hopes, and Visions (London:
Oyokoanyinaase House, 1989), 17. Thus, Donald Mapp, a Philadelphia lawyer,
was well aware that black Nova Scotians lacked the resources and the money of
black American groups, but he drew on Malcolm X’s words to encourage his son
to become a trained lawyer who could also condemn colourism and nepotism
within his community. TS, 47.
9. Winks’ research notes for The Blacks in Canada are stored at the Schomburg
Center in Harlem. Kwamdela moved to New York when he tired of a black
community in Canada that was “but a joke compared to the Black community in
the United States.” Odimumba Kwamdela, Soul Surviving up in Canada (New
York: Deep Roots Books, 1998), 102.
10. Jeffrey Reitz, “The Institutional Structure of Immigration as a Determinant of
Inter-racial Competition: A Comparison of Britain and Canada,” International
Migration Review 22.1 (1998): 141. One can only assume that Reitz considered
black Nova Scotia a “sideshow,” just as he considers Malcolm X and the Black
Muslims to have been a “sideshow” to the “real business” of the US civil rights
movement. Jeffrey Reitz, Commentary on Edward Curtis’ paper, “Malcolm X
Between Religion and Politics: An African-American Islamic Struggle for
Liberation,” Ross Johnson/Connaught Speaker Series, Munk Centre, University
of Toronto. Friday, 28 February 2003. Reitz could benefit from the proud and
humble words of Donald Mapp, a regular letter writer to the Nova Scotian
newspapers:
Malcolm X … was one of the smartest black men, way smarter
than Martin Luther King; the only thing with Martin Luther King
was he was a minister, so they followed him more, and he got more
credit. Malcolm X was a smart cookie, boy, you let nobody fool
223
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
224
you. I loved to hear him talk, he talked just the way I would like to; I
would talk that way if I was educated. (TS, 56)
Hill has betrayed his commitment to bourgeois role models by depicting
working-class blacks of mixed racial origins as tragic objects when they “don’t
work, or don’t have work that makes them appear valuable in the eyes of the
middle-class black community.” Lawrence Hill, Black Berry, Sweet Juice: On
Being Black and White in Canada, 1st ed. (Toronto: HarperFlamingo, 2001), 230.
“The Conservatives are polling visible minorities on same-sex marriage … the
Tories see the same-sex message as a wedge they can drive between the Liberals
and immigrant Canadians … appealing to the socially conservative attitudes of
new arrivals” in “the ethnic press.” John Ibbitson, “Same-sex Will Smite
Harper,” Globe and Mail, Friday, 18 February 2005, A4.
George Elliot Clarke, Odysseys Home: Mapping African-Canadian Literature
(Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2002), 182; A. Compton, “Standing Your
Ground: George Elliott Clarke in Conversation,” Studies in Canadian Literature
23.2 (1998): 143.
Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks, 121.
Anaïs Nin, The Diary of Anaïs Nin, 1931–1934 (New York: Swallow
Press,1966), 291.
Otto Rank, Art and Artist: Creative Urge and Personality Development, trans.
C.F. Atkinson (New York: Knopf, 1932).
Quoted in George Elliott Clarke, “Treason of the Black Intellectuals,” Odysseys
Home.
Nin’s romantic racism unveils some of the ways in which black bodies inspired
Rank:
I suggest Harlem … The Savoy. Music which makes the floor
tremble, a vast place, with creamy drinks, dusky lights, and
genuine gaiety, with the Negroes dancing like people possessed.
Rank said he could not dance. “A new world, a new world,” he
murmured, astonished and bewildered … All around us the
Negroes danced wildly and gracefully … Rank could not forget
Harlem. He was eager to return to it. He could hardly wait to come
to the end of his hard days’ work. He said: “I am tempted to
prescribe it to my patients. ‘Go to Harlem!’” (Anaïs Nin, The Diary
of Anaïs Nin, 1934–1939 [New York: Swallow Press, 1967], 6)
Clarke, Odysseys Home, 5.
Ibid., 202.
Jacob Burckhardt, The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, trans. S.G.C.
Middlemore (London: George Allen and Unwin, 1921), 11; W.E.B. DuBois,
“The Talented Tenth: Memorial Address,” Boulé (October 1948): 3–13. Frantz
Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth (New York: Grove Press, 1968), 120.
Clarke is “weary of black people always being a subject only for sociologists,
criminologists and morticians, their scalpel eyes slicing into us, their shrapnel
voices exploding our dreams, their heavy metal hands ripping into us — with a
crabby penmanship that dates back to the Dark Ages. In their minds, we are
supposedly too poor to even have history. Or they consider our writing mere
carping … Or they classify us as ‘exotics,’ as symbols of liberal progress, of
white paternalism, of black suffering, of feminist rage. Or they pretend that
‘Black Canadian’ literature consists of two or maybe three writers, and, if
pressed, will struggle to name Austin Clarke and Dionne Brand.” Clarke,
Odyssey’s Home, 6–7; emphasis added. It is unlikely that a Canadian
23.
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29.
30.
31.
32.
33.
34.
35.
congregation reading Clarke’s Odysseys Home needed to ask who else might be
the third member of the holy trinity of “Black Canadian literature.”
From a population of approximately 400. P. Stamadianos, Afro-Canadian
Activism in the 1960s (Concordia: 1994).
Clarke, Odyssey’s Home, 3.
Ibid., 204n1.
TS, 93.
Aside from his defence of violent insurrection, Fanon’s ideas about a “native
intellectual” showing the “outcast masses” that we — the anti-royal “we”— work
for them had a profound impact on the intellectual development of Rocky Jones
and Stokely Carmichael. Whereas Fanon called on intellectuals educated in
colonial universities to “put at the people’s disposal the intellectual and technical
capital that it has snatched when going through the colonial universities,” Rocky
took up the theory of déclassé — the idea that intellectuals educated in urban
areas would go back to the countryside and educate and “politicize the people” —
as his own. Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth, 120. TS, 94, 101. Whereas Fanon
insisted that the middle class is “a closed society in which life has no taste, in
which the air is tainted, in which ideas and men are corrupt,” and believed that the
“taints, the sickness and inhumanity of Europe have grown to enormous
dimensions” in the United States of America, Stokely opined, “The goal of black
people must not be to assimilate into middle-class America, for that class — as a
whole — is without a viable conscience as regards humanity.” Fanon, Black Skin,
White Masks, 224–25; Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth, 252. Stokely
Carmichael and Charles Hamilton, Black Power: The Politics of Liberation in
America (New York: Vintage Books, 1967).
The meeting was held on 31 November 1968. For more on the family meeting see
F. Boyd, “The Politics of the Minority Game,” and Rocky Jones, TS, 90–91.
“Black Nova Scotians … responded in a truly Canadian fashion, in a manner that
was more orderly, organized and restrained than the black revolution in the
United States.” F. Boyd, “The Politics of the Minority Game,” 11. Also see
Rocky Jones, TS, 88, 91–92.
F. Boyd, “The Politics of the Minority Game,” 11.
TS, 94.
To give some examples of Rocky’s work, he has founded and/or led the
Afro-Canadian Liberation movement, the Black Inmates Program, the Transition
Year Program and IBM Program (to help indigenous, black and Mi’kmaq
individuals enter law school).
In 1968 Rocky announced “Black Power is here and it is up to the whites to see we
never have to use it in a violent manner. If we have to, we will.” “Nova Scotia
Simmers Down,” West Indian News Observer, December. In 1969 the Globe and
Mail also recorded his rhetoric of violence in voyeuristic pieces of journalism.
See M. O’Malley, “A Tolerant People? Nice to Believe, We’re Really Just Polite
Racists” and “Rocky the Revolutionary,” Globe Magazine, 15 February 1969. In
2002 Rocky acknowledged, “We sometimes had the rhetoric of armed revolution,
but it was never a possibility; it was never a reality of the Canadian experience to
ever think of it.” TS, 90. Also see Clarke’s wistful recollection of the 1960s when,
“There was no righteously destabilizing Black Power activism, for our provincial
community of less than 30,000 souls was too small and too conservative to
tolerate more than casually militant rhetoric.” Clarke, Odysseys Home, 27.
F. Boyd, “The Politics of the Minority Game,” 11.
TS, 96.
225
36. “I think Nova Scotia is more class conscious than race conscious, although race
plays a major part. If you’re a professional, a black professional, then the larger
community see you different, or differently than the masses of black people —
you’re not really one of them, you’re more one of us, because you’re a
professional, right, so there’s a class distinction.” TS, 98. Again, Rocky’s words
exemplify and complicate Clarke’s belief “that minority-group blacks will face
identity conflicts over ‘blackness,’ while majority-group blacks will struggle
primarily around class and religious differences.” Clarke, Odyssey’s Home,
206n10.
37. TS, 97; emphasis added.
38. Harold Cruse, The Crisis of the Negro Intellectual (New York: Morrow, 1967),
556–57.
39. Molefi Asante, “Howard Cruse and Afrocentric Theory” in Harold Cruse’s The
Crisis of the Negro Intellectual Reconsidered, ed. Jerry Watts (New York:
Routledge, 2004).
40. Winston James, Holding Aloft the Banner of Ethiopia: Caribbean Radicalism in
Early Twentieth-Century America (London: Verso, 1998). Aside from attacking
Jews throughout his text, Cruse portrays West Indians as little more than “black
Jews”: “aggressive. Efficient, acquisitive, calculating and clannish.” David
Lowenthal and Institute of Race Relations, West Indian Societies (London:
Oxford University Press for the Institute of Race Relations in collaboration with
the American Geographical Society, 1972), 227. To give one example, Cruse
locates Caribbean-Americans staying on the sidelines, “with an eagle eye open
for every opportunity to lap up whatever crumbs the power structure tosses to the
civil righters, or to profit from whatever barriers are breached to enhance middleclass status.” Cruse, The Crisis of the Negro Intellectual, 434. Cruse’s anti-West
Indian sentiment reflects the power dynamics of the Harlem Renaissance
documented in Nancy Cunard and Hugh Ford, Negro: An Anthology (New York:
Frederick Ungar, 1970); Amritjit Singh and Daniel Scott, eds., The Collected
Writings of Wallace Thurman: A Harlem Renaissance Reader (New Brunswick,
NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2003); Louis Dantin, Fanny (Montreal: Harvest
House, 1973), 51.
41. See J. Harewood, “Is There Really a Canadian Black Elite?” Contrast, 2 June
1977.
42. A group that is often defined broadly (anyone with a “visible admixture of Negro
blood”) or perniciously (as “aristocrats-in-a-hurry and … Kerenskyite,
reactionary defenders of the slaveholding status quo”), is, in Clarke’s hands,
related intimately (to honour a cousin, Blair Arnold States, “who could pass for
white but was culturally black, who was Canadian, but also profoundly
African-American in his orientations”) and impishly (as “tantalizingly tan”).
Thus, Clarke’s description of the treason of the black intellectuals offers an
eloquent response to an unfortunate Toronto youth who proclaimed, “There are
too many mulattoes here” after he had been invited to a Halifax meeting of the
Black Youth Community Action. Clarke, Odysseys Home, 182–83, 83n1,
206n10.
43. Henderson, “Where, by the Way, is this Train Going? A Case for Black (Cultural)
Studies,” Callaloo 19.1 (1996): 65. Clarke, Odyssey’s Home, 50.
44. See Cecil Foster, Where Race Does Not Matter: The New Spirit of Modernity
(Toronto: Penguin Canada, 2005), 182–83.
45. Hazel Carby pointed out Cornel West’s reliance on Anglo-Victorian modes of
respectability when he condemned the “shabby attire” of black intellectuals and,
226
46.
47.
48.
49.
50.
51.
52.
53.
whereas West has talked about the “nihilism” of the “black poor,” Gilroy has
asked intellectuals to point out the nihilism of economically privileged blacks as
well. Hazel Carby, Race Men (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1998),
21. bell hooks, “Thinking about Capitalism: A Conversation with Cultural Critic
Paul Gilroy,” Z Magazine, April 1996; Paul Gilroy, Small Acts: Thoughts on the
Politics of Black Cultures (London: Serpent’s Tale, 1994). More pointedly,
Lewis Gordon considers the recent history behind the term “African-American”
catering to the concerns of the black pseudo-bourgeoisie: “it serves as a way of
differentiating a certain class of blacks from the dismal global situation of most
blacks. I don’t meet many working-class blacks who are ‘African Americans.’”
Lewis Gordon, Bad Faith and Antiblack Racism (Atlantic Highlands, NJ:
Humanity Books, 1995), 1.
“The few working-class people whom I had the chance to know in Paris never
took it on themselves to pose the problem of the discovery of a Negro past.”
Fanon, Black Skin, White Masks, 224.
Otto Rank, Art and Artist, 63.
Introduction, Rinaldo Walcott, Black Like Who? Writing Black Canada, 2nd rev.
ed. (Toronto: Insomniac Press, 2003).
Rocky moved between Montreal, Toronto and Halifax as well as various cities in
the US. When he returned to Halifax he was disappointed that the Black Inmates
Association — a group he established to help those without the ability to freely
move around North America — often ran out of volunteers.
The people who really got into volunteer work were people who
had family in jail, and it seems that when that person gets out the
volunteer kind of drifts away, when you’re continually changing
volunteers it’s difficult in the long-term to keep something going;
that’s my experience, anyway. TS, 98.
Nonetheless, it is important to note that notions of family in Nova Scotia can
include various uncles, aunts and cousins outside of one’s “blood” relatives.
George Elliott Clarke, “Cool Politics: Styles in Honour of Malcolm X and Miles
Davis,” Jouvert 2.1 (1998). “The Afro-Canadian Liberation movement started in
1968 or ’69, something like that, and the ACL was very militant, cultural
nationalist in its approach; we renamed Citadel Hill, ‘Maroon Hill’ in a
ceremony.” Rocky Jones, TS, 100.
Clarke, Odysseys Home, 201.
There was “tension between the aboriginal leadership and the black leadership of
the Transition Year Program. And the aboriginal leadership really wanted to
support their own university, or their own program — there’s a program in
Saskatchewan for aboriginal students — so there was a boycott at one point by the
aboriginal community of the Transition Year Program. I felt that perhaps we had
to have a program for black lawyers, and when we first started to talk about a
program for law school, we talked about developing a black program, what
happened was in speaking with the administration, the law profs, and trying to put
that together, they made it very clear that politically that that program would not
fly, but an integrated program the same as the IBM [indigenous, black and
Mi’kmaq] program — then funding would be made available for it. So we shifted
and made it a program for both communities. In that planning for the IBM
program, the Mi’kmaq community was not involved so they didn’t really have an
ownership.” TS, 99.
C. Nicholl, “Black Activist Blasts ‘Racist’ Attacks,” Halifax Daily News,
Saturday, 26 November 1988.
227
54. Many individuals were proud African Nova Scotians, but could also lay claim to
Jamaica, Tanzania, Trinidad, Zimbabwe, South Africa, Cameroon, England and
Manitoba. For an overview of the individuals interviewed see Daniel McNeil,
“Afro(Americo)centricity in Black (American) Nova Scotia,” Canadian Review
of American Studies 35.1 (2005).
55. Dr. Abucar (now deceased), a retired sociology professor; Frank Boyd, a
historian of African-Canadian life; Billy Downey, an ex-nightclub owner and
sleeping car porter; Donald Mapp, a “Philadelphia lawyer” for sleeping car
porters and letter-writer extraordinaire; Raymond Sheppard, director of
BCAANS (Black Community Advocates Association of Nova Scotia); Simon
Union (pseudonym), a former executive in the Nova Scotia Human Rights
Commission; Gus Wedderburn, the former head of the Nova Scotia Association
for the Advancement of Colored People.
56. Amanda Carvery, an undergraduate student at Dalhousie; Edson (pseudonym),
an educator and organic intellectual; Nicole Gardiner (pseudonym), an
undergraduate student at Dalhousie; Barbara Hamilton-Hinch, director of the
BSAC; Mark Holding-Obeng (pseudonym), a graduate student in criminology;
Kevin Koshinsky, unemployed; Craig Murray (pseudonym), a journalist; Leslie
Reid, mother; Angu Vifansi, entrepreneur.
57. Donna Bailey Nurse, What’s a Black Critic to Do? Interviews, Profiles and
Reviews of Black Writers (Toronto: Insomniac Press, 2003).
58. As well as her role at the BSAC, Barbara has held leadership positions with the
Black Educators Association and Cultural Awareness Youth Group.
60. Ibid., 151–52.
61. “In Law and Order, when the [white] wife found out, [the father] actually wanted
to pay [the woman of colour] because he didn’t want a mixed child, and those are
real stories because a white man or a white parent may not know how to raise a
biracial child without a black parent being present.” Ibid., 153–54.
62. “Lawrence Hill wrote that book … and I think his mum was white. I think it was a
talk show, and he was talking about his experiences, and the question was, ‘Did
he think his experiences would have been different if his dad was white’? I think
in the end he married a white woman … And one woman made the point that the
way a black mother raises her child is quite different to the way a white woman
raises her child, because she’s a black woman, and her husband’s white, and she
has two children, so she was talking about her sons and growing up biracial, and
its completely different what they’re exposed to … And also with Hill, his family
wasn’t poor, so he was protected.” Ibid., 153. On the idea that a black identity can
be “diluted,” see ibid., 160, 166.
63. Ibid., 138, 164.
64. Lawrence Hill, “Can Black America Save Africa?” Walrus, February 2005.
Lawrence Hill, Any Known Blood, 1st ed. (Toronto: HarperCollins, 1997).
65. TS, 61–62.
66. Ibid., 64–65; emphasis added.
67. Ibid., 71.
69. Ibid., 69.
71. Hill, Black Berry, Sweet Juice, 230.
72. Ibid., 172.
73. Ibid., 173.
228
74. Ibid., 166.
75. Ibid., 192.
76. “As far as Africville goes, most people are focusing on, where’s our church?
Well, you know, where’s your money? Your land? Never mind your church, you
were given $200 for prime real estate, government owes y’all big time, that was
prime real estate property. People died as a result of them putting a dump next
door, all kinds of those issues; right now, it’s all about the church. The Africville
Genealogical Society is supposed to be working on getting some money, but, I
mean, it’s not happening, and if it’s happening, it’s happening extremely slow. By
the time it does happen the people who started it will probably be dead … It’s hard
to say how long [organized groups] will last, you never know how long
something’s going to last, just because people start with good intentions, it may
not last past a year, so it’s really hard to say on stuff like that. Especially when
you’re talking about Scotian people.” Ibid., 192. Nicole’s comments strongly
relate to the generational conflict in Haitian communities in Quebec. See M.
Potvin, “Second Generation Haitian Youth in Quebec: Between the ‘Real’
Community and the ‘Represented’ Community,” Journal of Canadian Ethnic
Studies, 31.1 (1999): 52.
77. On one hand: “Whenever the police comes into my neighbourhood to arrest
somebody and stuff, our whole neighbourhood comes in, we take pictures, we
pull out video cameras; this is how ridiculous it’s got … If I have kids my kids
probably won’t have anything to do with the cops and that’s horrible because cops
are supposed to protect and serve, but I wouldn’t want my children anywhere
around police. No, never, I don’t trust them. I never will.” On the other hand:
“Black people can actually fight and the police will not interrupt, I’ve seen it. I’ve
seen a girl get beaten up by a guy, naked, on Gottingen Street and four cop cars
drove right by. Eventually another girl had to go and jump out on a cop car, just to
get the cop to stop. Happens all the time … I’ve walked past, seen kids playing
right there, people are smoking weed, selling crack over there, kids are on the
ground right there. You know, they had a dogfight, right in the middle of the
playground. I know that they’re trying to clean it up. Round Africville, they’d
have certain areas where that stuff took place, it wasn’t just wherever.” TS, 188,
190–91.
78. Ibid., 176.
79. Ibid., 175; emphasis added.
80. Ibid., 193.
82. Ibid., 168.
83. Ibid., 185, 187.
84. Ibid., 175.
85. Ibid., 178. On Nicole’s use of “always a little different” see Nella Larsen,
Quicksand and Passing (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1928),
102; Naomi Pabst, “Always a Little Different: The Politics of Blackness” (UC at
Santa Cruz, 2000). While Larsen and Pabst articulate the ways in which people of
colour in majority white spaces can produce an effective opposition to racialist
oppression, Nicole opines:
If you’re a black family who lives in the suburbs in a pure white
neighbourhood and never bring your family around other black
people, well, then your children are going to reflect the values of
the community they live in, and the school that your children go to
and the functions they attend, which will probably be majority
229
white. I’ve never had a black friend who didn’t grow up in a lower
class neighbourhood because I really don’t have too much in
common in the end. Everything is different, perspectives on
everything, they don’t understand where I’m coming from, I don’t
understand where they’re coming from. End up just being
acquaintances, just saying hi when we walk down the street.” (TS,
195; emphasis added)
87. “I don’t really know any Caribbeans at all. Jamaicans, Jamaicans are just pretty
relaxed, chilled out people who say hi to everybody.” Ibid., 177.
88. Ibid., 180, 184.
90. Ibid.
91. “I really don’t meet too many people. I’ve been in Nova Scotia for 26 years, so as
far as I’m concerned, anybody I haven’t met now, I really don’t want to meet
you.” Ibid., 175, 184.
93. Ibid., 179–80.
94. Ibid.
95. “The family romance … serves on one hand the need for self-aggrandizement and
on the other a defence against incest … Where does the material for creating the
romance, adultery, illegitimate child and the like — come from? Usually from the
lower circles of servant girls. Such things are so common among them.” Sigmund
Freud, letter to Wilhelm Fleiss, 20 June 1898.
96. Otto Rank, The Myth of the Birth of the Hero: A Psychological Exploration of
Myth, expanded and updated, trans. Gregory C. Richter, and E. James Lieberman
(Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004).
98. Ibid., 244.
99. Ibid., 248.
100. Ibid., 246, 258.
101. Ibid., 256.
103. “They look at me, and look at my skin colour, as far as they’re concerned, I’m
white; I’m not black enough. Even if I tell them I’m half-black, they’re like ‘so
what? Your skin’s white.’” Ibid., 252.
104. Ibid., 244, 248, 258.
105. “It is strange that we had to wait for the dreams of colonized people in order to see
that, on the vertices of the pseudo triangle, mommy was dancing with the
missionary, daddy was being fucked by the tax collector, while the self was being
beaten by the white man.” Gilles Deleuze, and Felix Guattari, Anti-Oedipus:
Capitalism and Schizophrenia (New York: Viking Press, 1977), 96.
106. Ibid., 258.
107. TS, 249, 262–63.
109. Ibid., 261–63.
110. On the idea of whites suffering colonization see Pierre Vallières, White Niggers
of America (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1971). On the idea of white punks
sharing the fate of blacks “in the ghetto,” see the comments of Joe Lyndon of the
Sex Pistols:
230
There’s no such thing as patriotism any more. I don’t care if it
blows up … England never was free. It was always a load of
bullshit … Punks and Niggers are almost the same thing … when I
come to America I’m going straight to the ghetto … I’m not asking
blacks to like us. That’s irrelevant. It’s just that we’re doing
something they’d want to do if they had the chance. (C.M. Young,
“Rock is Sick and Living in London,” 20 October 1977)
111. TS, 266.
112. Ibid., 156–57.
113. “The funny thing is that my father has a thing about British people, he has a
humungous idea in his head that everyone who lives in Britain is automatically a
racist, which is funny as I’m talking to you.” TS, 64.
114. Various African-American cultural producers have also failed to introduce their
audiences to black British working-class cultures. Henry Louis Gates Jr.’s article
“Blacks in London” in the Africana Encyclopedia is a particularly striking
example of an African-American unable, or unwilling, to engage with
representatives of a culture who do not happen to be middle class. After being told
by Hall and Gilroy about the creative artistry of working-class individuals, Gates
Jr. did not grant his readers access to the words of working-class individuals.
Instead, he quoted a black bourgeoisie at length and remarked that working-class
Londoners of African and Caribbean descent did not “sound black.” An
Afro-Saxon butler was also used in The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air to mine laughs
from the presumed incompatibility of “the Queen’s English” and a black body. In
addition, a non-American black was useful for producers to erase the “house
Negro” from an African-American identity in the 1990s, just as AfricanAmerican actors are asked to affect Jamaican accents when they become servants
for a rich white families in Hollywood films like The Wedding Crashers (2005).
115. TS, 37.
116. “[P]eople making a living picking up stuff from the dump. That was Africville.”
TS, 35.
117. Ibid., 33, 38. “From Slavery to the Ghetto: The Story of the Negro in the
Maritimes,” paper presented to the New Brunswick Human Rights Commission,
26 March 1968.
118. Similar debates have occurred in the US after African immigrants like John Ogbu
and Caribbean immigrants like Thomas Sowell established differences in
academic achievement between the children of immigrants labelled black and
indigenous blacks, and then tried to explain these differences with reference to a
vague conception of “culture.” Whereas Ogbu distinguishes between voluntary
and involuntary immigrants in order to offer an explanation as to why black
immigrants (and the children of black immigrants) might outperform indigenous
blacks in academic achievement, Sowell contends that black Americans languish
when they are encouraged to identify with a “redneck” culture. John Ogbu, Black
American Students in an Affluent Suburb: A Study of Academic Disengagement,
(Mahweh, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 2003). Thomas Sowell, Black
Rednecks and White Liberals (New York: Encounter Books, 2006).
119. Wayde Compton, Performance Bond (Vancouver: Arsenal Pulp Press, 2004).
120. “British Marxists were not tangled up with black people because there were no
black people in Britain then.” Pamela Beshoff, “Conversation with C.L.R
James,” Jamaican Journal, 26.
121. “In Jamaica, as elsewhere in the United Kingdom, England differentiates
between the full bloods and the half bloods.” Eric Walrond, a well-known West
231
Indian novelist and journalist, in the Independent, 3 January 1925. In 1930,
Muriel Fletcher’s report on the “half-caste problem” in Liverpool was popular
with a few journalists because she provided them with an accessible study to
announce “A Social Menace: Half-Caste Evil in Liverpool,” Liverpool Post and
Mercury, 14 June 1930. Muriel Fletcher, “Report into the Colour Problem in
Liverpool and Other Ports,” (Liverpool Association for the Welfare of Half-Caste
Children, 1930).
122. Following his brief tour of Liverpool, Phillips announced that he couldn’t find
“anything in the city about which Liverpool born Blacks might feel particularly
proud.” Caryl Phillips, The Atlantic Sound, 1st Amer. ed., (New York: Knopf,
2000), 109.
123. Mike Phillips and Trevor Phillips, Windrush: The Irresistible Rise of Multi-racial
Britain (London: HarperCollins, 1998), 382.
124. Lewis Gordon, Existentia Africana: Understanding Africana Existential Thought
(New York: Routledge, 2000), 112. See his comment: “If the working class
should be careful of people who function as their bosses, why should darkskinned people be any different in virtue of the historical, supervisory role of
light-skinned people? It is not that black people are morally right in having such a
suspicion; it’s simply that they may be no more unusual than any other group who
is constituted as society’s bottom.”
125. A tabloid newspaper quoted Reese denigrating “Liverpool born blacks, the
products of mixed marriages.” He was even used to replicate Thatcher’s fears
about coloured immigrants “swarming” the white population: “The half-caste
population is well over 50% of the non-white population of Liverpool. They are
concentrated in Liverpool 8 and if they ever come together they would swarm
over everybody else.” “When Blacks and Browns Fall Out,” The Daily Star, 7
May 1981; J. Nassy Brown, Dropping Anchor, Setting Sail: Geographies of
“Race” and Identity in the Port City of Liverpool, England, (Stanford: 1994),
177.
126. Quoted in Ed Vulliamy, “We Can Work it Out,” London Guardian 20 October
2004.
127. An Alan Parker film that won transatlantic success with the trite comment, “The
Irish are the blacks of Europe” and northern soul music. De Paor has usefully
qualified the urge to tie Irish Republicanism in Northern Ireland to “Soul Power”:
In Northern Ireland, Catholics are blacks who happen to have
white skins. This is not a truth. It is an oversimplification and too
facile an analogy. But it is a better oversimplification than that
which sees the struggle in Northern Ireland in terms of religion …
The Northern Ireland problem is a colonial problem and the
“racial” distinction (and it is actually imagined as racial) between
the colonists and the natives is expressed in terms of religion.
(Liam De Paor, Divided Ulster [Harmondsworth, UK: Penguin
Books, 1971], xiii)
128. Some white English-born actors have also found themselves bamboozled by the
meaning of the term “cracker” in the United States. For example, Domenic West,
the lead actor in The Wire (an exploration of race, class, gender, crime and
policing set in Baltimore, Maryland that far surpasses the quality and range of
Fitz or Cracker), encouraged an arena filled with thousands of AfricanAmericans to watch a “cracker” show. Fortunately for West, his co-stars were on
hand to let the people know that he was a naïve Englishman. Feature
Commentary, “Port in a Storm,” The Wire, episode 25.
232
129. Paul Gilroy, The Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double-Consciousness
(Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1993), 101.
130. Paul Gilroy, Postcolonial Melancholia (New York: Columbia University Press,
2005), 126.
131. J. Nassy Brown, Dropping Anchor, 311.
132. Ibid., 291.
133. “When viewed from its local scene by the British reader, it is the Britishness of
Smith’s novel which stands out: a Guardian reviewer has declared White Teeth to
be ‘perhaps the best novel … we have ever read … about contemporary
London.’” Karen Westman, “Anatomy of a Dust Jacket: Deracination and British
Identity in Zadie Smith’s White Teeth,” paper presented at the Globalization and
the Image II MLA Convention, New York City, NY, 30 December 2002.
134. Mark Christian and Diedre Badejo, Multiracial Identity: An International
Perspective (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2000), 56. W. Ackah and Mark
Christian, eds., Black Organisation and Identity in Liverpool, (Liverpool:
Charles Wootten College Press, 1997). Mark Christian, “The Black Intellectual/
Activist Tradition: Notes on the Past, Present and Future,” Black Identity in the
20th Century: Expressions of the US and UK African Diaspora, (London: Hansib,
2002). Mark Christian obtained his BA in sociology and American studies at
Liverpool Hope College and went on to complete his master’s in black studies at
Ohio State University. He regularly contributes to the Journal of Black Studies
edited by Molefi Asante.
135. See W. Benton, “The Evolution of Afrikan Consciousness: The Effects of
R.A.C.I.S.M. on Afrikans in the Diaspora” (Halifax: Dalhousie University, 1997
[unpublished thesis]). Since Benton’s thesis was used by the African-Canadian
legal clinic in their testimony to the Supreme Court of Canada regarding the role
race should play in decisions regarding custody of mixed race relationships (see
http://www.aclc.net/cases/kvvte.html), it would be amiss not to note that David
Divine, the current James R. Johnston chair in African-Canadian studies at
Dalhousie University, also adopts an Afrocentric approach and was instrumental
in the attempts of the British Association of Black Social Workers and Allied
Professionals (ABSWAP) to deny the possibility of a “mixed race” existence.
Ten years after the National Association of Black Social Workers in the US
declared, “the black child should not be placed with white parents under any
circumstances,” ABSWAP looked to shape public policy in Britain by
announcing:
12(b) It has been seen that children of mixed parentage, the
so-called “mixed race” children of lighter skin, with physical
characteristics approximate to that of white adopters, are the first
to be placed transracially … Those who intend to adopt or foster
black children should recognise that there are no “mixed race”
children as such. They are perceived and related to by society as
black …
12(d) The term [“mixed race”] is derogatory and racist. It is a
conscious and hypocritical way of denying the reality of the child’s
blackness and the ways in which society generally perceives black
people. (“Black Children in Care,” ABSWAP’s evidence to the
House of Commons Social Services Committee [March 1983])
136. TS, 13.
137. Ibid., 16.
138. Gilroy, The Black Atlantic, 95–96.
233
139. Asante’s effort to pitch a vigilante Afrocentric COPS show offers one of the most
illuminating examples of his attempts to regulate inner-city blacks. In Malcolm X
as a Cultural Hero he begins his anecdote by announcing, “A few years ago I
observed about 10 young men in hot pursuit of one young fellow in the Richard
Allen Projects in North Philadelphia.” The intrepid Asante stopped his car and
ran after the young men. He intended to “break up what seemed to be sure
violence perpetrated on the potential victim. Thinking as I was moving in their
direction [a sure sign of a warrior-philosopher], I stopped running, walked and
then stopped. What occurred to me was the fact that these young men were not
Afrocentric and that it would make no sense to appeal to them on the basis of our
African culture or common values, particularly since many of them probably did
not believe they were Africans in the first place.” Molefi Asante, Malcolm X as a
Cultural Hero and Other Afrocentric Essays (Trenton, NJ: Africa World Press,
1993), 124. Alternatively, one could assume that they would be as unwilling to
receive racial profiling at the hands of Asante as they would from the Philadelphia
police department.
140. London Guardian, “Jesse Jackson, The Princely Paradox of Malcolm X,” 22
February 2005.
141. TS, 236–37.
142. Clarke, “Cool Politics.”
143. See Christian and Badejo, Multiracial Identity, 25.
144. J. Nassy Brown, Dropping Anchor, 157; emphasis added.
145. Ibid., 414; original emphasis. Also see Jackie Kay’s Adoption Papers
(Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Bloodaxe Press), 27 for Angela Davis’ impact on a
light-skinned black woman in Glasgow:
Angela Davis is the only female person I’ve seen (except for a
nurse on TV)
who looks like me. She had big hair like mine
that grows out instead of down.
My mum says it’s called an Afro.
If I could be as brave as her when I get older
I’ll be OK.
Last night I kissed her goodnight again
and wondered if she could feel the kisses
in prison all the way from Scotland.
Her skin is the same too you know
I can see my skin is that colour
146. TS, 142.
147. Ibid., 158, 152, 163.
148. Gary Younge, No Place Like Home: A Black Briton’s Journey through the
American South (London: Picador, 1999), 225–26. Marita Golden has also asked
why “the female icons of the movement, Civil Rights to Black Power, were
light-skinned Angela Davis, Rosa Parks, Coretta Scott King, Kathleen Cleaver
and Elaine Brown … but Fannie Lou Hamer was too black and too angry and too
country to achieve the icon status her sacrifice and her work should have earned
her.” Marita Golden, Don’t Play in the Sun: One Woman’s Journey through the
Color Complex (Toronto: Doubleday, 2004), 14.
149. “I was involved as coordinator for the Black Student’s Network for a number of
years, and often, at least once a year, there’d be a discussion on shadism, and that
discussion was always a very gendered discussion, and I never understood why
we had to have at least one a year; it was always a discussion proposed by
234
females, and in which the speakers were female; it doesn’t take too long to realize
that the obsession with shadism, in terms of societal thing, it’s very much a
gendered thing, it’s very much a notion of beauty and attractiveness.” Mark
Holding-Obeng, TS, 290.
150. Ibid., 97. The use of police officers is telling given Rocky’s later comment: “I’m
presently being sued by the police for protecting two, three, young black girls, I
mean, and speaking the truth. They will continue to move against any kind of
dissent, that’s the way the system works; it cannot accommodate dissent, real
dissent, meaningful dissent, they’ll try to crush you, so. The struggle continues.”
Ibid., 101.
151. Ibid., 262–63.
152. Ray Costello, Black Liverpool, The Early History of Britain’s Oldest Black
Community 1730–1918 (Liverpool: Picton Press, 2001), 21, 102.
153. George Elliott Clarke, “White Like Canada,” Transition (1997). Keanu is also
considered “white” by Armond White, “History gets lost in the Matrix,”
http://www.firstofthemonth.org/culture/culture_white_history.html.
Both Clarke and White erase Reeves’ Chinese-Hawaiian father so as to place him
squarely within a North American vision of whiteness that acts as a synonym for
EuroAmericans or EuroCanadians. They don’t challenge the myth that
“whiteness” only relates to people who refuse to acknowledge non-European
ancestors. Reeves condemns “half-breeds” in Constantine (2005), a Hollywood
film modelled on the Hellblazer comic book originally set in Newcastle.
154. Freud was thinking about alcohol when he described an “intoxicating media.”
Nonetheless, American popular culture also seems to offer a service to
individuals in “the struggle for happiness and in keeping misery at a distance.”
Sigmund Freud, Civilization, Society and Religion: Group Psychology,
Civilization and its Discontents, and Other Works, vol. 12, ed. Albert Dickson
(Harmondsworth, UK: Penguin Books, 1985), 266. In addition, whereas Freud
lampooned Rank’s American methods by comparing psychotherapy to the
“white-washing of the Negro,” Fanon famously dismissed the “jazz howl
hiccupped by a poor unfortunate Negro” used by whites faithful to expressions of
“nigger-hood.” Otto Rank, Beyond Psychology: Published Privately by Friends
and Students of the Author (Camden, NJ: Haddon Craftsmen, 1941), 272. Fanon,
The Wretched of the Earth, 195–96.
235
David Palmieri
Stuffing the Scarecrow: The Anti-Americanism
of George Grant and Pierre Vadeboncœur
Abstract
Anti-Americanism in Canada experiences upswings and downswings and,
since September 11, 2001, has made a return, in spite of the wishes of
historian Jack Granatstein who in 1996 declared that it was “dead as a
dodo.” A comparative study of two examples of the genre, George Grant’s
Lament for a Nation (1965) and Pierre Vadeboncœur’s Trois essais sur
l’insignifiance (1983), demonstrates that English and French Canadian
anti-Americanism share a similar foundation in their resentment and in their
stress on the purity of their societies’ foundings. Both Grant and
Vadeboncœur believe that American Protestantism is corrupt; they defend
ideologies, Red Toryism and Quebecois separatism, that have hindered the
development of a Conservative political tradition in Canada; and they admire
France. Grant’s fascination with Céline brings to the foreground the
similarities between Canadian anti-Americanism and European antiSemitism. The increase in anti-Americanism in Canada since September 11,
2001 represents an inevitable turn toward nationalism after a twenty-year
period of continentalism.
Résumé
L’anti-américanisme au Canada connaît des hauts et des bas; or, depuis le
11 septembre 2001, il est réapparu en dépit des souhaits de l’historien Jack
Granatstein qui déclarait en 1996 qu’il était « tout ce qu’il y a de plus mort ».
L’étude comparative de deux exemples du genre, Lament for a Nation de
George Grant (1965) et Trois essais sur l’insignifiance de Pierre
Vadeboncœur (1983), montre que l’anti-américanisme canadien-anglais et
l’anti-américanisme canadien-français reposent sur des bases semblables :
leur ressentiment et leur insistance sur la pureté des fondements de leur
société respective. Grant et Vadeboncœur croient tous deux que le
protestantisme américain est corrompu; ils défendent des idéologies – le
conservatisme libéral et le séparatisme québécois – qui ont fait obstacle au
développement d’une tradition politique conservatrice au Canada; en outre,
ils admirent la France. La fascination de Grant pour Céline met au premier
plan les ressemblances entre l’anti-américanisme canadien et l’antisémitisme européen. L’accroissement de l’anti-américanisme au Canada
depuis le 11 septembre 2001 représente un inévitable virage vers le
nationalisme, après vingt-cinq ans de continentalisme.
The global rise of anti-Americanism in the eighteen months between the
Islamist terrorist attack against Manhattan and Washington, DC on
31, 2005
September 11, 2001 and the start of the Second Iraq War on 20 March 2003
had an enormous impact on Canada and effectively put an end to twenty
years of friendly relations with the United States. Since 1774, when British
Parliament passed the Quebec Act and successfully dissuaded French
Canadians from joining the American Revolution, Canadian thought has
moved back and forth between continentalism and nationalism, the latter
perspective never straying far from its foundation in mistrust of “America.”
In Yankee Go Home? Canadians and Anti-Americanism (1996), historian
Jack Granatstein argued that Brian Mulroney’s re-election in 1988, and the
Free Trade Agreement that was its immediate result, symbolized the
definitive victory of continentalism. In effect, during the 1990s, Canadian
anti-Americans found it difficult to make their case.1 However, the new
forces at work since the revelation of American vulnerability are again
pushing Canadian thinking, particularly in Quebec, away from continentalism.
On 18 November 2002 in Montreal’s La Presse, editorialist André Pratt
wrote, “I continue to be astonished by the scale of the present anti-American
current in Quebec. If we are to believe several of our readers, the terrorist
menace has for all intents and purposes been invented by the Bush
administration to justify its aggressive policies!”2 Anti-Americanism in
Quebec has two sources: first, a native variant that emphasizes the
province’s “colonial” status and, second, a French variant that stems from
the influence on the Quebecois and francophones worldwide of France’s
“obsession anti-américaine” as it manifests itself in newspapers like Le
Monde.3
A one-sentence paragraph opens Canadian journalist Knowlton Nash’s
book Kennedy and Diefenbaker (1990): “We were the original antiAmericans.”4 In Here: A Biography of the New North America (2001), New
York Times reporter Anthony DePalma writes, “Canadians can be
considered the original anti-Americans; their feeling of antipathy toward
certain aspects of the United States date to the first days of the new
republic.”5 Canadian historian Frank H. Underhill joked, “The Canadian is
the first anti-American, the model anti-American, the archetypal
anti-American, the ideal anti-American as he exists in the mind of God.”6
Canada is, in fact, an excellent laboratory for studying anti-Americanism.
In the 1770s and 1780s, the Protestant Loyalists who rejected the United
States’ new freedom from monarchy and established religion travelled, or
were forced, into British North America — today Ontario, Quebec and the
Maritime provinces — which led them into cohabitation with
French-speaking Catholics. The two founding groups of the Canadian
Confederation are, as Nash, DePalma and Underhill recognize, the world’s
first anti-Americans.
Anti-Americanism in Canada is thus a tradition. Canadians can embrace
or stand aloof from it, but the tradition will go on with or without them.
238
Rooted in the eighteenth century, anti-Americanism begins in Quebec with
France’s defeat in the French and Indian Wars, and in English Canada with
Britain’s defeat in the American Revolution. These reverses led many
Canadians to conceive of their nation’s origins as being purer than that of
the “materialist” American republic, an enduring sentiment of moral
superiority substituting for military victory.
The last sharp upturn in anti-Americanism in Canada occurred between
1965, the outbreak of the Vietnam War, and 1984, when Pierre Elliott
Trudeau stepped down after fifteen years as prime minister. Two
particularly virulent books that bracket this period offer insights into the
enduring themes of Canadian anti-Americanism revived in the aftermath of
9/11: George Grant’s Lament for a Nation: The Defeat of Canadian
Nationalism (1965) and Pierre Vadeboncœur’s Trois essais sur
l’insignifiance (Three Essays on Insignificance) published in Montreal and
Paris in 1983.
The following essay seeks to identify the perennial themes of the
Canadian Confederation’s two anti-American traditions, specifically
through these two books. It will not, however, place Lament for a Nation
and Trois essais sur l’insignifiance in the context of their authors’ larger
intellectual projects: in Grant’s case, his critique of technology and
modernity; in Vadeboncœur’s, his articles in favour of Quebec’s
independence, and his art and literary criticism.7 Lament for a Nation
mourns the downfall of John Diefenbaker’s Progressive Conservative
Party government in April 1963. Grant attributes its failure to the
impossibility of conservatism in an era during which “American
modernity” imposes uniformity and destroys local cultures.8 Trois essais
sur l’insignifiance analyzes James Cain’s novel The Postman Always Rings
Twice (1934), Judy Chicago’s feminist sculpture The Dinner Party,
exhibited at the Musée d’art contemporain in Montreal in 1982, and a
passage from Julian Green’s Journal set in Harlem in 1933. In them,
Vadeboncœur identifies three phenomena that he believes to be typical of
“America”: the “liquidation of culture,” “religion reduced to the level of bit
player,” and the victory of an arbitrary “raw reality without philosophy.”9
Grant was born in 1918 in Toronto. Vadeboncœur was born in 1920 in
Strathmore on the island of Montreal. Coming to maturity in the 1940s, the
English Canadian became a university professor, while the French
Canadian worked for 25 years as a union official before committing himself
in 1975 to writing full time. In his book Radical Tories, journalist Charles
Taylor places Grant in the Red Tory tradition. A “Tory” because of his
loyalty to English-Canadian Loyalism, Grant also became a hero to the new
Left, a “Red,” in the 1960s during the Vietnam War because of his equally
strong commitment to pacifism. Vadeboncœur published articles in the
1950s in Cité libre, at that time Quebec’s most important reformist
239
magazine, but he radicalized in the 1960s, becoming an indépendantiste, a
socialist, and an admirer of the Cuban revolution. Les deux royaumes, his
1978 book on the loss of “spiritual” values, however, “disconcerted” some
of his readers on the secular Left.10
Both Grant and Vadeboncœur revere Europe in their writings. As
Canadians they struggle with their existence in North America, and their
contradictory feelings about the continent stem from their lack of
“groundedness,” expressed by Northrop Frye in his oft-quoted insight that
the Canadian writer, instead of asking the question “who am I?” seems to be
asking “where is here?”11
An admirer of Grant, Ian Angus has worked to formulate a uniquely
Canadian philosophy. The difficulties in articulating it, to his mind, indicate
a “deep danger” in the idea of such a national philosophy and in Canadian
culture itself. The danger has two parts:
The first is simply envy. We have never been at the top. Canadian
culture is permeated with resentment of those who are and
consists, in many secret ways, of strategies of self-promotion. The
second is more subtle and may be called “the purity of origins.”
Since we have never been in charge, we do not have to take
responsibility for the way things are.12
In Angus’terms, Grant and Vadeboncœur are both resentful of the United
States’ power and influence and convinced of the purity of English- and
French-Canada’s origins.13 Grant combines his anti-Americanism with a
preference for “Greek” over “Judaic” Christianity; his complex attitude
toward Judaism brings to the foreground the relationship between
European anti-Semitism and Canadian anti-Americanism. Vadeboncœur’s
veneration of French art informs his resentment of the long reach of
American culture.
Grant: A Fearful Hatred14
In his late teens and early twenties, Grant considered John Dewey and
William James his favourite philosophers. He read Robert Frost and Hart
Crane, and admired Franklin Roosevelt. However, in “Canada Must
Choose: The Empire, Yes or No?” (1945), a pamphlet published when he
was 27, Grant firmly rejected the continentalism of his youth and
reintegrated into a Canadian nationalist perspective.15 The image that he
formed of the United States at that time was set in stone. With the zeal of a
reformed apostate, Grant would for the rest of his life reject pragmatism,
modernity, liberalism, progressivism, corporations, capitalism, and
technology, all of which to his mind became “American.”
Louis-Ferdinand Céline’s postwar novels D’un château l’autre, Nord
and Rigodon fascinated Grant. Calling it “the greatest literary masterpiece
240
of this era,” Grant deeply admired the trilogy, which chronicles Céline’s
odyssey through Europe in the final days of World War II.16 Yet the French
novelist’s pre-war anti-Semitic pamphlets troubled Grant.17 Gerald Owen
compares Céline’s “pacifist hatred” in these pamphlets to Grant’s
“anti-nuclear anger” in Lament for a Nation, charitably adding that the
Canadian, however, “did not leap into a lie, let alone into a wilfully lying
fantasy as Céline did.”18 Nonetheless, Grant’s anti-Americanism plays the
same obsessive role in his thought that anti-Semitism did in Céline’s: the
bat in the belfry that won’t stop squeaking.
Grant’s anti-Americanism has political and religious components. In his
view, a wise political philosophy served as a foundation for the
conservatism of the Loyalists. That philosophy rejected the separation of
church and state established by the founders of the United States, a secular
nation, in Grant’s mind, whose moral shallowness has corrupted
Protestantism, Catholicism and Judaism.
In Lament for a Nation, Grant argues that in the United States “skeptical
liberalism” has replaced other liberal traditions based on the Church,
constitutional government, and classical studies. In contrast, the Loyalists
who established English Canada maintained their allegiance to the British
Tory tradition with its noblesse oblige and stress on community over
individual rights. According to Grant, the Loyalists were less followers of
the liberal John Locke than of the Anglican theologian Richard Hooker
who, in Of the Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity (1593–1662), argued for a
society made coherent through its religion, thus justifying an established
church.19 Janet Ajzenstat writes that, in Grant’s view, “Canadians should be
wary of liberal democracy because Canada is inherently a ‘Tory’nation.” A
continentalist, Ajzenstat has opposed Grant’s conception of their nation’s
history but admitted in 1998 that “one comes across his arguments
constantly in the media and in the political statements of educated
Canadians.”20
The ambivalent response of Canadians to Lament for a Nation began at
its publication. Saturday Night said the book was flawed but served an
admirable purpose. John Gellner wrote that Grant “has made some
important and debatable points and, by overstating his case, he will shock
thoughtful readers into giving some thought to a very great and very
pressing Canadian problem.”21 Striking the same ambiguous chord,
Alexander Brady felt that some points in Grant’s argument were “true,
provocative, and brilliantly expressed.” The University of Toronto
Quarterly reviewer, however, was “disturbed by the author’s exaggeration
and distortion in the analysis and the stark black and white colours in which
he pronounces judgment and disposes of Canada as a branch plant
satellite.”22 The first reviews of Grant’s future classic often gave the book
this kind of backhanded compliment. In Cité libre, philosopher Charles
241
Taylor described Lament for a Nation as “one of those remarkable books
that goes to the bottom of a problem without throwing much light on it.”23
In 1965, Grant participated “as a nationalist and a conservative” in a
teach-in against the Vietnam War, organized by his nephew Michael
Ignatieff at the University of Toronto.24 This event marks the beginning of
Grant’s popularity with the nationalist Left. In the decade after its
publication, the influence of Lament for a Nation slowly grew. The text that
best explains why this occurred is poet Dennis Lee’s “Cadence, Country,
Silence: Writing in Colonial Space.” First given as a talk at a writers’
congress in Montreal in 1972, the essay is a Grantean howl against
continentalism. Paralyzed as an artist by his life in a space colonized by
American culture, Lee credits Grant’s essays with giving him the tools to
understand his and other Canadians’ “self-hatred and sense of inferiority.”
Lee felt liberated by Grant’s description of their Loyalist ancestors as men
devoted to the “classical European tradition,” opponents of the “liberal
assumptions that gave birth to the United States.”25
Grant and Lee’s caricature of the United States as a monolithically liberal
society owes much to sociologist Louis Hartz’s 1955 book The Liberal
Tradition in America and its 1964 sequel The Founding of New Societies.
Hartz believed the nations formed by European immigration were
“fragments,” their political cultures frozen in the historical era of their
founding. The United States was a liberal fragment without a relevant
socialist party because it lacked a feudal tradition, socialism resulting, in
Hartz’s scheme, from a Marxist-type synthesis of feudalism and liberalism.
According to Philip Abbott, The Liberal Tradition in America was “the
dominant interpretive text in American political thought for a generation,”
but in the late 1960s it came under severe attack “and by the 1990s was
‘pretty much dead.’”26
In Canada, Hartz’s theory was taken up by Gad Horowitz, whose 1966
article “Conservatism, Liberalism, and Socialism in Canada: An
Interpretation” is, wrote H.D. Forbes, the best-known argument about the
origins of Canadian culture, and “one of the few things in the field that
practically everyone has read and remembers.”27 Horowitz labelled French
Canada a feudal fragment and identified a “Tory touch,” a residue of the
Loyalist migration, in English Canada.28 The presence of Toryism has thus
led to the establishment of an enduring socialist tradition in English
Canada, represented in politics by the New Democratic Party.
A continentalist school of thought has formed to combat the portrait of
Canada’s origins advanced by Grant and Horowitz. Lament for a Nation
and “Conservatism, Liberalism, and Socialism in Canada: An
Interpretation” are not based on a study of primary documents. Grant and
Horowitz deduce the presence of Toryism in Loyalist thought but do not
provide empirical evidence to prove it.29 In The Origins of Canadian
242
Politics (1986), historian Gordon T. Stewart provides an alternative view.
A comparative study of Britain, the United States and Canada, and based on
the work of J.G.A. Pocock and Bernard Bailyn, the book identifies “court”
and “country” parties in the anglo-atlantic culture of the eighteenth and
nineteenth centuries organized around platforms of mistrust and faith in
democracy. In the United States, the court/country party division
manifested itself in the federalism of Alexander Hamilton and the
Democratic-Republicanism of Thomas Jefferson. For Stewart, Canadian
Tories were not disinterested paragons of “community” and “tradition” but
court party men, many of whom were interested in using the government to
enrich themselves, often through patronage.30 Ajzenstat calls these two
parties the “liberal democrats” and the “civic republicans”; the former
represented for her by Étienne Parent and Joseph Howe and the latter by
Louis-Joseph Papineau and William Lyon Mackenzie, the leaders of the
1837 rebellion.31
It is significant that the first chapter of an important 1998 contribution to
this school of thought is entitled “Liberal-Republicanism: The Revisionist
Picture of Canada’s Founding.” If the evidence continues to mount
demonstrating the ideological character of the Grant-Horowitz scheme of
Canada’s origins, the “revisionist” interpretation may one day become the
dominant approach. During the outbreak of anti-Americanism in the
months after 9/11, however, the Grant-Horowitz paradigm continued to
provide an intellectual frame for many Canadians.32
Under the influence of Hartz, in Lament for a Nation Grant argues that
political differences among Americans are illusory. Canada’s neighbour,
the “most progressive society on earth,” guided by “Jeffersonian
liberalism,” desires for individuals “the emancipation of the passions.”33 In
the United States, conservatism is impossible, and Americans who call
themselves conservatives are in truth liberals.34
Grant also seems to be engaged in a frustrated dialogue with Russell
Kirk’s The Conservative Mind (1953), which argues that American
conservatism does indeed exist and that its founding text is Edmund
Burke’s Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790). In Kirk’s view, in
the 1790s Alexander Hamilton and John Adams formulated American
conservatism, which finds its greatest voice in Abraham Lincoln, struggles
against the excesses of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, goes into
eclipse during the New Deal, and is reborn in the 1950s.35 Arapid debatable
rundown of American political history, this sentence, given its sympathetic
tone, is also one that could never have been written by Grant.
Ernest Manning’s Political Realignment (1967), written like Lament for
a Nation during Lester Pearson’s term as prime minister from 1963 to 1968,
analyzes conservatism from a western-Canadian perspective. Unlike
Grant, who mourns the passing of Loyalist conservatism, Manning planned
243
its adaptation to a new era. He proposed “a rationalized two party federal
political system.” Manning felt that the Progressive Conservative Party,
“for reasons not primarily of its own making,” was the vehicle for bringing
together his Social Credit movement and other groups on the right.36 His
proposal was realized in 2003 when Peter MacKay and Stephen Harper
negotiated the merger of the Progressive Conservative Party and the
Alberta-based Canadian Alliance to form the Conservative Party of Canada
(CPC). The formation of the CPC is in part recognition by its leaders that the
Grantean Red Tory current is riddled with contradictions that have hindered
the articulation of a coherent conservative tradition in Canada.
In Lament for a Nation’s most famous sentence, Grant states that “the
impossibility of conservatism in our era is the impossibility of Canada.”37
He calls Canada a branch plant society of the United States; for him, the new
CPC, a political formation oriented more toward North America than
Europe, would simply be branch plant conservatism. Western Canada,
however, is not the Loyalist heartland of Nova Scotia and the southern
halves of Ontario and New Brunswick, as shown by Kim Campbell’s angry
reaction in the late 1980s to her reading of Grant’s classic. The future prime
minister from British Columbia felt that the Canada “lamented by George
Grant and others is a Canada whose history is a colonial history … a history
in which central Canada has arrogated to itself the right to define what the
roles of the components of this country will be.”38
The conflict at the centre of Grant’s thought — whether Canadian
conservatism should be oriented toward its Tory past or toward the
post-World War II American conservative revival announced by Russell
Kirk — has been decided against his wishes. The resentment of Kim
Campbell and many others has led Canadian conservatism to separate from
the Loyalist homelands and take root in western Canada. I would argue that
in the future conservative thought — using the CPC as its political vehicle
— will develop the “terrestrial” identity of Canada based on its existence as
a neighbour of the United States in North America.
The religious component of Grant’s anti-Americanism found expression
in a 1959 lecture that dismissed American Protestantism as “secularized
Calvinism,”39 and, in Lament for a Nation, that criticizes American
Catholicism for not questioning “the assumptions of the society that
permits it, except in the most general way.”40 Secularized or sold out,
American Protestantism and Catholicism serve the empire.
In a 1969 essay, “In Defence of North America,” Grant argues that
American Judaism is close to the American dream, but that it would be
degrading “to say that it has been able to express its riches in American
culture when the public contribution of Jews has been the packaged
entertainment of Broadway and Hollywood, the shallow coteries of
intellectual New York.” Different immigrant groups on the continent have
244
“colored the central current of the American dream,” such as the large role
Catholics play in politics or “Jews in communications and intellectual life,”
but they have been making contributions to “traditions utterly differing
from their own.”41 Eli Mandel — noting that Grant seems to have forgotten
the contributions of English-Canadian Christians such as Innes, McLuhan,
and Frye to “communications” — rightly condemns this statement as “not
worthy of serious intellectual discourse.”42
Later, in a 1983 article on Céline, Grant analyzes the rise of “modern antiSemitism.” He writes that the Jews were
pouring into western Europe from the east, their religion setting
them free from the straining loneliness which was consequent on
the impersonal world of mass civilization. They could treat the
public world [as capitalists and communists] without thinking of
the consequences of destroying it, because they had a nation other
than the nation which the public world manifested.43
In explaining the “mistake” of a “great artist,” Grant uses a language similar
to that of Lament for a Nation, which censures the United States for being a
“destructive nation.”
In Grant’s thinking, Christianity has Greek and Judaic roots, and he
expressed his preference in an interview:
But that does not mean there aren’t grave intellectual differences
between Christianity and Judaism. Clearly, for myself, I’m on the
side of Christianity that is farthest away from Judaism, and nearest
to the account of Christianity that is close to Hinduism in its
philosophic expression. I would accept what Clement of
Alexandria said: some were led to the Gospel by the Old
Testament, many were led by Greek philosophy. This same applies
today when there are many ways into the apprehension of what is
universal about Christ. What I object to in many modern theologians (particularly the Germans) is that they make Christianity
depend on the religious history of a particular people, as told in the
Old Testament.44
Published two years before his death, Grant’s Queen’s Quarterly essay
on Céline holds the key to the tortured amalgam in his thought of admiration
for Judaism, disdain for the products of American-Jewish culture,
disagreement with the argument of German theologians who make
Christianity depend on the Old Testament, and his veneration of the French
anti-Semitic novelist. At pains not to fall into anti-Semitism, Grant’s
analysis nonetheless veers toward apology, especially when he asks his
reader to “just read” and understand Hitler’s account of his loneliness in the
decaying gaudy world of pre–World War I Vienna.45 The Jews were
supposedly less lonely than the Hitlers of Europe because of their religion.
245
Grant’s analysis of Céline’s “paranoia” and “hate” concerning the Jews
merits close attention. For him, the French novelist was a European pacifist
who “thought that the Jews and the English were trying to push the French
into war with the Germans, and that this should be avoided at all costs.” This
observation leads Grant, a Canadian pacifist, into an “explanation” of
anti-Semitism, which suggests that his identification with Céline is in part
an effort to understand his own “paranoia,” a feeling which, he argues, is
sometimes justified, and his own “hate,” which he rationalizes in asking:
“Aren’t all of us, other than the saints, full of hates of one kind or another?”
Grant writes:
I must first state that it seems to me unimportant to take seriously
the political judgments of most of us. They are caused mainly by
necessity and chance — occasionally a little by good. They are
better understood in terms of comedy than by behavioral science.46
Avowedly anti-American and avowedly not anti-Semitic, Grant’s
analysis of Celine’s obsession with the Jews reveals the rationalized
paranoia and hate that lie behind his own obsession with the Americans.
Sometimes labelled Jewish, Hollywood has long been a favourite target
of Canadian anti-Americans.47 However, in Grant’s view, pragmatism, not
Hollywood, is the most “iniquitous” component of American culture. He
considers the philosophy of William James as simply a manifestation of
dying liberal Protestantism. 48 In Trois essais sur l’insignifiance,
Vadeboncœur also laments the degradation of “le protestantisme” in the
United States.49 In a review of William Christian’s biography of Grant, W.J.
Hankey identifies the weakness in the argumentation of Canadians who
adopt this point of view:
There are blind spots. He [Grant] was not capable — as Canadians
frequently are not, their relations being too exigent — of doing
justice to the ambiguities in the American “experiment.” The
United States is not just the imperial center of the engulfing secular
tyranny, she is equally the most vibrant and creative actual
Christian society, infinitely more so than the Britain on which
Canada depended.50
Four months before he died on 27 September 1988, Grant, an
anti-abortion activist, admitted that he was confused to find allies in the
heartland of “secular liberalism,” and told his future biographer, “One of
the things that really surprised me and made me understand that I really
didn’t understand the United States was this revival of Pentecostal religion,
because naturally I found myself on the same side of the issue about
abortion.”51 After his youthful flirtation with American culture, Grant was
blinded all his adult life by what he called “his deep ancestral antipathy to
the United States.”52
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Vadeboncœur: A Profound Hatred53
On our arrival in New York, we went first to the business center,
Manhattan. This vast temple dedicated to Mammon. What else
could it be dedicated to? Isn’t it the idol’s soul palpitating with
vertiginous rapidity, at ground level and in the air, in the noise of
these trucks, cars and trains? Isn’t it money that pushes these
passersby to walk rapidly, eyes fevered, hurrying to reach the one
goal which they fear will flee before them, taking hardly the time to
sustain their bodies, entering a restaurant only if they are sure to
find a quick lunch? Isn’t it the spirit of the god of money that lives
from top to bottom in these monstrous sky-scrapers with their
categories of elevators, rapides, express, omnibus, loading and
unloading every minute, where masses of salesmen, stenographers, typists and telephone, telegraph, and wireless boys are
unable to breathe?54
A French Jesuit published the above paragraph in 1922 in La revue
canadienne. When Catholicism dominated Quebec, its clergy often
promoted anti-Americanism. Since the Church’s collapse in the 1960s,
intellectuals on the Left have been its messengers. Their secularized
language, however, retains traces of Quebec’s clerical past. Pierre
Vadeboncœur writes:
Our skepticism concerning the United States of America and the
severity that I am showing for a culture that represents, in its mass,
an anti-metaphysics and an anti-morality, or an absence of
metaphysics, of morality, of spirit, of spirituality, an incredible
mediocrity — this skepticism, this severity strikes against such
power! America imposes its power like a force that will lead to the
end of the world; or simply, it has murdered in man too many things
and man can no longer judge today what it has done to him.55
This example of leftist anti-Americanism from Vadeboncœur’s Trois
essais sur l’insignifiance shares the word “spirit” with Father Tamisier’s
article. The spirit —corrupted, according to Tamisier, by its connection to
money, and of which Vadeboncœur sees the complete absence in the United
States — links the thought of the two men. Tamisier’s warning that the
worshippers of Mammon may one day control the world is confirmed 61
years later by Vadeboncœur, for whom Mammon does rule, having left man
mediocre, immoral, and spiritually murdered. The culture of the United
States stands over the corpse of humanity, a smoking gun in hand.
The first readers of Trois essais sur l’insignifiance tended to have
extreme reactions to its condemnation of America. Pierre Quesnel gave it a
glowing review in the separatist Le Devoir, calling it “a beautiful book to
meditate on.”56 Other critics defended the American artists it denigrates.
Jean-Pierre Roy criticized Vadeboncœur’s “strange mythical conception”
of James Cain as a novelist who was “inconscient,” while Rose-Marie
247
Arbour defended Judy Chicago from a feminist perspective.57 More
ambiguously, Gilles Marcotte offered Trois essais a hedging positive
notice in L’actualité, criticizing the author’s lack of knowledge of
American culture but praising him for discovering that our “present values
resemble at times a denial of culture, of any possible culture.”58
The roots of Vadeboncœur’s 1983 anti-American tract can be traced to
New France’s defeat in the French and Indian Wars. Officially recognizing
the numeric and military superiority of the continent’s English-speaking
Protestant majority, the Treaty of Paris in 1763 ended the dream of a
French-speaking Catholic North America. Throughout the nineteenth
century, French Canada’s priests and bishops engaged in an ideological war
with the modernizing forces infiltrating their country from the United
States and Europe. In 1837, Papineau and the Patriots, inspired by the
American Revolution, declared war on their British colonial master, while
in the 1850s and 1860s, les Rouges and the Institut Canadien battled an
ultramontane clergy. Neither group fared well. The Patriots were militarily
defeated, and Monsignor Bourget led a victorious campaign against les
rouges that reached a symbolic end in 1869 when the Vatican placed the
previous year’s “annuaire de l’Institut Canadien” on the Index. Liberals
and anti-clericals had an impact on Quebecois culture throughout the
nineteenth century, but their breakthrough came in the twentieth century
when the Church’s hold on the popular culture began to wane, and then
collapsed.
Vadeboncœur, educated before Catholicism’s fall, writes surrounded by
its various ideological replacements on the political and cultural Left. The
passage from clerical to leftist anti-Americanism in Quebec, however,
required little change in the substance of its arguments. On each side of the
divide, two perceived qualities of the United States are singled out for
criticism: its materialism and its love of action for its own sake.
Trois essais sur l’insignifiance is, in essence, a reworking of the
exemplary anti-American text of the clerical era, La revue Dominicaine’s
special issue of 1936, “Notre Américanisation.” In that issue, Hermas
Bastien wrote that “economics dominates” the United States.59 Striking the
same note, Vadeboncœur condemns American culture because it has
reduced humanity to its “economic meaning.”60 Father Raymond-M. Voyer
is not far from that view when he writes that American Catholics are
characterized by the stress they place on “action,” which leads them to
neglect the “mystical” element of Christian life,61 a point that in turn
resonates with Vadeboncœur, who states that “America is the daughter of
the act, not of thought,” and, that by the “primacy of the gesture,”
Americans have devised a culture that devastates other cultures and has
earned them “their power and their inanity.”62
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The Dominicans and Vadeboncœur also share the conviction that
American culture corrupts women. In 1937, Ernestine Pineault-Leveille
wrote that “americanization has unbalanced women,” and that by
transforming their character and soul it “menaces the stability of the
family.”63 In Vadeboncœur’s Trois essais, feminism is American because,
without a philosophical basis, it has entered into the “pragmatism of
success.” The essayist feels that the women’s movement has inherited the
“anti-spiritual spirit” of the American twentieth century.64 Seeing in its
author a misogynist threatened by women, Rose-Marie Arbour calls
Vadeboncœur’s argument in this essay “reactionary” and “pointless.”65
Vadeboncœur’s opinions do not issue from the Quebecois extreme. He
has won virtually every literary prize the province has to offer, from the
most prestigious government award, the Athanase-David Prize in 1976 for
his writings up to that time to the Victor-Barbeau Prize in 2001 for his book
L’humanité improvisée. Publishing regularly in Liberté and L’Action
nationale, and counting among his admirers important critics like François
Ricard, Vadeboncœur and his books have been at the centre of the
province’s literary thought for 40 years.66
The most important word in Vadeboncœur’s lexicon is “culture.” In Trois
essais he states, “I have an enormous hunger for culture.”67 It is his view that
when France was the centre of Western culture the world had a conscience,
but, with the arrival of “American materialism,” man has returned to an
“animal morality.”68 The United States’ culture has not replaced France’s;
what has occurred is more fundamental. The idea has come to dominate the
world that “there is no need for ideas,” and Vadeboncœur wonders: “Would
man be a dog?”69
Expressing his dualism, Vadeboncœur’s Les deux royaumes, his 1978
essay on “l’esprit,” opens the door into his Manichean conscience, which
loves the good (Europe, childhood innocence, the interior) and hates the
bad (America, the spiritual poverty of contemporary man, the exterior). Les
deux royaumes is a quest for the “country of the spirit,” and Vadeboncœur
finds it in an interior “space.”70 Like Dennis Lee’s national space, his
Canada colonized by America’s philosophy of “essential human freedom,”
Vadeboncœur’s space, his “heart of hearts” (for intérieur), has been
corrupted by the corrupt “liberté” exported to the world by American
“inculture.”
For Vadeboncœur, “culture is the worship of the soul,” and the demigod
creators of this cult are “the artist, the mystic, the writer.” These are the men
and women who have the most contact with the soul. In a 1996 essay he
writes, “No one has, in the full sense, more culture than the artist, the mystic,
the writer. Because they make it.”71 Like Lee’s Canadian, Vadeboncœur’s
Quebecois often feels inferior.72 Vadeboncœur himself overcomes his
feeling of inferiority by watching Marcel Dubé’s play “Le retour des oies
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blanches” or by being in the presence of paintings by the poet Michèle
Lalonde. Through these works of art, “the soul takes possession of a
good.”73
French Canada’s religious culture also gave to Vadeboncœur and his
generation a sense of the “good.” When, in Les deux royaumes, he
nostalgically describes his childhood, Vadeboncœur tends to avoid the
word “Catholicism” but often respectfully uses the more imprecise
linguistic symbol “religion.”74 Less reserved concerning Jesus Christ,
Vadeboncœur describes Him as “the only historical character who gives the
impression of having entirely existed, as if being itself had played his role.”
The writer considers Jesus a revolutionary, like himself, and feels that, in
spite of the Quebecois’entry into “modernité,” Jesus still belongs to them as
an example of “absolute dignity”:
Is it because of his words, his legend, because of the fact that we
believed that he was himself the living God? We don’t know how to
untangle it all. But it is certain in our spirits as the sons of
Christendom, this God made man does not seem to have been
contingent.75
For Vadeboncœur, although the Quebecois, unlike their French Canadian
ancestors, may no longer believe Jesus Christ was the “living God,” they
have internalized his words and legend; they are still “the sons of
Christendom.” Given that America is on the side of bad, he must deny that
America also belongs to Christendom, and, thus, he describes the United
States as a “post-Christian” nation.76 Like Grant, he criticizes American
Protestantism, but goes further. Protestantism in America started out
virtuously, but slowly its spirit turned to “activity” and “exterior possessions.” Like New Yorkers for Father Tamisier, American Protestantism, for
Vadeboncœur, worships an idol:
In the end, it wasn’t even a religion, or to put it better, it wasn’t a
religion at all, for only a feeling of legitimacy persisted. The entire
Protestant conscience, the good Protestant conscience, was
engaged in new work. She marked it with her intensity, her
exclusiveness, her load of passion and will, her narrow views; so
that an idol, taking the place of God, received from the Protestants
the service destined to God, without the faithful, for all that,
thinking that anything had been subtracted from Him. But look, the
American has managed a complete transfer and he has fixed
forever his new pole: the exterior.77
The late Quebecois critic André Belleau, observing his reactions while
reading Vadeboncœur, noted, “I feel myself becoming intolerant and
moralizing.”78
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Conclusion
Globally, the literature of anti-Americanism is enormous. The Canadian
contribution to the genre represents the oldest continuous argument against
the United States. Lament for a Nation has never been published in the
United States and Trois essais sur l’insignifiance has never been translated
into English. An American publisher who collected and made available
such documents would be providing a service to scholars and the public.
Only when the myriad texts of worldwide anti-Americanism are read and
analyzed together can they be understood and confronted.
More rhetorically violent than Grant and haunted by Quebec’s solitude in
North America, Vadeboncœur tends to fold English Canada into the United
States and reject “Anglo-Saxon culture.” Grant, on the other hand,
embraces French Canada as an ally in his struggle against the United States.
Nevertheless, in spite of Vadeboncœur’s rejection of Canada, his
Quebecois nationalism has much in common with Grant’s Canadian
nationalism.
Grant believes that the dominant philosophy of the United States is
“secular liberalism,” while Vadeboncœur calls America “post-Christian.”
Grant and Vadeboncœur both equate modernization with Americanization.
They view “post-Christian secular liberalism” not as a Western phenomenon that, along with Americans, they have to confront but, rather, as a
problem that comes, like a disease, from the south.
Ian Angus’ difficulties in formulating a Canadian philosophy, as well as
the long-time dilemma conservatives in the country have had in developing
a consensual tradition, stem from the “resentment” and “purity” that
suffuse Canadian thought. Grant and Vadeboncœur’s writings present
extreme examples of Canadian resentment of the United States as well as of
the tenacious belief in Canada’s and Quebec’s pure origins in England and
France. Politically, Grant’s Red Toryism and Vadeboncœur’s separatist
movement have acted as barriers to the articulation of both a coherent
national philosophy and an effective conservative tradition in Canada.79 In
addition, both Grant and Vadeboncœur hold a grudge against American
Protestantism. To Grant, American Protestantism is dead, replaced by a
morally shallow pragmatism. Echoing Father Tamisier in La revue
canadienne, Vadeboncœur accuses American Protestants of worshipping
an idol he calls “the exterior” (Tamisier called it “money”).
On the other hand, Grant and Vadeboncœur both admire France. In
particular, they respect Charles de Gaulle and defend the Gaullism of the
1960s, when the French president built an independent foreign policy often
in opposition to the United States.80 Concerning France, however, not the
politicians but the rebels of French art most deeply move Grant and
Vadeboncœur. In 2003, the French Canadian published a book about
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Rimbaud,81 while the English Canadian’s study of Céline occupied the last
ten years of his life.
Benoît Melançon remarks on the “generic tension” present in Trois
essais. Classed first as “essais,” they were later republished as “essais
philosophiques.” Melançon feels that Trois essais sur l’insignifiance
belongs to the genres of “la littérature morale” and the pamphlet, and calls
Vadeboncœur a moraliste because the French author opposes a “monde
moral” to American “inculture.”82 Grant’s essays evoke the same generic
tension. Some analysts in the United States and Canada would like to
consider Grant a philosopher; however, he is more accurately labelled an
English-language moraliste, closer to Montaigne than to Spinoza. I would
also argue that his anti-Americanism was an impediment to his becoming a
philosopher. Like Vadeboncœur’s Trois essais, Grant’s analyses in Lament
for a Nation and elsewhere most often operate at the level of the pamphlet
and the philosophical essay. He belongs in the company of writers like
Vadeboncœur, not with Eric Voegelin and Leo Strauss, two twentiethcentury philosophers who influenced him.
Once Grant and Vadeboncœur publicly entered the traditions of Englishand French-Canadian anti-Americanism, it took about twenty years before
their thought reached the boiling point and they were compelled to write
their major texts in this mode. Grant’s 1945 pamphlet “Canada Must
Choose: The Empire, Yes or No?” and Vadeboncœur’s 1961 essay
condemning the American union movement, “Projection du syndicalisme
américain” (“The Negative Influence of American Unionism”), are their
first significant statements concerning the United States. John
Diefenbaker’s defeat by Lester Pearson, openly endorsed by the Kennedy
Administration, led Grant to write Lament for a Nation. Vadeboncœur’s
reading of James Cain’s The Postman Always Rings Twice and Julian
Green’s Journal and his visit to Judy Chicago’s exhibit The Dinner Party
inspired the composition of Trois essais sur l’insignifiance.
In 2002, Jack Granatstein offered a mea culpa for his 1996 claim that
Canadian anti-Americanism seemed as “dead as a dodo.” He admits that the
recent burst of anti-Americanism once again “consuming many
Canadians” proves that the phenomenon continues to flourish. In
particular, the “mindless” anti-American “bile” he had listened to on a
recent book tour distresses him. Clearly Granatstein’s wishes were ahead of
the facts when he announced in the 1990s that Canadian anti-Americanism
had been “marginalized, by-passed, and overtaken by events.”83 All
announcements of the final end or triumph of anti-Americanism in Canada
will later be proven incorrect. In a speech in 2003, Granatstein showed he
seemed to understand this better when he said, “Anti-Americanism has
been and to a substantial degree remains Canada’s state religion, the very
bedrock of Canadian nationalism, its strength rising and falling with
events.”84 This echoes Underhill, who wrote in 1957 that “there is a
252
periodicity of about twenty to thirty years in these anti-American crises of
our Canadian history.”85 The movement toward continentalism always
balances a period of nationalism and vice versa. Thus, after almost twenty
years of continentalism, including two free-trade agreements, many
Canadians were ready for a nationalist phase, and the vigorous American
response to the 9/11 terrorist attack provided the convenient trigger.
Yet can any given American foreign policy be held responsible for
upturns in Canadian anti-Americanism? Only in part, because a study of
Grant and Vadeboncœur’s writings demonstrates that anti-Americanism is
the obsessive centre of their thinking and that the specific public or private
event that provokes the writing of an anti-American tract is like flipping a
light switch. The electricity is in the wire, it’s just waiting to be turned on.
Raised in the anti-American tradition of the United Empire Loyalists —
losers in the struggle of political philosophies that accompanied the
American Revolution — Grant spent his life nuancing, rationalizing and
struggling with his hatred of the United States. Aless subtle anti-American,
Vadeboncœur inherited the French-Canadian clergy’s mistrust of the
Protestant religious liberty of the United States. The resentment of that
clergy — losers in the struggle of Christian confessions that accompanied
the French and Indian Wars, and having once dreamed of a Catholic,
French-speaking North America — has evolved into Quebec’s leftist
anti-Americanism at the beginning of the 21st century. Indeed, now in his
eighties, Vadeboncœur continues to write passionately against the United
States.86
Canadian anti-Americanism has always existed alongside a continentalist tradition that promotes friendship with the confederation’s only
neighbour. In the twenty or so years following 9/11, however, barring an
Islamist terrorist attack on its own soil, Canada will be in a nationalist phase,
uncomprehending and often critical of America’s actions in the world.
Notes
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Jack Granatstein, Yankee Go Home? Canadians and Anti-Americanism (New
York: HarperCollins, 1996), 246–77. The final chapter of the book is entitled
“Last Gasp Anti-Americanism.” The Free Trade Agreement (FTA) became
effective on 1 January 1989. The North American Free Trade Agreement
(NAFTA) went into effect five years later on 1 January 1994.
André Pratt, “Bin Laden ou Bush?” La Presse, 18 November 2002, A8.
Throughout this article, all translations from French to English are mine.
See Jean-François Revel, L’obsession anti-américaine (Paris: Plon, 2002).
Knowlton Nash, Kennedy and Diefenbaker: Fear and Loathing Across the
Undefended Border (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1990), 17.
Anthony DePalma, Here: A Biography of the New North America (New York:
Public Affairs, 2001), 239.
253
6.
Underhill is quoted by Granatstein in Yankee Go Home? Canadians and
Anti-Americanism, 8.
7. Three themes dominate Grant’s thought: the modern era as relativist and
historicist, technology as homogenizing and destructive, and the role of the
United States in propagating modernity and technology. His major works are
Philosophy in the Mass Age (New York: Hill and Wang, 1960), Lament for a
Nation ([1965] Ottawa: Carleton UP, 1989), Time as History (Toronto: CBC,
1969), Technology and the Empire (Toronto: Anansi, 1969), English-Speaking
Justice (Sackville: Mount Allison University, 1974), Technology and Justice
(Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1986). A short but important
anti-American text is “From Roosevelt to LBJ,” in The New Romans, Candid
Canadian Opinions of the U.S., ed. A.W. Purdy (Edmonton: M.G. Hurtig, 1968).
Most of Vadeboncœur’s writings analyze Quebecois politics and argue for the
province’s separation from Canada. On this subject, see L’autorité du peuple,
essais (Montreal: Éditions de l’arc, 1965), La dernière heure et la première,
essais sur l’indépendance du Québec (Montreal: Hexagone/Parti pris, 1970;
Hexagone 1980), Indépendances (Montreal: Hexagone/Parti pris, 1972; HMH,
1977), Un génocide en douce (Montreal: Hexagone/Parti pris, 1976), Chaque
jour, l’indépendance (Montreal: Leméac, 1978), To Be or Not to Be, That is the
Question! (Montreal: Hexagone, 1980), Gouverner ou disparaître (Montreal:
Typo, 1993). His first essay collection La ligne du risque, essais (Montreal:
HMH, 1963) has been re-edited twice: (Montreal: Hurtsubise, 1977) and
(Montreal: Bibliothèque Québécoise, 1994). The collection of articles and essays
Lettres et colères (Montreal: Parti pris, 1969) presents a useful guide to
Vadeboncœur’s radicalization in the 1960s and contains several anti-American
texts (“Démocratie égale Nations,” 45–50; “Allocution du 1er mai 1967,” 81–84;
“Les salauds contre Cuba,” 85–100). Vadeboncœur has written two books on
childhood: Un amour libre, récit (Montreal: HMH, 1970); Dix-sept tableaux
d’enfant: Étude d’une métamorphose (Montreal: Bellarmin, 1994). His debt to
French culture is clear in L’absence : Essai à la deuxième personne (Montreal:
Boréal Express, 1985) and in Essais inactuels (Montreal: Boréal, 1987). He has
written two essays on love: Essai sur une pensée heureuse (Montreal: Boréal,
1989); and Le bonheur excessif (Montreal: Bellarmin, 1992). He has written on
painting: Vivement un autre siècle! (Montreal: Bellarmin, 1996); and Qui est le
chevalier (Montreal: Leméac, 1998). He wrote against postmodernism in
L’humanité improvisée (Montreal: Bellarmin, 2000). He has published on
Rimbaud in Le pas de l’aventurier : à propos de Rimbaud (Montreal: PUM,
2003).
8. George Grant, Lament for a Nation ([1965] Ottawa: Carleton UP, 1989), 53–54.
9. Pierre Vadeboncœur, Trois essais sur l’insignifiance (Montreal: Hexagone,
1983), 12, 56, 90. Trois essais was also published in Paris by Albin Michel in
1983. The Parisian edition contained an epilogue entitled Lettre à la France.
References to the book in this article are to the Montreal edition published by
Hexagone. In 1984, Trois essais won the annual France-Quebec Prize awarded
by the French Language Writers’ Association.
10. See Pierre Quesnel, “Le mal américain, ou la mort de la pensée,” Le Devoir, 19
March 1983, 23 and the special issue of Liberté (21.6, Nov.-Dec. 1979) to
understand the shock it produced in Quebec.
11. Northrop Frye, “Conclusion to a ‘Literary History of Canada,’” The Bush
Garden: Essays on the Canadian Imagination (Toronto: Anansi, 1995), 222.
254
12. Ian Angus, “Crossing the Border,” The Massachusetts Review 31.1/2 (Spring–
Summer 1990): 32–47.
13. William Watson writes, “Thus our lower income per capita does distinguish us
from the Americans, but would we be so indifferent to this or so quick to discount
wealth’s importance if ours were the higher income? If one twin becomes richer
and more famous, the other may stew in secret envy, a common Canadian
syndrome as far as the Americans are concerned” (131). And in discussing a
government aerospace contract that in 1986 was given to a Montreal company
instead of one in Winnipeg that had submitted a lower bid: “Resentment being the
Canadian condition, Montrealers were resentful in turn because of the accusation
that they won only because the contest was rigged” (209). Globalization and the
Meaning of Canadian Life (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1998).
14. “English-speaking Canadians, such as myself, have despised and feared the
Americans for the account of freedom in which their independence was
expressed, and have resented that other traditions of the English-speaking world
should have collapsed before the victory of that spirit; but we are still enfolded
with the Americans in the deep sharing of having crossed the ocean and
conquered the new land.” George Grant, “In Defence of North America,”
Technology and Empire (Toronto: Anansi, 1969), 17.
15. William Christian, George Grant: A Biography (Toronto: University of Toronto
Press, 1993), 107.
16. George Grant, “Céline: Art and Politics,” Queen’s Quarterly 90.3 (Autumn
1983): 801.
17. Céline’s three anti-Semitic pamphlets are: Bagatelles pour un massacre (1937),
L’école des cadavres (1938), and Les beaux draps (1941).
18. Gerald Owen, “Why Did Grant Love Céline?” George Grant and the Subversion
of Modernity, ed. Arthur Davis (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1996), 58.
19. Grant, Lament for a Nation, 63–64.
20. Janet Ajzestat, “The Conservatism of the Canadian Founders,” After Liberalism:
Essays in Search of Freedom, Virtue, and Order, ed. William D. Gairdner
(Toronto: Stoddart, 1998), 19, 20.
21. John Gellner, “Books in Review: The Canadian Crisis,” Saturday Night 34–46
(July 1965): 22.
22. Alexander Brady, “Letters in Canada: 1965, Social Studies, National and
International,” The University of Toronto Quarterly 35.4 (July 1966): 459.
23. Charles Taylor, “Bâtir un nouveau Canada,” Cité libre 79 (Aug.–Sept. 1965): 10.
24. Christian Roy, “George Grant: L’identité canadienne face à l’empire de la
technique,” Argument 4.2 (Spring–Summer 2002): 181–82.
25. Dennis Lee, “Cadence, Country, Silence: Writing in Colonial Space,” Boundary
2 3.1 (Fall 1974): 156, 159.
26. Philip Abbott, “Still Louis Hartz after All These Years: A Defense of the Liberal
Society Thesis,” Perspectives on Politics 3.1 (March 2005): 93.
27. H.D. Forbes, “Hartz-Horowitz at Twenty: Nationalism, Toryism and Socialism
in Canada and the United States,” Canadian Journal of Political Science 22.2
(1987): 287.
28. Forbes criticizes the Hartz-Horowitz scheme for its “distortion of FrenchCanadian political thought”; “Rejoinder to ‘A Note on ‘Hartz-Horowitz at
Twenty’: The Case of French Canada,” Canadian Journal of Political Science
21.4 (December 1988): 807–11.
29. Peter J. Smith and Janet Ajzenstat, “Canada’ Origins: The New Debate,”
National History 1.2 (1997): 114–15.
255
30. Gordon T. Stewart, The Origins of Canadian Politics: A Comparative Approach
(Vancouver: UBC Press, 1986).
31. Janet Ajzenstat, “The Constitutionalism of Étienne Parent and Joseph Howe,”
Canada’s Origins: Liberal, Tory, or Republican (Ottawa: Carleton University
Press, 1995): 209–32.
32. See, for example, Andrew Potter’s letter, Literary Review of Canada 10.1
(Jan.–Feb. 2002): 3. And in French: Roy, “George Grant.”
33. Grant, Lament for a Nation, 43, 33, 71.
34. Gad Horowitz, “Conservatism, Liberalism, and Socialism in Canada: An
Interpretation,” Canadian Journal of Economics and Political Science 32 (1966):
141–71.
35. Russell Kirk, The Conservative Mind (London: Faber and Faber, 1954).
36. E.C. Manning, Political Realignment: A Challenge to Thoughtful Canadians
(Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1967), 50, 92.
37. Grant, Lament for a Nation, 68.
38. Kim Campbell is cited in Gad Horowitz, “Commentary,” By Loving Our Own:
George Grant and the Legacy of Lament for a Nation, ed. Peter C. Emberly
(Ottawa: Carleton University Press, 1990), 75–76.
39. George Grant, “American Morality,” Philosophy in a Mass Age (New York: Hill
and Wang, 1960), 96.
40. Grant, Lament for a Nation, 83.
41. George Grant, “In Defence of North America,” Technology and Empire
(Toronto: Anansi, 1969), 26.
42. Eli Mandel, “George Grant: Language, Nation, the Silence of God,” Canadian
Literature 83 (Winter 1979): 171–72.
43. Grant, Céline: Art and Politics,” 810–11.
44. Larry Schmidt, ed., George Grant in Process: Essays and Conversation
(Toronto: Anansi, 1978), 102.
45. Grant, Céline: Art and Politics,” 811–12.
46. Ibid., 805–8.
47. Sylvie Groulx’s National Film Board of Canada documentary À l’ombre
d’Hollywood (2000) is a good example of this timeless theme in anti-American
thought. The article by Albin Janin, “Le Cinéma,” in La revue Dominicaine’s
special issue of 1937 “Notre Américanisation” speaks of an “American, with an
Israëlite name, well known in film circles” who “attacked” French films in the
province by playing them in double features with dubbed American movies (95).
48. Grant, Philosophy in a Mass Age, 101.
49. Vadeboncœur, Trois essais, 94–95.
50. W.J. Hankey, “English Canada’s Philosophic Voice,” The Review of Politics 57.1
(Winter 1995): 175.
51. Christian, George Grant: A Biography, 46.
52. George Grant, “Revolution and Tradition,” Tradition and Revolution, ed. Lionel
Rubinoff (Toronto: Macmillan, 1971), 89.
53. Translated from Vadeboncœur’s “une détestation profonde” in Trois essais:
“Agitation-inattention, grandiloquence, action sans conscience, existentialisme
turpide, primitif et avant la lettre, primauté du résultat pour le résultat, je ne dis
pas que ce soit là toute l’Amérique, mais enfin c’est beaucoup l’Amérique, c’est
surtout beaucoup de ce qu’on apprend par l’Amérique et de ce qui est passé dans
la culture dominante de ce continent. J’éprouve la plus profonde détestation de
tout cela” (81). [Agitation-inattention, grandiloquence, action without conscience, base existentialism primitive and before its time, results for the sake of results,
256
54.
55.
56.
57.
58.
59.
60.
61.
62.
63.
64.
65.
66.
67.
68.
69.
70.
71.
72.
73.
74.
75.
76.
77.
78.
79.
80.
I am not saying that this is all of America, but in the end, this is in large part
America, above all it is what we learn from America and from what passes for the
dominant culture of this continent. I feel the most profound hatred for all that.]
M. Tamisier, SJ, “L’Amérique du nord, que faut-il en penser? (suite et fin),” La
revue canadienne 27.5 (June–July 1922): 355–56. “Quick lunch” and
“sky-scraper” are in English in the text.
Vadeboncœur, Trois essais, 30.
Pierre Quesnel, “Le mal américain, ou la mort de la pensée,” Le Devoir, 19 March
1983, 23.
Jean-Pierre Roy, “Pierre Vadeboncœur et le roman américain,” Le Devoir, 11
June 1983, 21; Rose-Marie Arbour, “Vadeboncœur et le féminisme,” Possibles
8.1 (1983): 181–89.
Gilles Marcotte, “Trois essais sur le bon vieux temps,” L’actualité (June 1983):
103–05.
Henri Bastien, “L’américanisation par la philosophie,” in “Notre Américanisation,” special issue, La revue Dominicaine (Montréal: Presse Dominicaine,
1937): 48.
Raymond-M. Voyer, “L’américanisme et notre vie religieuse,” in “Notre
Américanisation,” special issue, La revue Dominicaine (Montréal: Presse
Dominicaine, 1937): 38.
Ernestine Pineault-Leveille, “Notre américanisation par la femme,” in “Notre
Américanisation,” special issue, La revue Dominicaine (Montreal: Presse Dominicaine, 1937), 134, 150.
Arbour, “Vadeboncœur et le féminisme,” Possibles 8.1 (1983): 189.
François Ricard wrote the preface to the 1977 edition of Vadeboncœur’s first
book La ligne du risque (Montréal: Hurtsubise, 1977), 1–8.
Ibid., 20, 40.
Ibid., 23.
Pierre Vadeboncœur, Les deux royaumes (Montreal: Hexagone, 1978), 40.
Pierre Vadeboncœur, “Le neuf et le jamais vu,” Études littéraires 29.2 (Autumn
1996): 89.
Vadeboncœur, Les deux royaumes 203.
Ibid., 56–57.
Ibid., 195.
Ibid., 78. Vadeboncœur writes of “la révolution du Christ” on page 214.
Ibid., 95.
André Belleau, “Un génocide en douce, de P. Vadeboncœur: un discours
crépusculaire,” Voix et Images 3.1 (September 1977): 155.
Barry Cooper casts doubt on the Tory component of Grant’s Red Toryism,
suggesting that Grant has reduced Toryism to anti-Americanism. “Review of
George Grant: Selected Letters and George Grant and the Subversion of
Modernity: Art, Philosophy, Politics, Religion and Education,” Canadian
Literature 161/162 (Summer/Autumn 1999).
Grant, Lament for a Nation, 45; Vadeboncœur, “Sans la nation politique, qui peut
défendre quoi?” L’Action nationale 92.9/10 (Nov.–Dec. 2002) : 27.
257
81. Pierre Vadeboncœur, Le pas de l’aventurier: à propos de Rimbaud (Montreal:
PUM, 2003).
82. Benoît Melançon, “La fiction de l’Amérique dans l’essai contemporain: Pierre
Vadeboncœur et Jean Larose,” Études françaises 26.2 (1990): 33–34.
83. Jack Granatstein, “Our best friend — whether we like it or not,” The National
Post, 23 October 2002, A22.
84. Jack Granatstein, “The Importance of Being Less Earnest: Promoting Canada’s
National Interests through Tighter Ties with the U.S,” Benefactors lecture, C.D.
Howe Institute, Toronto (21 October 2003), 1–2.
85. Frank H. Underhill, In Search of Canadian Liberalism (Toronto: Macmillan,
1960), 259.
86. Vadeboncœur has contributed to the latest wave of anti-Americanism in Canada
in articles for L’Action nationale and Le Couac.
258
Review Essay
Essai critique
Leslie R. Alm and Ross E. Burkhart
Canada and the United States: Approaches to Global
Environmental Policy-making
·
·
·
Rosenbaum, Walter. Environmental Politics and Policy. 6th
ed. Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2005.
VanNijnatten, Debora and Robert Boardman, eds. Canadian
Environmental Policy: Context and Cases. 2nd ed. Don Mills,
ON: Oxford University Press, 2002.
Vig, Norman J. and Michael E. Kraft, eds. Environmental
Policy: New Directions for the Twenty-first Century. 6th ed.
Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2006.
How do Canada and the United States create environmental policy,
considering the impact that the global environment has on both of these
geographically large countries (the second and third largest land masses in
the world)? Do Canada and the United States demonstrate similar or
different approaches, considering their political structures and histories?
What policy-making lessons can we learn from each country’s experiences
in tackling some of the most crucial and vexing public policy problems on
the planet (and in space)? Does the context of a globalizing world provide
more insight into the environmental policy-making processes of Canada
and the United States?
The purpose of this review essay is to provide a starting point for the
evaluation of the ways in which Canada and the United States approach
global environmental policy-making. Each country has its own special
place regarding environmental leadership — one tends toward exceptionalism and unilateralism, while the other tends toward participation and
multilateralism. Essential to explaining how and why Canada and the
United States approach global environmental concerns is understanding
their relationship to each other, both as nation-states and countries
dedicated to the protection of the environment.
In the following pages, we highlight common themes in three books that
outline the Canada–United States relationship as it pertains to international
environmental policy-making: Environmental Politics and Policy by
Walter Rosenbaum (2005), Canadian Environmental Policy: Context and
Cases edited by Debora VanNijnatten and Robert Boardman (2002), and
31, 2005
Environmental Policy: New Directions for the Twenty-first Century, edited
by Norman J. Vig and Michael E. Kraft (2006). These works illuminate the
vast similarities and differences that characterize the way each of these
nations views its place in bringing about environmental globalization. We
then discuss how globalization (especially economic globalization) as a
policy affects the salience of the environment. Finally, we meld a
framework of policy-making into the environmental arena as a way of
comparing and contrasting the two countries.
The chapters in the VanNijnatten and Boardman book and in the Vig and
Kraft book focus on four main categories, from two geographical
perspectives. Domestically and internationally, the chapters focus on
general environmental policy-making, environmental organizations in the
policy arena, business and the environment, and environmental institutions
including legal structures. The most frequent contribution is in general
environmental policy (fifteen chapters), followed by environmental
organizations in the policy arena (seven chapters), environmental
institutions including legal structures (six chapters), and business and the
environment (five chapters). In a slight departure, the Rosenbaum book
examines specific policy areas, such as hazardous materials regulation
(including nuclear material), public lands management, and air and water
pollution, in addition to including a policy-making chapter and a political
institutions chapter. Overall, the themes of these books suggest that
sustainable development is the current overarching theme that is utilized to
address current environmental controversies (Vig and Kraft), that a whole
host of pending controversies remain in Canadian environmental politics
that will need cross-border solutions (Van Nijnatten and Boardman) and
that science has imposed itself on the environmental policy-making
process in providing both benchmarks for assessing policy solutions and an
overall ethic of professional stewardship over the environment
(Rosenbaum).
The Setting: Globalization and the Environment
There exists no lack of grand statements portraying the importance of the
environment to the peoples and governments of Canada and the United
States as each country attempts to fashion its unique role in the making of
global environmental policy. It has been argued that we as a world society
are increasingly shifting our values toward an emphasis on quality of life
rather than economic growth,1 and there is little evidence that the
environmental movement’s growing impact on national and international
politics will slow any time soon.2 In fact, it appears that environmental
quality now occupies a central place in the public policy of most advanced
industrial nations3 such that “environmental issues have become matters of
central national and international concern that transcend ideology and
political persuasion.”4
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Policy-making
There appears to be a greater awareness evolving in both Canada and the
United States that environmental issues have moved past the realm of local
and national concern to become increasingly connected to global
concerns.5 This evolution is characterized by the Canada–United States
relationship, which is said to be “reflective of the problems and promise of a
more integrated world,”6 a world whose rapid ecological progress now
allows for both protecting nature and maintaining a comfortable living
standard.7
There are those, however, who question the ability and desire of peoples
and countries to foster true concern for the environment on a global scale.
When talking about the earth’s biosphere, Dyson speaks of the “enormous
gaps in our knowledge, the sparseness of our observations, and the
superficiality of our theories.”8 Bryner criticizes both Canadians and
Americans for being “unwilling to embrace the criterion of ecological
sustainability”9 and VanNijnatten and Boardman assert that “[our] society
continues to favour the individual accumulation of consumer goods and
wealth, as opposed to reducing production and consumption patterns for
environmental gain.”10
There should be no doubt in anyone’s mind that this movement toward
global environmentalism, or the internationalization of environmental
issues, is tied directly to the market economy.11 As Switzer makes clear, in
the last decade of the twentieth century, “the issues of environment and
development became even more closely intertwined.”12 The positive part of
this connection between the environment and market economy in an
international setting is that because such a linkage allows recognition of
shared problems and the possibility of mutual advantage, it provides “the
most compelling and common incentive for nations to negotiate
environmental agreements.”13
The negative side of this linkage is that the success of the market
economy is directly associated with environmental pollution and resource
degradation.14 In this light, some characterize the era of globalization and
free trade, insofar as free trade is linked to environmental quality, as a
worldwide “race to the bottom.”15 Whether one agrees or disagrees with
these assessments, it is difficult to disagree with the fact that the
complexities of global environmentalism are formidable. As Vig and Kraft
put it, “Democracies in the twentieth century proved capable of sustaining
national and international efforts to defeat enemies in war and to contain
them for decades in peacetime. Sustainable development will be the
challenge of the twenty-first century.”16
Few doubt that concern about the environment in Canada and the United
States has moved firmly within the realm of globalization. None have been
more pointed in this assertion than Esty and Ivanova, who pronounce “the
need for international cooperation to address environmental problems with
263
transboundary or global implications is clear in both theory and practice.”17
Their basic premise is quite straightforward: “There exists today a set of
inescapably global environmental threats that require international
collective action.”18 This argument is not new. Over the past several
decades, many have essentially made the same point: that, in one way or
another, environmental problems, being transboundary in nature, require
global solutions fashioned in the international arena.19
The evolution toward the grand linkage of environmental concerns and
globalization has witnessed what some call “striking advances in
international treaties and the establishment of new institutions and policymaking regimes” that offer “fresh, boundary-spanning approaches” to
environmental decision-making that cut across technologies, environmental media, socio-economic groups and geographic boundaries.20 More
important to the Canada–United States relationship, it appears that
ecological deterioration is setting the stage for North Americans “to unite
and work together in an even broader global environmental context.”21
The Canada–United States Relationship
Despite the growth of stronger ties among North American nations (e.g.,
North American Free Trade Agreement, North American Agreement on
Environmental Cooperation, Commission for Environmental Cooperation), transboundary environmental management remains predominantly
bilateral in nature with little supranational environmental institutionalization at the continental level.22 This certainly is an apt description of the
Canada–United States relationship, which remains centred on a bilateral
level of interaction. Over the years, the Canada–United States relationship
has been described in both simple and eloquent terms, and in ways that
amplify the extreme nature of this connection. A listing of some of these
descriptions is worthy of careful attention. The Canada–United States
relationship has been described as:
· profound, the envy of other bilateral relationships in the
world23;
· the best and closest relationship of any two countries in the
world24;
· the closest and most cordial transboundary relationship
between any two nations in the world25;
· robust and positive … mechanically fit to travel well down the
road into the next millennium26;
· truly special in world affairs27;
· providing a sense of mutual security and amity.28
Despite these claims, Canada and the United States remain diametrically
opposed in many important ways — none of which stands out more than
their asymmetric environmental relationship. Carroll provides an
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Policy-making
enlightening description of this relationship in saying, “Both nations are
vulnerable to each other, although the United States has a greater capacity to
affect (and inflict) Canada than vice versa. Canada is much more aware of
this interdependence and assigns a higher priority to it.”29
Carroll’s words are revealing along two different lines. First, he notes the
dominance of the United States, which some simply characterize as
“overwhelming.”30 This asymmetry of power, economic development and
population size is not some new phenomenon characterizing the Canada–
United States relationship.31 The United States’ economic and cultural
dominance, coupled with its military superiority, have throughout time
threatened Canada’s identity as a sovereign nation.32
The United States’ dominance at times does appear to overwhelm the
Canada–United States relationship. In fact, the United States is so dominant
that Munton has labelled the particular connection between Canada and the
United States with respect to environmental concerns as “environmental
dependence.” 33 Hoberg argues that the relationship goes beyond
dependence; that American influence on Canadian environmental
regulation is such that Canadian emulation of United States values
regarding the environment is “the single most pervasive dynamic behind
United States influence.”34 In this same light, Canada is viewed as
remaining unabashedly dependent on American ideas regarding the
scientific information that underlies environmental decision-making.35
The United States’ dominance has taken a relatively sharp turn in recent
times. This is particularly evident as the United States — under the
guidance of President George W. Bush — has moved strongly in the
direction of unilateralism in world affairs.36 The United States has largely
ignored all of its “traditional” allies in its foreign policy-making, save for
Great Britain. As President Bush states, “America will never seek a
permission slip to defend the security of our country.”37
Carroll’s second line of thought is more interesting — at least with
respect to the substance of this paper — that is, that Canada remains acutely
aware of its inferior position vis-à-vis its bilateral relationship with the
United States and, more importantly, acts accordingly. Perhaps the most
glaring reaction to US dominance is Canada’s efforts to look outside the
North American continent in an attempt to bring more balance to its US ties.
In seeking such balance, Canada has become an enthusiastic advocate of
international measures to reduce cross-border pollution38 and has pushed
— along with western Europe, New Zealand, and Australia — for “a greater
recognition of global problems.”39 In short, with respect to environmental
concerns, Canada places a far greater importance on the ability of
international forces to solve problems than the United States.40 Schwartz
sees neither Canada nor the United States as willing to push the other too
265
hard in the environmental arena, but views Canada as focusing more
attention on multilateral environmental issues than the United States.41
At the same time, the balance of concern and attention to the
Canada–United States relationship lies firmly on the Canadian side of the
border.42 As Mahant and Mount point out, “Perhaps no one has studied their
country’s relationship with the United States as obsessively as have
Canadians. Yet, we still do not know if there is or ever has been an American
policy toward Canada.”43 In this vein, Canadians have been roundly
criticized for unrealistic expectations of their special status with the United
States.44 Simply put, Canadians are viewed as believing that the United
States will “always accord their country consideration when calculating the
American interest,”45 and do not appear to realize the degree to which
Canada is viewed by the United States as a country like any other, with no
special status.46 “As one well-informed Canadian put it: ‘10 years ago, we
had little influence in Washington. Now we have less.’”47
The United States’ view toward the Canada–United States relationship,
as noted above, has been quite accurately labelled as “extreme
ambivalence”48 and “benign indifference.”49 The United States does
acknowledge, however, that the bilateral relationship is a very dense web of
interactions between individuals, private institutions of all kinds and
governments at every level.50 In addition, Canada is especially important in
regard to national security matters, such as in the creation of a bilateral
SMART borders program to monitor border crossings. However, with
respect to shaping American perceptions of the international environment,
Canada’s influence has been characterized as “negligible.”51
Canada–United States Comparisons
Recent research has reminded us that Canada and the United States have
two distinct and different forms of democratic political systems.52 With
respect to environmental politics, Canada and the United States present
contrasting and interesting comparisons. In general, Canadians are viewed
as being more collective and supporting of institutions, while Americans
are viewed as more individualistic and suspicious of institutions.53 The
Canadian environmental policy-making process is viewed as being less
pluralistic, less open, less adversarial and more informal than that of the
United States.54
A specific example highlighting the differences between Canada and the
United States regarding environmental policy-making is the ability of
citizens in each country to affect administrative decisions in the courts.
There is a dearth of environmental citizen suits in Canada, whereas in the
United States citizen suits are considered commonplace.55 Howlett
documents the “general lack of citizen ability in Canada to overturn
administrative decisions through recourses in the courts.”56 He argues that
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Policy-making
limited rules of standing and restricted grounds for judicial review
essentially prevent Canadian citizens from influencing environmental
assessment and regulation in a meaningful way.57 On the other hand, the
National Environmental Policy Act provides easy access to the courts for
US citizens and guarantees the ability to pursue actions for the public
good.58
Having said this, it is important to point out that some now argue that
environmental policy in the United States is in the midst of a profound
transition, such that the once dominant command and control structure is
giving way to market considerations involving volunteerism, collaboration
and public education.59 Furthermore, while the Canadian environmental
implementation style remains distinct from that of the United States, it
appears that the United States’style is changing “somewhat towards that of
Canada.”60
Canada and the United States have important institutional differences
regarding environmental policy-making. As Hoberg posits, “The United
States system of separation of powers and checks and balances is
profoundly different from the Westminster-style government in Canada.”61
In fact, Canada is both profoundly centralized in its monarchical
accountability and decentralized in its constitutional division of powers
between Ottawa and the provinces. While both Canada and the United
States operate relatively decentralized environmental systems, “Canada is
a model of extreme decentralization among Western democracies [such
that] Canadian provincial governments are more powerful, more
independent, and more influential than are American state governments in
most issues of environmental policy.”62
Canada and the United States are vast and wealthy consumptive nations.
For most, it is no surprise that the United States has enormous stores of
natural resources. Many forget, or simply do not know, that not only is
Canada richly endowed with natural resources (it possesses 10% of the
world’s fresh water) but it is also the world’s largest per capita consumer of
energy.63 “The two countries are thoroughly intertwined [vis-à-vis energy
trading, Canada supplies] 17 percent of America’s natural gas imports and
nine percent of its oil and refined petroleum intake.”64 As Hessing and
Howlett submit, “The size and wealth of [Canada] alone are of global
significance.”65 In essence, both Canada and the United States possess
enormous stores of natural resources and rank high among the most
consumption-oriented nations in the world.
Canada and the United States share common interests and a common
geography that provide what some consider a catalyst for greater
transnational interactions regarding the environment.66 Both nations place
a high priority on environmental protection67 and have become “consi-
267
derably more participatory in the way they formulate environmental
policy.”68
Looking Inward: Domestic Environmental Policy-making
Characteristics
Scholars have long noted the linkages between domestic policy-making
and international relations. Schmidt goes as far as to observe that policy
change at the international level occurs only at the intersection of domestic
politics and international negotiations.69 In general terms, domestic politics
are often viewed as the “dominant consideration” for nations participating
in international negotiations related to the environment.70 Along these lines,
Doran posits that “the very essence of the current revolution in diplomatic
discourses is the supremacy of the domestic over the foreign.”71
This pattern of domestic policy driving international (or cross-border)
negotiations is quite prevalent in the Canada–United States environmental
sphere.72 Moreover, the dominance of United States domestic policymaking (as discussed earlier) is readily apparent with respect to the
Canada–United States environmental relationship. VanNijnatten notes the
“political asymmetry whereby Canadian policy-makers [are] largely at the
mercy of American domestic political outcomes”73 and Desombre directly
links United States unilateralism on international environmental issues to
the values of the domestic political system.74 Simply put, “If we want to
understand what the United States has chosen to pursue or avoid
internationally in terms of environmental policy, we need to look at what it
has regulated or shunned domestically.”75
Looking specifically at the United States, it is quite obvious that
protection of the environment is important to the American people.
Environmentalism is now considered a core American value and
environmentalists are now viewed as major players in the American policy
process.76 Over the past 50 years, public opinion polling has consistently
shown a pattern of high support for environmental protection, with vast
majorities of respondents indicating the environment as a priority issue.77 In
fact, environmentalism has become such a regular feature of the United
States public policy-making process that its basic tenets are often referred to
as being “woven into the fabric of everyday life.”78
It is important to keep in mind, however, that despite the high support
environmental protection seems to garner among the American public, over
the past several decades salience for environmental issues has remained
fairly low.79 Add that fact to several decades of underfunding on the part of
the federal government for environmental protection,80 the limited role that
environmentalism appears to play in presidential elections — including the
last one —81 and the fact that the United States has recently been labelled
“the world’s leading laggard when it comes to global warming issues,”82
268
Policy-making
and the prominence of the environment on the United States policy-making
agenda fades a bit.
On the domestic side, Canada has moved toward what some call the
“intergovernmentalization of environmental policy-making,”83 a move
characterized by the federal government’s efforts to harmonize
environmental policy-making among the provinces through the sharing of
authority and voluntary compliance.84 Having said that, there should be no
doubt in anyone’s mind that the provinces have the lead role in Canadian
domestic environmental policy-making.85 In this regard, provinces are said
to be “calling the shots”86 with powers over environmental matters that are
considered “sweeping.”87
While Canadian public support for the environment has remained fairly
steady over the past several decades, some are worried that the trend is
downward. McKenzie argues that “environmental issues have lain dormant
in the shadow cast by continued government inaction and public apathy”88
and VanNijnatten and Boardman point out that despite moderate levels of
concern about environmental degradation, these concerns are consistently
pushed aside by others about the deficit, health care and education.89
However, according to a Centre for Research and Information on Canada
poll, more respondents said that “protecting the environment” is a “high”
priority compared with other issues.90
Looking Outward: International Environmental Policy-making
Characteristics
There is no doubt that the United States has displayed strong leadership
with respect to environmental protection, both at home and in the
international arena. The United States has consistently set a high standard
of environmental protection at home91 and is known throughout the world
as having the most comprehensive environmental program of any nation.92
At the international level, the United States has displayed strong and
effective leadership on some very important environmental issues,
including bringing about consensus for an ozone standard.93
The United States remains the single most important country with
respect to bringing about global consensus on environmental issues. People
speak in terms of the United States as “the most powerful nation in the world
and the primary driver of the forces of globalization … what the United
States does, or fails to do, will be decisive.”94 Such strong language
represents the hope that it is the United States that is going to bring about a
new way to think about the environment95 and provide the incentives for an
environmental “race to the top.”96 Paarlberg summarizes this view as
follows:
269
[T]he leadership of the United States is essential in global
environmental affairs. If the United States decides to take a lead, a
strengthening of international environmental policy becomes
possible. If the United States fails to lead or resists the leadership
of other nations, paralysis sets in.97
The hope that the United States is going to lead the world to
environmental glory is now under grave attack. While the United States
retains some of the strictest environmental regulations at the domestic
level,98 it also remains the biggest polluter and energy consumer in the
world.99 More important, the United States is now viewed as “retreating
from multilateralism and becoming more and more unilateral in its
approach to major international issues,”100 including the environment. The
United States is seen as failing to provide international leadership on the
global level with respect to environmental issues. Indeed, the United States
is increasingly being characterized as “a principal holdout on international
environmental agreements.”101 Recent United States refusals to ratify
major international initiatives to address global issues (e.g., climate
change, biodiversity protection) appear to suggest “the United States is
often unwilling to exercise leadership or even participate in some
multilateral environmental efforts.”102 In short, many now view the United
States as lagging in its leadership on international environmental policy.103
On the other side of the border, in 2003 Canadian Prime Minister Paul
Martin spoke of a “new politics of achievement” for Canada that “extends
far beyond our relationship with the United States.”104 He pointedly
asserted that Canada’s influence is going to come from being “at the
leading edge of where the global economy is going.”105 Along these lines,
Canada’s domestic environmental regime is viewed as “more than
sufficient to back up its credentials as an international player.”106 And it is at
the international level that Canadian environmentalism appears to shine.
Despite the fact that economic globalism has seemingly diminished
Canada’s capacity to engage in across-the-board proactive multilateralism,
Canada continues to push an environmental agenda that reflects the pursuit
of what some argue are purely Canadian values — the pursuit and
promotion of the virtues of multilateralism and international institutions.107 In this light, Canada has used the international stage for the
germination of environmental policy ideas, de-emphasizing the “politics
of shaming.”108 In fact, through its advocacy of progressive solutions in
both the ozone and climate negotiations, Canada has been viewed as an
active policy entrepreneur.109
It is looking outward, beyond their borders, that Canada and the United
States are most contrasted. The words of Lipset resonate in this regard:
Americans more than other western peoples tend to view
international politics in non-negotiable moralistic and ideological
terms. Canadians, like Europeans, are more disposed to perceive
270
Policy-making
foreign-policy conflicts as a reflection of interest differences, and
therefore subject to negotiation and compromise.110
Reflecting Lipset’s general belief, Canada draws on a reservoir of
“internationally recognized contributions to global environmental
leadership,”111 and governments around the world increasingly look to
Canada “as the world’s most successful pluralist state.”112 Canadians view
global leadership with respect to environmental protection as a way to gain
prestige within the world community and take pride in their efforts to bring
about global environmental cooperation, especially as it relates to the
United Nations. Canada pursues its domestic environmental policy goals
through international means and uses its middle-power statecraft as a way
to affect policy change in the international environmental arena.113
The connection that Canadians feel toward the United Nations remains
strong, something Canadians point to with confidence.114 Canadians
perceive themselves as “enthusiastic joiner[s] of international agreements”
and embodied with “a strong internationalist tradition.”115 This tendency
toward multilateral relations is characterized as “an intrinsic, substantial,
and growing feature of environmental policy in Canada,”116 one that plays
directly to the values that Canadians believe constitute the foundation of
their existence: the rule of law, liberty, democracy, equality of opportunity
and fairness.117 Wood sums up Canada’s unique view toward the world
outside its borders rather nicely:
Canada … does not get its influence from power but from cooperation, supporting proposals, enthusiasm, forming coalitions,
willingness to work with weaker nations, and contributing more
than its fair share. Canada has a focus on values like understanding
the social aspects of globalization; a need for a fair process to
ensure legitimization; a sharing of the burdens and the focus on
legitimization.118
Over the years, Canada “has gained a reputation as one of the world’s most
ecologically minded nations”119 and has earned “a positive international
image on the environmental front.”120 In recent times, mostly due to the fact
that Canada’s economy remains dependent on natural resources, that image
is under attack.121 Smith contends that Canada’s failure to provide credible
leadership in the fight against climate change has tarnished its image in the
international arena122 and Paehlke proclaims that in today’s world Canada
is “losing ground in environmental protection in the face of both public
opinion and international reputation.”123 Schneider observes that economic
worries are exerting pressure on environmental priorities in Canada such
that Canada’s image as one of the world’s “greener” industrialized
countries is under attack, since Canada’s focus is now on jobs, trade and
deficit-fighting, at the expense of the environment.124
271
Conclusion
We are now functioning in an era marked by great complexity and diversity,
one in which environmentalism is now cast as “the most elaborate and
segmented of our social issues.”125 There should be no doubt in anyone’s
mind that environmental protection is now considered one of the core
values of North American society, along with social justice, economic
prosperity, national security and democracy.126 Furthermore, emphasis has
turned toward the internationalization of environmental problems and
policy, as issues such as climate change, acid rain, geochemical flux and
control of toxic pollution are viewed more and more from a global, rather
than state, perspective.127
As illustrated above, this turn toward a global environmental perspective
provides a good backdrop to view how Canada and the United States
approach the development of international environmental policies as well
as how the Canada–United States relationship plays out in that regard. Both
Canada and the United States are richly endowed countries that trumpet
their strong commitment for protecting the environment. Yet each country
approaches environmental policy-making outside their borders from
uniquely different perspectives. Canada looks outward, pushing its values
through international organizations and using its reputation as a caring
multicultural country to foster conversations at the multilateral level. The
United States looks inward, using its domestic agenda to push values from a
unilateral perspective. Each country remains entrenched in its particular
approaches to environmental policy-making: Canadians are committed to
negotiation and compromise and the United States is committed to pressing
its values along non-negotiable moralistic and ideological terms.128
Having said all that, Canada and the United States — in their own unique
ways — also remain deeply affected by their bilateral relationship. The
United States, despite almost unending criticism over the past several
decades, remains substantially ambivalent toward Canada when it comes to
environmental concerns. The United States can and does ground all
environmental policy decisions within its own domestic policy goals and
expects all other nations, including Canada, to react to its position. Canada
continues to challenge the United States to recognize the uniqueness of the
Canada–United States relationship in a way that would provide special
status to Canadian views. To this point, the type of special recognition that
Canada desires from the United States has not materialized.
Still, Canada is not sitting idly by, waiting for this special status to
somehow appear without warning. Canada continually reaches out to the
international community in ways that build upon its commitment to
improving its status and influence at the global level, as well as with the
United States. Canada clearly recognizes its asymmetric relationship with
its powerful neighbour and looks beyond its borders for ways to foster
272
Policy-making
values important to the Canadian way of life while gaining some leverage in
its bilateral relations with the United States. Paul Martin enunciated the
heart of Canada’s position vis-à-vis the United States:
Like other countries, we must come to grips with the fact that the
United States has emerged as the world’s lone superpower. We
need a proud partnership based on mutual respect with our closest
friend and nearest neighbor. Two nations with many shared values
but each acting independently. … We must ensure that the global
institutions of the coming decades are suffused with the values
Canadians treasure — rule of law, liberty, democracy, equality of
opportunity and fairness.129
In meeting such goals, Martin suggested that Canadians “have to develop
new thinking about how the international community governs itself; and
how sovereign nations take action together in tackling global issues.”130
One question yet to be answered is exactly how Canada uses its “sense of
a more orderly, more civil, less market driven, more collectively and
socially responsible mindset”131 to fit into the changing global dynamics
and at the same time deals with the overwhelming influence of its southern
neighbour. Will the projection of ecological deterioration unite Canada and
the United States to work together in a broader environmental context or
must Canada go its separate way? Again, this is a decision that Canadians
must make, as the United States appears quite content in its relationship
with Canada and has clearly indicated that such integration with Canada in
approaching global environmental concerns is not a central element of its
domestic policy agenda.132 In essence, Canadians are the ones really left
with the choice of joining the United States or going it on their own. The
immediate decade ahead will provide a tantalizing forum to find the
answers.
Notes
1.
2
3.
4.
5.
Ronald Inglehart, “Public Support for Environmental Protection: Objective
Problems and Subjective Values in 43 Societies,” PS: Political Science and
Politics 28.1 (1995): 61; Glen Toner, “Contesting the Green: Canadian
Environmental Policy at the Turn of the Century,” Environmental Politics and
Policy in Industrialized Countries, ed. Uday Desai (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press,
2002), 71–120.
Sheldon Kamieniecki, ed., Environmental Politics in the International Arena:
Movements, Parties, Organizations, and Policy (Albany, NY: SUNY Press,
1993), 2.
Norman Vig and Michael Kraft (2000) Environmental Policy, 6th ed.
(Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2000), 374.
John Sigmon, “Saving the Environment (from Ourselves): An Editor’s
Perspective,” Human Dimension Quarterly 1.4 (1996): 11.
Melody Hessing and Michael Howlett, Canadian Natural Resource and
Environmental Policy: Political Economy and Public Policy (Vancouver: UBC
Press, 1997), 3; Richard Kiy and John Wirth, “Introduction,” Environmental
273
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
11.
12.
13.
14.
15.
16.
17.
18.
19.
20.
21.
22.
274
Management on North America’s Borders, ed. Richard Kiy and John Wirth
(College Station, TX: Texas A&M University Press, 1998).
Debora VanNijnatten and Robert Boardman, Canadian Environmental Policy:
Context and Cases, 2nd ed. (Don Mills, ON: Oxford University Press, 2002).
Gregg Easterbrook, “Good News from Planet Earth,” USA Weekend, 14–16 April
1995, 4–6.
Freeman Dyson, “What a World!” [book review of Vaclav Smil’s The Earth’s
Biosphere: Evolution, Dynamics, and Change], The New York Review of Books,
15 May 2003, 4–6.
Gary Bryner, “Building Preservation and Logging: Public Lands Policy in British
Columbia and the United States,” Policy Studies Journal 27.2 (1999): 234.
VanNijnatten and Boardman, Canadian Environmental Policy, xi.
David Vogel, “International Trade and Environmental Regulation,” in Vig and
Kraft, Environmental Policy, 355.
Jacqueline Switzer, Environmental Politics: Domestic and Global Dimensions,
4th ed. (Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Thomson Learning, 2004), 60.
Walter Rosenbaum, Environmental Politics and Policy, 6th ed. (Washington, DC:
CQ Press, 2005), 335.
Daniel Press and David Mazmanian, “The Greening of Industry: Combining
Government Regulation and Voluntary Strategies,” in Vig and Kraft,
Environmental Policy, 265.
Robert Paehlke, “Environmentalism in One Country: Canadian Environmental
Policy in an Era of Globalization,” Policy Studies Journal 28.1 (2000): 161;
Vogel, “International Trade and Environmental Regulation,” 357.
Vig and Kraft, Environmental Policy, 389.
Daniel Esty and Maria Ivanova, “Toward a Global Environmental Mechanism,”
Worlds Apart: Globalization and the Environment, ed. James Speth
(Washington, DC: Island Press, 2003), 68.
Ibid.
Kamieniecki, Environmental Politics in the International Arena, 9; Lettie
Wenner, “Transboundary Problems in International Law,” in Kamieniecki,
Environmental Politics in the International Arena, 165; Richard Benedick,
Ozone Diplomacy: New Directions in Safeguarding the Planet (Cambridge, MA:
Harvard University Press, 1998), vii; Donald Kettl, “Environmental Policy: The
Next Generation,” The LaFollette Policy Report 9.2 (1999): 16; Vogel,
“International Trade and Environmental Regulation”; John Robinson, “Working
Across the Line: Environmental Perspectives,” Horizons 3 (2000): 34; James
Speth, “Two Perspectives on Globalization and the Environment,” in Speth,
Worlds Apart, 1; Switzer, Environmental Politics: Domestic and Global
Dimensions.
Michael Kraft, “Environmental Policy and Politics in the United States: Toward
Environmental Sustainability,” in Desai, Environmental Politics and Policy in
Industrialized Countries, 43.
Mebs Kangi, “North American Environmentalism and Political Integration,”
American Review of Canadian Studies 26.2 (1996): 183.
Roberto Sanchez-Rodriguez, Konrad Von Maltke, Steven Mumme, John Kirton
and Don Munton, “The Dynamics of Transboundary Environmental Agreements
in North Africa,” in Kiy and Wirth, Environmental Management on North
America’s Borders, 33; Debora VanNijnatten, “Analyzing the Canada–US
Environmental Relationship: A Multi-Faceted Approach,” American Review of
Canadian Studies 33.1(2003): 97.
Policy-making
23. David Biette, “United States–Canada Relations Will Never Be the Same,”
Canadian Studies Update 22.1(2003): 9.
24. Raymond Chrétien, “Canada @ 2000: America’s Partner for the New
Millennium,” speech at Woodrow Wilson Center, 29 April (Washington, DC:
Woodrow Wilson Center, 1999), 4.
25. Alice Chamberlin and Leonard Legault, “International Joint Commission Looks
to the 21st Century,” Focus 22.3 (1997): 4.
26. Christopher Kirkey (2000) “The Canada–United States Political Relationship:
The Pivotal Role and Impact of Negotiations,” Canada and the United States:
Differences That Count, ed. David Thomas (Peterborough ON: Broadview Press,
2000), 295.
27. John Kirton, “A Global Partnership: The Canada–United States Political
Relationship in the 1990s,” Handbook to the Modern World: Canada, ed. Mel
Watkins (New York: Facts on File, 1993), 284.
28. Lauren McKinney and Victor Konrad, “Borderlands Reflections: The United
States and Canada,” Borderlands Monograph Series No. 1 (Orono, ME:
University of Maine Canadian-American Center, 1989), iii.
29. John E. Carroll, Environmental Diplomacy: An Examination and a Prospective of
Canadian-US Transboundary Environmental Relations (Ann Arbor, MI:
University of Michigan Press, 1986), 296.
30. Peter Newman, “The End of Canada,” Maclean’s 114.2 (7 January 2001): 19.
31. Chamberlin and Legault, “International Joint Commission Looks to the 21st
Century”; Stephanie Roussel, “Canadian–American Relations: Time for
Cassandra,” American Review of Canadian Studies 30.2 (2000): 137.
32. Gregory Millard, Sarah Riegel and John Wright, “Here’s Where We Get
Canadian: English-Canadian Nationalism and Popular Culture,” American
Review of Canadian Studies 32.1(2002): 25.
33. Don Munton, “Acid Rain and Transboundary Air Quality in Canadian–American
Relations,” American Review of Canadian Studies 27.3 (1997): 352.
34. George Hoberg, “Sleeping with an Elephant: The American Influence on
Canadian Environmental Regulation,” Journal of Public Policy 2 (1991): 126.
35. Anthony Scott, “Fisheries, Pollution, and Canadian–American Transnational
Relations,” in Canada and the United States: Transnational and Transgovernmental Relations, ed. Annette Baker Fox, Alfred Hero Jr. and Joseph Nye Jr.
(New York: Columbia University Press, 1976), 239.
36. John Herd Thompson, “Playing by the New Washington Rules: The United
States–Canada Relationship,” American Review of Canadian Studies 33.1
(2003): 6.
37. George W. Bush, “State of the Union Address,” Washington, DC: 20 January
2004.
38. Marvin Soroos, The Endangered Atmosphere: Preserving a Global Commons
(Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina Press, 1997), 111.
39. Lester Milbrath, “The World is Relearning Its Story about How the World
Works,” in Kamieniecki, Environmental Politics in the International Arena, 36.
40. Munton, “Acid Rain and Transboundary Air Quality,” 352.
41. Alan Schwartz, “Canada–US Environmental Relations: A Look at the 1990s,”
American Review of Canadian Studies 24.4 (1994): 490.
42. John Kirton, “Promoting Plurilateral Partnership: Managing United States–
Canada Relations in the Post-Cold War Period,” American Review of Canadian
Studies 24.4 (1994): 460; Thomas, Canada and the United States.
275
43. Edelgard Mahant and Graeme Mount, Invisible and Inaudible in Washington:
American Policies toward Canada (Vancouver: UBC Press, 1999), 3.
44. Kim Richard Nossal, “‘Without Regard to the Interests of Others’: Canada and
American Unilateralism in the Post-Cold War Era,” American Review of
Canadian Studies 27.2 (1997): 194.
45. Bruce Muirhead, “From Special Relationship to Third Option: Canada, the US,
and the Nixon Shock,” American Review of Canadian Studies 34.3 (2004): 439.
46. John Herd Thompson and Stephen Randall, Canada and the United States:
Ambivalent Allies (Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press, 1994), 1–2.
47. Robert Greenhill, “Making a Difference? External Views on Canada’s
International Impact,” interim report of the External Voices Project (Toronto:
Canadian Institute of International Affairs, 2005), 6.
48. Stephanie Golob, “North America Beyond NAFTA? Sovereignty, Identity, and
Security in Canada–US Relations,” Canadian–American Public Policy 52
(2002): 5.
49. Anthony Wilson-Smith, “All Depends on the View,” Maclean’s 4 (24 May 2004).
50. Paul Cellucci, “The Ties That Bind: The Common Borders and Uncommon
Values of Canadian–US Relations.” Speech given at the conference of the
Association for Canadian Studies in the United States, Vancouver BC, 29 October
2004.
51. Roger Gibbins, “Canada as a Borderlands Society,” Borderlands Monograph
Series No. 2 (Orono, ME: University of Maine Canadian–American Center,
1989), 12.
52. David Kumar and James Altschuld, “Science, Technology, and Society,”
American Behavioral Scientist 47.10 (2004): 1360.
53. Jon Alston, Theresa Morris and Arnold Vedlitz, “Comparing Canadian and
American Values: New Evidence from National Surveys,” American Review of
Canadian Studies 26.3 (1996): 311; Seymour Martin Lipset, “North American
Cultures,” Borderlands Monograph Series No. 3 (Orono, ME: University of
Maine Canadian–American Center, 1990), 2.
54. Stephen Bocking, Ecologists and Environmental Politics: A History of Contemporary Ecology (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1997), 195; Debora
VanNijnatten, “Participation and Environmental Policy in Canada and the United
States: Trend Over Time,” Policy Studies Journal 27.2 (1999): 270.
55. Marcia Valiante, “Legal Foundations of Canadian Environmental Policy,” in
VanNijnatten and Boardman, Canadian Environmental Policy, 16.
56. Michael Howlett, “Policy Instruments and Implementation Styles: The Evolution
of Instrument Choice in Canadian Environmental Policy,” in VanNijnatten and
Boardman, Canadian Environmental Policy, 32.
57. Ibid.
58. Ibid.
59. Kraft, “Environmental Policy and Politics in the United States,” 29.
60. Howlett, “Policy Instruments and Implementation Styles,” 37.
61. George Hoberg, “Canadian–American Environmental Relations,” in
VanNijnatten and Boardman, Canadian Environmental Policy, 174.
62. Barry Rabe, “Federalism and Entrepreneurship: Explaining American and
Canadian Innovation in Pollution Prevention and Regulatory Integration,” Policy
Studies Journal 27.2 (1999): 264; Debora VanNijnatten, “The Bumpy Journey
Ahead: Provincial Environmental Policies and National Environmental
Standards,” in VanNijnatten and Boardman, Canadian Environmental Policy,
146.
276
Policy-making
63. Annette Fox, Canada in World Affairs (Washington, DC: The ACSUS Papers,
1989), 7.
64. Mary Janigan, “The Energy Payoff: Martin May Parlay Bush’s Desire for Oil
Security into Freer Trade across the Border,” Maclean’s, 14 February 2005, 20.
65. Hessing and Howlett, Canadian Natural Resource and Environmental Policy.
66. Donald Alper and James Loucky, “North American Integration: Paradoxes and
Prospects,” American Review of Canadian Studies 26.2 (1966): 178; Chamberlin
and Legault, “International Joint Commission Looks to the 21st Century,” 3.
67. Hoberg, “Sleeping with an Elephant: The American Influence on Canadian
Environmental Regulation,” 126.
68. VanNijnatten, “Participation and Environmental Policy in Canada and the United
States,” 268.
69. Robert Schmidt, “International Negotiations Paralyzed by Domestic Politics:
Two-Level Game Theory and the Problem of Pacific Salmon,” Environmental
Law 2 (1996): 107.
70. Courtney Brown, “Politics and the Environment: Nonlinear Instabilities
Dominate,” American Political Science Review 88.2 (1994): 292.
71. Charles Doran, “Style as a Substitute for Issue Articulation in Canada–US
Relations,” American Review of Canadian Studies 27.2 (1997): 177.
72. Juliann Allison, “Fortuitous Consequence: The Domestic Politics of the 1991
Canada–United States Agreement on Air Quality,” Policy Studies Journal 27.2
(1999): 347; Jurgen Schmandt, Judith Clarkson and Hilliard Roderick, Acid Rain
and Friendly Neighbors: The Policy Dispute between Canada and the United
States (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1988), 24.
73. Debora VanNijnatten, “Analyzing the Canada–US Environmental Relationship:
A Multi-Faceted Approach,” American Review of Canadian Studies 33.1 (2003):
95.
74. Elizabeth R. Desombre, “Understanding United States Unilateralism: Domestic
Sources of US International Environmental Policy,” The Global Environment:
Institutions, Law, and Policy, ed. Regina Axelrod, David Downie and Norman
Vig (Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2005), 182.
75. Ibid.
76. Rosenbaum, Environmental Politics and Policy, 38.
77. Neil Harrison, “Political Responses to Changing Uncertainty in Climate
Science,” Science and Politics in the International Environment, ed. Neil
Harrison and Gary Bryner (Boulder, CO: Rowman and Littlefield Press, 2004),
120.
78. Christopher Bosso and Deborah Guber, “Maintaining Presence: Environmental
Advocacy and the Permanent Campaign,” in Vig and Kraft, Environmental
Policy, 95.
79. Hoberg, “Canadian–American Environmental Relations,” 179.
80. Rosenbaum, Environmental Politics and Policy, 11.
81. Switzer, Environmental Politics: Domestic and Global Dimensions, 73.
82. Lamont Hempel, “Climate Policy on the Installment Plan,” in Vig and Kraft,
83. VanNijnatten and Boardman, Canadian Environmental Policy, xi.
84. G. Bruce Doern, “Environmental Canada as a Networked Institution,” in
VanNijnatten and Boardman, Canadian Environmental Policy, 107; Valiante,
“Legal Foundations of Canadian Environmental Policy,” 19–20.
277
85. Judith McKenzie, Environmental Politics in Canada: Managing the Commons
into the Twenty-First Century (Don Mills, ON: Oxford University Press, 2002),
115.
86. VanNijnatten and Boardman, Canadian Environmental Policy.
87. Valiante, “Legal Foundations of Canadian Environmental Policy,” 3.
88. McKenzie, Environmental Politics in Canada, vii.
89. VanNijnatten and Boardman, Canadian Environmental Policy, x–xii.
90. Centre for Research and Information on Canada, “Portraits of Canada 2004”
(Ottawa: CRIC, 2005), 2.
91. Robert Paarlberg, “Lapsed Leadership: US International Environmental Policy
Since Rio,” in Axelrod, Downie and Vig, The Global Environment, 236.
92. Desai, Environmental Politics and Policies in Industrialized Countries, ix.
93. Benedick, Ozone Diplomacy, 316; Karen Litfin, Ozone Discourses: Science
and Politics in Global Environmental Cooperation (New York: Columbia
University Press, 1994), 107; Soroos, The Endangered Atmosphere, 160.
94. Maurice Strong, “Stockholm Plus 30, Rio Plus 10: Creating a New Paradigm of
Global Governance,” in Speth, Worlds Apart, 49.
95. Wade L. Robinson, Decisions in Doubt: The Environment and Public Policy
(Hanover NH: University Press of New England, 1994), 15.
96. Ted Chambers, “Canada and NAFTA,” presented at the Boise State University
International Institute on Canada, 19–23 June 2000, Boise, Idaho.
97. Paarlberg, “Lapsed Leadership,” 236.
98. Desombre, “Understanding United States Unilateralism,” 182–83.
99. Desai, Environmental Politics and Policies in Industrialized Countries, 14.
100. Strong, “Stockholm Plus 30, Rio Plus 10.”
101. Speth, “Two Perspectives on Globalization and the Environment,” 8.
102. Desombre, “Understanding United States Unilateralism,” 184.
103. Paarlberg, “Lapsed Leadership.”
104. Paul Martin, “Speech to the Liberal Leadership Convention,” Ottawa, 14
November 2003.
105. Ibid.
106. Robert Boardman, “Milk-and-Potatoes Environmentalism: Canada and the
Turbulent World of International Law,” in VanNijnatten and Boardman,
Canadian Environmental Policy, 195.
107. Ibid., 197.
108. McKenzie, Environmental Politics in Canada, 246.
109. Harrison, “Political Responses to Changing Uncertainty in Climate Science,”
121.
110. Lipset, “North American Cultures,” 33.
111. Boardman, “Milk-and-Potatoes Environmentalism,” 194.
112. John Ibbitson, “Pluralism: The World Wonders How We Pulled it Off,” Globe
and Mail, 6 February 2004, A21.
113. Robert Boardman, Canadian Environmental Policy: Ecosystems, Politics, and
Process, (Toronto: Oxford University Press, 1992), 237.
114. Flora MacDonald, “Canada and the United Nations: Why We Must Lead the
Movement for Reform,” Canada and the United States: An Evolving Partnership
(Montreal: Centre for Research and Information on Canada, 2003), 17.
115. Toner, “Contesting the Green,” 73.
116. Boardman, Canadian Environmental Policy: Ecosystems, Politics, and Process,
224.
117. Paul Martin, “Speech from the Throne,” Ottawa, 2 February 2004.
278
Policy-making
118. Duncan Wood, Seminar discussion, Biennial Meeting of the Association for
Canadian Studies in the United States, Portland OR, 23 November 2003.
119. Howard Schneider, “Economy, Ecology Lock Horns: Canada Redefines
Relationship with the Land,” Washington Post, 27 October 1997 A01.
120. Paehlke, “Environmentalism in One Country,” 161.
121. Toner, “Contesting the Green.”
122. Heather Smith, “Stopped Cold,” Alternatives Journal 24.4 (1998): 10.
123. Paehlke, “Environmentalism in One Country.”
124. Schneider, “Economy, Ecology Lock Horns.”
125. Glen Sussman, Byron Daynes and Jonathan West, American Politics and the
Environment (New York: Longman, 2002), 313.
126. Rosenbaum, Environmental Politics and Policy, 38; Vig and Kraft,
127. Neil Harrison and Gary Bryner, “Thinking about Science and Politics” in
Harrison and Bryner, Science and Politics in the International Environment, 1–2;
Marybeth Martello and Sheila Jasanoff, “Globalization and Environmental
Governance,” Earthy Politics: Local and Global in Environmental Governance,
ed. Sheila Jasanoff and Marybeth Martello (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2004),
3.
128. Lipset, “North American Cultures.”
129. Martin, “Speech to the Liberal Leadership Convention.”
130. Ibid.
131. Hugh Segal, “The Politics of Enhanced Canada–US Relations” (Victoria, BC:
University of Victoria Centre for Global Studies, 2004).
132. Ibid.
279
Authors / Auteurs
Vijay AGNEW, Professor of Social Science, Director, Center for
Feminist Research, York University, 228 York Lanes, 4700
Keele Street, North York, Ontario, M3J 1P3.
Leslie ALM, Professor/Department Chair, Public Policy and
Administration/SSPA, Boise State University, 1910 University
Drive, Boise, Idaho, 83725-1935 USA.
Ross BURKHART, Associate Professor and Chair, Department of
Political Science, Boise State University, 1910 University Drive,
Boise, Idaho, 83725-1935 USA.
Katie CHOLETTE, Ph.D. Candidate, Canadian Studies, Carleton
University, 1125 Colonel By Drive, Ottawa, Ontario, K1S 5B6.
Daniel CHARTIER, Professeur, Directeur, Laboratoire international
d’étude multidisciplinaire comparée des représentations du Nord,
Département d’études littéraires, Université du Québec à
Montréal, Case postale 8888, succursale Centre-ville, Montréal,
Québec, H3C 3P8.
Serge GRANGER, chargé de cours, Département d’histoire et de
sciences politiques, Faculté des lettres et sciences humaines,
Université de Sherbrooke, 2500, boul. de l’Université,
Sherbrooke, Québec, J1K 2R1.
Daniel McNEIL, PhD candidate, Department of History, University
of Toronto, Sidney Smith Hall, 100 St. George Street, Toronto,
Ontario, M5S 3G3.
David PALMIERI, 5570, av. Decelles, app. 4, Montréal, Québec,
H3T 1W5.
Janusz PRZYCHODZEN, Professeur adjoint, Études françaises,
Université York, bureau 705, édifice Ross North, Faculté des
arts, 4700, rue Keele, Toronto, Ontario, M3J 1P3.
Vijaya RAO, Associate Professor, Centre for French and
Francophone Studies, School of Language, Literature & Cultural
Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India 110067.
31, 2005
Heather SMITH, Professor, Department of Geography and Earth
Sciences, University of North Carolina at Charlotte, 9201
University City Blvd., Charlotte, North Carolina, 28223-0001,
USA.
Subha XAVIER, PhD candidate, Department of French and Italian,
University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1220 Linden Dr., Madison,
Wisconsin, 53706-1525, USA.
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REVUE INTERNATIONALE D’ÉTUDES CANADIENNES
Appel de textes
Volume 35 (2007)
La loi constitutionnelle de 1982 — vingt-cinq ans plus tard
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Volume 36 (2007)
Canada and Emerging Powers in the Global System
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Appel de textes
Volume 36 (2007)
Le Canada et les puissances émergentes dans le
système mondial
La croissance économique fulgurante de la Chine et de l’Inde est peut-être
la manifestation la plus importante d’une nouvelle répartition internationale du pouvoir. Ces « nouvelles puissances » et peut-être d’autres,
comme le Brésil, le Mexique, l’Indonésie et la Corée du Sud, modifient les
anciennes dichotomies de l’Est et de l’Ouest, du Nord et du Sud ainsi que
des pays développés et des pays en développement. Les États-Unis
demeurent sans égal dans les domaines militaire, économique, scientifique
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