WislaHD
Superstar
Maybe - but that isn't what has happened in Vancouver.
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Revitalization of historic ethnic enclaves
- Thread starter King of Kensington
- Start date
jje1000
Senior Member
I would imagine that the majority of the Chinese community would be doing their day-to-day shopping and dining in and between the suburbs, with a occasional trip downtown for luxury consumption (Holt, etc.). Those living downtown likely also own a car, and can drive to the suburbs for better Chinese food. Simply put- the consumers aren't there, and those who live there would likely prefer better and more expensive cuisine.
Vancouver's Chinatown doesn't have the benefit of being beside a large university or college which would provide a captive source of consumers with limited mobility. Toronto's Chinatown, meanwhile is beside U of T which means that students can always walk down for some cheap eats.
wild goose chase
Active Member
I think perhaps that overall, Vancouver being a place where proportionally more people are of Chinese descent residing all over the city (with people ranging from multigenerational Chinese Canadians all the way to really recent newcomers from China in the last few years), the appeal of one particular historical Chinatown downtown is less important when cultural products are more widely available further afield and all over the city.
It seems like it's the cities where there isn't as much of a large Chinese community and where new Chinese immigration still occurs but is not particularly high, that Chinatowns get revitalized by new immigration (eg. Chicago, Cleveland etc.), and new immigrants add to the historic community rather than directly creating new Chinese ethnoburbs. Then again, New York city's Manhattan Chinatown is thriving and growing despite the presence of large immigration towards the boroughs and burbs so in that case, it's not like they're all skipping or bypass the oldest historic downtown enclaves entirely.
It seems like it's the cities where there isn't as much of a large Chinese community and where new Chinese immigration still occurs but is not particularly high, that Chinatowns get revitalized by new immigration (eg. Chicago, Cleveland etc.), and new immigrants add to the historic community rather than directly creating new Chinese ethnoburbs. Then again, New York city's Manhattan Chinatown is thriving and growing despite the presence of large immigration towards the boroughs and burbs so in that case, it's not like they're all skipping or bypass the oldest historic downtown enclaves entirely.
wild goose chase
Active Member
I wonder what is the main or stronger determinant of whether new immigrants from the same part of the world choose to live alongside old immigrants from the same area or choose to form new enclaves wholesale (which could be in the suburbs or be in the city but still located far from the historic enclave). Wealth differences? Cultural affinity, or time or generations between the immigration waves (where the farther apart in time any two waves arrived, the less affinity they'd have community-wise)?
Wealth seems to be a big one (eg. look at all the enclaves that disappeared once wealthy suburbs became within reach and new upscale ethnoburbs formed), but in terms of cultural affinity it seems to vary. In some places, communities (eg. post-Soviet Eastern European immigrants such as Polish vs. much older waves from the same country) of the "same" ethnicity may not live together as they can feel like they have nothing in common, but on the other hand immigrants from the same part of the world can still choose to create a common community (eg. West Indians from places like Jamaica, Trinidad, Guyana etc. sometimes live together in Caribbean neighbourhoods, Chinese and Vietnamese living together in Toronto/Montreal etc. or even pan-(East) Asian districts of multiple ethnic origins forming in places like Cleveland).
WislaHD
Superstar
If this documentary is to be beleived, then in Chinese immigrants case it is a combination of both wealth and cultural differences.
Older Chinese immigration originated from H.K. and Canton region while newer immigration from elsewhere in the Chinese mainland, leads to newer immigrants finding that the "heritage" of our Chinatowns is not their "heritage".
prosperegal
Senior Member
The segregation of Chinese immigrants living in Chinatown and 905 suburbs like Markham (or northern 416 areas) is about wealth. As I've said before, in the 90s, kids like me were warned about Chinatown - that it was a "bad" place for "good/proper Chinese boys/girls."