13. Thinking through Space: Toronto’s Chinatowns in Chinese Canadian Fiction

In a collection of the history of Chinatowns in North America printed in 2005, Paul Yee examines the history of Toronto’s Chinatown, marking the forced migration of the original Chinatown to the current Spadina location in the 1960s. In addition, Yee notes the post-1980 suburbanization trend of such Chinese Canadian spaces; what I would also refer to as Chinatowns in the plural. In support of the suburbanization hypothesis, Shuguang Wang, a Geography professor at Ryerson University, examined the trend in Chinese commercial activities in the 1990s. In his article, “Chinese Commercial Activity in the Toronto CMA: New Development Patterns and Impacts” (1999), Wang acknowledges the rapid spread of Chinese retail outside of the three main Chinatowns. The Chinese economy, while retaining mainly ethnic Chinese clientele, Wang argues “is no longer an enclave economy limited only to the central-city Chinatowns” (20).

Hall (1994, p. 392).

Bates (2003, p. 11).

Bates 12.

Bates 191.

Hall 394.

Here I refer to both colonizer and colonized writings during the colonial era.

By writing about the “Other’s culture,” writers and authors of travelogues were granted authority and given an important role—to help produce the “Other.” Producing the “Other” refers to knowledge production. Knowledge production includes the scientific knowledge that the European writers were producing by naming plants and creating order among specimens in non-European regions, thereby empowered with the gift of producing the “Other” (Pratt 32). Knowledge production also entails the construction of the “rest of the world” through these travel stories, which attribute static qualities to the “Other.” Travel writer William Paterson illustrates this producing of the “Other” when he describes the Africans as “cultureless beings” (Pratt 52). For further reading, please see: Pratt (1991).

Bates 63.

Bates 185.

Bates 186.

Bates 193, emphasis mine.

Hall 393.

There are no specific years indicated in the story, only calendar dates accompany the story. However, there are hints as to when this takes place as the one of the five protagonists describes the Communist takeover and escape to post-war Hong Kong as being in his parents’ generation (see Woo 80–81).

Cho (2008, p. 195).

This is a term used to describe people who were born outside the nation they identify themselves most belonging to, but moved to this location before a formative age.

“FOB” is not a widely accepted phrase in various dictionaries. However, it is generally known to stand for “fresh off the boat,” translating into a new immigrant connotation or those who behave as if they are new immigrants. Some consider this term derogatory. More on FOB and its meaning will follow.

Hall 394.

Woo (2000, p. 80).

Woo 80, emphasis mine.

Yee (2005, p. 84). Yee comments that three plazas, which were very close in proximity, in Scarborough became known as Agincourt Chinatown by 1984.

Found in Sherwin Tjia’s “Shoplifiting Tiger, Bomb-making Dragon,” the main characters discuss the coining of “Asiancourt”: “We were both born in Toronto, and grew up in a part of Scarborough called Agincourt. Back in the eighties, when there were a lot of Chinese moving into the neighbourhood, people were calling it ‘Asiancourt.’” (159). Please see Strike the Wok: An Anthology of Contemporary Chinese Canadian Fiction. Ed. Lien Chao and Jim Wong-Chu. Toronto: TSAR (2003).

Woo 83.

Woo 85.

Brah 183.

Woo 180, emphasis mine.

Woo 181, emphasis mine.

Woo 181.