1. The Innocent Traveller and NFB’s Joe
English 1102

2. Key Moments in Canadian Multiculturalism
~1860s: free entry policy; government gives land to European settlers
1858~: Chinese immigration during Gold Rush
1867: Constitution Act assigned Parliament legislative jurisdiction over "Indians and Lands reserved for the Indians.“ Policy of full assimilation.
1876: Indian Act passed. Enfranchisement in exchange for assimilation/loss of Status.
: Immigration from China sought by Canada, to build CPR
1903 South Asian immigration picks up, disenfranchised between
s: ‘White Canada’ laws and policies:
The ‘Border’ first appears in The Immigration Act of 1910.
Chinese Head Tax ($50 in 1885, $100 in 1900, $500 in 1903) and Exclusion Act (1923)
1910 ‘Continuous Journey’ regulation excludes British Subjects from India
1910 Exclusion in Immigration Act: ‘unsuited to the climate of Canada’ (mainly targeting British Subjects from India and the Carribean)
1914: Komagata Maru
WWII ‘None is too many’ policy
WWII: expulsion of BC’s coastal Japanese Canadian community
Denial of citizenship even to those born in Canada
1963 Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism, response to Quebecois, Indigenous, and racialized minority demands for equality
Official Languages Act of 1969 made English and French the official languages of Canada; two ‘founding’ or ‘charter’ nations.
1971 Multiculturalism adopted as federal policy, ‘within Bilingual framework’
Non-immigrant Employment Authorization Program created the category of the worker who does not gain citizenship
1988 Official Multiculturalism becomes law: The Multiculturalism Act
1988 Free Trade Agreement (FTA) passed between Canada and US same year

3. Reading The Innocent Traveller
What / who does Topaz notice and not notice? Who does she meet?
How would a novel like The Innocent Traveller perhaps fit into the ways that Canada or Canadian culture as it was taking shape culturally (1910s – 1970s) would like to think of itself? How might this shift over the time between when the novel is set, when it was written, when it was published and when it became canonical?
How does Topaz understand (or not) the people she interacts with?
What or whose voices are distorted or missing in the narrative?
Were The Innocent Traveller’s Topaz to meet Monkey Beach’s Lisa, whose stories would be hegemonic? Who has the structural power to assert which are ‘real’ and legitimate and which are ‘just stories’?
What kinds of power (cultural, personal, ancestral) or awareness of who she is does Lisa have access to with which to resist this hegemonic notion of her land, her identity and culture?

4. from The Innocent Traveller

5. from The Innocent Traveller

6. from The Innocent Traveller

7. from The Innocent Traveller

8. from The Innocent Traveller

9. National Film Board: Joe
National Film Board: Joe

10. Segregation of swimming areas
The significance of Simone Manuel’s medal, first Black woman to medal for Olympic swimming, is greater than her individual win
Segregation of swimming areas

11. Segregation of swimming areas
A hotel in Las Vegas drained its pool in 1953 after the movie star Dorothy Dandridge dipped her toe in the water. Another pool was drained after the beloved singer/dancer Sammy Davis Jr had swum in it.
Segregation of swimming areas

12. Segregation of swimming areas
St. Augustine, FL, Fully clothed bystander jumps into pool to remove black swimmers at motel. Moments later, the motel manager poured acid in the water to drive them out.
Segregation of swimming areas

13. Segregation of swimming areas
Denied ready access to pools and swimming areas, Black people were then subjected to a myth that they ‘couldn’t swim’ which survived long after the end of Jim Crow
(source: Isabel Wilkerson)
Segregation of swimming areas

14. Segregation of swimming areas
Denied ready access to pools and swimming areas, Black people were then subjected to a myth that they ‘couldn’t swim’ which survived long after the end of Jim Crow
(source: Isabel Wilkerson)
Segregation of swimming areas

15. Segregation of swimming areas
English Bay was racially segregated except for Fortes
Meanwhile, housing policies and redlining across North America maintained segregation and set the stage for wealth disparity that continues today
Vancouver was no exception – meanwhile, Hogan’s Alley razed to make way for Georgia st Viaduct
Segregation of swimming areas