SIGNIFICANT EVENTS IN ASIAN CANADIAN HISTORY

These significant events acknowledge the long and rich history of Asian Canadians and their contributions to Canada.
Canada's cultural diversity strengthens the country socially, politically and economically in innumerable ways. 
explorASIAN/Asian Heritage Month is an ideal occasion for all to celebrate the beauty and wisdom of various Asian cultures.

Canadians are invited to take part in the festivities that commemorate the legacy of Asian Canadians and 
their many contributions which have helped Canada to become the multicultural and diverse nation it is today.


Chinese-Canadian history
Japanese-Canadian history
Sikh-Canadian history 


Click here for information on our 
Asian North American History Timeline Project


Anniversaries of Change "07" 
The years 1907, 1947, 1967, and 1997 each mark a watershed moment in the history of Asian migrants in Canada 
and in their struggles to fight discrimination and create the society of today.  In commemorating them together in the year 2007, 
we acknowledge the great changes they reflect in Canadian history over the last 100 years.

• 100th anniversary of the 1907 anti-Asian riots in Vancouver, BC:
The riots began in Bellingham as a movement to drive Punjabi Sikhs out of the lumber industry.  
On September 7, a white supremacist crowd marched to Vancouver city hall to demand a "White Canada". 
Many proceeded to attack Chinatown and then the Japanese community around Powell Street. 
Rioters were challenged by Japanese Canadians, who had armed while windows in Chinatown were being broken. 
The riots were not only a landmark in the rise of racism in Canada, they signaled the beginning of systematic 
federal intervention to prohibit Asian immigration to Canada through the imposition of quotas on Japanese emigration, 
"continuous voyage" regulations and a $200 landing fee to exclude those from India, and the enforcement of "head-tax" laws 
against the Chinese and, when that proved ineffective, passage of the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1923. 
Despite Asian Canadian efforts to fight these measures, the period was marked by escalating injustices, 
including the infamous Komagata Maru case of 1914 and the uprooting, dispossession and dispersal of 
Japanese Canadians during and after World War II.

• 60th anniversaries:  
A sea change began in 1947 when peoples of Chinese and Indian descent won the franchise in British Columbia and the 
Japanese Canadian community established the pan-Canadian National Association of Japanese Canadian Citizens Associations 
(now the NAJC). Japanese Canadians remained severely restricted but over the next two years, the federal franchise would be 
won for all Asian-Canadians and the final restrictions against Japanese Canadians lifted. It was a period where allies from other 
communities actively supported Asian Canadian efforts to end discrimination. These communities began a period of recovery 
and rebuilding. The Canadian citizenship act also came into effect in 1947, and anti-Asian measures such as the 
1923 Chinese Exclusion Act, the1885 Chinese Head Tax, and the Continuous Journey Act were overturned.

• 40th anniversary of the 1967 Immigration Act:  
The revised legislation opened Canada to trans-Pacific migration from Asia. The points based system reformed the process of 
immigration, allowing new migrants to come and families to reunite. The new waves from Asia and other developing countries 
transformed Canada. The year 1967 also marked a new sense of Canada as a multicultural nation willing to embrace a wide array 
of different peoples, beginning a rejuvenation of Asian Canadian communities.

• 10th anniversary of the 1997 handover of Hong Kong to the Peoples Republic of China:  
An event that triggered the aspirations of B.C. and Canada to engage with the rising economic prowess of the Asia Pacific region. 
In the decade prior to the handover, new waves of Chinese migration from Hong Kong as well as elite migrants from all around the 
Asia Pacific region responded to changes in federal immigration policy designed to attract wealthy migrants, bringing remarkable 
changes to Canada. The influx of Asian entrepreneurs and investors has remade Canadian cities such as Vancouver and Toronto, 
but has also presented new challenges in terms of social justice and equality. Not only did these new migrations spark resentment 
against the "Asianization" of the city (prompting the popular usage of the term "Hongcouver"), but it also augured a new era of 
global connections in which we still find ourselves in the midst.


Historical summary courtesy of the Anniversaries of Change "07" Steering Committee
For more info:  http://anniversaries07.ca