Arab Canadian identity
Arab Canadian identity is the objective or subjective state of perceiving oneself as an Arab Canadian and as relating to being Arab Canadian. The expression of the identity has been widely analyzed and observed by academics as a culturally challenging self-identification in the context of elements of Western culture in the 21st-century.
Background[edit]
Raja G. Khouri, who has served as President of the Canadian Arab Federation, in 2003 described the interconnected perceptions of a Canadian national identity and Arab identity.[1] In 2009, University of Alberta professor Wisam Kh. Abdul-Jabbar described the "double consciousness" of Arab Canadians, variously struggling with their Arab Canadian identity versus a sense of "being Canadian".[2] Abdul-Jabbar has proposed that citizens or residents of Arab descent have come to consider a cautious dual-identity approach as essential to social integration in the country.[3]
Presented at the 2009 annual American Sociological Association meeting, research from Madona Mokbel detailed the "Dichotomous Perceptions of the Arab Canadian Identity in Canada", particularly since the 2001 9/11 attacks.[4][5] Shortly after the attacks, Canadian Museum of Civilization postponed an exhibit, The Lands within Me, displaying the diasporic-based works of thirty Arab-Canadian artists. Moral outrage at the short notice of the postponement, suspicion of its connection to the attacks and subsequent protest at the decision, has been described as an early centralizing medium for Arab Canadian identity.[6]
Dr Christina Civantos of Miami University, writing in Food for Our Grandmothers, has detailed the broad and sometimes conflicting elements that constitute the Arab world and which, therefore, do not always simply amalgamate into a coherent Arab Canadian identity.[7] The collection of writing by Arab-American and Arab-Canadian feminists, in analysis by Amaney Jamal, has been described as shifting the definition of Arab Canadian identity onwards from "essentializing categories" while still explicitly confronting the racial and cultural realities of Arabs in North America.[8]
In 2013, academic Paul Eid, a researcher at Commission des droits de la personne et des droits de la jeunesse, has remarked that Canadians of a Coptic Egyptian background are the most likely to explicitly embrace an Arab-Canadian self-identification, due to the fact Copts were some of the earliest Arabic immigrants to Canada since the 1960s.[9][10]
Academic studies[edit]
A survey conducted in Edmonton, Alberta in the pre-2000, showed females 3 in 10, and 1 in 10 males, "tried to hide their Arab-Canadian identity". The research also significantly contrasted along lines of faith, with 44 percent of Arab Christians and 13 percent Arab Muslims also suppressing the identity.[11]
Research by academics Caitlin McDonald and Barbara Sellers-Young has also suggested that anti-Arabism and prejudice in North America can create a hostile environment for the expression of Arab Canadian identity.[12]
See also[edit]
References[edit]
- ↑ Raja G. Khouri (2003). Arabs in Canada: Post 9/11. G7 Books. p. 19. ISBN 978-1894611367.
This dimension refers to the community's cultural affiliation and belonging; what its perceptions of the Canadian identity, the Arab identity and Arab Canadian identity are.
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- ↑ Wisam Kh. Abdul-Jabbar (8 May 2019). "Arab Muslim Canadian high school students call for globalized curriculum to change stereotypes". The Conversation.
The students’ responses demonstrated a sense of double consciousness: they felt perceived as being Canadian, and yet not quite. Both my interviews and surveys reveal a condition of the Arab-Canadian identity as one that must constantly defend or apologize for itself.
- ↑ Wisam Kh. Abdul-Jabbar (2019). "Implications and Conclusions". Negotiating Diasporic Identity in Arab-Canadian Students: Double Consciousness, Belonging, and Radicalization. Palgrave Macmillan. p. 137. ISBN 978-3030162856.
For Ibrahim, existing contentedly with a rather balanced image or perception of an Arab-Canadian identity is key to social integration
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- ↑ Madona Mokbel (2009). "Either Arab or Canadian: Dichotomous Perceptions of the Arab Canadian Identity in Canada". American Sociological Association.
- ↑ Vic Satzewich; Lloyd Wong, eds. (2007). "Who's Transnationalism?". Transnational Identities and Practices in Canada. University of British Columbia Press. p. 223. ISBN 978-0774812849.
Recent research shows that even through children of Arab Canadians born in Canada were "Americanized ... their Arab identity has been raised as a result of [the] events" of 11 September 2001.
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- ↑ Elayne Oliphant (2005). "Paradoxes of Displaying Arab-Canadian Lands within the Canadian Museum of Civilization Following 9.11". Institute of Political Economy: Carleton University. pp. 86–87.
However, although The Lands within Me was intended to be an exhibit about migration, movement and belonging in its broadest sense, it was through the restrictive framework of the Arab-Canadian identity that the artists were forced to demand the exhibit be displayed as planned.
- ↑ Christina Civantos (2017). "The Middle East in North America". In Joanna Kadi. Food for Our Grandmothers: Writings by Arab-American and Arab-Canadian Feminists. South End Press. ISBN 978-0896084902.
Given the different ethnic and religious groups and colonial histories within the nineteen countries of the Arab world, the question arises, what constitutes an Arab-American or Arab-Canadian identity? What links exist between Arabs and other ethnic and national groups in the region designated the Middle or Near East and North Africa?
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- ↑ Amaney Jamal (2008). "Grandmothers, Grape Leaves, and Kahlil Gibran". Race and Arab Americans Before and After 9/11: From Invisible Citizens to Visible Subjects. Syracuse University Press. p. 201. ISBN 978-0815631774.
The introduction places an emphasis on culture and specific cultural production and couples it with an explicit discussion of race positionality of Arabs in North America. This discussion moves the definition [sic?] of Arab American / Arab Canadian identity away from essentializing categories.
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- ↑ Paul Eid (2007). Being Arab: Ethnic and Religious Identity Building among Second Generation Youth in Montreal. McGill-Queen's University Press. p. 235. ISBN 978-0773532229.
The preference of Egyptian-origin respondents for a hyphenated (Arab-Canadian) identity is probably attributable to the fact that this group comprises a majority of Copts
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- ↑ Kathryn Carriere (2009), "Spring, Volume 1", SYMPOSIA: The Graduate Student Journal of the Centre for the Study of Religion, University of Toronto,
In his provision of countless sources, epistemological camps, and theories of ethnic identity, Eid deconstrcuts various debates to present his viewpoints on how Arab-Canadian identity is formed.
- ↑ Baha Abu-Laban; Sharon McIrvin Abu-Laban (1999). "Arab-Canadian Youth in Immigrant Family Life". In Michael Suleiman. Arabs in America: Building a New Future. Temple University Press. pp. 140–154. ISBN 978-1566397278.
The extent to which Arab-Canadian ethnicity is perceived to be a liability is reflected by responses to the following question: "Are there times when you try to hide your Arab-Canadian origin?" The results show that more females (three of ten) than males (one of ten) tried to hide their ethnicity, and within the female group, more Christian (44 percent) than Muslim (13 percent) tried to hide their Arab-Canadian identity.
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- ↑ Caitlin McDonald; Barbara Sellers-Young (2013). "Arab-Canadian Youth in Immigrant Family Life". Belly Dance Around the World: New Communities, Performance and Identity. McFarland & Company. p. 49. ISBN 978-0786473700.
Fluctuating levels of anti—Arab prejudice in North America, linked with national and international politics, mean that claiming an Arab Canadian identity can be socially compromised and compromising
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