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Calla Durose-Moya

Margaret Hobbs
WMST1000Y
March 7, 2014

A Multicultural Canada?: Asian-Canadian Women's Struggles


Canada is multicultural. There are statutes in the Canadian Charter of
Rights and Freedoms implementing policies to supposedly foster a multicultural
mosaic to reflect the image Canada wants to display for itself. Canada is home to
the world's most multicultural city, Toronto, which is also Canada's largest city.
One can look at Toronto as a microcosm of Canadian multiculturism which
includes certain systemic dynamics such as exploitation and marginalization.
Essentially, Canada is not a utopia. This essay aims to debunk the myth of
Canada being a 'land of milk and honey' and a happy multicultural oasis by
looking critically at the experiences of Asian Canadian women. Asian Canadian
women have been and continue to be integral to the foundation of Canada, yet
are underappreciated and discredited. This includes a look at the efforts Asian
Canadian women have made to Canadian culture and the women's movement,
Filipina migrant workers in Canada and the racist and sexist policies the
Canadian government have made, and what this means in an intersectional and
globalized context.
Lesbian Asian Canadian writer Sky Lee asserts that, in order for white
feminists to 'broaden their critical consciousness', they must hear and learn about

the struggles that women of colour experience. Racism has developed into the
very struggle of making a unique Canadian culture, thus repeating the pattern of
imperialism. Asian Canadian identity and culture has developed during and into
important Canadian social movements like Quebecois nationalism, First Nations
struggles, and Canada's fight against ties to colonial roots from England and the
United States. As Roy Miki, a Japanese Canadian poet and writer, explains in his
work, Broken Entries that Canadian nationalists:
adopted the language of victimization to place Canadian cultural identity in
opposition to its external enemies, American and British imperialisms. This
triadic model justified a reductive Canadianness- a cultural lineage linked
to an essentialized British past- that elided the relations of dominance
inside the country, what has been called internal colonialism. The internal
structures of dominance include a racialization process in which non-white
subjects in the Canadian state are subordinated as others who inhabit a
realm of shadows, of chaotic darkness, of non-persons. If the assumption
is that critics, academics, and theorists are social subjects whose actions
are necessarily enmeshed with dominant values, then the products of the
research and writing must signify in terms of omissions, containments, and
displacements.
Even critical work that proposes itself as the cutting edge may be unable to
extricate itself from the historical determinants of its institutional setting.
Within this context, a direct example of Canada attempting to assert its newfound
goal of 'Canadianness' or its own culture diverting from the roots of American and

British imperialism on non-white subjects is the labour of Asian Canadians being


exploited to help construct a nation state. This happened with the contruction of
the national railway, the Canadian Pacific Railway, where Chinese Canadian
labourers, despite their contributions, were considered undesirable workers and
were exported to Canada to work on the railway. More than fifteen thousand
Chinese workers were exported to Canada in the 1880's to work on the most
dangerous parts of the railway. It was reported that nearly one worker died for
each mile of the track being lay through the Rocky Mountains. After the railway
was finished, the Canadian government tried to discourage Asian immigration by
implementing the racist 'head tax'. Asian Canadians faced horrible discrimination
then, as well. According to CBC's article titled A Legacy of Hate, hatred against
Asians boiled over in September 1907, at a huge protest rally at Vancouver City
Hall organized by the newly formed Asiatic Exclusion League. Half the citys
30,000 people turned out for the rally wearing ribbons that said "For a White
Canada." On July 23 1923, Canada banned outright the immigration of Chinese
people1, and the ban was not repealed until 19472. Clearly, this is a fairly recent
example of the blatancy of racist policies Canada implement against Asian
Canadian individuals, and calls for a critical look into the transparency of the
multicultural mosaic Canada today likes to pride itself of. Even within the
Canadian women's movement, which its main goals were and still are to
emancipate all women from systemic oppression, Asian Canadian women still
find themselves feeling like outsiders or having to constantly educate white
feminists. There have been many accounts of Asian Canadian women in the

movement still feeling stereotyped- as if the stereotypes that Asian women are
the least oppressed, the least political, and the most soft-spoken and polite still
apply even within this movement that seeks to break stereotypes about women
and advocate for all women and listen to them speak about their experiences.
The fact that even within the women's movement, Asian Canadian women still
feel excluded, is problematic. Asian American writer Mitsune Yamata writes about
hers and her collegues experiences with the (white) women's movement:
When Third World women are asked to speak representing our racial or
ethnic group, we are expected to move, charm or entertain, but not to
educate in ways that are threatening to our audiences. We speak to
audiences that sift out those parts of our speech (if what we say does not fit
the image they have of us), come up to shake our hands with "That was
lovely my dear, just lovely," and go home with the same mind set they come
in with.
Alternatively, Asian Canadian women have also created spaces for
themselves and also were a major factor in the creation of the Third Wave
feminist movement. One notable example of Asian Canadian women activism
is a theatre company based out of Toronto called Loud Mouth Asian Babes,
which its name aimed to 'subvert the stereotype of the submissive Asian
personality'. The company produced and put on plays including the creative
work of Asian Canadians. By being strong, creative, and intelligent, Asian
Canadian women (as well as their male counterparts) have come a long way
in surviving state sanctioned oppression and fighting against it.

The Filipino government sees the export of labour as gaining foreign


exchange, as well as relieving the high unenmployment and poverty rates in
the Philippines. As a result, many Filipina/os were and are encouraged to work
in North America, Europe, the Middle East, and other parts of Asia. Also, due
to the Filipino government's reliance of the remittance of migrant workers,
there is little awareness about regulation and protection of migrant workers.
Filipino/as are the highest source of short term and long term immigration in
Canada3, and are now the fourth largest visible minority in Canada.4 This is
partly due to the fact that the Philippines has a human labour export policy.
More than fifty percent of Filipina migrant workers in Canada are domestic
workers.5 The cause of this is partly owed to the emancipation of White
women in the global north, championing labour rights only for themselves, thus
leaving the role of domestic and child labour to women of colour and migrant
workers (most often times both). The Canadian government instituted the Livein Caregiver Program in the 1980s as a labour measure, and women from the
Philippines who originally could not come to Canada under any other
immigration categories could now use the program to emigrate to Canada.6
Domestic care jobs, deemed undesirable and stigmatized since White women,
as explained, have access to the entire general labour market and migrant
women do not, were fulfilled by Filipina migrant women under the LCP. With
the political contexts of Filipina migrant workers in Canada, there are also
major social implications and underlying intersectional context that must be
highlighted to fully understand their struggles. Often, women in the Philippines

are exploited before they even leave the country. With this, they see migration
as an escape from domestic abuse and exploitation, a way to earn wages for
their families, and to see the world. Unfortunately, migration can aggravate
abuse. While Filipinas are abroad, there have been accounts of the money
they send for their children to eat and go to school being taken and abused by
the husband. Also, Filipina women who go abroad experience abuse one way
or another- physical, emotional, economic, and/or sexual. So, the violence
they experience abroad is almost an extension of what they experienced back
home. Stories of Filipina migrant workers working twenty hours a day and
thinking it is just part of their job and also facing sexual abuse from their
employers are very common. In Canada, their salaries start lower than the
salaries for Canadian workers ($300/month- actual Canadian wage is
$100.25/week). Filipina migrant workers in Canada often report having to work
seven days a week, and are unable to move from employers due to the need
for having sponsors to live in Canada.7 In an interview on cassette tape titled
Exporting Lives by PINAY and the Women's Media Circle Foundation,
interviewee Rosie(pseudonym) , a Filipina domestic worker in Canada,
remarked that her employer stopped her from making phone calls home and
was unable to go out and make friends, furthering her feelings of alienation
and exacerbating feelings of being unable to integrate into Canadian society,
which many women like her also experience: I was just like a prisoner. For
many Filipina women, migration is seen as an escape from domestic abuse, a
better way to make money to provide for their families, and as a way to see

another part of the world. Yet, when they come to Canada, they find
themselves facing deprofessionalization, enslavement, and discrimination. The
education they earned in the Philippines is discredited by the Canadian
government. They also find integrating into Canadian society difficult, being
casted off as outsiders without rights. Even when Filipinas earn enough money
working one or more low wage jobs to bring their families over, they still must
continue to work subsistence jobs thus having little time to spend with their
families.8 To sum, Filipina migrant workers in Canada find themselves in a
perpetual role as temporary workers of precarious employment and unstable
living conditions.
The recognition of rights for Asian Canadian women, especially Filipina
migrant workers is important to occur. Asian Canadian women, of course, are
affected by discrimination caused by systemic and historical oppression.
These contexts will be analyzed using Filipina migrant workers as a direct
example of the importance of analyzing discrimination within large
structures/systems from an intersectional and globalized context. The
Canadian Research Insitute for the Advancement of Canadian Women
(CRIAW) provides a document titled Intersectional Feminist Frameworks: A
Primer which analyzes the problems of poverty through intersectional context.
This document specifically sheds light on the problematic results for women
using the Live-in Caregiver Program, and recognizes the historical links
between colonialism, nation formation, global economies, and immigration
policies. CRIAW asserts that:

IFFS can help build soild support and recognition for domestic workers by
viewing gender alongside other forms of oppression that attempt to take
away migrant women's power. A review of the Live-in Caregiver Program by
advocacy groups and the Canadian government with IFFs would

expose the role of colonialism and Canada's racist and sexist


immigration policies in shaping this program;

force this issue to become all of society's problem and not only the
problem of the women facing the abuse;

reveal how immigration, employment standards, citizenship, and


restrictive labour policies combine to exclude and limit equal treatment
of racialized women.

Globalization also has direct application to the mistreatment of Filipina


migrant workers in Canada. Because of the reliance of the exportation
of labour in the Philippines and the global outsourced job market, many
women come to Canada seeking employment. A positive of
globalization is that the increase of employment now has the potential
to liberate women from traditional roles and status in society. But
employment only benefits women when they are able to live
comfortably with their wages, whether or not they are being exploited
(physically, emotionally, economically, and/or sexually), and whether
she still is responsible for the majority of household and family care
work. In Shawn Meghan Burn's Women Across Cultures: A Global
Perspective, she remarks that, Many of the jobs are domestic and care

labour jobs that replicate traditional gendered roles and may allow more
affluent women to low-status, gendered roles. All of these factors
directly apply to conditions of Filipina migrant workers and the majority
of the labour duties they perform in Canada.
Canada has and continues to be a nation ruled by racist and sexist
government policies. This has been proven by looking at the experiences of
Asian-Canadian women, and specifically the experiences of Filipina migrant
workers in Canada in a globalized and intersectional context. Asian-Canadian
women, once again, are integral to Canadian society, culture, and the
women's movement but are underappreciated, and too often are asked to
speak or educate White women about their struggles. The Canadian
government refuses to listen about the experiences of isolation and abuse of
domestic workers under the Live-in Caregiver Program, and the attitude of the
government must be changed and there should be more awareness, both
about the rights of domestic workers and about the mistreatment of workers to
other Canadians, who generally are unaware of the implications of workers
under the LCP. The suffering of racialized minority women should be reflected
upon by all women. As the writer Mitsuye Yamada previously quoted
concluded: Asian Pacific American women will not speak out to say what we
have on our minds until we feel secure within ourselves that this is our home
too; and until our white sisters indicate by their actions that they want to join us
in our struggle because it is theirs also.
Works Cited

"60th Anniversary of the Act to Amend the Immigration Act." Government of


Canada. N.p., 2007. Web. 01 Apr. 2014.
<http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/multiculturalism/asian/60act.asp>.
"An Act Respecting Chinese Immigration - P. 1 - Early Canadiana Online." An Act
Respecting Chinese Immigration - P. 1 - Early Canadiana Online. N.p., n.d. Web.
01 Apr. 2014. <http://eco.canadiana.ca/view/oocihm.9_08043/2?r=0&s=1>.
Burn, Shawn Meghan. Excerpted from Women and Globalization in Women
Across Cultures: A Global Perspective. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill, 2010.
Canadian Research Institute for the Advancement of Women, excerpted from
Intersectional Feminist Frameworks: A Primer. Ottawa, ON. CRIAW, 2006.
http://criaw-icref.ca.
Eric, Josephine. "The Rites of Passages of Filipinas in Canada." Filipinos in
Canada: Disturbing Invisibility. By Roland Sintos Coloma. Toronto: University of
Toronto, 2012. 123-39. Print.
Exporting Lives: Stories of Filipina Migrant Workers in Canada and the
Philippines. PINAY (Montreal) and the Women's Media Circle Foundation
(Manila), 1984. Cassette.
Fisher, Matthew. "Philippines Was Canadas Greatest Source of Immigrants
In 2012."O.canada.com. Canada.com, 20 Oct. 2013. Web. 01 Apr. 2014.
"Legacy of Hate." CBCnews. CBC/Radio Canada, n.d. Web. 17 Mar. 2014.
Li, Xiaoping. "Redefining Asian Canadian Women." Voices Rising: Asian
Canadian Cultural Activism. Vancouver: UBC, 2007. 50-57. Print.
Macklin, Audrey. "Foreign Domestic Worker: Surrogate Housewife or Mail Order

Servant?" (1992) 37 McGill Law Journal 681-760.


Miki, Roy. Broken Entries: Race, Subjectivity, Writing: Essays. Toronto: Mercury,
1998. 131-32. Print.
Yamada, Mitsuye. "Asian Pacific American Women and Feminism." This Bridge
Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color. By Cherre Moraga and
Gloria Anzalda. New York: Kitchen Table, Women of Color, 1983. 71-75. Print.

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