Term
| Assembly of First Nations |
|
Definition
| The Assembly of First Nations (AFN) is an assembly, modelled on the United Nations General Assembly, of First Nations (Indian bands) represented by their chiefs. It emerged from and replaced the Canadian National Indian Brotherhood in the early 1980s. The aims of the organization are to protect and advance the aboriginal and treaty rights and interests of First Nations in Canada, including health, education, culture and language. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
| Pier 21 was an ocean liner terminal and immigration shed from 1928 to 1971 in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. Over one million immigrants came to Canada through Pier 21 and it is the last surviving seaport immigration facility in Canada.The facility is often compared to the landmark American immigration gateway Ellis Island. |
|
|
Term
| The Merit Point System in Canada |
|
Definition
| To help immigration officials select who enters and who does not, there is a merit point system that awards actual numbers or values to qualities like education, skills, health (or lack of it), wealth and so on. Each category has its own threshold for admission, but overall it is out of 100 points per applicant. |
|
|
Term
| Barnardo children in Canada |
|
Definition
| Home Children was the child migration scheme founded by Annie MacPherson in 1869, under which more than 100,000 children were sent from the United Kingdom to Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and South Africa. MacPherson also had arrangements with Barnardo's Homes in London (as well as other homes in Scotland and Ireland). |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
| The Book of Negroes is a historical document that records names and descriptions of 3,000 Black Loyalists, the African-American slaves who escaped to the British lines during the American Revolution and were evacuated by the British by ship to points in Nova Scotia as freed men. |
|
|
Term
| The Dominion Lands Act of 1872 |
|
Definition
| The Dominion Lands Act of 1872 copied the American system by offering ownership of 160 acres of land free (except for a small registration fee) to any man over 18 or any woman heading a household. They did not need to be citizens, but had to live on the plot and improve it. |
|
|
Term
| Family reunification in Canada |
|
Definition
Under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and associated Regulations, a Canadian citizen or permanent resident of Canada aged at least 18 is allowed, subject to certain conditions, to sponsor specific members of their immediate family for permanent residence in Canada.
The eligible persons are the sponsor's spouse, common-law partner, or conjugal partner aged 16 and over, parents and grandparents, a dependent child of the sponsor, a child whom the sponsor intends to adopt, and orphaned brothers, sisters, nieces, or grandchildren under the age of 18 and who are not married or living in a common-law relationship. As an exception to the rules, if there are no eligible persons from the preceding list who may be sponsored and the sponsor has no relatives in Canada, the 'last-remaining family member' may be sponsored, but applications of this type are rare. |
|
|
Term
| The Bilingual Belt in Canada |
|
Definition
| Knowledge of the two official languages is largely determined by geography. Nearly 95% of Quebecers can speak French, but only 40.6% speak English. In the rest of the country, 97.6% of the population is capable of speaking English, but only 7.5% can speak French. Personal bilingualism is most concentrated in southern Quebec and a swath of territory sometimes referred to as the bilingual belt, which stretches east from Quebec through northern and eastern New Brunswick and west through Ottawa and that part of Ontario lying to the east of Ottawa, as well as north-eastern Ontario. There is also a large French speaking population in Manitoba (Metis). In all, 55% of bilingual Canadians are Quebecers, and a high percentage of the bilingual population in the rest of Canada resides in Ontario and New Brunswick. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
| The Acadians are the descendants of French colonists who settled in Acadia during the 17th and 18th centuries, some of whom are also Métis. The colony was located in what is now Eastern Canada's Maritime provinces (Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island), as well as part of Quebec, and present-day Maine to the Kennebec River. Although today most of the Acadians and Québécois are French-speaking (francophone) Canadians, Acadia was a distinctly separate colony of New France. It was geographically and administratively separate from the French colony of Canada (modern-day Quebec). As a result, the Acadians and Québécois developed two distinct histories and cultures. They also developed a slightly different French language. France has one official language and to accomplish this they have an administration in charge of the language. Since the Acadians were separated from this council, their French language evolved independently, and Acadians retain several elements of 17th-century French that have been lost in France. The settlers whose descendants became Acadians came from many areas in France, but especially regions such as Île-de-France, Normandy, Brittany, Poitou and Aquitaine. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
| In 1907 the Grand Trunk and Pacific Railway lobbied Ottawa to let it import 10,000 Japanese workers to build its line in Northern BC. Premier Bowser was against such a large Asian influx. In 1907 the Asiatic Exclusion League developed a resolution asking the Canadian government to “enforce the Immigration Act passed by the provincial legislature in the Spring of 1907”, but the Canadian Government refused to endorse the Act. In September 1907 there were anti-Asian riots (not just in Vancouver, but also up the West Coast of the USA). No one was killed but the damage to Asian-owned property was extensive. One result was an informal agreement whereby the government of Japan stopped emigration to Canada. |
|
|
Term
| Opening the (Canadian) West |
|
Definition
| From 1867 to 1914, the Canadian West opened for mass settlement, and became home to millions of immigrant settlers seeking a new life. This immigration boom created key industries still important to Canada’s international role – like agriculture, mining, and oil. The Prairie Provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta grew rapidly in these years as settlers began to transform the barren prairie flatland and establish unique cultural settlements. Many motivations brought immigrants to Canada: greater economic opportunity and improved quality of life, an escape from oppression and persecution, and opportunities and adventures presented to desirable immigrant groups by Canadian immigration agencies. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
Loyalists were American colonists who remained loyal to the British Crown during the American Revolutionary War. At the time they were often called Tories, Royalists, or King's Men; Patriots called them "persons inimical to the liberties of America." They were opposed by the Patriots, those who supported the revolution. When their cause was defeated, about 15% of the Loyalists or 65,000–70,000 fled to other parts of the British Empire, to Britain or elsewhere in British North America. The southern colonists moved mostly to Florida, which had remained loyal to the Crown, and to British Caribbean possessions, while northern colonists largely migrated to Ontario, Quebec, New Brunswick, and Nova Scotia, where they were called United Empire Loyalists. Most were compensated with Canadian land or British cash distributed through formal claims procedures.
Historians have estimated that between 15 and 20 percent of the 2.5 million whites in the colonies were Loyalists, or about 500,000 men, women and children. Numerous black Americans were also Loyalists. In Nova Scotia, the community of Birchtown was one of three communities settled by black Loyalists. |
|
|
Term
|
Definition
The Immigration Act. 1976, in Canada was insured in 1978 by the Parliament of Canada. It focused on who should be allowed into Canada, not on who should be kept out. The act came into force in 1978, along with new immigration regulations. This act gave more power to the provinces to set their own immigration laws and defined "prohibited classes" in much broader terms. Individuals who could become a burden on social welfare or health services would now be refused entry, rather than specific categories of people, i.e. those who identified themselves as homosexual, the disabled, and so on. Further, it created four new classes of immigrants who could come to Canada: refugees, families, assisted relatives, and independent immigrants. While independent immigrants had to take part in the points system, other classes did not have to take part in this test so long as they passed basic criminal, security, and health checks. The act also created alternatives to deportation for less serious criminal or medical offenses, since deportation meant the immigrant was barred from entering Canada for life. After 1978, the government could issue 12-month exclusion orders and a departure notice, if the cause for a person's removal wasn't serious, but in some cases it could be severe.
The 1976 Immigration Act was replaced by the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA) in 2002. |
|
|
Term
| Grosse Île and the Irish Memorial National Historic Site |
|
Definition
The island was the site of an immigration depot which predominantly housed Irish immigrants coming to Canada to escape the Great Famine, 1845-1849. In 1832, the Lower Canadian Government had previously set up this depot to contain an earlier cholera epidemic that was believed to be caused by the large influx of European immigrants, and the station was reopened in the mid-Nineteenth Century to accommodate Irish migrants who had contracted typhus during their voyages. Thousands of Irish were quarantined on Grosse Isle from 1832 to 1848.
It is believed that over 3000 Irish died on the island and over 5000 are currently buried in the cemetery there; many died en route. Most who died on the island were infected with typhus, which sprang up from the conditions there in 1847. Grosse Isle is the largest burial ground for refugees of the Great Hunger outside Ireland. After Canadian Confederation in 1867, the buildings and equipment were modernized to meet the standards of the new Canadian government's immigration policies. The island is sometimes called Canada's Ellis Island (1892-1954), an association it shares with Pier 21 immigration facility in Halifax, Nova Scotia. |
|
|
