Ó Copyright by Mark Edward Pfeifer (1999)

Abstract/Acknowledgements/Table of Contents - [ Chapters - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10 - 11 ] -  Appendices - References Cited

This chapter explains the content of my study. Decisions in regard to the content have come about as a result of both my personal experience interacting with persons of Vietnamese origin and also as I have reviewed the literature on immigrants and ethnic groups in North American cities. Selected theoretical perspectives to the study of immigrant adaptation are the focus of Part I of the chapter. This section is not intended as a traditional literature review. It is primarily an overview of scholarly approaches to understanding the relationship between immigrant newcomers and the host society in North American urban settings in the late 20^th century. More detailed assessments of scholarly work pertaining to specific research realms are included in the introduction of the individual chapters discussing various components of the adaptation of the Vietnamese in Toronto.

Part I of the chapter is further broken down into three sections. The first of these defines the process of immigrant adaptation, this is followed by a discussion of models suggested by social scientists for understanding the relationship between immigrants and the host society in which they are situated. The final portion of the first part of the chapter examines in more detail scholarly writing pertaining to a central question framing the larger research study: what is an ethnic community and how is such an entity constituted in space over the physical territory of a given city?

The second part of the chapter provides an account of how the study itself came about. It discusses the relationship between the larger theoretical issues and my own interest in the adaptation of Vietnamese individuals in Toronto. This leads into a discussion of the major research questions guiding the study followed by an overview of the major sources of data utilized. In the final section, I discuss how my personal biography affected my interactions with my research subjects as well as the collection and analysis of data.

THE ADAPTATION PROCESS

Adaptation is a concept used quite broadly in the study of ethnic groups residing within host societies. For the purposes of this particular research project, the term is conceived along the lines of the seminal definition posited by Richmond and Goldlust (1974): "the mutual interaction of individuals and collectivities and their response to particular physical and social environments" (p. 195). Adaptation is a bilateral process. Individual immigrants and larger ethnic collectivities are influenced and transformed by the host society and vice versa (Richmond and Goldlust, 1974; Berry; 1987).

Richmond and Goldlust (1974) point out that the adaptation of immigrant group members is affected by both their pre-migration characteristics and conditions in their homeland of origin, as well as situational determinants within the host society itself. Pre-migration characteristics include the immigrant population’s level of education and technical training, the existence or nonexistence of prior experiences with urbanization, demographic characteristics of the immigrant group (including age distribution and gender balance), and the auspices or motives for migration (refugees fleeing persecution as opposed to family-sponsored or independent immigrants who come to the new country for primarily economic reasons). Richmond and Goldlust also identify several situational factors within the receiving society which may influence the trajectory of adaptation. Among these are the existing demography of the host society (which is especially relevant to the process of labour market incorporation), trends of urbanization and industrialization impacting the society as a whole, government policies (for example "multiculturalism" and other policies directed toward the integration of immigrants and minority populations), and the degree of pluralism and the level of stratification in the receiving society.

The process of adaptation itself may be broken down into several dimensions, each involving a different component of interaction between the migrant and the larger society. Categories of the adaptation process identified by scholars include both `objective’ or external components, as well as `subjective’ or socio-psychological aspects. Objective dimensions include economic, cultural, social and political components. Economic adaptation is related to the socioeconomic trajectory of the immigrant in the host society. Cultural adaptation includes among other things language learning, exchange of cultural symbols between immigrants and the new society, as well as changes in religious or moral beliefs and practices. Social aspects of adaptation involve the integration of immigrants into networks of primary relationships with relatives, co-ethnics, individuals belonging to other ethnic groups, and majority group members, as well as participation in formal co-ethnic institutions or those of the host society. The process of immigrant adaptation also involves political aspects, including voting behaviour and the possible formation of new parties and ethnic subgroups within existing parties as well as attempts to bring about change in host society institutions (Richmond and Goldlust, 1974). Finally, ethnic group adaptation involves important socio-psychological or subjective dimensions. Subjective aspects identified by scholars include changes in group identification, attitudinal and value changes, as well as the level of satisfaction of the individual immigrant with his or her life in the host society (Richmond and Goldlust, 1974; Berry, 1987). While subjective elements are not completely ignored, the primary focus of this study is upon "objective" aspects of Vietnamese adaptation (socioeconomic, cultural, social, and political) to life in Toronto.

Many Vietnamese have come to Canada as refugees. It should be noted that scholars usually distinguish refugees from immigrants by making reference to the differential circumstances of their migration. Immigrants are most often conceived by scholars as having voluntarily migrated for primarily economic reasons. Alternately, refugee migration is usually conceptualized as involving a coerced or forced departure for the purpose of fleeing political persecution tied to such personal characteristics as race, ethnicity, religion, nationality, and/or political beliefs (Black and Robinson, 1993). It should be noted, however, that this rather simplistic dichotomy does not adequately account for the complexity of the migration process experienced by many contemporary refugees and immigrants.

Zolberg (1991) argues that most refugees from the developing world today are motivated to leave their home country by an inextricable mixture of both economic and political factors. At the same time, many persons admitted as immigrants into receiving societies leave in part as a result of the political situation in their countries of origin. Haines (1996) distinguishes the experiences of refugees from other migrants in several ways. This scholar notes that the exodus of a refugee usually involves a rupture of cultural and social relations far more severe than the experience of other immigrants. This rupture may include a loss of relatives and friends. Flight is often chosen rapidly, making social and financial losses necessary. As a result, the resettlement process of the refugee usually does not involve the advance preparation and preexisting ethnic community structures in the new society that are typically available to immigrants.

Haines (1996) also notes that the psychological impacts of the refugee experience are also more severe than those felt by most immigrants during the migration process itself. Exodus from the country of origin is usually risky and clandestine, with family members left behind or lost enroute. Psychological manifestations from this trauma may be serious and multiple. A number of studies have documented the long-term mental health difficulties experienced by many Vietnamese, as well as members of other refugee groups, after resettlement. These problems include grief, depression, anxiety about the welfare of separated family members, panic over an uncertain future, confusion, feelings of remorse and guilt, and a sense of bitterness, disappointment, and anger. Haines points out that these emotional burdens are often intertwined with the problems individual refugees may have adjusting to the host society in their country of adopted residence. Many refugees experience difficulty in finding well-paying stable employment. Disappointment with their economic situation in the United States and a perceived loss of personal status may generate mental health problems including depression. These problems, in turn, may make it difficult for refugees to find employment and hinder their general integration into life within a new society.

MODELS OF ETHNIC GROUP ADAPTATION

As mentioned in the introductory chapter, there are a number of approaches which have been posited by social scientists to account for the immigrant adaptation process in North American cities. The following is a brief discussion of the tenets and propositions of several perspectives influential in contemporary scholarly accounts of ethnic group adaptation.

In part due to the writings of the Chicago School sociologists, the assimilation model dominated scholarly writing pertaining to immigrant adaptation in the first half of the 20th century. The assimilation model takes it as virtually inevitable that ethnic minority group members will eventually conform to and adopt the cultural standards of the dominant population and integrate into the social structure of the larger urban, industrial modern society (Hune, 1991; Heisler, 1992). The assimilation model posits that all ethnic groups, regardless of national origin or ethnic or racial background, tend to be drawn into the economic mainstream over a period of time, gaining social acceptance in the larger society through the educational and occupational achievements of individual members. Thus, it is argued, distinctive ethnic cultural traits will disappear with time in the host country (Hirschman, 1982; Morawska, 1990). Ethnic group activities may serve the short-term function of easing adjustment to a new society but in the long-run will disappear as the inevitable processes of assimilation occur among individual group members. The assimilation paradigm has been particularly influential for scholars studying ethnic residential patterns and the relationship between residence and group institutional life. The human ecologists posit that with time in the host society and increasing socioeconomic mobility, ethnic group members will move out of central city enclaves to suburban neighbourhoods. As this residential dispersion occurs, it is hypothesized, group identity will diminish and ethnic institutions will flounder.

Certain scholars have maintained that with refinements, the assimilation model still offers a viable account of the adaptation process experienced by many contemporary ethnic groups (Massey, 1985; Alba 1990; Morawska, 1990; Morawska, 1994; Yinger, 1994; Alba R. and V. Nee, 1997; DeWind and Kasinitz, 1997; Gans, 1997). Over the years, many scholars have critiqued the various generalizations of the assimilation model. Social scientists have been particularly critical of the assimilation theorists' tendency to focus almost exclusively upon the adaptation of immigrants as individuals. Much of the research influenced by the assimilation model is concerned with the cultural, psychological, and socioeconomic changes that occur in the lives of ethnic group individuals with time in the host country. In these studies, little attention is paid to the collective dimension of adjustment among group members. Some critics have noted that immigrants first and foremost belong to households, families and ethnic communities, and that analysis of their adaptation should pay attention to their use of the networks existing within these varied entities (Hein, 1995). In a related vein, certain social scientists have criticized the insufficient room the assimilation model allows for the personal agency of ethnic group members within the adaptation process. The assimilation theorists devote most of their attention to the impact of larger societal forces upon group members while not giving much consideration to the influence of individual group members upon their own adaptation (Hein, 1995).

A common criticism of the assimilation model is its implicit assumption that the host society has a unitary core culture for migrants to integrate into (Rumbaut, 1997a, Rumbaut, 1997b; Zhou, 1997). In the case of the U.S. and Canada, presumably this core culture is that belonging to white persons of European ancestry. This assumption, however, is inconsistent with the realities of contemporary urban North America, where a considerable number of ethnic minority groups make up substantial portions of the population. Indeed, in many U.S. urban areas, new immigrants move to inner city neighbourhoods where minority groups such as Hispanics and African-Americans are the majority of the population. These new immigrants, including several Asian and Hispanic groups, interact on a daily basis with other ethnic minority groups as opposed to persons of white European origin. In addition, defining a set of core American or Canadian cultural values is an extremely problematic if not impossible task to achieve. Ethnic pluralism and class inequality structure the populations of these nations. Given these facts, it may be very difficult to discern exactly what ethnic group members should be assimilating to in these host countries. Another limitation of the assimilation model is its primary focus upon the immigrant group member and his or her ability to adjust and become incorporated into the host society. Scholars writing from an assimilationist perspective tend to ignore or downplay changes immigrant newcomers bring to the host society itself (Hune, 1991; Heisler, 1992).

Cultural Pluralism

For these and other reasons, scholars of ethnicity have come to question the very utility of the concept of assimilation. First postulated by author Horace Kallen early in the century, the cultural pluralism model of ethnic group adaptation arose in response to the presumed deficiencies of the assimilationist paradigm. Pluralist theorists have argued that ethnicity has persisting staying power both as a facet of personal identity and as a basis for collective organization (Hune, 1991; Omi and Winant, 1994). Ethnic communities are seen as providing a sense of physical and psychic security that comes from the familiar and dependable. Over time, despite socioeconomic mobility among individual members, ethnic groups may remain as bases of solidarity and primary interaction, allowing immigrant group members to meet expressive as well as more instrumental needs.

The pluralism model does not dismiss the possibility of integration into the social and economic institutional structures of the host society. It does, however, posit such integration to be difficult for many ethnic group members to achieve, especially for those who have been strongly socialized in their original culture. After the second and third generations though, it is believed that group members may turn away from traditional institutions and cultural values. Importantly, however, this process is not necessarily associated with the loss of individual ethnic traits and cultural identity as presumed by the assimilation model (Zhou, 1992).

Structural Theories

The strongest criticisms of the cultural pluralism model have focused upon the almost exclusive attention it gives to the role of ethnic culture in the lives of immigrant group members. Like those of the assimilation model, cultural pluralism explanations turn to the distinctive cultural characteristics of particular ethnic groups to explain the social and economic trajectory of their members' adaptation (Li, 1990; Omi and Winant, 1994). Structural theorists believe this preoccupation with the realm of culture serves to obscure key factors explaining the continued salience of ethnicity in modern society. Structural explanations of ethnic group adaptation emphasize the intersecting roles of class inequality and racism in perpetuating ethnic group segregation in realms such as housing and the poorly compensated sectors of the labour market (McAll, 1990).

One school of structuralist-oriented scholars link racism to the needs of capitalist economies for significant quantities of inexpensive and docile labour. It is argued that some sectors of capitalist production (especially employers in the so-called secondary labour market) require the presence of large pools of cheap labour that can be drawn upon when labourers are needed and disregarded when they are not required. In a process of `racialization', superficial, biological, physical, and/or other cultural characteristics are used by employers or representatives of the state, to delineate group boundaries, structure the production process, and justify unequal treatment. Proponents of such a view often argue that racism is an ideology imposed from above by capitalist employers with collusion by the state. Such a process of `racialization', it is argued, has also served to polarize the working class as it functions to create class factions, which by their very existence, contribute further to the maintenance of the status quo. In sum, capitalists benefit from racial divisions because a working class which lacks unity will exercise less leverage over employers (Satzewich, 1991; Omi and Winant, 1994).

An influential version of the structuralist approach has been advanced by Edna Bonacich and other proponents of the so-called split-labour market theory. According to this perspective, racial and ethnic boundaries are salient in society as a result of interaction between high-priced and cheap labour. It is argued that racial or ethnic conflict takes place between dominant and subordinate workers. Differences in the price of labour mean that the higher-cost, white majority group workers feel threatened by the lower-cost minority group workers. The high-priced workers respond by pressuring various levels of government to restrict entry to the country or, failing this, seek to restrict entry to persons who will fill certain occupations (Bonacich, 1973; Satzewich, 1991; Bonacich, 1994; Omi and Winant, 1994).

Structural theories may be critiqued for their almost exclusive emphasis upon the influence of large societal structures for explaining the trajectories of ethnic group adaptation. Structural approaches tend to leave little room for the role of human agency, specifically the actions of ethnic group members themselves, in the course of their own adaptation. The most rigid structural theorists are also guilty of a form of theoretical determinism. Scholars writing from such a point of view tend to impose grand, all-encompassing theory upon their research subjects without adequately considering the possibility that ethnic group members may actively choose to assert their own ethnic identity for various reasons. The most rigid structural theorists seem to deny the possibility that ethnic culture itself may in and of itself possess a certain intrinsic value to some people in their lives. Instead, these writers tend to promulgate a view which considers ethnicity by and large to be a construct imposed by hostile external agents in order to further their own ends.

Since the 1970s, a new approach to ethnic adaptation has emerged which combines elements of the cultural pluralism and structural theories. In effect, this perspective argues that ethnicity is a dependent variable, usually only emerging as an important basis for social identity and collective organization in the context of certain situations created by wider societal structures. This alternative approach emphasizes the interrelationships among inequality, conflict, and ethnic pluralism (Yancey, et al, 1976; Olzak, 1983; Olzak, 1992). Some of the most influential contemporary work utilizing this perspective has been concerned with the function of ethnic enclaves in group adaptation.

An ethnic enclave may be defined as an ethnic group population that supports an internal economy sufficient to provide members with jobs and investment capital without assistance from the larger society (Portes and Manning, 1986). In recent years, a plethora of scholars have shown that immigrants who work in these co-ethnic enclaves may receive better jobs and higher salaries given their skills, education, and knowledge than if they worked in the jobs of the larger society. Perhaps the most influential body of work in this area has been that produced by Alejandro Portes and his associates. Based on case studies of the Cuban ethnic economy in the Miami metropolitan area, Portes and his colleagues claim that the economic, social, and political interests of ethnic group members are often best served by maintaining their ethnicity and emphasizing pluralism. Key to ethnic enclave theory is its emphasis on the roles of discrimination and disadvantage in situationally provoking immigrants to utilize their ethnicity as a means of collective advancement within the context of a hostile host society. It is argued that an inward turn to the ethnic economy and ethnic social networks may actually serve to facilitate the social mobility and status attainment of group members as co-ethnics provide assistance to one another not only in finding enclave employment but also in mediating interactions with host society institutions including the labour market, government agencies, the education sector, the criminal justice system and the media (Portes and Jensen, 1987; Portes, 1989; Zhou, 1992; Portes, 1995; Portes and Rumbaut, 1996; Portes and Zhou, 1996; Razin and Langlois, 1996; Portes, 1997).

The ethnic enclave perspective has been criticized for its strongly instrumental conception of ethnic identity. Gold (1992) argues that the enclave model's view of ethnic loyalties and affiliations as being primarily maintained by the underlying socioeconomic interests of group members offers a rather incomplete description of immigrants' collective lives. Gold believes the model fails to capture the ability of ethnicity to motivate feelings of group belonging and action in a way more fundamental than can be articulated by calculations of cost and reward alone. Gold argues that primarily expressive, non-instrumental concerns may also provide a significant basis for ethnic solidarity.

The enclave model may also exaggerate the solidarity existing within ethnic group populations. Immigrants of the same ethnicity may vary widely in their social, political, and economic backgrounds. Extremely stratified and segmented ethnic populations may resist unification for economic and political goals. Furthermore, not all of the members of a particular group may benefit economically from the existence of an ethnic enclave (Sanders and Nee, 1987; Gold, 1992; Bonacich, 1994; Gold, 1994).

Finally, the enclave model may simply not be applicable to the situations of certain ethnic minority groups. Most of the studies offering support for the enclave perspective have focused upon immigrant groups such as the Japanese, Jews, Cubans, Koreans, and Chinese. Many members of these particular groups possess a combination of cultural, historical, educational, and economic characteristics that serve to promote an extensive degree of entrepreneurship. Other ethnic minority groups may not possess such human capital resources and it is unrealistic to expect members of these groups to generate the large numbers of successful business enterprises that the enclave model posits as the key to mobility and status attainment in a host society where discrimination is endemic (Gold, 1992).

In recent years, a group of scholars have focused attention upon the ways in which racial and ethnic identities are socially constructed and the subsequent impact of these social representations upon the adaptation process as experienced by different minority groups. According to this perspective, racial and ethnic differences and patterns of racial and ethnic domination, conflict and accommodation are socially produced through group-level and institution-group interactions. These interactive practices establish the racial or ethnic identity of a group by specifying the nature of its relations with other groups. Racial and ethnic groups are seen as historically situated categories which are created, inhabited, transformed, and destroyed (Anderson, 1987; 1988; 1991; Smith and Feagin, 1995).

Social construction theorists link the formation of racial and ethnic categories to the evolution of hegemony - the ways in which society is organized and ruled. It is argued that racial and ethnic identities are locally constructed at particular historical times and places through a politics of representation in which the role of the state is crucial. State power is typically used to enforce relations of racial and ethnic domination-subordination. State policies, are, in turn, usually correlated with the cycles of the capitalist economy and its shifts in job creation and labour demand (Smith and Feagin, 1995)

Dominant representations of racial and ethnic minority groups are reinforced through the behaviour of institutional actors including politicians, the media, the criminal justice system, the sociocultural elite (including academics), the economic elite (including employers in the mainstream and ethnic economies), and state bureaucrats, who administer the census as well as entitlement and regulatory programs. Importantly, social construction theorists recognize that while subordinate group members often accommodate to the structures of domination, they may also contest the dominant representations and possibly overcome the related structural constraints through the exercise of practices of resistance in their everyday lives. These widely varying practices may range from agitation and protest to the utilization of co-ethnic social networks and informal sector income for material support in an economy where the best paying jobs are not open to most minority group members. In sum, the social construction of racial and ethnic identity involves not only representations imposed by agents external to the group but also a dynamic mode of self-consciousness, which emerges as group members respond to the situational material condition and hegemonic power relations shaping the opportunities and constraints in a historically specific time and place (Smith and Feagin, 1995 ).

Social construction theorists may be critiqued for their rather limited conception of the experiences of minority group members. Quite simply, members of minority ethnic groups do not spend every moment of their daily lives consumed in a struggle to resist and overcome institutional oppression perpetrated by dominant group members. Furthermore, social construction theorists promulgate a view of ethnicity in which material interests are the prime motivation for the activation of personal ethnic identity. Social construction approaches tend to pay inadequate attention to the expressive, non-instrumental personal needs which may be met through identification with a particular ethnic group and its cultural values and traditions.

In addition, it may be stated that many of the social scientists who utilize a social construction approach do attempt to incorporate aspects of both structure (the influence of institutional actors of the dominant society upon subordinate group adaptation) and agency (the strategies of resistance practiced by members of subordinate groups) in their work. However, in practice, much of the literature from a social construction perspective focuses most heavily upon the impact of societal institutions on the experiences of particular minority groups while paying only marginal or token attention to the efforts of subordinate group members to facilitate their own adaptation to the host society.

In the preceding section, five paradigms of ethnic group adaptation were presented. Each of the approaches reduces the complex process of adaptation to a few fundamentals. These perspectives are not mutually exclusive but they do differ significantly in the social phenomena they emphasize as well as their explanation of the adaptation process. The question begs itself of how I as a researcher looking at the adaptation of a primarily immigrant population should use each of these influential theoretical perspectives in my study, or indeed if I should utilize them at all. I could reject each of them on ideological grounds. Many scholars have found the assimilation model objectionable for its seemingly inherent presumption that ethnic group members should strive to adopt the norms and values of the host society. The cultural pluralism approach can be faulted for its almost exclusive emphasis on the culture of the ethnic group in question as the determining factor in the adaptation process. Scholars influenced by structural-based theories (including those who have articulated the ethnic enclave and social construction models) present a conflictual view of society, which many other social scientists have found unpalatable.

I myself believe that each of these theoretical perspectives makes a significant contribution to understanding the experiences of immigrant newcomers in North American cities. With several generations of residence in Canada and the United States, many ethnic groups have exhibited patterns of residential dispersion and cultural and social integration not altogether unlike that posited by the assimilation model. The cultural pluralism approach addresses a major deficiency of the assimilation paradigm by emphasizing the continuing relevance of ethnic culture to many descendants of immigrant groups. Structural perspectives direct needed attention to the role of larger societal institutions in the trajectories of the adaptation process. The ethnic enclave model shows how situations of discrimination and disadvantage experienced in the larger society may provoke immigrant groups to utilize ethnic institutions for the purposes of collective support. Social construction theorists point out how the identities of certain ‘racial’ and ethnic groups are constructed among the institutional actors of the dominant society and the ways in which members of immigrant minority groups resist the representations of themselves advanced within the mainstream media, the criminal justice system, the state bureaucracy and other societal institutions.

In this study, I have chosen to judge these models on empirical as opposed to ideological grounds. I do not believe any of them address a sufficiently wide range of issues in the immigrant adaptation process to be used in isolation. For this reason, unlike many researchers, in this study I have not chosen to primarily adopt one approach to determine the relevant questions and interpret data at the exclusion of the others. I believe each of the major paradigms may have utility for understanding certain aspects of the adaptation process. While the extent to which they were used differed significantly, all of these models were considered in the design of the study and the interpretation of findings.

DEFINING AN "ETHNIC COMMUNITY" AND ITS SPATIAL EXPRESSION

The term community tends to be used quite ambiguously in the ethnic studies literature when referring to the population of an immigrant group residing in a given city. Social scientists, including those who write from the perspectives reviewed above, commonly assume persons of a given ethnic origin residing in particular cities constitute communities. Few scholars of ethnicity have attempted to unambiguously clarify the concept of the ethnic community as it pertains to the context of their own research. Social scientists writing from the assimilation perspective have had the most to say about the spatial component of ethnic communities, while theorists promoting other models of adaptation have been largely silent on this issue, although their writing may contain implicit suggestions. What might be called the ecological and romantic view of the ethnic community is still quite pervasive in many scholarly and journalistic accounts of ethnic neighbourhoods and institutional life. Recent immigrants are still assumed to live in spatially cohesive enclave neighbourhoods, in which primary relationships with fellow co-ethnics and participation in ethnic institutions is promoted through a high level of residential clustering. Decreasing interaction with fellow co-ethnics and ethnic institutions and integration with the social and cultural norms of the host society is assumed to be correlated with residential dispersion to outlying neighbourhoods located throughout the metropolitan area.

This classical perspective of the ethnic community serves as the centrepiece for Fitzpatrick’s seminal conceptual article. Assessing the social science literature, Fitzpatrick writes of the ethnic community concept:

There is agreement that the basic elements of the community are the conscious sharing of common ends, norms, and means which give the group a `conciousness of kind’, an awareness of bonds of membership which constitute their unity. It is also widely agreed that interaction in a primary group is required. And since this can generally not take place at too great a distance, some kind of area limits are necessary to define a community. Thus, area, primary group interaction, and consciousness of kind in the possession of common ends, norms, and means appear to be indicators of community. (Fitzpatrick, 1966, p. 10)

Fitzpatrick explicates his definition further. He argues that when attempting to identify a particular ethnic community, the scholar must determine the variables that constitute the boundaries of the community. These boundaries are defined as the ends, norms, attitudes, and values – in sum a subculture - which gives a particular form or style to the interactions of members. According to Fitzpatrick, the boundaries of the ethnic community are perpetuated by ethnic institutions, both formal and informal. Kinship and family relations are important informal institutions. However, formal institutions can also serve to preserve the boundaries of the ethnic community. These may include the church, the parochial school, social, political, and civic associations as well as some commercial establishments.

One of Fitzpatrick’s primary prerequisites for the existence of an ethnic community is the presence of a consciousness of kind among group members. His definition posits unity and solidarity as key features tying individuals together into an entity which might be called a community. In many if not most observable situations, however, urban ethnic populations possess substantial divisions pertaining to numerous aspects of social differentiation among constituent members. Fitzpatrick himself acknowledges that the investigator must make a decision whether to define the community in terms of the harmonious possession of common values and attitudes, or whether to allow the presence of some conflict within the community.

In an influential study of Koreans in New York City, Illsoo Kim (1981) describes the internal organization of a fairly recently arrived ethnic population within the context of a contemporary metropolitan area. Ultimately, based on his evidence, Kim concludes that it may not be possible for ethnic groups in the modern city to create the "Gemeinschaft"-type community described in the literature. He writes: "In the classic sense, community is based on a deep commitment to shared values, a unique culture, and autonomous institutions within which members of a purported community can live most of their lives." (Kim, 1981, p. 305) However, the organizational landscape Kim describes as the Korean community is actually quite fragmented. Korean ethnic solidarity is maintained through the activities of hundreds of geographically scattered churches of different denominations. Even more segmented is class-selective membership in Korean professional, occupational, artistic, recreational, and alumni associations. In New York City, no centralized Korean organization or leadership has emerged to integrate, coordinate, and direct various ethnic-related activities.

In sum, Kim argues that what persons of Korean origin have initiated in New York City is a special modern type of ethnic community. The New York City Korean community articulated by Kim lacks any real cohesion, it is composed of many different interest groups. Similarly, its spatial expression differs markedly from the "Gemeinschaft" model. Rather than living in enclave neighbourhoods composed of clusters of Korean residents and co-ethnic institutions, in this community residentially dispersed members maintain some semblance of ethnic solidarity by participating in a variety of activities taking place at spatially decentralized and uncoordinated ethnic institutions. Kim’s work has particular relevance for researchers studying fairly recently arrived immigrant groups in contemporary cities as it contradicts the conventional ecological assumptions linking social interaction among ethnic group members to residential concentration in enclave neighbourhoods.

APPROACH TO SELECTION OF ISSUES CHOSEN

FOR RESEARCH CONSIDERATION

This study has been shaped by both my personal experiences interacting with Vietnamese as well as my reading of the scholarly literature and "theory" related to immigrant groups in North American urban settings. As I have engaged in both my M.A. work in Philadelphia as well as my Ph.D. research in Toronto I have made considerable effort to make acquaintance with Vietnamese individuals and learn about their experiences in attempting to adjust to life in a new society. While studying in Philadelphia, I volunteered teaching English at both a Vietnamese Buddhist temple as well as a Vietnamese Catholic congregation. In Toronto, I have tutored members of several Vietnamese families who attend a Catholic church and have also shared a home with a Vietnamese family for about a year and half.

Many social scientists, including geographers, focus upon narrow fragments of the overall immigrant experience in their studies of adaptation (e.g. investigations of group residential behaviour or labour market incorporation). My everyday interactions with Vietnamese have suggested to me that the adaptation experience is not as segmented as it may appear in the scholarly literature. Most of the Vietnamese I have met struggle to find meaningful and well-compensated employment and fairly regularly must confront negative stereotypes and attitudes within the host society. However, these same individuals also value attendance at a church or temple, interact informally with fellow Vietnamese (often these individuals are fellow members of particular religious or other ethnic associations), and have long-run goals to improve their family’s housing situation. I believe these and other aspects are all important components of the overall adaptation process. My goal in designing this study has been to investigate several dimensions of Vietnamese adaptation to life in Toronto. Ideally, I wanted to conduct a broad, multidimensional and in some respects "holistic" study but there were, of course, practical considerations related to both time and resources which restricted the number of components of social experience I could hope to investigate. Given these conditions, I settled on several aspects of adaptation suggested by my familiarity with the lives of Vietnamese persons as well as the larger body of social scientific research. Dimensions of adaptation selected for research included the organization of ethnic community life and utilization of ethnic institutions, trajectories of residence, as well as the interactions of Vietnamese individuals with host society institutions including the labour market, the mainstream media, and the criminal justice system.

The models of immigrant adaptation discussed above helped me focus research questions pertaining to the dimensions of adaptation selected for investigation. Conceptual issues related to the composition of ethnic "communities" as well as their spatial expression suggest an examination of issues related to the internal organization of the Vietnamese "community" as well as the relevance of the still influential ecological approach to understanding the residential patterns and institutional life of a contemporary ethnic group such as the Vietnamese in a contemporary city. The assimilation and cultural pluralism paradigms with their diverging accounts of the role of ethnic institutions in the lives of immigrants provide the premise for a set of research questions related to the functional significance of Vietnamese associations and churches and temples. Structural-oriented theories (including the ethnic enclave model) posit an explanation which might be useful for understanding the experiences of Vietnamese individuals in the mainstream Toronto labour market. Social construction approaches imply that a process of `racialization’ may negatively affect the interactions of a "visible minority" group (such as the Vietnamese) with the institutions of the host society including the mass media and the police and courts.

My primary aim in choosing these research questions was to understand as holistically as possible the adaptation of persons of Vietnamese origin who have moved to Toronto. My secondary goal was to achieve some measure of the applicability of the existing conceptualizations and models of the immigrant experience to a fairly recently arrived immigrant group residing in the contemporary setting of a large North American urban area. Topics chosen for research consideration were also selected in part for their utility in illustrating the agency of Vietnamese as individuals and as members of collectivities as well as the influence of the host society’s institutional structures in the adaptation process.

OUTLINE OF STUDY: RESEARCH ISSUES, QUESTIONS,

AND DATA SOURCES

1. CONTEXTUAL VARIABLES SHAPING THE ADAPTATION OF THE VIETNAMESE IN TORONTO

It is obviously very difficult to understand the adaptation of Vietnamese origin individuals without making reference to the life histories they brought with them from Vietnam. Gender roles, ethnic identity, religious identity, region of origin, and class differences originating in Vietnam but recontextualized within a new society all shape the internal dynamics of the Vietnamese population as well as its relationship with the host society in Toronto. With the goal of facilitating the analysis throughout the entire study, Chapter 3 attempts to clarify Vietnamese cultural values, family structure, the social structure in the country during the Vietnam War era and immediately after, as well as the roles of the Chinese ethnic minority and the major religions in both the nation’s history and more contemporary times.

The demography of the Toronto Vietnamese aggregate has strong implications for every facet of adaptation examined in the larger study. The demographic characteristics of the population are strongly influenced by the fact that many Vietnamese arrived in Canada as refugees as opposed to immigrants. Chapter 4 discusses the distinctive waves of migration of Vietnamese to Toronto and the largely disparate social characteristics of individuals who came to the city in these different time periods. The analysis also compares the enumerated Vietnamese population to the entire Toronto CMA population and other major "visible minority" groups in terms of its 1991 distribution on the variables of age and gender composition, immigrant status, period of arrival in Canada, educational background, knowledge of official languages, birth rates, mobility, and religious affiliation.

2. INTERNAL DYNAMICS OF THE VIETNAMESE AGGREGATE IN THE TORONTO AREA

Two very different conceptions of an ethnic community exist in the literature. One school of thought holds than an ethnic community, like communities generally, is characterized by a general sense of unity as well as an overarching sense of common interest among its members (Fitzpatrick, 1966; Davies and Herbert, 1993). Other scholars have argued that many ethnic populations in North American cities display significant social cleavages and that such fragmentation in terms of social status, political philosophy, organizational prerogatives, and political philosophy among members may serve as essential indicators of a dynamic and functioning ethnic community (Breton, 1991). The issue of community structure needs to be addressed empirically and it begs the following interrelated research questions analyzed in Chapter 5: How is the Vietnamese ethnic "community" constructed internally by the Vietnamese in the Toronto CMA? Which aspects of social differentiation seem to most strongly influence participation in community-based activities among the Toronto Vietnamese?

Some scholars have argued that while ethnic communities are often characterized by social differentiation, segmentation, and conflict, typically some degree of interaction, shared social relations, as well as collective interests and goals serve to bind ethnic groups into a common, definable entity which might be considered a community (Breton, 1991). Dorais et al. (1987) argue that this is the case among the very small Vietnamese population in Quebec City. Gold (1992) is somewhat more hesitant in his findings. He observes scant evidence of extensive interaction or collective organization among the many Vietnamese religious, social welfare, occupational and political institutions which have arisen in Southern California. The issue of cohesiveness provides the framework for another set of research questions discussed in Chapter 5: Are there institutions and/or possibly certain events and occasions where members of the sub-groups in the Vietnamese "community" come together for the purpose of common interaction? Is there any evidence of communication and cooperative activities among the majority of the groups?

The assimilation paradigm and the closely related ecological model of ethnic group residential behaviour still strongly influence the work of geographers and sociologists. In brief, this perspective argues that immigrants initially settle in low-rent districts located in the central city. The interrelated processes of chain migration and ethnic institutional development stimulate a clustering of the immigrant group in certain inner city locales. Over time and with improving socioeconomic status, the model predicts, individual members of ethnic groups become increasingly dispersed in higher status neighbourhoods located throughout a metropolitan area including the suburbs (Massey, 1985).

In Chapter 6, the following research issues will be addressed: To what extent do the temporal patterns of Vietnamese residence resemble the predictions of the classic ecological hypothesis? In which respects do the trajectories of Vietnamese settlement in the Toronto metropolitan area differ from those posited by the ecological model of ethnic residential patterns? Given the disproportionate numbers of Vietnamese who arrived in Toronto as refugee and immigrant newcomers, how have other factors not typically accounted for in the conventional literature including the decisions of institutional actors (refugee and immigrant reception counsellors), influenced residential settlement? To what extent does the distribution of Vietnamese institutions diverge or converge with the residential patterns of the group?

There is considerable debate in the social science literature concerning the issue of the spatial character of ethnic communities. Those scholars coming from the ecological or spatial assimilation perspectives tend to emphasize the importance of residential propinquity in the formation and survival of institutions among group members (Driedger and Church, 1974; Darroch and Marston, 1987; Darroch and Marston, 1994). Another group of social scientists has argued that in the modern North American city, residential concentration is no longer necessary for the establishment and maintenance of vital institutions among ethnic group members (Agocs, 1981; Goldenberg and Haines, 1992). The logic of the cultural pluralism model suggests that group institutions are manifestations of ethnic identity which may remain relevant to co-ethnics several decades after arrival in the host society and regardless of the extent of residential dispersion among group members in a given metropolitan area. The spatial character of Vietnamese community-based activities will be addressed in Chapter 7 utilizing the following interrelated research questions: Is residential proximity strongly related to membership and participation in Vietnamese ethnic institutions? Do Vietnamese ethnic institutions tend to possess memberships which are primarily derived from spatial catchment areas encompassing nearby areas of the city or conversely do members come to institutions from sites of residence located throughout much of the metropolitan area?

There is disagreement in the scholarly literature over the functional significance and impact of ethnic institutions in the adaptation of immigrant group members. One school of social scientists has argued that formal ethnic associations for the most part work as agencies of cultural integration or "assimilation" with the institutions of the host society (Ward, 1989). On the other hand, another group of writers has emphasized the role of such associations in perpetuating the maintenance of an ethnic identity among group members. Chapter 8 will focus attention on a set of research issues influenced by this larger debate which parallels the dichotomy in the literature between the assimilation and cultural pluralism paradigms of ethnic group adaptation. The research topics to be considered in this chapter are as follows: To what extent do the ethnic institutions of the Vietnamese residing in Toronto seem to facilitate the integration of members with the host society? By what means, if any, have the leaders of Vietnamese ethnic institutions attempted to further cultural integration among their members? Conversely, to what extent do Vietnamese ethnic institutions serve to promote the maintenance of a "Vietnamese" ethnic identity among their participants? In what specific ways, if any, do the leaders of Vietnamese ethnic associations attempt to stimulate and/or reinforce an ethnic identity on behalf of their members?

3. RELATIONSHIPS OF THE VIETNAMESE POPULATION WITH THE HOST SOCIETY IN THE TORONTO METROPOLITAN AREA

Scholars have observed that many Vietnamese-Americans tend to experience only a marginal relationship with the mainstream economy in the U.S. Researchers have found that structural explanations of labour market integration seem to have some relevance for the experiences of the Vietnamese. These scholars have observed that like many "visible" minority groups, persons of Vietnamese origin are overrepresented in the jobs of the "secondary" tier of the economy, particularly in manufacturing and the service industries as well as the "informal" sector. Conversely, they are very much underrepresented in jobs of the so-called "primary" tier, including the professions and commerce, as well as the corporate world (Kibria, 1993; Gold and Kibria, 1993). Subsequently, the types of occupations in which Vietnamese-Americans are concentrated are often of unstable and only temporary duration, lack benefits, and are typically associated with very small, non-unionized employers who pay salaries close to the minimum wage. U.S. scholars have also pointed out that the income of the Vietnamese population is significantly lower than the norm, and unemployment rates among Vietnamese-origin individuals are much higher than the average for the entire population (Rumbaut, 1989a; Rumbaut, 1989b; Ong and Azores, 1994; Kitano and Daniels, 1995; Rumbaut, 1995; Cheng and Yang, 1996; Hung and Haines, 1996; Espiritu, 1997). Canadian scholars have noted similar socioeconomic patterns among Vietnamese populations in certain Canadian metropolitan areas, including Quebec City and Montreal (Dorais et al., 1987; Lam, 1996).

Chapter 9 will address the experiences of the Vietnamese population in the mainstream Toronto economy through the following set of research questions: How did the Vietnamese ethnic origin population enumerated in 1991 compare to the total population of the Toronto CMA as well as other major "visible" minority groups in terms of its representation on a range of socioeconomic variables including occupational and income distribution, income composition, and unemployment rates? What are some of the factors which might help account for the labour market incorporation of the Vietnamese ethnic origin population? Which other strategies have Vietnamese-Canadians used to achieve subsistence as well as advance socio-economically given their status in the mainstream Toronto labour market?

Social construction theorists have devoted considerable attention in recent years to the intrinsic role of the mass media in producing and perpetuating harmful ‘racialized’ stereotypes of certain minority groups (Anderson, 1991; Smith and Tarallo, 1995). Indeed, it may be stated that the mainstream media may play a crucial role in influencing general public attitudes of acceptance, or conversely, intolerance towards individuals identified as belonging to a minority group.

The first set of topics for research consideration in Chapter 9 address the interactions between persons of Vietnamese origin and the mainstream Toronto media: What have been the major themes of the portrayals of the Vietnamese in the Toronto print media since their initial arrival in large numbers during the "Boat People" crisis in the late 1970’s? What possible implications have these portrayals had for the perceptions the larger Toronto public possesses of Vietnamese-Canadians generally? How have community activists attempted to bring about change in reporting practices and improve overall portrayals in the mainstream Toronto newspapers?

Interactions between representatives of the criminal justice system and minority populations have increasingly attracted the attention of social scientists. In a seminal work, Hall et al. (1978) focused scholarly attention upon the interrelationship between the law enforcement officials and crime beat reporters in producing and sustaining stigmatizing ‘racialized’ imagery of minority groups within the host society. Cultural misunderstanding and mistrust, and in some cases systemic prejudice, racism, and discrimination have characterized the relationships between the police and certain minority groups (Hall et al., 1978; Jackson, 1993, Henry, 1995). In some cities, where considerable tension exists between particular racial and ethnic minority groups and law enforcement, perceived incidents of discrimination and mistreatment have provoked community activists to engage in a variety of means to try to improve relations with the police and/or affect systemic change in the criminal justice system apparatus. In Toronto, ethnic community leaders have expressed concerns over how perceived negative and stereotypical imagery of group members may influence the interactions of criminal justice officials with minority populations (Stasiulis, 1982; Jackson, 1993; Henry, 1994; Jackson, 1994). The second portion Chapter 9 focuses upon the relationship between the Vietnamese population and representatives of the criminal justice system in Toronto as it addresses the following set of research questions: What types of issues and concerns have characterized the experiences of persons of Vietnamese origin with the police and the courts? By what means have Vietnamese community organizations as well as individual Vietnamese attempted to alleviate police-community tensions and facilitate change in the practices of law enforcement?

MAJOR DATA SOURCES USED FOR STUDY

A variety of methodologies have been used to compile information for this study. These methods of data collection were chosen with the goal of facilitating analysis through a "triangulation" approach. Information derived from a variety of data sets and gathered through disparate means was combined to produce the insights presented across the larger study. These include an analysis of census data, a cross-sectional assessment of telephone directory listings over four different time periods, the mapping of addresses derived from church and temple membership lists, semi-structured interviews with "expert" key informants, an examination of the documents of ethnic associations, an analysis of articles appearing in the mainstream Toronto print media, as well as personal observations derived in the course of everyday interactions with Vietnamese persons residing in Toronto. Within each chapter, the specific data collection methodologies utilized are outlined in detail. The following is a brief discussion of the most important data sources used and their relative contribution to the study.

Two main sources of census data were used for this study. These included a "Target Group Profile" data set for the Vietnamese ethnic origin, single response population in Canada, Ontario, Toronto, and nine other Canadian metropolitan areas. These special tabulations were compiled from a 20% sample of the 1991 enumerated population and consist of a wide range of demographic and socioeconomic variables. For comparative purposes, an employment equity data set published by Statistics Canada was also analysed. The employment equity profile also consisted of a 20% sample based on the 1991 census. Included in this profile are enumerations of several "visible minority" groups in the Toronto CMA, including Chinese, South Asians, Blacks, Koreans, Japanese, Filipinos, West Asians/Arabs, and Latin Americans as well as the total population on a range of demographic and socioeconomic variables.

In general, social scientists must be very careful when using census data to make generalizations about the demographic and socioeconomic profiles of immigrant and minority populations. Throughout the course of this study, I encountered strong doubts among informants concerning the accuracy with which the census enumerates Vietnamese-Canadians. Representatives of Vietnamese community organizations argue the census significantly undercounts persons of Vietnamese origin. Scholars and Vietnamese community workers have posited several explanations as to why Vietnamese populations tend to be undercounted in government census enumerations. One factor has to do with the fact that many Vietnamese do not speak English or French very well or at all. For this reason, some Vietnamese are not aware of the census, and others have difficulty understanding the census form. In addition, some Vietnamese may be reluctant to provide personal and family information to representatives of the government because of past negative experiences with government officials in Vietnam or because they are fearful of compromising the position of family members still in Vietnam. Furthermore, Vietnamese households with members receiving illegal government transfer payments as well as untaxed income from informal sector employment may be hesitant to fill out forms accurately or to participate in the census at all (Yu and Lui, 1986; Nguyen Dinh Phuong, personal interview, April 30, 1997). In sum, the researcher must be very careful when drawing conclusions from census enumerations of the Vietnamese population. It is very likely that systemic biases, which result from the data collection process, may have resulted in substantial undercounts among segments of the population who have arrived in Canada relatively recently. These persons may not possess much facility in English or French, and being less established in Canadian society, they may be disproportionately represented at the lower end of the socioeconomic spectrum.

Key Informant Interviews

Interviews with key informants associated with Vietnamese ethnic institutions and social agencies servicing a large Vietnamese clientele constituted a primary source of data for each of the chapters. Due to a limitation of time and resources, it was decided that these "expert" informants would be the most accessible source of information in regard to a broad range of topics including community structure, Vietnamese residential trajectories, the relationship between residence and institutional participation, utilization of ethnic institutions, incorporation in the labour market and interactions with the media and criminal justice system. The sample was derived from ethnic directory listings of associations and agencies offering social services in the Vietnamese language as well as through a "snowball" approach in which key informants were asked to provide names of potentially helpful subjects for interviews. The interview schedule was semi-structured. Research questions were fine-tuned at the interview site and elaborations were sought from informants after initial responses to particular issues. Most of the interviews were not tape recorded. Detailed notes were typed up within a few hours of each interview. Tape-recording was abandoned not long into the interview process as it became apparent otherwise helpful informants were reluctant to speak at length on tape in part because of their fear of comments being misinterpreted due to their struggles with the English language.

Overall, 55 informants of Vietnamese-origin were interviewed. Individuals interviewed included leaders and staff of Vietnamese mutual assistance associations, employees of social service agencies who work with a Vietnamese service population, clergy and lay elders of Vietnamese religious institutions, and publishers and staffers of Vietnamese-language print and broadcast media outlets in Toronto. In total, the personal interviews included ten individuals associated with mutual assistance organizations, twenty employees of social service agencies, eighteen representatives of churches and temples, and seven spokespersons for ethnic media outlets. The mutual assistance organizations represented in the interview sample included ethnic Vietnamese associations located in the metropolitan area, a Chinese-Vietnamese association, a panethnic Southeast Asian organization, as well as elderly, professionals’, artists’, and physicians’ associations. The social service organizations represented included settlement counselors employed by neighbourhood organizations situated in the Parkdale, City of York and Downsview sections of Metropolitan Toronto, as well as Mississauga, and Brampton, which are all areas of Vietnamese residential concentration. The service agency personnel in the sample also included employees of an ethnic-specific legal aid clinic, the City of Toronto Board of Education, two refugee reception centres, and several health-related organizations. Religious institutions represented in the sample included four Buddhist groups, two Catholic congregations, eleven Protestant churches, and a Cao Dai temple. Lastly, Vietnamese-language media outlets represented in the sample included four weekly newspapers, one bimonthly magazine, one weekly radio broadcast, and one weekly television program. Appendix III provides details of the interview sample.

I am confident that the sample is with a few exceptions representative of Vietnamese institutions and Vietnam-origin personnel employed by social service agencies in the Toronto area. Of the secular ethnic associations, organizations with a primarily political orientation are underrepresented. There are at least six of these groups active in the Toronto area but my efforts to schedule interviews with the leaders or members of each these groups were unsuccessful. I was able to achieve a high participation rate with other segments of the formal Vietnamese "community". For example, I interviewed representatives of eighteen of the twenty-four Vietnamese religious institutions active in Toronto and the surrounding region including Hamilton and Kitchener-Waterloo. Representatives of each major Vietnamese denomination were included in the sample. Similarly, I was able to schedule interviews with seventeen out of a total of twenty-five individuals listed in a City of Toronto-funded directory of Vietnamese-origin social service providers working for agencies in the metropolitan area.

A few things should be said about the social characteristics of my sample compared to the Vietnamese population as a whole in the Toronto area. The sample is almost entirely composed of South and Central Vietnamese who have resided in Canada for fifteen to twenty-five years. Given their duration of residence and occupations, many of my informants are better established in Canadian society than the majority of Vietnamese. While fairly evenly distributed in terms of age or generation (early twenties to around fifty years of age and fifty or older), the sample is also structured by gender (forty-four out of fifty-five informants were men reflecting the fact that Vietnamese public life is dominated by males) and ethnicity (forty-six ethnic Vietnamese and nine Chinese-Vietnamese were interviewed). Perhaps the influence of the social composition of the sample was felt most strongly as I attempted to analyze the intersecting roles of social class, time of arrival, and region of origin as they structure interaction among segments of the Vietnamese population. Several of my informants made rather harsh generalizations linking fairly recent refugee and immigrant arrivals (both ethnic Vietnamese and Chinese-Vietnamese) from North Vietnam with crime, poverty, and other indicators of social dysfunction in certain Toronto neighbourhoods. Most of the informants who made these comments were older ethnic Vietnamese men originating from the South or Central regions of the country and the social distance they felt from this other portion of the population undoubtedly coloured their comments.

Documents provided by Vietnamese ethnic associations based in Toronto were another source of data utilized throughout the course of the study. Most of these documents were in the form of annual executive reports which listed the services and activities, service population composition, funding sources, and expenditures of given organizations. Other documents used included copies of speeches given by agency representatives at meetings with representatives of mainstream institutions as well as copies of programs from public events sponsored by individual ethnic associations.

A considerable amount of data used in this study was derived from observations I have made during the course of my considerable interactions with persons of Vietnamese origin in Toronto over a two and a half year period. As noted above, in January 1996, I initiated an English tutoring service for Vietnamese members of a Catholic congregation based in the Downsview section of North York. Consequently, over the past two years, I have periodically assisted both Vietnamese high school and university students with homework questions on an on-call basis. Through my volunteer work, I have also met a Vietnamese Catholic family, who invited me to move into the basement of their newly purchased Downsview home in May 1997 to provide supplemental income in order to help pay off a mortgage. The tutoring work along with this residential situation has provided me with many opportunities to visit the homes of Vietnamese families residing in Downsview. As I have developed a friendship with several Catholic Vietnamese families, I have received invitations to attend various formal and informal social gatherings including family dinners, wedding parties, fishing trips, visits to karoake bars, a banquet for a local group agitating for political change in Vietnam, as well as an annual pilgrimmage of hundreds of Vietnamese Catholics to a shrine located in Midland, Ontario. In the course of my extensive interactions with working class, fairly recently arrived Vietnamese Catholics, most of whom originate from South Vietnam, I have learned a great deal about the perceptions of these individuals in regard to a broad range of issues, including various aspects of ethnic community life, as well as concerns about mainstream institutions, including the employment market, the criminal justice system, the education sector, and the mass media.

As I have made acquaintance with numerous key informants, I have also been invited to many community events on a regular basis including weekly religious services, cultural and religious festivals, Vietnamese New Year celebrations sponsored by mutual assistance organizations and churches and temples, as well as events honouring high-achieving Vietnamese youth in the Toronto schools. Throughout these more informal interactions with both Vietnamese families and in the course of regular attendance at a wide range of community functions, I have made a point of writing a weekly and often daily journal consisting of personal observations. I have made frequent reference to these journal entries while working on all of the chapters which comprise this study.

‘REFLEXIVITY’/PERSONAL OBSERVATIONS ON THE CONDUCT OF RESEARCH UTILIZED FOR STUDY

Social scientists from a variety of disciplines have argued that individual scholars should engage in a process of "reflexivity" in order to enhance their understanding of the give and take between researcher and informants. Reflexivity may be defined as self-critical, sympathetic introspection and the self-conscious analytical scrutiny of the self as a researcher. Proponents of such an approach note that fieldwork directed towards human subjects is a dialogical process, which is structured by both the researcher and the people being researched. Implicit in this point of view is a rejection of the positivistic orientation so influential in the social sciences, which assumes a researcher can and should remain impartial, "objective", and distant from the population under study (England, 1994).

Scholars arguing for reflexivity note that a given researcher may be positioned by his or her gender, age, "race"/ethnicity, and sexual identity among other personal characteristics as well as his or her specific biography. These individual characteristics may work to both inhibit or enhance interactions with research subjects and the analysis of field observations. Reflexivity may also enable the social scientist to become more aware of asymmetrical and possibly exploitative relationships with human subjects, as it exposes the partiality the investigator brings to the research process. The following section consists of my own introspective comments on some of the key situational circumstances which impacted on the conduct of the research throughout the course of this study.

To begin, I should state that I think the opportunity to live with a Vietnamese family and share in the lives of several others through my volunteer work opened certain doors to segments of the "community" that might have been largely closed to other researchers possessing my outsider status. Throughout these informal interactions, persons of Vietnamese-origin have on many occasions related to me their expectations, joys, frustrations and disappointments with life in Canada. I have been invited to many community functions including religious gatherings, cultural celebrations, and political events as a consequence of these relationships. I have developed a deep respect for the efforts of Vietnamese to improve their lives in Canada, while at the same time holding on to key aspects of their culture, including family roles, the continued use of the ancestral language among young people, as well as the maintenance of the family religion.

Personal observation and the ongoing informal comments of Vietnamese acquaintances have endowed me with a significant degree of empathy for the very difficult time many Vietnamese have experienced in their attempts to find satisfactory and well compensated employment in the Toronto labour market. I have seen first-hand how years of underemployment intertwined with bouts of unemployment can take its toll on the self-esteem and mental health of Vietnamese persons who came to Canada as refugees or family-sponsored immigrants years ago. Again and again, Vietnamese have related to me in conversations their perceptions of harmful caricatures of Vietnamese individuals in the mainstream media and the negative consequences these portrayals may have for the interactions of persons of Vietnamese-origin with the education and employment sectors. Over time, I have also heard a range of comments which are indicative of a general wariness and mistrust of the criminal justice system in Toronto. Observations made possible as a result of my informal relationships with individual Vietnamese have clearly stimulated my interest and informed my analysis of the Vietnamese population’s relationship with mainstream institutions including government and nonprofit grant-making agencies, the educational sector, law enforcement, and the mass media.

I do believe my outsider status has profoundly affected my data collection and analysis in certain important ways. This was especially the case as I conducted my semi-structured interviews with key informants. I think that my age combined with my status as a non-Vietnamese impacted the information I was able to receive from several informants. Middle-aged or elderly leaders and staffers of organizations (usually 50 years or older) were very reluctant to talk to me at length about certain topics. In several cases, older informants who spoke at considerable ease and in detail about the activities of their own agencies or ethnic associations exhibited discomfort when asked more general questions about the interactions of persons of Vietnamese origin with host society institutions in Toronto. This group of older staffers and organizational leaders were particularly reluctant to speak at any length about the relationships between the Vietnamese population and the criminal justice system and, to a lesser extent, the mainstream media. Questions in regard to these topics clearly made some of the informants ill at ease and it seemed as if they were reluctant to go on record with any opinions about such issues despite any concerns they might actually have held. It seemed as if many of these leaders and social service workers preferred to keep a low profile in relation to these potentially controversial matters.

It is interesting to note that I generally had the opposite experience as I interviewed younger staffers of social service agencies. Most of the younger informants (in their late 20s-mid 40s) were more than willing to talk about most these same issues, including the experience of Vietnamese individuals in the education system, interactions with the criminal justice system, and portrayals in the mainstream media. In fact, in numerous cases, interview questions in regard to these topics provoked younger informants to relate several minutes of anecdotes and forcefully argued pleas for systemic change among institutional sectors of the host society. On a variety of occasions, younger interview subjects commended me for addressing these concerns in my research. Clearly, some of these informants felt that I was a useful conduit for increasing awareness in the larger society of what they perceived to be pressing social issues. A few of these individuals even told me that they were particularly pleased that I had chosen these topics for study because as an "unbiased" non-Vietnamese there was a greater likelihood that attention would be paid to my analysis of such matters.

One area where my outsider status definitely had an impact on the cooperation and extent of information I received from various potential informants was in the realm of activities organized by Vietnamese in Toronto to protest the Communist regime in Vietnam. There seemed to be a general reluctance to share information of this nature with me. Attempts to set up interviews with the leaders of several primarily political organizations and publications were for the most part unsuccessful. In our brief phone conversations, these potential interview subjects seemed wary of what I would do with any information they might share with me. This all seemed somewhat unusual since there are at least five primarily political Vietnamese language newspapers and magazines published in the Toronto area. The agenda of several local organizations which oppose the current Vietnamese government are clearly articulated in these advertiser-supported publications – some of which contain small English-language sections. It seems plausible that these organizational leaders and newspaper publishers may have been hesitant to share information with a non-Vietnamese researcher because of their fear that other Canadians might not approve or condone the continued active involvement of Vietnamese in the political affairs of their homeland. As a final note on this subject, it should be pointed out that there were exceptions to the general difficulty I encountered in gathering information about these groups and publications. At an annual Vietnamese New Year celebration, I became involved in a lengthy conversation with a representative of a political organization who invited me to join his group as a member. On another occasion, through a personal friend I was invited to a banquet intended to raise funds for a primarily political Vietnamese-language newspaper. At this function, I met the publisher and learned a great deal about his publication and involvement in activities to bring about change in the current Vietnamese regime.

It is interesting to ponder whether an insider – a scholar of Vietnamese ethnic origin – would have been able to gain better access than myself to various community organizations and other sources of information. A Vietnamese researcher would obviously not experience difficulties related to the language barrier. I have taken a few courses in the Vietnamese language but my working knowledge does not extend beyond some basic vocabulary and phrases. There is little doubt that my lack of facility in Vietnamese did inhibit my ability to communicate with and conduct substantive conversations with some older informants in relation to certain issues. A Vietnamese scholar would also of course possess a personal biography which would be of immense utility when analysing both the internal dynamics of the Vietnamese "community" and the relationships of the Vietnamese population with institutions of the mainstream society.

I believe, however, my status as an outsider may have actually assisted me in certain important ways. I would argue that investigators who come from both inside and outside a given research population carry a considerable amount of personal "baggage" which may have crucial implications for both the conduct and analysis of fieldwork. As will become apparent in later chapters, Vietnamese community life in Toronto is structured by many variables of social differentiation. Age, gender, time of arrival, religious affiliation, region of origin, political ideology and several other facets of personal identity might influence the response and cooperation of informants to a scholar of Vietnamese origin.

To Chapter 3

Abstract/Acknowledgements/Table of Contents - [ Chapters - 1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 - 6 - 7 - 8 - 9 - 10 - 11 ] -  Appendices - References Cited

		Updated February 09, 2004