The Chinatown Reimagined Forum 2023 is a three-day event that will take place in Montréal, Québec from September 28 to 30, 2023. The conference aims to ‘Re-imagine a future for Chinatowns across North America’ and bring together community stakeholders, urban planners, social housing professionals, policymakers, government officials, and change-makers from across North America to share innovation, best practices, and current knowledge. The event will be delivered both online and in-person. Online forums will speak to national and North American concerns, while in-person activities will serve to mobilize efforts to advance sustainable development in Montréal’s Chinatown.
Born of historic racism, Chinatowns all over North America have faced ongoing and imminent threats to growth and vitality. Still today, the colonial legacy of urban planning and city bureaucracies have contributed to decades of over-development, economic pressures, gentrification, and lack of sustained government investment resulting in the gradual erosion of Chinatowns and in some cases total erasure.The recently released 2022 documentary Big Fight in Little Chinatown highlights the displacement and resistance of these communities across North America. 2023 also marks the 100th anniversary of the Chinese Exclusion Act, an acknowledgment of the history of anti-Asian racism that impacted the development and growth of Chinatowns across Canada.
With speculative developments in and around many Chinatowns all over North America, affordable housing, cultural heritage, and community equity remain common challenges in search of an inclusive revitalization approach to a diverse neighbourhood. This Forum aims to:
- bring together Chinatown communities from across Canada and North America to share key research, innovation and best practices;
- provide new ideas, strategies, and current knowledge to advance local protection, and share models for revitalization and community-based efforts for Chinatown’s future; and
- provide participants with skills, tools and approaches to develop sustainable Chinatowns; and
- gain a better understanding of the Montréal community efforts to save, protect and sustain its Chinatown.