CONSTRUCTING RWANDAN IDENTITY IN THE DIASPORA: REMEMBERING THE GREEN HILLS IN COLD CANADA ANNA AINSWORTH A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF GRADUATE STUDIES IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY GRADUATE PROGRAM IN POLITICAL SCIENCE YORK UNIVERSITY TORONTO, ONTARIO OCTOBER, 2015 ©ANNA AINSWORTH 2015 Abstract This study investigated the processes of identity formation among those who identified as Rwandan and lived in the Greater Toronto Area. The study was conducted using in-depth qualitative interviews and ethnographic participant observation. It argues that those who identified as Rwandan in the GTA were subject to powerful discourses of simultaneous belonging and non-belonging in both the Canadian and the Rwandan state. The extreme violence of the Rwandan genocide ruptured the bonds of belonging that had tied those who identified as Rwandan to each other and to the Rwandan state. Since 1994, the new Rwandan state had developed a powerful mythico-history that proposed that all those who are identified as Hutu are perpetual perpetrators and all those who are identified as Tutsi are perpetual victims, even as it had denied that the identities of Hutu and Tutsi continued to exist. The re-telling and re-enacting of this mythico-history became the condition of belonging to the newly created diaspora and the Rwandan state. Simultaneously, ambivalent welcome and racialization that those who identified as Rwandan faced in Canada, and, specifically, the GTA, generated an anxiety and an awareness that they could only partially belong in the new homeland. Thus, the exclusion of the Canadian state generated a desire for the imagined homeland and enabled the Rwandan state to create a diaspora. Yet, those who were defined as part of the Rwandan diaspora negotiated and navigated the terms of their belonging/non-belonging in both Canada and in Rwanda. Even as they were they were racialized by the Canadian state and framed as both desirable and threatening by the Rwandan state, those who identified as Rwandan in the GTA built a sense of home and belonging in Canada. They simultaneously became a diaspora and rooted themselves in the new homeland of Canada. ii Acknowledgments I would like to thank Dr. Susan Henders for patiently and kindly walking me through every stage of the dissertation process. Her warmth and support carried me through me many a bout of self-doubt. Her keen eye caught many a grammatical and linguistic error, sparing me embarrassment, and her astute editorial suggestions helped shape this from an amorphous creature into something resembling a dissertation. The other members of my committee, Dr. Daphne Winland and Dr. Robert Latham also offered invaluable guidance and advice, encouraging me to further crystallize and clarify my ideas, and I owe them, and Dr. Nergis Canefe, a debt of gratitude. My family, especially Wendy and Steve, offered much needed sustenance, usually in the form of delicious meals and technical support, the one keeping me nourished, and the second keeping me sane. My friends, Liz, Carmen, Mark, Erin, and Daisy offered the boozy and often much needed rest from work, without which I would be a rather dour individual. My work family, Belinda, Maureen, Eva, Shannon, Adam, and Andrew supported me with kind words, encouragement, chocolate and good fiction—all necessary to the well-being of my soul. Finally, the largest debt of gratitude goes to my partner, Michael Ainsworth. When we chose to pursue our dissertations at the same time he warned it would be difficult. He was right (he usually is…). But, over the last six years, he, as always, has been my staunchest and most steadfast advocate, intellectual sounding board, emotional support, supplier of good music, great books, and tasty treats, invaluable companion and dearest friend—thank you. iii Table of Contents Abstract………………………………………………………………………………………..ii Acknowledgments……………………………………………………………………………..iii Table of Contents……………………………………………………………………………...iv List of Tables…………………………………………………………………………………..vi List of Figures…………………………………………………………………………………vii Chapter One: Introduction………………………………………………………………….....2 Brief Historical Context………………………………………………………………..9 Methods………………………………………………………………………………....16 Framework of Analysis………………………………………………………………...25 Central Arguments of Study and Key Contributions…………..……………………26 Organization of Study……………………………………………………………….....32 Chapter Two: The Making of a Diaspora…………………….………………………………33 Theorizing Diaspora………………………………..…………………………………..35 Theorizing Nation, Ethnicity, and Race………………………………………………38 States and the Making of Diasporas…………………………………………………...51 Home and Diasporas……………………………………………………………………58 Chapter Three: Collective Violence and the Making of a Diaspora………………………...63 Rwandan Genocide as Cultural Trauma……………………………………………...64 Individual Traumas…………………………………………………………………….65 Coping with Trauma…………………………………………………………………...69 Creating Cultural Trauma…………………………………………………………….73 State Appropriation of Survivor Narratives………………………………………….88 Chapter Four: Individual and Institutional Practices of Identity Formation……………...94 History of Diaspora Organizational Life in the GTA………………………………...96 Emergence of a “Diaspora”…………………………………………………………...101 Remembrance and Performances of Unity………………………………………….105 Opening Thoughts about Sexual Violence………………………………..…115 Celebrations and Performances of Unity……………………………………………120 Song and Dance as Expressions of Rwandaness…………………………….124 Micropolitics and/or Internal Contestations………………………………………..128 Ethnicities……………………………………………………………………..128 Gendered Divisions…………………………………………………………...141 Chapter Five: Ambivalent Welcome: Canadian Multiculturalism and Racialization……147 Multiculturalism………………………………………………………………………149 Loving the Hostland/Homeland………………………………………………………155 The Role of Migration stories in Creating a Shared Narrative……….……………162 iv Keeping Families Together…………………………………………………………...170 Raising Children in the Host/Homeland…………………………………………….172 Families and New Gender Regimes………………………………………………….177 Confronting Multiculturalism………………………………………………………..181 Reminders of non-belonging: “What’s your background?”……………………….186 What do you know about Rwanda?………………………………………………… 188 Racialization in the Host/Homeland…………………………………………………189 Racializing Children…………………………………………………………..191 Racializing Men………………………………………………………………..195 Racializing Young Men……………………………………………………….200 Racializing Women……………………………………………………………204 Labour market integration and segregation………………………………………...207 Accent Discrimination………………………………………………………………...212 Chapter Six: The Contradictory Dynamics of Transnationalism.………………………....216 Little Transnationalisms……………………………………………………………...220 Little Digital Transnationalism………………………………………………………223 Children’s Transnational Imaginations……………………………………………..227 Imagined and Real Transnational Interventions in Rwanda………………………230 Absence of Affective Transnationalism……………………………………………...232 Transnationalism from Below: Civil Society………………………………………..234 Rwandan State-led Transnationalism………………………………………………..239 Diaspora as Desirable: Rwanda Day…………………………………………………240 Diaspora as Threat…………………………………………………………………….246 Chapter Seven: Belonging in our homes: Claiming Space and Citizenship……………….254 Claims of Belonging …………………………………………………………………..255 Intimate Connections to the New Homeland………………………………………...264 Rwandan Pride in the New Homeland……………………………………………….266 Chapter Eight: Conclusion…………………………………………………………………...274 Summary of Findings…………………………………………………………………275 Limitations of Study…………………………………………………………………..285 Contributions and Wider Implications………………………………………………287 References……………………………………………………………………………………...294 Appendices………………………………………………………………….………………….310 Appendix A: Abbreviations and Terms……………………………………………...310 Appendix B: Informed Consent Form……………………………………………….312 Appendix C: Interview Questions……………………………….………………...…315 Appendix D: List of Interviewees and Interviews…………………………………..317 v List of Tables Table 1: Individuals Identifying as Rwandan on Canadian Censuses………………………….…6 vi List of Figures Figure 1: Photo of Rwandan flag flying over Toronto City Hall, April 2013…………………..1 Figure 2: Illustration of Umushanana………………….………………………………………265 Figure 3: Illustration of Kaba and Slit…………………………………………………………265 Figure 4: Illustration of Wrapper……………………………………………………………....265 vii Figure 1: Rwandan flag flying over Toronto City Hall, April 2013 Chapter One Introduction Interviewer: How do you define yourself? Janvier: That’s a question I struggle with all the time. I’ve been here since ’86, so, my adult life really tends to make me a Canadian. And my children, who are born here, they are Canadian in all their thoughts and everything else. So it’s not easy, much as I love Rwanda, to uproot myself from here, I know my kids would not go back, I had wanted to go there in [...] we were there, I didn’t get enough, or I didn’t get support from my family. I realize, I can go back no problem, but I again, I say that, most of who I am, is here. Interviewer: Well, you’ve already hinted at this, but to what extent do you feel that you belong to Rwanda or belong in Rwanda? Janvier: Great extent, great extent. I’m a Rwandese. And the fact that, it may be psychological, having been stateless for that long in other African countries, the fact that now I can hold a Rwandan passport makes me feel deeply psychologically involved with that country because it’s like something we never had. I used to carry stateless travel documents. If