TEE OPERATION OF WBlTENESS AND FORGETTiNG IN AHUCVILLE: A GEOGWHY OF RACISM

Jennifer Ji11 Nelson

A thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Sociology and Equity Studies in Education Ontario lnstitute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto

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Iennifer Ji11 Nelson, Doctor of Phiïosophy, 200 1 Department of Sociology and Equity Studies in Education Ontario Institute for Studies in Education of the University of Toronto

In the 1960s the City of Halifav dismantled the black community of Afncville under a program of urban renewal and 'slum clearance'. Africville's 400 residents were evicted from their homes, in many cases receiving insufficient financiai compensation. From that time on, the

City has defended its actions by citing the deplorable living conditions in Afncville, obscuring its own creation of these conditions through years of neglect and the refusal of essentiai services. In the 1980s, the space of Mictille was made into a public park, which remains a site of contestation, protest and commemoration. The City of Halifav continues to deny financiai compensation to former residents, has never issued a public admission of wrong- doing and has actively maneuvered to silence protes.

This dissertation traces the events around this history as a chain of evictions of

MXcvilIe From its own space. The regdatory measures taken by the city of Halihu are theorized as a series of choices - rather than inevitably necessary moves - which constituted

~cviilein various ways: as a sIum, then as a 'problem' which was solved, and more recently as a white communal space in which past vioIence is rendered invisible.

The aim of my anaiysis in this work is not an explication of the experiences of

Africvilie residents, or of the eqerience of Afiican Canadians in general, but rather a criticai .- 11 mapping of the actions of the white municipality of Halifau in AfiicvilIe's history. 1 argue that these acts of regdation of black spaces and bodies Iogically foliow one another in creating a

'geography of racism'. In tracinç the continuing management of space over tirne, 1 demonstrate how whites in positions ofprivilege and authonty come to know themselves as

Iegtimately dominant. In critiquing the effective erasure of racism and violence in the white story of .Akicville, I illustrate how these dominant social ectors construct their innocence through panicular foms of comrnemoration. Acknowledgments

Any doctoral candidate will atten to the potential for a great sense of intellectuai and emotional isolation while writing a dissertation. However, many people have helped to keep me focused and connected to the real world, Their support consistently bolstered my energy and made this process not only bearable but often rich and rewarding. I could not have asked for a more supportive partner than Andrew .Allen, who has sustained me emotionally. intellectually and "technologically" throughout. Sherene Razack, with her razor-sharp insight, has consistently chailenged me to think and to write beyond my perceived Iimits. She has called this a process of "finding my voice," but 1 could not have done this without her own voice and her unflagging dedication to my project and to anti-racist struggie broadly. Ruth Roach Pierson, on the eve of her retirement Eom academe, traversed this work with a fine tooth comb. Her early insights made the work much stronger and her thoroughness made the final drafi much simpler to generate. Kari Dehii took tirne from her sabbatical to facilitate my completion. Her complex questions and thoroush engagement with the broader issues demonstrated interest and commitment for which 1 am very gratefùl. Nicholas Blomley performed a small miracle of eqediency in returning his perceptive and illurninating comments within a week of an unfortunate misdemeanor on the part of Canada Post. (Future graduates, find a reliable courier service well ahead of time.) Numerous fiiends and colleagues have taken a great interest in both my subject rnatter and my progress during this work. 1want to thank Nancy Nelson and Kevin Davison for invaluable research assistance and for being dedicated "Halifax correspondents." 1am indebted to Donna Jeffery, Zoe Newman, and Doreen Fumia for more than a year's worth of regular intellemal insight, deepening ûiendship and more great meals than t cm count. They have truly made the process feel tike the work of a team. As well, the Fnendship, enthusiasm and support i received from Sheila Gill and Laura CIeghorn during the earlier stages of research was fundamental in bringing the work to hition. 1 thank them, along with Sherene, Ruth, Donna Zoe and Doreen, for believing 1 had a wonhwhile and orik9inal project when 1 myself was in doubt. 1 thank Homa Asayesh and Elizabeth Rooney from the Women's Health Resource Centre. On top of their consistent interest and concem, their flexible approach to my work hours was greatly appreciated. The stafFat the Public .4rchives of Nova Scotia and the Halifau Regionai Library were incredibty helphl, showing interest and patience as I monopolized enormous volumes of work. This project was undertaken and completed dunng the course of a four-year doctoral Fellowship from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada. 1am grateful for their support. Table of Contents

Abstract i

Acknowledgments iii

Table of Contents iv

Quotation v

Preface 1

Chapter 1 The Spatial Order of White and Black: A theoretical framework

Chapter iI Allegories of Blackness and Space: Racial Knowledge Production in Mid-Century Nova Scotia

Chapter [LI The Destruction of .\fricville: Fusing racial discourse and spatial management

Chapter iV "A Place to Dream Their Dreams": Forgetting as 'reconciliation'

Works Cited If you don't know my name, ihen you don't know your own.

-James Baldwin Replying "ficville" to a question about one's work always commands a meaningfiil gaze. It is a well-known story, and alrnost ai1 Canadians have their version at hand: It was a sharne, a tragedy, The City had no other choice. It was a slum. it was the era of integration.

What ever happened to those people? We didn't want to leave. It's shocking. It isn't surprisinç. tt was only because we were black. They're tenibly bitter. They can't forget the past. It will never happen again ...

-4swith any story, opinions Vary with individuai and group histories, wavering as we draw nearer or hnher away. For me it is a story both immediate and remote. For an academic writer attempting to think critically about race, it is both a poignant moment in the nation's history of racism and an ongoing struggle for justice. tis a white woman tiom a segregated, working-class rural town in Nova Scotia, PLfncvitle was a shadow of the past, minoring the black comrnunity near my own home. It is far removed fi-ommy experience, yet produced in my own history - that of white settlement - which detemined to a large degree how it could evolve and how it failed to resist destruction.

In the many variations of the story, white perspectives fom a miu of pity, regret. shame, defensiveness and anger. Most common is a belief that Mifcville's destruction was an unfonunate incident which, while not wholIy successfùi, was a necessary and humanitarian effort. This is accompanied by a sense that the past must be forgotten, that 'we', and therefore 'they', must move on. But what is at stake in hrgetting the pas? What are the risks in remembering? 1s it merely a coincidence that a comptex !ook at the last four decades might unearth something whites find uncornfortable to fice, something biacks find cruciai to 2 address?

This work tells Afnctille as a story of white domination, as a story of the making of a slum, and of the operation of technologies of oppression and regulation over time. It mes

PLfncville as an image in the white imagination, a place against which progress and respectability couId be measured, and around which borders, real and syrnbolic, could be placed. This story sees rU'ncvi1le.s destruction as a deliberate, long-term project within a larger colonial picture of spatial management. It relies on the tenet that certain bodies are consistently produced as black within various facets of dominant white culture. such as media, education, academic work and ~ovemmentaldiscourse. It traces the rey1ation of black bodies and spaces with a view to how whites come to know themselves in relation to these acts. and through representations of their own choices. This is the ody story of Africville which 1 feel entitled to pursue, the oniy angle From which [ think a white person can approach an intimate, violent black experience. To ignore it is to rernain cornplicit in forgetting, while to retell it is to intnide on an experience not mine to articulate, or to suggest it has not already been told, well, by those who know firsthand.

I aim not to simpIy reproduce the narratives, black or white, in existence. 1 focus. rather, on the actions and words of whites in positions of authonty in and around the

Afiicville decision - that is, the academic studies, urban planning and social work reports, city council discussions, journalistic wriung and mainsueam news that shaped how blacks were viewed and pomayed by whites in Nova Scotia shortly before, dunng and after the destruction of Afncville. This introduction, then, provides a brief history of events leading up to Atncville's establishment and dislocation, positioning both my intent and my subjectivity in the project.

I will begin two years ago as I waiked on the former site of the community, dong grave1 paths through the roIling sropes of a grey-green park at the edge of the ocean: Bitter

Maritime winds raked my face and the barren land. Scattered wispy young trees struggled to grow on the roc@ soi]. The cries of hungry plis sliced the background din of cars, whose exhaust was muted in the damp, briny harbour air. Two or three other souls lingered across the grass, wandering to the harbourside for a look at the water, sitting on benches, hunched into layers of clothes against the wind. Today, 1 reaiiied, this site with the splendid view covers the gound where rViicville once stood. Its contours have been altered, there is little to suggest its history.

Facing West, one feels part of a large living tom; east, witness to the bustle of a sprawling naval base, but immediately around oneself, a smaI1 figure in a space that seems empty. To the south is the pon where my first Danish ancestor escaped kom a British press gang upon docking, to form a filynetwork in the northwest resion of the province. For over 200 years my family, formed kom this dislocated Dane and various Northern Irish,

German and white Loydist settlers, fmed these lands, buiIt streets and fountains to carve out the presence of their commissioners, placed monuments to mark the Iandscape in public celebration and private $ef 1 am rooted in this rugged, sparse corner of the world; 1 find the archeology of my Iife at aimost every tum - when t see Londonderry on the map, when I corne across the sundial my father bdt in Halifau's Public Gardens, when 1 visit any cemetery and see the markers of my farnily, whether their gaves or their work (or both) lie there, comemorating the past.

1 did not lem about Micville in school. Still, it has been offered to me too; it has been made public, 'neutral'. I am invited to enjoy the scene, the ocean wind, the tribute to history on the monument, even though it does not tell of how this history was made. This is. in a City official's words, "a place for younç and old, a pIace to dream th& drearns." But to whose dreams does he refer? Surely not those of the black families who settled here for over a century before their cornmunity was destroyed, for the cruel irony of that should escape no one. Surely not the drearns of black children who once spent their sununers at the water's edge, diving into the basin. For this is a space frorn which those children were expelled, on which their story must fight to speak itself, and to which they are now invited back as guests, permitted to dream until the next eviction forbids that too.

1 grew up visiting cemeteries with rny father, as he and his brothers designed and built monuments. 1 have never found thern strange or morbid. But this one is difïerent. At the edge of the harbour is buried the evidence of a death produced by the City itself. Produced, covered, rnernorialized, rewritten. 1 have no obvious connection to this grave site, to the

Stone marking the death of Africville. Why, then, the nagging idea that Afndle has everything to do with my history too? Why the sense that there is more to lem from this site than of its life and death, more than its Othemess in time and space? How might history be

read so that the complex uneven connections between white Iives and black lives are visible? The establishment of Nova Scotia as a British domain and a world naval base did not come about easily. White settlement here, as in North Amenca generally, followed a long and complex path characterized by violence. racial segregation and ethnic and class struggle. Yet, the particularities are worth noting in brief if we are to understand the history and shape of racism under which Atiicville developed.

Though a small region, Nova Scotia saw the largest migration of blacks into Canada following both the revolutionary and 18 12 wars. Prior to immigration patterns of the last few decades, it was known as the hub of Canada's black citizenry. It is the descendants of these early populations which make up the majority of the province's black community today.

For geographic reasons, namely the rocky soi1 and harsh climate, plantation slavery never developed on a large scale in Nova Scotia. Still, slavery was practiced throughout the province From as early as the sixteenth century, when Portugese and French explorers began enslaving members of the First Nations. Records show that a few black slaves easted in the province at this time as well, but the importation ofblacks into Canada for the purpose of slave labour \vas officially sanctioned in 1689 by King Louis MVof France.' Still, the labour requirements of the tùr trade were inconsistent with slavery, and the Iack of plantation industry, accompanied by indifference on the part of the Roman Catholic Church, meant that little importation followed. By contrast. when British mle was established in 1760, slavery was ùicorporated into the treaty by which the governrnent changed hands. and the English protestant churches proved more supportive of the institution. It became actively employed,

'Bridgld Pachai, Bertearh the CIo~idsof the Promised Lmd: the StlrvivctI of Nova Scoria 's Blucks vol- 1 (Halifax: Black Educators Association of Nova Scotia, 1987) 30-3 1. 6 and was reinforced by an imperial law in 1790, which encouraged incoming British citizens to bring their slaves dong with 'other property'.

The processes facilitating an increase in slavery had begun even earlier in Nova Scotia, where the British retained the lands of Acadie from the French in 1713, offenng settiement upportunities to New England immigrants who brought slaves with them. In mid century, the continuing struggle over territory between France and Britain resulted in the exile of over

8000 French Acadians who retùsed to swear loyaity to the British crown, prefening to remain neutrai. Their conflscated lands, fonnerly inhabited by the Mi'kmaq, opened the way for more

English settlers and the number of slaves in the province reached about 500.

Records indicate the presence ofblack slaves in the building of Fort Louisbourg in

Cape Breton and in Halifav from the time of its founding in 1749. Numerous papers corn 18" century Halifav advertize the sale of slaves. and the years of Loyalist migration in 1783 and

1784 saw not ody an increase in their numbers by 1200,' but in the replacement of Aboriginal peoples with blacks in these roles. This replacement would have coincided with the ongoing displacement of the Mi'kmaq whose lands were seized throu@out the 18Ih century. When they refused to reiinquish entitiement to their territories, and resisted the tems of English-

language treaties which had been uncIear to them upon siging the British retaliated with a

campaign of bounty-hunting and imprisonrnent of Mi'haq peoples. Most had been pIaced on

reserve lands by the early 1800s, having been decimated through starvation tiom enforced

dependance on the French for European goods, including alcohol, and the coinciding 7 depIetion of traditional hunting and trading. These factors were of course multiplied by genocide and the transfer and spread of disease fiom ~urope.~

Due to its location as a naval base ody 600 miles from New York, its eisting core of former New England residents, and its sparse population, Nova Scotia was deemed an ideai site for the resettlement of Loyalist immigants. Atogether about 3500 Free blacks arrived during this period, rnany of whom had promised their loyalty to the British anny in return for freedom. While white Loyaiists holding upper class or military status received sizeable plots of land suitable for farming, pour whites were of much Iower priority and rnany waited several years for their land. Facins the greatest discrimination were fiee blacks, whom the colonial government forced to settle outside the major toms in all-black areas. When they were çiven land at all, it was of the poorest quality, rocky and infertile.' Their plots were significantly smaller than those of whites and the government, in rnost cases, failed to keep its promise of free food and supplies for the first three years.' Blacks were ofien required to prove their intent to settle for severai years before being ganted lqal title. This precluded seliing their properties and relocating to more productive areas. It also aliowed the government great

&dom in re-appropriatinç their lands and thus controlling the province's patterns of industrial and residential development dong racial lines.

3DanieI N. Paul, We werr not rhr mages. (Halifzx: Nimbus, 1993).

4 Six years foliowing their amvd ody 14% of blacks had received land grants at dl; Pachai, Benearh the CZutiak, 1 :47. 8

After 1800, it became increasingly difficult to hold slaves in Nova Scotia- This decline, and slavery's officiai illegality in 1834 were due in part to public opposition, but also to an increase in the available labour pool of fiee Loyalist blacks and whites whose services could be bought for even less than the price of keeping slaves. Still, the struggle for abolition was strongly opposed by some slave proprietors into the early 1800s, when petitions were drawn up requesting maintenance of the institution and the securing of the "personal property" of petitioners.

Slave-owners demanded financial compensation for any slaves removed fiom them.

Govemmentai regdations were then set for the graduai release of slaves, ofien according to ase and length of term served, and there are no records of compensation having been ganted following their relea~e.~

While slavery as a system faded in this penod, the conditions of life for black workers seem to have changed only marginally with their alternative forrns of Iivelihood. The 30 000

Loyaiist migants had more than tripled the population of Nova Scotia. placing enormous demands on govemment resources. Many whites lived under deplorable conditions, and promises of Iand and assistance to black Loyalists were predictably more elusive. Jobs were scarce, and competition with the many poor white residents complicated the sertrch. The fact that the labour of blacks was undervalued economicaIly by white employers fùeled the bittemess of lower-class whites who felt blacks' lower remuneration undermined their

6C. B. Fergusson, cl Doctrmetltary Stlidy of the Ektablishment ofthe Megroes in Nova Scoticr Berneen the Wur of 1812 utrd the Wit~t~ingof Respot1Si61e Gotvn~rnetii(Halifax: The Public Archives of Nova Scotia, 1948) 8-9: Pachai, Beneath the Clorrdr; John N. Grant, BIack Nova Scotians. (Halifax The Nova Scotia Museum, 1980) 20. opportunities. This resentment contributed to racial riots in the Shelburne area in 1784, during which whites pursueu blacks to their settIement at Birchtown and proceeded to destroy many of their homes.' While several riots are to be found in historical accounts,%my individual cases of violence against black indentured servants have also been n~ted.~

Opposition to the Imperial government's acceptance of refugee blacks was strong in the provincial House of Assembly, which cited "Afncans" as a liability, periious to the immigration of "decent white labourers and servant^."^' The legacy of slavery contributed to a notion of black rehçees as unfit for employment.'' Following the settlement of the Free

Loyalist blacks, a nurnber would be forced to se11 themselves and their children back into slavery or to become. in the comrnon terminology of the the, "indentured servants." Some, settled near major towns, were able to find waçed labour at about one quaner of the rate paid

'~achai,Berrearh rlw Clo~tds1:4748; Birchtown is believed to have been one of the largest settlements of blacks outside Afnca at the time, with a population of about 1500.

"ee Sheridan Hay, "Black Protest Tradition in Nova Scotia: 1783-1964 (master's thesis. Saint Mary's University, 1997).

'James W. St. G. Walker, "The EstabIishment of a Free Black Comrnunity in Nova Scotia, t 783-1840," in The Afi.icnrr DÎnsp~r~:Ïnrerpretive essuys, eds. Martin L. Kilson & Robert 1. Rotberg, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1976), 214.; T. Watson Smith, "'The Slave in Canada," Coiiecriotrs of the Nova Scoria Historical Society X (Halifm: Nova Scotia Printing Company, 1899).

'"Cited in DonaId H. Claimont & Dennis W. Magill, Nova Scoriun Bkacks: An HÏs~oricular~d Sm(ctrtruf Overview (Halifax: Instinite of Public Affairs, Dalhousie University, 1970)' 79.

"Highlighting an apparently common white view, the EarI of Dalhousie, Govemor of Nova Scotia, wrote "...slaves by habit and educasion, no longer working under the dread of the lash, their idea of freedom is idleness and they are therefore quite incapable of indusuy." ibid., 30. 10 whites performing the same work. Others found work as tenant farmers un white-owned lands, where it was not uncornmon for them to be arbitrarily moved and resertled as needed.

Overail, bIack workers were instrumenta1 in clearing the majority of lands and constructing the majority of roads and buildings in Loyalist Nova Scotia"

Due to the paucity of arable land and the apparent indifference on the part of Nova

Scotia's govemment, a number of black tesidents seized an opportunity for emigration offered by the Sierra Leone Company in 179 1. Almost 1200 sailed to Sierra Leone the foilowing year, leaving the province's population of i?ee blacks lower than that of its indentured servants.

Within four years, a group of 550 Maroons, refùgees deported by the sovernment of Jamaica for their rebellion against slavery, had settled on the black Loyalists' vacated lands in the

Preston are& outside HaIifau. Supported financiaiIy by the Jamaican government and known for their physicai strength and rnilitary experience acquired from stniggies in Jarnaica, the

Maroons were a welcome source of labour in rebuilding the Haiifav Citadel. However, they mongly resisted Christian teachings, se~tudein white homes, and threats tu their group identity. Like the former occupants oftheir lands, the Maroons found the harsh climate and poor soil a great barrier to productivity, and were unable to achieve financial seIf-sufficiency.

When their requests to be relocated to another part of the British Empire were igiored, the

Maroons adopted a resistant strategy of non-cooperation, refusing to work on public projects.

When the Jarnaican government withdrew support after the fïrst year and Nova Scotia refused to step in, the province was faced with a population that ivould not settIe for servitude: underpaid labour or harsh conditions. The Maroons were forciÎIy shipped to Sierra Leone in Even in brief, it becomes cIear that Nova Scotia's historical patterns of settlement have been characterized by the regulation, confinement and upheaval of its Aboriginal and minority populations. While it is beyond the scope of this work to provide a detailed analysis, it is essential to recall, throughout, that al1 disputes over temtory share a foundation in the origjinal dispossession of Native peoples. The Acadiens lived on Mi'kmaq lands, and thus these areas were appropriated not once but twice; similarly, the lands ailotted to black migrants were neither within the righttùl jurisdiction of the British to distribute, nor in possession of the black settlers. Hoviever, it is cruciai to keep in mind the histories by which these groups came to occupy the lands - the former having landed unannounced and forcibly claimed the temtory for their own, the latter beinç variably eded or escaped peopIes Iooking for a chance at survival. Many blacks came unwillingly, and those who seiected Nova Scotia as their home did so within a severely Iimited rançe of choices. Blacks share with the Mi'kmaq, and with the Acadiens, histories of physical and psychological tonnent throuçh the destruction of their communities and ways of life. These groups have been regarded as ultimately expendable, their territories unoccupied and available according to the spatial and labour requirements of the goveming Europeans. They became accustomed early to a steady underlying geographic instability that comes of tenuous land occupancy, meagre resources and a consistent underlying threat of violence. Nova Scotia's character as a reluctant retkge, a repository for unwanted 'deviants' or a ternporary, bitter haven before expulsion to other lands was fidyin place long before Afncville was uprooted and buildozed. In 1815, former lands of the black LoyaLists and Maroons were made available to black refugees fiom the war of 18 12. Ironicaily, the govemrnent had hoped the retùgees would suppIy Halifax with fiesh produce, but soi1 conditions were hardly amenable. The opportunities of these fiee blacks were additionally impeded when they were awarded only

'licenses of occupation' rather than title to their fallow tenitory. While they had been promised legd title derinhabiting the space for three years, it was twenty-seven years before this promise was fùlfilled, and only then could they sel1 their plots and consider relocating to more desirable Locales.

Miicville was founded by these retùgees and their descendants. In the 1830s, they purchased properties on the shore ofthe Bedford Basin from white merchants, several of whom had been siave-owners and traders. Here, the new residents found a steady supply of fish, began keeping livestock and increased their opportunities for waged labour in the nearby city. Within a few years they had built a Baptist church. Mer petitioning for educationd resources fiom the City for over twenty years, they were abie to establish their own school.

Properties in the community were handed down within fandies, and new homes constnicted near those of relatives. Men found work as stevedores in the nearby dockyards. or as stonernasons, truck drivers and seamen, while women tiequently performed domestic work in white households or g,overnment institutions. The establishment of a separate post oftice and severai smaii stores contniuted to the comrnunity's seif-sufficiency and the population grew to about 100 people by the time ofits destruction in the 1960s. 13

As Halifav expanded, particularly in the later 19" century, various industries and businesses began to encroach on ficvilie land. The establishment of the Nova Scotia

Railway Company in 1853 resulted in early dernolition of severai homes as rail lines were built through the community. Around the same the, the city prison was built on the hiIl overlooking i\fncville, and the city's "ni@ soii" disposal pit was placed on the Eastern edge of ficville. The next decades saw the expansion of various industries, including an oil plant storage facility, a bone mill, a Cotton factory, two slaughterhouses, a tar factory, coal handling facility and a foundry. In the 1 WOs, the city's infectious diseases hospital was built on the overlooking hill, and later a trachoma hospital, the wastes fiom whicli poured ont0 ficville soil. The early twentieth century saw more railway expansion, requiring the uprooting of more

.ficville families and, &er a 1947 rezoning, the city began to solidi@ plans to fully expropriate the lands for industrial use. In ficville's last decade the city dump was moved directly ont0 the conununity's land. Two years lacer, an incinerator appeared only fi@ yards beyond the south border of Africviile.

Throughout rUncviIle's existence, building permits to improve homes were frequently denied by the city govemment. Requests for water lines, sewerage and garbage collection were refused. as were police seMces and fire protection. Newspapers From the time report dangerous conditions and speculate that residents may have developed immunities to the copious bactena in their wells."

13Frank Doyle, ".M?icvilIe: Mided Question." Haiifmt MdStar, 5 Febniary, 1963; Barbara Hinds, "Africviiie Families Poisonai," Hdifar Mail Star, 28 January, 1958; Mary Casey, ".4fncviiIe Awaits the Wreckers," GIobe andhiad, 25 August, 1962. 14

Obscuring its own creation of these conditions, the city of Haiiiax used the state of the community in reasonhg for its inevitable removai. tt entered into a series of discussions with

-expertsTwho evaluated Afncville similarly, and voted to demolish the community afier only minimal, superficial consultation with residents. By the end of the 1960s, against the wishes of most residents, .4ti-icville had been expropriated by the City of Halifau.

Due to an informal system of handing down properties and housing within familia and between in-laws over the years, many residents were unable to prove legal title to their land and had IittIe recourse when faced with the choice to sel1 orbe evicted. Even where fair ptices were obtained for homes and land, compensation did not account for the difficulties implicit in paying for rent and services after owning one's home. In other instances, financial reward was minimal at best. rUncville had little formal community leadership and no political representation or access to the legal bargaining tools of the municipality. From the begimin;, the so-cailed relocation'' took a patemal rather than cooperative approach characterized by broken promises, bureaucratic disorganization and lack of long-term planning. The result was the obliteration of Afncville and the dispersal of its residents into housing projects in the city's north end or in outlying areas, where many were forced to accept welfare payments and to pay rent for the first time in their [ives.

"Throughout the project, I have ofien avoided use of the term 'relocation' except when refemng to how the City viewed its own policy, for it denotes a politically benign arrangement in which aii parties simpIy agree to the movement of some persons. The term rnisrepreseiit: what was done in ficville. The cornmunity was not transported, as it was, to a new place; it was destroyed and the people spread out and forced to live in pIaces they did not choose. Preference is given to reaiistic depictions through such terrns as 'dislocation', 'forced dislocation' or 'destruction'. 15

Dunng the 1980s and 90s, various comrnemomtive events occurred in AFricville's honour, including the construction of this manicured park, where I now may stand on green grass covering the remains of homes, roads, a baseball field, outside lavatones, a dump.

Another community, much like this buried one, stiil eirists 30 miles away outside my home tom. I have not been there, as it has long been deemed by whites to be deplorable and unsafe for 'outsiders'. 1 was schooled with its chiIdren, who learned white European history along with me, and none of us leamed of iüncville. It seems chat every srnail comrnunity has a smaller community outside itself, separated by that appreciable line between respectability and aberration, white and black. Standing here now, 1 know that even had I been bom in Halifax, a few decades earlier, i would not have corne to .MticvilIe. I would have attended high school to heu white boys bragging about their weekend exploits, drinking and driving through

AfnMlle in an act of daring defiance, much the way boys I knew laughed over their drives into the city and dow Hollis Street CO see the hookers. These joumeys are about race. and gender, and class, and the crossing of boundaries and the safe retum home again. They cari be actual or metaphoncal, but they dways accomplish at least one thing: the creation of a subject by whom degenerate spaces can be known and explored. The space of the Other is available, yet separate, affording one the knowledge that home remains elsewhere, distinct. The dispossession of spaces deemed marginal bolsters the developrnent of 'respectable', white space, and their presence allows the wastes of white space to be housed somewhere else.

They have everything to do with my history, because they offer the white subject a place to explore. to exploit, to becorne, and the ultimate choice of withdrawal. And for this reason it is 16 imperative to question why I am here, whether walking or writing. How might my own arriva1 in this place replicate those 1 critique?

As will be shown, academics, perhaps more than others, contnbuted to the pathologizinç of ficville and of black communities ~eneralb.The nature of 'study' has been to approach 'tiom above' as an expert, as one who can know the problem and produce the appropriate diagnosis and treatment. This has ofien been represented as objective study, to which the researcher brings no personal history or values. She or he simply collects information about a gven population and makes this knowiedçe available to those in decision- makinç roles. The information is recycled through the media, who also purport to convey the facts objectively, althouçh decisions as to which facts are highlighted and how they are portrayed remain unseen. These technologies of knowledse production are rarely made visible in Afiicville's story. How they serve to bolster the enforced removal ofa black community from its home remains obscure.

Telling a subversive, critical 'white story' of LVncville means articulating what whites have had to Say about AFncville, what knowledge they have chosen to circulate about

Afncville, what these views and the power that sustains them have enabled whites to do in and to .ficville, and how this knowledge has enabled them to remember and explain what they have done. A cntical whke story aims to make particular soverning bodies and institutions accountable for the kinds of information they produce and the actions this information enables. FinaUy, it arges that coming to terms with AfncviUe in a matenal sense is an inhented responsiiility of the City of Haiifax. This work does not provide a recipe for 17 accountability, but it does propose that accountability begins with the retùsai to judge stories of racial oppression out of their historicai contexts and unconnected to our own Iives.

am trespassing on Aiiicville ground in order to expiore a story of white domination. it is not the story of a century and more ofcommunity survivai against racism. It is not a story of the pain of forced removai from one's home, nor of the spirit of ficville which ignites powerful tesistance on the pan of black Nova Scotians. These stories are told by those who know them well, and they are crucial, connected, yet distinct. My analysis contributes to a growinç body of work on ficville by raising questions about not only what was done, but the underlying intent of those carryinj it out. This is not to suggest that a unified set of intentions existed and can be unearthed, but to disrupt a common assertion that officiais and planners operated innocently with onIy the welfare of AFncville residents at the hem of their project. Mer elsamining critical race perspectives. spatial theory, racial discourses and other andyses toçether. i suggest that the context of racisrn in which whites operated was too forceful rtot to have permeated their decisions.

The first major task is to fashion a theoreticai fiamework for elsamining the story.

This hework suggests that racialized Jpnces,as well as people and practices, are significant in the making of white subjects. Drawn 60m other studies anaiyzïng space, it foreçrounds the manner in which dominant subjects come to know themselves in and throu* particular places. This process includes the 'racialization' of populations deemed unfit to inhabit white, rniddle-class society, and relegates them to marginal sites. These sites come to be known by outsiders through racist tropes, and in mm influence the relations which take place within them and among different popdations. 18

Chapter 2 examines racial discourses produced in the era shortly before and dunng the relocation years. This elaboration allows a distinction of my project tiom those which have gone before, positioning certain works as my primary data to be re-read through new theoretical Ienses. In this chapter, 1 both analyze the sources and establish another important aspect of the theoretical approach, cntically exarnining white writing and speaking about ficville and black Nova Scotians.

This sets the context for a 'spatial walk', in Chapter 3, through the sarne terrain.

Here, it is clearer that more than one kind of subjectivity is made in racialized space: dominant subjects require subordinates, and dominant identities are made through encounter and negotiation with difference as much as through exclusion. This analysis utilizes both spatial theory and the racial discourses explored herein to demonstrate that colonization is a spatial project. This project is ongoing, adopting different forms over time, stretching into the present day. This process is not unique to ficville, rather .%cville is but one site at which to read the broader interlocking narratives of race, space and subjectivity.

It is rny contention that racism was the tùndarnental reason for the dislocation of

Miicville people from their community. However, this cannot be simply esplained as a direct translation of conscious attitude into action. It was, rather, a deliberate expulsion based on notions of order and progress which could not accommodate the radical Otherness black cornmunities were thought to embody. It was eqlained through white-defined desires for integration which were seen to preclude racist views. Race, then, is often coded in the

Ianguage used to study and consider Afiicville's fate, and the discourses used 'officially' to explain what was done claim an mlti-racisr stance seen to be inherent in the goal of 19 integration. In addition, the fadure of the dislocation program to improve the lives of black residents is ofien elrplained as a product of negiect or an unfortunate outcorne. despite good intent. 1 rehse this explanation, arguing that racist narratives are too firmly entrenched in systemic modes of researcfi and govemance to make motivation so ben@ While emphasizinç that racism is systemic, I do explore the words and actions of individu&, who are hardly divorced From the bureaucratic machinery through which they operate.

The final chapter cames the study of spatial regdation into the present day by examining the cornmernoration of .4Fncville. Here, 1 posit that whites continue to manage the space of .4fncville in specific ways. These include the suppression of protest, the forgetting of harm to the black community, and the continued support for a story of progress and integration which obscures past actions. Further, 1 demonstrare how the construction of present-day knowledge about iUncville relies on the aiteration and control of the landscape. t interpret the continuing story as an ongoing eviction of Afiicville Eom its own space, examining white reactions to protest and to the continuing challenge to broken promises.

Afiicville has become a symbol of black community. resistance and strength. What has it been to whites? It is the latter problem in which this thesis is ultimately absorbed. Chapter I

The Spatial Order of White and Black: A theoretical framework

Everything about human history is rooted in the earth, which has meant that we must think about habitation, but it has also meant that people have planned to have more territory and therefore must do sornething about its indigenous residents. At some very basic level, imperialism means thinking about, settling on, controlling land that you do not possess, that is distant, that is Iived on and owned by others. For al1 kinds of reasons it attracts some people and ofien invoives untold misery for others.15

White settlement in Nova Scotia took place within a broader imperial project which included the domination and colonization of native peoples in the quest to overtake their temtories, British preoccupation with establishing the British-ness of the new land determined who would end up where, and what they would then be gven or permitted to do.

Not surprisingly, Aboriginal, French and black populations were spatially seyregated and contained. tn some cases, the technologies by which this spatial management has been maintained over the years have changed Where they have shified, their spatiality itself

- the significance of space in racial containment - has not. This dissertation broadly demonstrates this contention, and this chapter sets the stage by arguing that colonization is always a spatial project. It does so through the review of vanous studies which place the role of social space centrally in the establishment of racial dominance.

Theory explored here is concerned with the connections between space and subjectivity; it examines how both dominant and subordinate identities are made through, and

"Edward Said, Cdtlit-e atidinzperi~~fism(New York: Vintage, 1994) 7

16For instance, First Nations in North Amerka stnl expenence a largely colonial style of administration. See Sherene H. Razack, "Gendered Racial Violence and Spatialized Justice: The Murder of Parnela George," Canadian Ioumai of Law and Society 15,2 (2000): 9 1-130; Dara Culhane, me Plemrre of the Crowti: Atrrhropology, Luw and First Natiot~s(Burnaby, BC: TaIon Books Ltd., 1998). 2 1 come to understand themselves in, distinct spaces. At the same time, space is a dynarnic phenornenon, acting upon knowledge construction and the formation of identities. To unpack what this means, the discussion must follow several main assertions: One, spaces do not sirnply predate historical events which occur 'in' them; they are determined through sociai relations and ideologies. Two, space plays a role in signitjling and enabling certain forms of howledçe production; in turn, such knowledge constitutes space in particular ways. Three, space produces certain kinds of identities, both dominant and subordinate, and these groups necessarily inhabit separate spheres. Finaily, raciaiized, spatial separateness and the concomitant values it places upon people have concrete repercussions in their daily lives.

To 'racialize' a population is to fashion knowledge about that group with charactenstics attributed only or mainly to its racial origins. Most irnportantly. this knowledge is designed to 'mark' as inferior, and to set the group apart from the dominant Society, bodily, spatially and socially. Raciaiized spaces, then, refer to spaces which are margnal - the project, the ghetto, the reservation, the streets of prostitution - and which are understood to be raciaily inferior by the dominant group. This is not to irnply that skin colour is the sole determinant by which a racial dichotomy - of blacidwhite; subordinate/dorninant - is composed. Predorninantly white spaces, too, may be racialized if they exhibit qualities sirnilar to ûther goups or Iive in proarnity with them. The white working class, the poor, the Irish, white prostitutes, and countless others have been racidied by dominant goups in some contem. Spaces take on racial connotations accordingiy. At the same time, a diaiectic exists in which space actively determines social relations, even as it is constituted by them. A good exampie is the North End of Haiifxc, reported in a 1960s study to consist of 71% blacks. This 22 area was IabeIed pejoratively as "the negro section" as if this racial fiflh coIoured the entire space. Mile "negro7*is no Longer used. simpIy ?he North End" now connotes blackness. much like Harlem in New York or the Jane-Finch corridor in Toronto. Such perceptions intùse space with meonings which have material consequences, such as helping to shape the activities of their inhabitants, or perpetuating their receipt of inferior services by the dominant society.

This chapter airns to demonstrate how racial minority groups corne to be marked as

Other, and how knowledge about !hem is created in and through spatial relations. it depicts the developrnent of the slurn and the establishment and management of racialized space in urban centres. At the same tirne, in tracing the reylation of both black persons and their spaces, it is possible to see how whites both materially and symbolicaIly construct thernselves through the manasement of spaces and populations. and in representations of the process. 1 airn, then, to "racialize" the dominant group as well, rather than uphold a cornmon view among dominant subjects of whiteness as simply auiomatic, a point tiom which ai1 Others deviate. Finally, through an exploration of the racial and gender identities which simultaneously evolve through spatial relations. the interdependence of different identities should become more apparent. Fur instance, 1explore theory which posits how domestic work constitutes the superior 'lady' of the home in relation to her servants. KnowIedge of the racial durn is also central in this, as are acts of transgression, by which dominant subjects uavel to the space of the Other and return ta the dety and purity of their own 'respectable' place. 23

A spatial analysis of Aficville in relation to the City of Halifax illuminates how white dominance and subjectivity are secured through the incitement to place, re-place and dis-place peopIe in particular spaces, as weli as to make and re-make the spaces themselves. Ultimately this analysis dismpts the common assumption that the relocation program was the product of good intent which simply failed to work. tt does so by insisting that racial discourses and spatial management have always been apparent and deliberate, and were intricately woven into the fabric of al1 levels of decision-making. Before this analysis can be employed, however, its theory mua be charted in more detail.

Space, Socialiîy and History

We often perceive places to be naturally occumng, to have simply 'emerged' and developed over time. To trace the histoncal events, policies, relations, struggles, that have made them as they are is to reveal that spaces are sociaily produced, whether the results of intensive planning or of indifferent neçlect. Henri Lefebvre writes:

Space is not a scientific object removed from ideolog and politics; it has always been political and strategic. If space has an air of neutrality and indifference with regard to its contents-..it is precisely because it has been occupied and used, and has already been the focus of past processes whose traces are not aiways evident on the landscape. Space has been shaped and molded fcom historicai and naturai elements, but this has dways been a political process... Tt is a product literally filled with ideol~gies.'~

At the same tirne, it is possible to see how spaces themselves influence which activities can take place withïn them, how their occupants know themselves, and how they are known by outsiders. Thus, a kind of diaiectical reIationship exists between space and subjectivity: We

"Henri Lefebvre, "Reflections on the Poiitics of Space," tram. M. Enders, Atlripode 8 (1976): 3 1- 24 understand who we are according to the place we inhabit; the place we inhabit in part determines who we can be. This becomes apparent in studies, to be discussed shortly, where characteristics of 'slurn' residents are read negatively by others due to their slum-like surroundings, and the space of the slurn itse1f is seen to have become what it is due to their occupation.

Such 2 relationship has not always been apparent in sociaI anaiysis. Lefebvre is best rernernbered for his critique of two traditional strains of geographic inquiry. On the one hand, geographers saw space as a fied 'container', upon which social history was written.

Altemately, space was seen as only an end resuIt of social processes, while these processes were not themselves 'placed' in particular sites which would influence their outcorne. [n both instances, space is left in a passive role and seen to be insignificant in determining human relations. Lefebvre, and others in his wake, argued that a didectic mode1 would better explain spatial relations. In this, the particular form spaces take is seen as a result of historicai developments and events; at the same tirne, space itself influences the relations and events which develop within it. This mode1 inserts political thouçht in the formation of geographic foms, and rernoves a sense of spaces as 'neutrai', devoid of the capacity to shape history.

Commenting on the usefiilness of Lefebvre's work in contemporary geography, Eugene

McCann embraces a theoretic insistence on Iinking representationd or rnetaphoric aspects

with the physical spaces of people's [ives. Lefebvre's theory, he notes, is applicable precisely

as it is rooted in the everyday spaces and life practices of cities."

I8EugeneJ. McCann, "Race, Protest and Public Space: Contextualizing Lefebvre in the U.S. City" Anripade 31-2 (1999): 163-184. Various feminist geographers have made important Iinks between gender politics and the development of social space.lg These chaIlenges to traditional geography have presented two general projects, as 1 see it: critiques of the privileging of conventionaily 'male' spaces in academic inquiry, and critiques of the precise way in which spaces become inscnied as male or female, or as public or private. For example, contemporary urban planning has reinscribed traditional gender spheres through the construction of the remote suburb, where women raising children in the home are isolated, reliant on vehicles, and removed fiom the city centre where they might better negotiate alternative work arrangements, or where men might be more accessible for participation in household work and childcare as well." Such an example does not imply a conspiracy on the part of planners to keep women from working outside the home, but rather that such tàctors are often overlooked completely because systemic sexism is so embedded in the way social planners, like other members of society, conceive of human need. In line with Lefebvre's dialectic approach, such arrangements exemplie how space is created by human choice, in tum influences what can occur within it, and aiso structures relations which perpetuate the creation of more such spaces.

IgSee, for example, Nancy Duncan, ed., B~pcr:desrabilizit~ggeographies of gender and sematity (London: Routledge, 1996).; Giliian Rose. Femitrism and Geography: The Linlits of Grographicd iôiowledge (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1993); Doreen B. Massey, Space. Place and Gender (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1993); Women and Geography Study Group, Ferninia Grogruphiex Euplorations Ïin Diversity and Dtflerence (Harlow: Longman, 1997).; Rosa Ainley, ed, .Vav Frotitiers of Space, Bodies and Gender Gondon and New York: Routledge, 1998).

''Se Susan Hanson and Geraldine Pratt, Gender, Work, mid Space (New York: Routledge, 1995), Despite these i~oads,geographers have not unilaterally leapt to analyze production of spatial configurations and relations upon minority or diserûianchised groups. McCann bas critiqued Lefebvre's work for its failure to theorize race, and has argued for a carefd establishment of historicai contes with regard to race when applying spatial theory to the

U.S. city." Many ferninist geographers producing work on gender and space also fail to analyze relations among different groups of wornen according to race or class." For instance, the notion of the middle class suburb is itself a racialized phenornenon, intended to remove the respectable family from the dangers of downtown slurns and crime. Many suburban communities are walled,') protected by pass codes or other secunty, and provided with nearby shopping malls so that most needs can be met close to home. Socio-economic conditions and other implications of racism dictate that the majority of families of colour, particularly if poor or recent immigrants, will not live in such neighbourhoods, but in separate, distinct, and noticeably run-down areas with perhaps fewer services, more crime and visible social pr~blems.'~While the so-called 'inner city' is not aiways clearly demarcated as a slum area, it

"McCann. "Race, Protest and Public Space."

?or similar critiques, see Melissa Gilbert, "'Race,' Space, and Power: The Survival Strategies of Working Poor Wome~"Attlials of the Associatiot~of Arnrricatl Geographrrs 88,4 (1998): 595-621 .; Sherene Razack, introduction to Race, Space and the Law: Umnppintg a White Settler Sociey (Toronto: Between the Lines, forthcorning Spring 2002).

-3David Harvey, JIistice, Namre ntrd the Grography of Drf/ere~~ce(Cambridge: BIachweU, 1996).

"David Theo Goldberg, '"Poiiuting the Body Politic': Race and Urban Location," in Racist Ctiltzire, Philosophy cmd the Politics of Memzing (Oxford: Blackwell, 1993); Richard Thompson Ford, "The Boundaries of Race: PoIitical Geography in Legai Anaiysis," Hmurd Law Reviav 107 (1994): l843-lg2l. 27 presents a somewhat vulnerable site, at nsk of contamination fiom Others who are not baned from entry, as they might be in a protected, middle-class suburb. Whether tangible 'on the ground' or not, the image of the urban racial slum becomes antithetical, and central, to how the suburbanite sees herself as a wonhy and respectable citizen.

Various theorists have analyzed the interlocking dynamics of space and subject formation, attending to the co-presence of race, gender, class and sexuality in ways which illuminate my own study. 1 pursue, in what follows, the work of theorists who examine how social subjects corne to construct and understand their lives and spatial environments in specific sites. Several of the sources taken up in this chapter have at the root of their analysis late 18" and 19" century European spatial arrangements. This is sig*ficantand appropriate for it matches the tirne period in which Nova Scotia's population was suddenly quadr~pled,'~ and that of the ensuing decades during which British noms and values wove the fabnc of the new society. The spatial relations in Halifax today are the legacy of arrangements which have been central. dl dong to the building of the city as a white space. Critical geographic readings of the nineteenth century and subsequent urban environments comprise a mode1 which 1 will apply, in C hapter UI, to the histoq of Hdifau and of Afiicville,

Making and Racing the Slum

Slums, ghettoes or 'project' areas within cities come to mean many things to those who plan, study or observe them. Whether they are physically visible or simpIy known by reputation, multiple negative rneanings are attached to them by those who Iive elsewhere.

refers to the amid of the Loyalists in the 1780s. 28

Due to systernic poverty, and often to the policies and practices of local governments, such spaces may appear, and eventually become, unsafi, unclean, and associated with disease, moral deficiency and crime. They may be treated as repositories for the wastes of the dominant society or for other populations deemed contarninated. While perceptions of the racialized slum expliciri) conîlate people of colour and immigrants with the above qualities, it is rare for such areas, even when inhabitants are mostly white, to be devoid of racial connotations and associations.

Importantly, the slum is known to be spatially distinct. The borders around it provide both a reaI and metaphorical distance for those from more privileged classes, most of whorn are not raciaIized in the view of the dominant society. As the following analyses show, the preservation of respectabIe spaces relies on the contahrnent of slum conditions in a separate sphere which cornes to be known as outside and beyond the bounds of legitimate society, a space apart, where the rules and conditions of dominant space no longer apply.

David Goldberg's work traces the technologies of spatial management throughout the colonial and postcolonial eras, delineating a shifi fiom colonial to slum administration of many racidied groups in the nid twentieth century. Consistently, it is the existence and movement of racidIy deEned populations that is seen to create the demand for new modes of maintainhg spatid boundaries. During European coIonization of the Amencas, the vast tracts of land were envisioned as -ernpty' and unoccupied, arvaiting the footprint of the settier society. Thus colonized spaces could be imagined as mainly devoid of human habitation, and the foreignness of those popuIations encountered, as well as their lands, made it simpler for 29 colonkers to distance themselves from any sense of identification with indigenous peoples.

With the later flow of fonnerly colonized people into the cities of North Amerka and Europe, stricter arrangements had to be configured and maintained to keep the Other spatidly and rnetaphoricai1y distant from the prvileged classes. Faced with what Bamor Hesse caIls the

'-interna1 Other," as opposed to the colonized ûther overseas, colonial management saw a need for the "rationalization of city ~pace,"'~which resulted in the development of poor racialized areas and a host of accornpanying discourses about the nature of these spaces and their residents. These discourses - of crime, moral degeneracy, filth and generd ineptitude - act in concert with spatial restrictions, bath justwng and reifying them. Hesse describes this process as "a spatial nativization in which people are compressed into prefabricated

Iandscapes, the ghetto, the shanty towm, and undergo a process of 'representationai essentializinç' ... in wbich one part or aspect of people's Iives cornes to epitomize them as a whole ...*'"

Due to the substandard resources allotted the raciaiized ghettos. as well as the original poverty of the immigrants who inhabited them. conditions in these neighbourhoods rapidly declined. As Peter Marcuse explains through his concept of the resid~~iralciry, racial minority spaces fiequently came to house the wastes of society, be they poliutants fi-orn industrial rnanufacturing, sewer systems and garbage disposal areas, or housing for others deerned

TBanior Hesse, "Black to Front and Black Again: Racidition through contested times and spaces," in phce and the politics of ideritiy, eds., Mchaet Keith & Sreve Pie (London: RoutIedge, 1993) 175. undesirable, such as patients with infectious diseases or homeless peoples." This contributed to their image as sites of filth, disease and grave social disorder. As 1 will demonstrate later in my own study, even where such conditions were attributed in lip service to govemmental policy, they were ultimately bound up in racial discourses which tied the filth, disease and disorder to the bodies of inhabitants of the slum. From there, it is a rninor step to seeing inhabitants as responsible for creating their own conditions. .As these conditions are self- perpetuating, their continued existence is seen to legitimate this view. Similarly, Stallybrass and White discuss the evolution of the slum throughout the nineteenth century in relation to the subjectivity of the lower classes:

...the metonymic associations (between the poor and animals, between the slum- dweller and sewage) are read at first as the signs of an imposed social condition for which the State is responsible. But the metonyrnic associations (which trace the socini articulation of 'depravity') are constantly elided with and displaced by a metaphoric Ianguaçe in which filth stands in for the slum-dweller: the poor ore pigs.Ig

This dehumanization coincides with a sense of moral outrage on behalf of the upper classes that the poor, in their unclean and disorderly habits, may transgess the boundaries of the

'civilized' bodyL30 The conflation of physical conditions with immorality is depicted by

Goidberg as weII, with the integrated complication of racial dehumanization. He writes:

The slum is by definition filthy, fou1 srnelling, wretched, rancorous, uncultivated, and lacking care. The rnciat slum is doubly determined, for the metaphorical stigma of a

"Peter Marcuse, "'Not chaos, but walls: Postmodemism and the partitioned city." in Postmodertz cities mdspacrs, eds., Sophie Watson and Katherine Gibson (Cambridge: Blackwell, 1995) 247.

??eter Stallybrass & Allon White, The Politics and Portics of Transgession (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1986) 13 1. black blotch on the cityscape bears the added connotations of mural degeneracy, natural inferiority, and repulsiveness... the slum locates the lower class, the racial slum the ir~tdercIas~.~'

GoIdberg delineates displacement fiom the rest of society as "the prirnq mode by which the space of racial marginality has been articulated and reprod~ced."~'

A further mode of racial articulation can be seen in the establishment of areas explicitly labeled according to the racial origins of their inhabitants. For exarnple, 'Chinatown' and

'ficville' have been reclaimed as titles by these groups, but were originalty raciai markers attniuted From outside the communities to signiq their essential difference. The separateness connoted in a word cornes to stand in for and capture a collection of racist narratives. whether they depict an e~oticFar East or a 'dark continent' of savages. -4sKay hderson argues.

Chinatown residents came to be known in white. public discourses as ernbodyinç al1 the negative qualities and activities associated with their homelands. including the opium trade. white slavery and prostitution. Their space, detiled by raciai Othemess. formed a similar slum-like image in the white imagination, and was depicted in the media as filthy, morally repugnant. and presenting a great danger to the rest of society."

33KayAnderson, P'ca~cotrwr's Chiriarowi: Racial Discorrrsr in Cari& 18 75-1980 (Montreal: M&X-Queen's University Press, 1991). Contamination and Containment

White European beliefs in the inherent dangers and perversities of the slum betrayed significant anxieties around the confinement of raciaiized populations. Fear of contamination is a central theme to be found in both early colonial situations and in the management of slums in the 20' century. As a repository for the unwanted eIements of white society, the degenerate zone posed a threat of contamination whose antidote was a pure and respectable space to insulate one's family and their race and class group.

.Anne McClintock discusses advertizing in the 19" century which contested the borders between public and private as a mode of organizing imperial relations. While the sanctity of the household was displayed in the public realm through ads promoting cleaning products and domestic purity, the public realities of empire made their way into the British household in the form of pictures and messages on househoid products. Fear of dirt, Other races, contamination from the Natives in the colonies. and the need to protect the European home are central to the incitement to purifi one's private space. keeping the contaminants out. For e'rample: "The first step toward Iightening The White Man's Burden is through teaching the virtues of cleanliness - Pear's Soap is a potent factor in briçhtening the dark corners of the earth as civilization advances..."." Other ads, and other educational devices of the day, express this unity of moral rectitude, civilkation, physical purity and raceb3'

U~nneMcClintock, Imperid Lrathrr. Race, Garder wzd SemmIiy itr the Colonial Contest (New York: Routledge, 1995) 33.

35Seeaiso, Stallybrass & White, "The City: the Sewer, the Gaze and the Contaminating Touch,' in Tramgressiotr; Mariana Valverde, fie Agt! of Light of Light, Soup niid Water: Mora[ Refonn in EngIish C~I&18854923' (Toronto: McCIeUand & Stewart Inc., 1991). Stallybrass and White have studied nineteenth century "refoming texts" which survey the British lower and working classes, depicting conditions in geat detail and advising as to their improvernent. These teas, that century's equivaient of urban planning reports, when read criticaily, reveai how moral considerations of the time structure what are considered to be the most economic uses of space and the most efficient measures by which the 'slum' rnight be cleaned up. They also reved a preoccupation with the study and surveillance of the Lower classes and were directed toward the middle-class, providing a way in which the bourgeois subject miçht 'see in' without crossing the borders of the ghetto. Fear of disease is centra1 in tbese narratives as well, and resulation was set in place so that, for instance, prostitutes couid be incarcerated if they were suffering from venereal disease. The slum is imagined. fiom the outside, as a large infectious body which can open and spill its contaminants, whether gem. persons or conditions. into the space of the respectable masses. For example:

...the slum, the labouring poor, the prostitute, the sewer, were recreated For the bourgeois study and drawing room as much as for the urban council chamber. Indeed, the reformers were central in the construction of the urban geography of the bourgeois Imaginary. As the bourgeoisie produced new forms of replation and prohibition governing their own bodies, they wrote ever more loquaciously of the body of the Other - of the city's 'scum'."

Disease, like crime, was treated as something which couId be po~iced.~'The police and soap, then, came to be seen as the primary civilizing agents.

"Stdybrass & White, Trmr~gre~ott.125-126.

3ÏIbid., 133. Mariana Vaiverde has traced sidar discourses in the Canadian context by exarnining the rise in middle-class concern over cleaning up the slums of the early twentieth ~entury.~~

This involved immigration policies which considered both the lower classes of England and non-white people as more likeiy carriers of semally-transrnitted and other diseases. In particulas, Valverde documents earry hopes of preventing slum development in Canada like that in the U.S. and Europe. This concern involved rnoralIy-inflected judgements about the heaith risks posed to the rest of society by the poor and racialized slum-dweller. Citinç the fiequent repetition around feus of "disease, vice, and crime", she demonstrates the necessary erasure of the subjectivity of slum residents and their representation by researchers and reformers. She notes a common emphasis on 'knowiedge as control', which was seen to necessitate vigilant observation and documentation of the degenerate areas.

Bnnging the concept of pollution into the twentieth cenniry, David Sibley discusses

Iiterature in which narratives of whiteness and bIackness are spatialized. He writes:

...whiteness is a symbol of pue, virtue and goodness and a colour which is easiIy polluted ... Thus, white may be connected with a heightened consciousness of the boundary between white and not-white, with an urge to clean, to expel dirt and resist pollution, whether whiteness is attributed to people or to rnateriai objects... As a marker of the boundary between puritied interior spaces - the home, the nation, and so on - and exterior threats posed by dirt, disorderty minorities or immigrants, white is still a potent symbol."

Here it seems apparent that views of home and nation are separate fiom immigrants and

minorities, who are considered an 'exterior' phenomenon. Sibley too explores advertisements

38Valverde,Age of Li&

3'tDavid Sibley, Geogruphies of e.rclrisiori: sociey md drfJerence Ïtr the wesr (London: Routledge, 1995) 24. for soap and detergents, though in the later twentieth century. These ads juvtapose the space of civilization, the clean, rniddle class kitchen, with the primitive and untamed exterior, in one case through images of white children dressed as Native Americans with face paint, getting dirty 'in the wiId'.m This is consistent with a view of rnarginai groups, particularly Fim

Nations, as incompatible with the spaces of legitimate society, as welI as antitheticai to progress and development."

Race seems to slip into view as a rudimentary device in many constructions of Other spaces, surfacing even in cases where writers set out to study the 'lower classes' without a conscious critical race analysis. While Stailybrass and White intend such inquiry in the British

context, the descriptions they uncover are never only about class: the Irish in Engiand are

depicted as barbaric and animalistic. the slum areas are compared to the colonized lands in

Africa as the city's "dark places." Whether overseas or at home, race becomes important

terrain on which the politics of spatial difference are written. While particulai- racial

stereotypes ofien shifl over tirne, the distinctions remain. T'hese are reflected in poIicy

designed to uphold segesation and restrict movement.

Goldberg traces the discriminatory and regdatory consequences of seemingly race-

neutral Iegal rulings in housing policy over time. He cites examples from South lVncan

Apartheid, under which renters could refuse families with more than a certain number of

%id., 63-67.; See also, Staiiybrass & White, "The City," for discussion of fears of contaminarion by the slum in relation to English soap ads in the nineceenth century.

I'David Sibley, Outsiders in Urbm Societies (Oxford: Blackweli, 198 1).; Evelyn I. Peters, -'Subversive Spaces: Fust Nations women and the city,' Emirot~rnentand Plnnnirig D: Society ar~dspcrce16 (1998): 665-685. 3 6 children, when black families tended to exceed this number. In the United States, 'racial convenants' were entered into by reai estate developers in the mid 20' century when zoning laws prohibited residentiai discrimination. These agreements prevented families of colour

From buying housing in certain areas, and served to develop the areas circiing the ghettos ro prevent ghetto expansion." Suburban developments, too, can be planned so as to lirnit rninority access, through expensive design, size and location. David Harvey studies a wealthy cornrnunity on the edge of an urban centre, theorizing its self-containment behind a bordering wall as a mode of establishing place and identity away fiom the traces of urban decay in the city centre. The wall as both concrete structure and metaphor offers both an illusion and some insurance that degenerate spaces and subjects wiil remain elsewhere, on the outside.

Shifting grounds: the project

In the mid twentieth century, as modem dies were sharned by the stain of poverty on their landscapes, slum removal replaced slum management as the dominant strategy. This presented a particular problem, for while city govemments desired the removai of the offending areas, they recognized that residents were hardly in a situation to afford housing elsewhere. Further, as evidenced by 'white flight' to the suburbs, cities were not prepared for integration, despite the liberai rhetoric of the era of urban renewd Anderson found that

Vancouver's Chinatown was eventually depicted as a tumour, threatening to spread were it not excised, indicating that "Chinatown's diagnosis as a 'slum' was to be justsed and realized through the surgery it~elf."'~This 'surgical' model, broadly applied, resulted in the displacement of groups of racial minorities from their dwellings in the 'slurns7 to public housing projects built specifically for this purpose. Constructed to provide low-rent, high density housing, many projects were placed in central areas of the city but were surrounded by isolating features such as rail Iines, vacant lots or public parks. This, dong with their highly visible structure, contained residents in zones which facilitated their observation by outsiders.

With slum residents piled neatly on top of one another, their former territories could be converted to respectable commercial or residential space and sold or rented at high prices.

As the conternporary configuration of the slum, the project has become 'known' by outsiders as a site of delinquency, social curmoil and contagion. Its poor, raciaiized population is similar, and the incentive to care for a cheap, impersonal structure that is not one's own is understandably low. As Goldberg writes, "the projects present a genenc image without identity: the place of crime; of social disorder, dirt and disease; of teenage pregnancy, prostitution, pirnps, and drug dependency; the workless and shifiless, disciplined internally if at al1 only by social welfare workers."" Thus, it seems the 'progress' of the era of urban renewal was not realized as the just and desegresating phenomenon it professed to be. Cities have 'progressed' to a new stage of spatial ordering, but it is one in which sorne 'sociai problems' have been removed, only to be reiocated. Rather than resulting in a systernic

43 Anderson, Vanco~rver'sChtrrn~mvrt, 187-1 9 1.

UGoldberg, Racisr CtlImre, 198. 3 8 andysis of poverty and racism in which govenunents recognize their central role, the practice of slum removal seems to perpetuate a common public view that the blight, the slurn, sirnp1y moves with the bodies of the poor and racidized, remaining entrenched within them. Instead, modes of enclosure and observation are simply updated, underscoring the chasms in the relations they make possible.

Sprce and Agency

The remarkable thing, of course, is that we can find alternative representational spaces at dl, and not oniy End thern, but find them repeated, time and again, in different settinçs. Such oppositional voices are constrained, of course, and ofien muted. Yet they persist. This tells us something very important about the potentialities of social iife and political opposition. One of the perils of critical theory, under the assumption that the life world has long been disciplined and Fracmred by the "totalizing logic*' of capital or the "hegemony" of liberai-legal discourse, is that in forgetting the old Iesson that relations of domination are also relations of resistance (Scott, 1990), we fail to Iisten for such insistent representational geographies."'

At the centre of both my own study and those consider in this chapter are the social mechanics of how spaces are racialized. A consequence of this focus can be an overemphasis on the agency of white actors in determining these arrangements. Specifically, it can corne to sound as if segegation is rnerely a tool of white supremacy which al1 racialized people would oppose and dismantle if possible. The growth of socid spaces is more complicated, and has an interna1 logic whereby spaces mean different things to those who inhabit them than they do to those outside. For instance, many residents did not imagine Atiicdle as a segregated community, and why wouId they? ïheir sertIement patterns were not designed to exclude

"%icholas K. Blomley, Lat: Space aird the Geogrnphies of Power (New York: Guiiford Press, 1994) 22 1 non-black residents (nor did they).% Rather they were structured by historical solidanty, migratory cohesiveness, and the need to share resources, information and a refuge fiom the discrimination of the outside world, conditions over which they had little control.

There is a danger, particularly when the goaI is to illuminate the instruments of racism, of obliterating agency on the part of racial minorities whose -segregatedl arrangements have functioned positively to maintain some stability and familiarity in the community. If this were not so, the contention over dismantling places like Afiicville might not exist. bel1 hooks in particular has pointed out the liberatory potential of marginal spaces, from which communities have a clear vantage point on the dominant society's motives and intentions. As well, people draw strength and creativity fiom one another in strategizing over political and social goals.

So, while many theorists speak of the margin as a site, both reaI and imagined, to which socially underprivileged groups are relegarrd, it is simuItaneously an empowering locale fiom which they are able to develop and enact foms of resistance. As hooks writes:

Understanding marginality as position and phce of resistance is crucial for oppressed. exploited, colonized people. If we only view the margin as a site marking despair, a deep nihilism penetrates in a destructive way the very çround of our being. it is there in that space of collective despair that one's creativity, one's imagination is at risk, there that one's mind is fùlly colonized, there that the Freedom one longs for is l~st.~'

%Saunders, Charles, et al., Afncvilk: A Spirit thLnfes 01i (Halifax: The Art Gallery, Mount Saint Vincent University, AFricvilIe GeneaIogical Society, Black Cultural Centre for Nova Scotia & Nationai Film Board, Atlantic Centre, 1989) 17. AIthough the number of white Africville residents was smail, they were reported to be well-received in the community and soii;e white people moved in &er marrying AfncvilIe people.

"'bel1 hooks, Yemlingi ruce. gender and ~~iltttraipolitics(Toronto: Between the Lines, 1990) 150-1 5 1. 40

Richard Thompson Ford offers a detded study of the manner in which spatial segregation is upheld even when legislative poiicy seeks to disband it. Were racial segregation bamed, he posits, the infrastructure already firmly instated by the dominant group makes it necessary for minority groups to maintain links to specific areas, networks, services and other su~valmechanisms, even when their socio-economic statuses change.4g To some degree, it is little wonder that homogeneous communities appear as if they were only natural. Tt would seem unlikely for a new. minority popuiation in an urban space to scatter about the city, settling individually in areas where they knew no one and would be likely to experience racism

- if such settlement were allowed in the first place. It seems incontestable that family networks, language, business contacts and farniliar services and resources would draw people together and help to maintain an interna1 cohesion. Concem here lies, clearly, with segregation which is imposed From outside, and for reasons which are not to do with community and quality of life. Et lies also with processes of desrgregotion which are imposed, and for reasons not to do with goodwill or equai opportunity.

It is with the conceded risk of appearing overIy deterministic that 1 focus on the process and effects of spatial dominance. Wemarginal group solidarity is undeniably important, it is not at the cmx of this work. Rather, my aim is to chip away from another angIe at some of the forces which make marginalized resistance so laborious. It is to take apart the brick wall that is white subjectivity and to theorize a 'geography of racism'.

uFord, "Boundaries of Race," 1843. 4 1

Thus far, the discussion has attempted to clarifi severai foundational points of such a geography: Spaces are constructed; they do not independently deveIop into their current

States, nor do they become automatically racialized, outside historicai relations. Spatial boundaries constitute the pure and the unclean. Racialized spaces define and mark their residents, inscribing their bodies with the quaiities ofthe spaces themselves and implicating their 'polluting' influence in whatever conditions prevail. The impetus for spatial distinctions is more complicated than exclusion fiom the larger society (dthough it does accomplish this); it concems the management of difference according to the needs white subjects perceive, or actually have, in their cornrnunity at the time. Multiple discourses about race exist, which may seem to merely accompany spatial arrangements. What 1 aim to show is their inseparability: the discourses structure how spatial arrangements play out, making them appear 'natural', and spaces in turn wpand the discourses, seeming to offer concrete evidence, through the physical environment, that the discourses are correct. This is a cycle with metaphoric aspects, and the space/subjectivity dialectic is a useful discursive model, but it is simultaneously crucial to see how it organites material life. For those on the less pnvileged end ofthe spectrum, this may mean water contamination, unemployment, drug abuse; it may mean that the police don't come when caIIed, or that children receive inadequate education. For those in Society's respectable places, it means other things, and these will form the themes of the upcoming sections.

This project focuses specifically on the subjectivity of white middle-class people, who made up the majority of the Halifax population at the urne of forced relocation (and still do) 42 and who had the power to determine what happened in Africville, whether through positions as City Councillors, business persons, joumalists, academics, or, in a few cases, as concerneci citizen activists. While I acknowledçe the generalities, it is also the case that people occupying such positions were overwhelmingly white and middle class, and that far more of them were male than femaie. The way in which decisions were discussed in the Iiterature shows a prevalence of dominant European values centred around the nuclear famiIy and around respectable marriage and sexuaiity. My enunciation of this is not as something surprising or 'new', but as something which is ofien taken for granted and which must be made visible. As David Roediger has pointed out, 'whiteness' has essentiaily no meaning outside systems of domination of the racial Other. In other words, for governing and

'majority' subjects racial identity becomes significant only in reference to that which it is tiot.'''

L'ntiI now [ have spoken of racialization as the process by which racial minority groups come to be 'marked', identified with their race as an essential quality, which constructs what can be 'known' about them by others. The aim here, then, is to 'racialize' the dominant goup as well, denaturaiking the un-marked-ness of whiteness by repositing it as an expIicit category which is aiso constructed, rather than simply axiomatic. Further, it is to demonstrate how different subjectivities are constituted in negotiation and interaction wïth one another, and corne to rely on one another for their articulation.

'Qavid Roediger, Towardr the abolitioti of whiteness: Essays on race. politics and working clms hisrory (London: Verso, 1994). See aiso Mary Louise FeIIows and Sherene Razack, "The Race to innocence: Confionting Hierarchicd Relations among Wornen," Jotrnral of Gender. Race andJirstice 1,2 ( 1998): 33 5-3 52. Placing, racing and gendering bodies in space

...the expiorers wish to influence and possess the world they rneet, but take great pains to be sure that it will not substantially inform thern in return. They evacuate the others they rneet, keeping their own subject position in the forrn of the aiready formulated, complete monad..- The European explorers attempted to maintain the environment on the 'outside' in order to preserve their mastery of it ... Mapping acted to distinguish 'seIf fiom 'other': in early Arnerica, cartography was the measure between human and non-buman, civilized and savage... The solid Iines that cartography draws between the subject and the Iand also reinforce the lines drawn becween European white subjects and ûthers."

In the analysis From which this quote is taken, Kathleen Kirby examines the mapping of space

as fundamental to the formation of the -cartesian subject'." Speaking of the necessity of

establishing identity through the mastery of unknown places, she notes the rnanner in which

space, for the privileged newcorner, must be studied and 'known'. while space itself is not

actively permitted to 'know', to act back upos the dominant subject. When this relationship

shifts. such disorder is profoundty disturbing to the white male subject (in this context) who

'explores' and, through mapping, conquers and reformulates space into something feIt tu be

his own. It is in the project of this expropriation, with its concomitant distancing from the

environment, that dominant subjects corne to know themselves. Mile Kirby's theory is set

out mons 'new world' explorer narratives, a simiIar mindset can be read in studies of the

slums of Europe and America, where white panic over the possibility of an enduring black

presence is played out in a continud project of re-examinino, rezoning and reformulating the

%athleen Kirby, "Re: Mapping SubjectiWty: Cartagraphic vision and the Limits of poIitics," in Baàyspce: destabilizit~ggrographies of get~derand sen~aiity,4. Nancy Duncan (London: Routledge, 1996) 49. environment, making clear who is in control as well as who may not achieve this subjugation of space.

Mary Louise Pratt, too, has usefiilly documented the gowth of a "planetary consciousness" in the eighteenth century, which involved the intensive study of the earth by

European explorers. Sbe examines descriptive work such as botanical treatises, naturalist texts and narrative travel accounts from this period, which were profoundly concemed with documentation of plants, animals and al1 components of the naturd environment. She too has contended that natudists' and cartographers' mapping of the world's borders served to bring the Empire and its vast outer reaches into the public European consciousness as a knorm space, with known contents. This project is seen by its agents as an innocent and benign mode of interest. in contrast to overt appropriation of the [and. Pratt positions the activities of mapping and exploring as components of acquisition under the usefùl term "anti-conques~" which refers to "the strategies of representation whereby European bourgeois subjects seek to secure their innocence in the same moment as they assert European hegemony." She posits the male subject of landscape discourses as the "'seeing man' ... whose imperiaI eyes passively look out and possess."" The seeing man is constituted not only through his discovery of

Other peoples and spaces, but through his assumed reciprocity with them, which makes him in his own mind, im innocent subject coming to the relationship on equal ground with the

Other. While the cartesian subject seems more overtly possessive, this 'innocent' perspective also serves to flatten power relations. b~gingonIy individuais, -outside history', to the

"Mary Louise Prats, Imperia1 Etes: Trmel Writing arid Trm~~~~~I~rrrarion(London: Routkdge, 1992) 7. 45 contact zone. While they deal with different conteas, explorer narratives and travel writing are useful in demonstrating the gaze of the dominant subject upon the subjugated, and to understand the politics of observation and scrutiny as more than simply a manifestation of curiosity.

Dominant subjects, too, are made in particulm spaces. They come to know themselves as dominant not in isolation but in relation to the bodies and the sites of conquer, of

Otherness and degeneracy. Writers such as Edward Said and Toni Momson examine literature and other cultural representations as expressions of their time and space. inseparable from the historical and geographic matenalities in which they are produced. They read these works as evidence of how the individual and the sociery are imagined in the contes of struggles over temtory and power relations, oflen with emphasis on the production of dominant subjects. For instance, Said's Orietitalism examines the inferior placement of the

Middle East in the West's image of itself as edightened, progressive and civilized. The imagined Orient forms a requisite exotic backdrop against which Western culture defines itself. Rather than any essential qudities of the actuaI region or peoples known as Oriental, the imagined Orient, with the contingent discourses of the Othemess of its space and people, is meaninghl in the West insofar as it reflects the mithesis of Western cult~re.~

Toni Monison, in Plqvilig in rhe Dark, approaches Amencan literature as a map of the historical pursuit of self-representation of whiteness. After explaining her former assumption that white authors mainly excluded people of colour fkom the stories they tell, she begins to

nEdward W-Said, Orientaiism (New York: Pantheon Books, 1978). 46 theorize many examples of an ever-present blackness, noting; "What became transparent were the self-evident ways Americans choose to tak about thernselves through and within a sometimes ailegoricai, sometimes metaphoricai, but aiways choked representation of an

Miicanist presence."" Most illuminating are the literary devices adopted to represent this presence in particular ways. For instance, awkward linguistic structure is employed by authors in the struggle to be sure black characters do not speak; white protagonists are ofien accompanied by a stereotyped, silent black servant or fnend whose subjuçation serves to highlight the independent, resourcefirl nature of the main character. Morrison's technical prowess as a writer is applied to underscorhg the literary treatment of the rncoicnrrr of the

Other by the white subject.

In this vein, Anderson highlights how Chinatown developed as a site through and against which Vancouver's white cornmunity could imagine its own visage.55 Chinatown, she argues, has been seen as an essentiai micro-representation of Chinese-ness in the West; this illuminates the image of the 'host' society, reveaiiig European ways of thinking and acting.

The spatial positioning of Chinatown as an area contained through different techniques and according to different social requirements over tirne, demonstrates much about white society, which came to know its identity, power and boundaries through this necessary Other space.

Such knowledge-construction can be read through news reports, policy changes such as

'Torii Momson, Piayri~gthe Dark: Fntirelless and the Lirerary Imagination (New York: Vintage Books, 1993) 17. racialized employment laws, and other media discourses, including cartoons which satirize

Chinatown according to well-known racial stereotypes.

Referring to the colonial context, Pratt speaks of a 'contact zone' in which the complex struggle over identity - who is able to be who - takes place. She demonstrates how, in the space of cohabitation ailer invasion by Europeans, power relations cannot be described through a dichotomous mode1 of inclusion and exclusion.

A contact perspective emphasizes how subjects are constituted in and by their relations to each other. It treats the relations between coIonizers and colonized, or travelers and "travelees," not in terms of separateness or apartheid, but in terms of copresence, interaction, interlocking understandings and practices, often within radically asymmetrical relations of ~ower.~~

While Pratt's tigure of the male explorer, identified earlier, is deeply significant in the constitution of whiteness, *masculine' qualities are simultaneously invoked in the meaninç of world travei, discovery, the tnumph over harsh unhown environments and the matching of skill and strength with perplexing, different men encountered along the way. Gender and semality, too, are embedded in the configuration of racial subjectivities, as Anderson notes of

Chinatown:

...racist knowledges had gender and moral codings relating to family, sexuality, maniage and residence embedded within them, just as discourses surrounding gender, sex, citizenship and farnily life relied on race meanings for their cultural integrity. It follows that race identities cannot be decontextualized and separated off analytically or politically from the constitution of other identities and axes of power."

"Pratt, Imperia1 Eyes, 7.

57KayAnderson, "Engendetinç race research: Unsettling the self-other dichotomy," in BoLjtpcr: drstabilizhlg geographies of gender und semratit)', ed., Nancy Duncan (London: Routledge, 1996) 308. The concentration on a specific site at which spath1 margins are clearly drain can allow one to discern how different systems - race, gender, class, se.wality - function together.

These various axes are visibly operative in AtncvilIe and in similar sites when examininç the urban planning studies airned at reforming the community. Discourses of slum rernoval rnake explicit moral assumptions as to how farnily arrangements and parenting styles hinder the deveropment ofchildren. the safery of the cornmunity, and the overail potential for cleanliness and nspectability.

Consistent with many of the assurned attributions ofthe slum itself are racialized depictions of the black male as dangerous and violent.'"he purported sexual threat the black male presents to white women has been the historicd justification for most lyn~hinçs.~~At the same time, black men have been portrayed as unambitious rvorkers, absent fathers and inferior pro vider^,^ offenng white men a self-image as deserving empioyees and supenor breadwinners. In the twentieth century's shiR fi-om biological racism to that justified by

sapeterJackson, "Policing difference: 'race' and crime in rnetropolitan Toronto," in Co~ismrctiot~sof Race. Place and Nation, eds., Peter Jackson & Jan Penrose (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, L993); bel1 hooks, "Representations: Feminism and Black Mascuhity," in Yrmiing.: Pau1 GiIroy, "Conc1usion: uhan social movements, 'race' and community," in ' Tkere Ait? 't No Black il? the Urriotr Jack': fie Cirhral Polirics of Race and Narion (London: Hutchinson, 1987) 223-250.

Ii%velyn Brooks Higginbotham, "Afiican-American Women's History and the Metaianguage of Race," Ses I7,2 ( 1992): 264.; Tmdier Harris, Erorcistt1g Blackness.- HistoricuI und Literary Ly~rchingatid Biirtring RÏf~iaIs(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1984).

%eu hooks, "Reconsuucting black mascurinity." in Black Look: race and representritiorr (Toronto: Between the Lines, 1993). 49

'cultural path~logy',~'the slum and the ghetto figure prominently as conteas in which the criminal behaviour of black maies is unleashed. When opposed to histoncal myths of the black rapist and beliefs in the inherent primitiveness of black cuItures, white male domestic violence, when situated in a respectable space, has been given a greater benefit of the doubt and seen as less common ~verall.~'A number of theorists have also attended to the formation of white, bourgeois female identity in relation to stereotypes of the black woman; it is for their potential to iilustrate the contingency of one identity upon another that 1 tum to these narratives nea.

Domestic work, female identity and the placement of dirt

Speaking of the race- and class-based construction of the "lady" in the nineteenth century, Fellows and Razack write, "Ladies ... pursued respectability by distancing themselves from din and degradation. That distancing could not occur either in the lady's imagination or

"Sec bel1 hooks for discussion of white ferninists' treatment of black men, which is often more critical of their seast views than it is of similar rnisogyny arnong white men, aiso media representations which portray them as more violent. For example, "Representations,' in Yécmiitzg, "Reconstructing black masculinity," in Black Lmh; "Doing it for daddy: Black masculinity in the mainstream" in Reel to Red: race, sex and clam at the movies condon: Routledge, 1996). See aiso Hertnan Beavers, "'The cool pose7: Intersectionality, masculinity and quiescence in the comedy and films of Richard Pryor and Eddie Murphy," in Race und the siibjecr of masctilitrÏttes, eds., Harry Stecopoulos & Michael Uebel (Durham: Duke University Press, 1997); Teun A van Dijk, "Media Discourse," in Elite Discotirse and Racism, vol. 6 of Sage Series on Race und Ethnie Relutions, ed., John H. Stanfield II (Newbury Park: Sage Publications, 1993). For discussion of white men's formation of anti-seiast activism in relation to, and exclusive oÇ black men, see Jennifer J. Nelson, ''In or Out of the Men's Movement: Subjectivity, Otherness and Ami-sexist Work" Cmiadian JottrnaI of Edicution 25'2 (2000): 126-138. in her middle-class home vithout the economic and semal expIoitation of domestic workers and prostituted women."" Defiled women, then, are relegated to social spaces where they can be understood as physically and metaphoricaily different. They take care of aspects of life over which the lady would express ignorance, shock or distaste. These understandings are inextricably liedto gender, clus and sexudity at once. For instance, Sherene Razack's work posits the prostitute as the embodiment of defiled femaie sewaiity, but she also notes how such women were dways racialized, even when white.@ The spatial separation of the zone of prostitution helps to solidie this sense of Otherness, wherein the unrespectable woman occupies a different place. Hirgginbotham, too, writes: "ladies were not merely wornen; they represented a class, a differentiated status within the generic category of

'women'. Nor did society confer such status on al1 white women. White prostitutes, aIong with many working-cIass white women, feu outside its rubric. But no black woman, regardless of income, education, refinernent or charmer, enjoyed the status of lady.'*65

As middle class white women have historicaily relied on the domestic service of

women of c~lour,~they have corne to know thernselves not simply as superior but as

63~ellows& Razack, "Race to Innocence," 348.

%erene Ebzack, "Race, Space and Prostitution: the Making of the Bourgeois Subjecc" Cmindintt Jo~rnruiof Womeil adthe Lm 1O ( 1998)

65Higginbotham,"Metalanguage of Race", 26 1

66~cornmon form of ernp10yrnent for A4fricMllewomen was as maids in white Halifax homes. See Susan Precious, "The women oEMiicville: Race and gender in postwar Halifax (Nova Scotia)" (master's thesis, Queen's University, I998).; See aIso Evelyn Nakano Glenn, "From sendude to service work: Histotical continuities in the racial division of paid reproductive labour" Sigis 18, 1 (1 993): 1-43 .; Rhonda M. Williams and Caria L. Peterson, drfferent kirids of r~orneri.~'The distinctions among various women's duties have helped to consolidate both separate spheres and separate identities. Studies of the development of these patterns in the nineteenth century make clear how the insertion of Other bodies into respectable spaces is necessary for the up-keep of middle class life. Thus, the bourgeois family allowed the 'outside in' for the performance of specific roles, clearly not to share the space as equais, to shop at the same supermarkets or to dine at the same restaurants. There is a clear exchange of 'dirt for cleaniiness', as the duties performed by racialized subjects result in the dirt being, as Razack and FeIlows have described, "absorbed" into the bodies of the

Other. This allows the bourseois househoid the illusion of being invdnerable to dirt, and upholds the notion that the wastes of white society belong elsewhere. The din is taken away with the racial Other. the excrement is dumped near her water supply, the garbage is caned to her doorstep.

Through rniddle-class exemption fiom work outside the home and heavier work within the home, as well as indulgence in social activities and causes, pnvilesed white women upheld the vinues of femininity which were naturalized during the nineteenth century. As

Higginbotham writes of the U.S. context, "Southem etiquette demanded protection of white

"The Color of Memory: Interpreting Twentieth-Century US. Social Policy from a Nineteenth-Century Perspective.' Femiiiisf Sfrrdies 24, 1 ( 1998) : 7-25 .; Higginbotham, "Metalanguage of Race."

67Higginbotham,"Metaianguage of Race," 257-258.; Janet Guilford & Suzanne Morton, eds., Separafe Spherrs: Womeir 's Worlds Ïir the 1p Crntiiry Marifimes (Fredericton: Acadiensis Press, 1994). For black women's views of white women in historicai domestic relations and in ferninist movement, see bel1 hooks, "Sisterhood: Politicai Solidarity Between Wornen-, in Feminist rheoryfiom murgin ta cei~ter(Boston: South End Press, 1984). wornen's 'racial honor' and required that they work under conditions described as 'suitable for ladies' in contradistinction to the drudgery and dirty working conditions considered acceptable for black women."" Virtues of 'the lady' included mord purity, passiveness, humility, and physical deli~acy.~'They did not involve perfonning heavy labour, getting dirtv, or assening authority - qualities attnbuted to, and likely necessary in, black women who ofien ran two or more households (their own as well as those of the white families they worked foq?

As Inderpai Grewal has studied in nineteenth century English culture, privileged white femininity also depicted the noms of beauty, which became inseparable From goodness and virtue, seen to be evident in the face. Examining Burke, Dickens, Thackeray and various other writers on femaie character. she writes, "...no woman who worked in the fields, the factories, or in the domestic space could possibly have the sofiness and smoothness ascnbed to beautifid women; it was only the aristocratie woman whose idle life enabled the cuitivation of such q~alities."~'

''Higginbotham, "Metaianguage OFRace," 260.

''Razack, "Race, Space and Prostitution"; lnderpai Grewai, Home and Harm: Nntioti. Ge~ider,Empire, und the Cdtrrres of Trmei (Durham: Duke University Press, l996).; McClintock, Imperia[ Leather.

70 With regard to rnid-twentieth century discourses of socio-psychological dependency, Fraser and Gordon have found that, "...white women were usuaily portrayed as emng on the side of excessive dependence, while black wornen were typically charged with excessive independence." Nancy Fraser and Linda Gordon, "AGenealogy of Dependerrcy: Tracing a Keyword of the U.S. Welfare State," Sigrts 19.2 (1994): 325.

"Grewd, Home and Harem, 30. The equation of beauty and decency with the fair, innocent and meek heroine converges with discourses which indict the raciaiized woman in the slum as an impudent, immoral character.

Grewal continues:

If only the domesticated and disciplined woman could be beautihl, then it was to be expected that working-class women lacked ttu's beauty. Women who work sixteen hours a day at sewing or in the factories for meager sums of money were neither subrnissive nor weak. Nor were many ofthem virtuous, for factories fostered an unbourgeois sexual freedom from an early age. Furthemore, the money to be gained from prostitution was competitive with that obtained from factory or home labor, and required far less eff~rt.~

Black women, who were usually labourers, appeared in the literature as grotesque and defiled figures, failing into the latter category of the comrnon binary drawn between the "infantilized ange1 of the house and the victimized ~hore."~

Seen throuçh the personas of, alternateiy, 'Jezebel', 'Mammy', or prostitue, black women have historically been forced to negotiate the multiplicity of stereotypes applied to them. These characterizations have included the excessively semal being (particuiarly available to white male owners or ernployers). the overbearinç household head (who dominates and drives away her man), the sturdy, formidable worker and the prolific bearer and nurturer of ~hildren.~"It has been virtudly impossible for the black woman to be the 'lady',

7"Deborah Gray White has traced the histoncal roots of these racialized images to travel narratives of whites in .%ca and the Carniean, and to the emphasis among whites on reproduction of the American slave population. She discusses the image of 'Mammy' as a conflation of the idealized woman and the ideaiÏzed slave, who could tùlfiII the requirements of virtuous womanhood only insofar as she cared for white households. Deborah Grey White, Ar 51 'r I a Woman?: FemnIe SZuves m the Plmitution Smth (New York: W.W. Norton & 54 for she is needed to tùffill the essentiai roles and duties incompatible with virtuous worrianhood. It is because of those who tùlfill such duties that the lady can exist; it is through these Others that she 'knows' her nature and occupies her subjectivity, both matenally and symbolicaily. The spaces of the slum. the field, the factory, or the red light district make possible the spaces of the bourgeois home and the ladies' charity group.

ClearIy, the boundaries between differently constituted spaces are essentiai to building the foms of knowledge explored here. And clearly, the different spaces are dependant on one another, mutually comprised, and meaningiess without the solidification of the actuai and conceived borders between thern. Further, it is apparent that these relationships are much to the benefit of one group, much at the expense of the other. However, in order to be known, it is imperative that spaces across the border be accessible to the dominant group, that opportunities for crossing and looking be available, for simply keeping spaces cordoned off from one another would severely obstmct the ability to 'know'. While the subjects ofanalysis in my study, and various others, abide within the borders of racial apartheid, I argue that there does exkt a 'contact zone' in which pnvileged white people travel to the space of the Other, where they lem their dominance and eqenence the fieedom of transgression and return.

This phenomenon has been examined through dominant subjects' exploration and mapping of

Company, 1985). See aiso Linda Gordon, Piried Brrr Nor E11Nrlrd.- Si@ Mothers arrd the History of Werfarr (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1994).; Patricia Hill Collins, Binck Ferninisr Thoirghr :knoiviedge, consciorimess, m7d the pditics of ernpowenner~t(Boston: llnwin Hyrnan, 1990), particulariy Chapter Four. "Mammies, Matriarchs and Other Controlling Images"; Patricia Morton, ed., Discoveririg the Wornen in SIavery: Emancipmnig Perspectives oit the dmerïcm Pust (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1996). 55 marginal spaces, but aiso through their engagement in the anomalous activities of the degenerate zone.

Tales of transgression

As several theorists make apparent, spaces of racial marginaiity are seen as zones where lawIessness prevails, and thus where deviant activity cm ofien take place without retribution. Kay Anderson demonstrates how Chinatown became an identifiable zone of prostitution. dmg abuse and other illegal activity. Denise Feneira da Silva explores the bnitality of police against inhabitants in racialized slum areas in Nonh Amencan cities, theonLing tiiese zones as spaces outside the bounds ofuniversal j~stice.'~Razack's work on prostitution explores the racialized, red light district as a locale of degeneracy in which dominant subjects have historically solidified their authotity upon the backs of the Others who occupy them.76 Further, she explores how, metaphorically and very physically at once, the anomaious zone of prostitution enables certain relations which are organized throu* sender, race and class Ienses. Through transgression into these spaces, the privileged male subjm moves in and out of a meaningfirl, dangerous and necessarily subjugated space. In attaching the deviant behaviour to the bodies of the degenerate classes and to the spaces they inhabit, she asks, what do dominant subjects accomplish? Much the way racialized domestic

75DeniseFerreira da Silva, "Interrogating the Socio-Logos of Justice: Considerations of Race Beyond the Logic of Exclusion," (paper presented at the Law and Society Association 3000 Summer Institute, Baldy Center for Law and Socid f oh,Buffalo, NY., ldy, 2000).

"Razack, "Race, Space and Prostitution." 56 arrangements iunction to displace wastes ont0 other sites, transgression and return enable the feeling that defilement remains behind, contained in the bodies and spaces of the Other while the subject produced escapes the risk of contamination. In this, the sanctity and morality of the middle class home are preserved.

Razack also explores the web of race, gender, colonization and spatial transgression through the 1995 murder of an Aboriginal woman narned Pamela George in the Canadian wex7 She argues persuasively against the naturalization of the kinds of spaces and bodies involved in the violence, and insists on historicizing the colonial relations which produced the priviIeged white men who entered a 'degenerate' space to violate an Aboriginal woman working as a prostitute. Discussing how Pamela George was seen as an object already defiled through her race, gender and identity as a prostitute, she notes how the bodies of degenerate zones are seen as natural targets of violence and the spaces of prostitution only natural sites in which exceptional or lawless activities can and do take place already. Although convicted of manslauçhter, the culpability of these men was diminished and the violence cloaked as an

'unfortunate' mistake rather than a quite unsurprising result of the violent encounter between these individuais given their histories and identities. The analysis makes clear the extent to which violent acts of transgression in degenerate spaces are aiiowed to escalate before they are considered reprehensible, and that even then, those who absorb this violence are seen to have consented, just by virtue of being in the space.

%zack, "Gendered Racial Violence." 5 7

The crossing of boundaries does not always necessitate the physicai joumey to the space of the Other, and thus it comprises various symbolic violences as well. Like narratives around the subject and space in general, it can be an imagined journey, based on racialized and gendered knowledge about the position of the traveler and those dhe seeks to 'visit'. To some extent, the knowledge gleaned by those who study or invade other spaces is enough; it makes its way into the public consciousness and is shared broadly through books, news reports, public gossip and other media. The fact that those reponing are frequently seen as respectable, authoritative voices - white academics, journalists, urban planners - serves to heighten the sense of Iegitimacy.

Modem day configurations of such journeys also mean that physical travel need not be so central to knowledge production about other spaces; the wider variety of available media help to achieve this. While the eighteenth and nineteenth century explorers and slum reformers relied on actuaily entering the new territory and reporting back to educate others, today, information technology allows access to knowledge more quickly, and spreads it more widely.

in some cases, it is the lack of a physicai exploration of the space which best serves outside interests. For instance, the imagined space of Anderson's Chinatown relies upon the ignorance of whites conceming the Far East. Likewise. Orientalist discourses have nothing to do with an attempt to reflect 'tnith', or to engage with the Orient on its own terms. They are conceptions about that culture and place which can be recreated in the dominant space, 5 8 another chosen site, or in the imagination, and they always serve to augment the constitution of the drearner.

In earlier work 1 have exarnined the mythopoetic and pro-feminist men's movements in

Canada and the U.S. '"espite some basic differences, both factions hold events in which men retreat to the woods or other "naturaï' settings away fiom "civilization." They conceive of themselves as transgressing the confines of western society, getting back to a primitive, essential manhood which is already present within the self and can be unearthed through the emuiation of other cultures. In prime demonstrations of what bel1 hooks has called "eating the

~ther,"~~they adopt ritual practices, often Eom First Nations or fican cultures, which are invested hith imagined 'exotic' notions rarely based in research or invitational engagement ivith these Others. There is an assumption that a small essence ofthis Other is already present, buried within the western self, awaiting rediscovery. This ritual enactment takes place in a space apart, away tiom westemized or 'civilized' notms. It is purported to be done out of respect and admiration, but can be read as a deep desire to rnake oneself in specific ways - indeed, rnany participants attest to this, but rarely see it as problematic. The new attributes can be taken from the space of rebirth, back to everyday tife, which is, of course, not lived on a reservation, not characterized by poverty, decimation, sexism, nor usually by racism. The professed knowledge and admiration of other cultures allows a feeling of innocence, while a sense of victimization is simultaneously invoked through emphasis on

nNeIson, "Men's Movement."

%ooks, uEatïng the Other," in Black Look. 59 participants' own spirituai poverty and confinement in a culture where they cannot tmly be themselves. Maintainkg that such acts are apoliticai, facets of the men's movement reproduce colonization through the appropriation of other cultural practices which are imagined to be spatially and materiaily procurable.

Staiiybrass and White identie a sirnilu phenornenon in their depiction of 'the carnival', a concept crucial to much nineteenth century cultural and Iiterary analysis. This refers broadly to large festivals and rituals, norrnaity held in public space, of an exceptional character - contrary to everyday norms. Aithough it differs From the men's movements' retreats in that the Others are actually encountered, initiating the events, the notion of exotic spaces and bodies offering spectacle and escape remains. As observed (and feared) fiom afar by the bourgeois subject, such occasions were seen as pertkrmances of gross excess and perverse, uninhibited behaviour of the masses. At the same time, fascination and desire propelled the flnt~eu?'' toward the carnival, to mingle not as one participating, but as an act of transgression in the shedding of constrictive, 'respectable' middle class norms for the limited permissible tirne."

'Tor tiirther discussion of the persona of theflmieitr, and particulariy the gendering of urban space, see Anne McClintock, '"Massa' and Maids," in Imperid Leather, See Janet Wolff,Ferninine Sentences (Cambridge: Polity Press, 1990), for her analysis of the 'invisible flarrcntse', the femaie version of the maie urban 'wanderer', who often dressed in male clothing in order to cIaim the sarne privilege to access and explore the city. Wolff uses this persona to theorize how Victorian women were either e~cludedfiom urban space or couId not occupy it without intense scrutiny of their status (for example, as prostitutes or 'loose women'), and of their class position.

*'Stallybrass & White, Trmzsgression. 60

A contemporary analogy rnight be Gay Pride parades, in which participants are free for a time to perform and exhibit aspects of their identities which are, tkom day to day, silenced and marginalized. This is consistent with Stallybrass and White's contention that 'carnival' may take on politicai rneanings for those who initiate it, recoding the everyday relations of power and constituting an act of resistance, however fleeting, through visibility and di~ruption.~'At the same time. onlookers, like thefïnrlerrr, rnay maintain knowledge of their difference fiom and superiority to participants. They are free to consume the spectacle, to indulge in amusement, 'scandai' or a taste for Othemess while knowing that the status quo remains at home and, fùrther, that these spaces entitle 'home' to be what it is.

Conclusion: A Geography of Racism

An engineer building a bridge works ffom principles which have built strong bridges in the past. He or she has actual and conceptua1 models which can be applied and tested, and can predict the effects of moisture, ffeeùng, of forces applied too strongly or in different places. New models will be simulated in ways that ailow testing before construction. When tragedy results, however, the construction of the bridge is questioned, the designers and their plans interrogated, perhaps a [aw suit is instigated; eventually improvements in the mode1 are

=Men privileged men appropriate and reenact these rituals, however, they ofien do so out of a skewed sense that they too are oppressed by society, tending to conflate petsonal feelings with Iack of social power and priviiege. They remain observers, outsiders looking in, whiie seeins themseIves as entitled to assume and perform any identity they End interesthg or psyc hologicaiiy iiberating. 6 1 made and new desigs worked out. It is not often that bridges collapse; most of us put out faith in this being the intended result.

In deconstnicting failed processes of social engineering too, we start tiom the present and work backwards, taking apart results, plans, results, plans, until we unearth how the processes may have resulted in the situation at hand. The difference is that outcomes are not always mismkes, and, depending on one's social standpoint, it is not as easy to remain faithfùl that they might be. Over time the results of social planning become naturalized so that processes themseives are rendered invisible; it makes sense that if something violent is in the works, its conceaiment must be built into the plan itself Where planning is deemed to have

'failed', we are lead to believe a different outcome was intended. Intention, indeed, is usually descnied in a positive light, much as an engineer does not intend for her bridge to collapse.

This project aims to disrupt some common assumptions that the fate of Afi-icville was simply the product of good intentions gone wrong. Tt does so through examination of the narratives of racism which permeated every facet of decision-making, every step of discussion. it also posits a larger context in which racism is intricately woven in the social fabric of Nova

Scotia (and western nations broadly) in particular ways, to argue that the actors implicated in removing rUncville had very little chance of seeing the residents as people, practicaily none of seeing them as equal agents. Without critical awareness of this context, and even in some cases with it, plans replicated the processes and practices of colonial racism, infused with particular semai and cultural imperatives. 63

But can even lack of awareness be credited firlly for Atncville's destruction? It has been the aim of this chapter to demonstrate that dominant subjects operate out of more than poor intent, and still more than ignorance, in their treatment of the spatially subjugated minority; there are firm investments in identity, which incorporates notions of race, class and gender, and which would collapse if not for the space and the body of the racialized Other. I argue that the erasure of Atnctille, the extension of the containment and regulation of its residents, and the maintenance of their economic status quo were unsurprising results. This is not to argue that plamers conspired to act in consciously evil ways (whether they did or not cannot be verified); it is to argue that there was hardly another way in which they couId have imagined acting in this context.

In my thinking, 'geography of racism' has emerged as the phrase which best encompasses any set of strategies by which spaces are organized to both express and determine racialized relations. It rests upon the tenet that spaces both produce and reflect identities - dominant, subordinate and their conhsed entangiernents. Such a çeogaphy is simultaneously a history in spatial terms: it maps the formation, transformation duration, destruction and comrnernoration which govern the corporealities of how life can be lived in a space.

Why read these processes as a geography and not sirnply a history of space? Because the latter image Ieaves space in a role devoid of action, upon which history sirnply 'happens' and proceeds. Geography inserts a new dimension, bringing to light the role space piays in acting back upon bodies and social systems. We have seen this through the influence of the 63 spaces of prostitution on the minds ofjudges and juries, throuçh the construction of the bourgeois subject, the lady, the slum. It will be seen through the story of ficville told as a geoçraphy of racism.

It has been my hope in this chapter not to obscure space theory with theoretical jargon, but to deliver it tiom some of this by evploring the work of theorists who apply it explicitly to particular sites and situations. These discussions have been my models, and their uses of space have been most effective in dariens central concepts: Dominance is made in the crossing ofborders; there would be no borders without spatial distinctions; there would be no spatial distinctions without difference, and there would be little difference of consequence were spatial distinctions never present. Perhaps the rnost useful aspect of a methodoIogy reliant on space is that it is demonstrable *onthe ground', to a degree so aiarminç as to make one wonder why it is not always the first point of entry (and in some cases it is, whether labelled so or not). We can identiS, what is considered 'the slum', ftom either side of the border. We 'know' that "the other side of the tracks" is not just a metaphor, no matter which side we occupy. We know that it can be a metaphor as well.

And so the story is told throuzh space because its components cm be mapped, traced: they have left their mark on the landscape and the Iandscape its mark on them. When this tracing is complete, it is no longer possibie to see space as the 'ernpty' container upon which history is born. ficviiie was raciaIized, not simply by Wnie of housing people of colour, but by the view the rest of the community upheld of this population it was marked fkom the beginning, and thus denied, neglected, placed out of society and Iaw and aliowed to 64 deteriorate until it could be known as the slum, and residents as slum-dwellers. And yet, white people entered Atncville. They entered for tùn, to pass out on doorsteps, to leave their garbaçe behind. They entered to study and observe, to report, to rescue. And when it finaliy became too visibly defiled, they entered to rernove people and bulldoze homes, to level and transform the land and to encrypt it with new meanings. This geography is one of deliberate transformation, not accident; it compeis meaninfil inquiry. Chapter II

Allegories of Blackness and Space: Racial Knowledge Production in Mid-Century Nova Scolia

If people in the southem U.S. treated Negroes as well as we do in Halifau, they would have no racial problem. .4nd you can quote me on that.83

Dunng the 1950s and '60s in Nova Scotia, the black community was a central object of intensive observation, analysis and regulation by white city officiais and professionals.

Through the eyes of govemment, urban planners, social workers, academics, and joumalists, black identity was relentlessly portrayed as a threat, a pathological problem, and an object of pity or disdain. It was within this context that Mricville. too, was studied and charactenzed as a place outside society. fit only for the wastes and production processes of the mainstream, and a pIace considered dispensable when it gew too visibly polluted. At the sarne time, black people were constituted as distinctly 'Other', perhaps most aiarmingly as infantile and directionless, unable to rationaily participate in the planning of their futures. These claims were made in a variety of disciplines, through different media, and by studies which were ofien portrayed as impartid and scientific.

White ideologies about black community and the consistency with which they appear offer a broader framework in which to contest arguments that Africville's ueatment was not racialiy motivated. The data eqlored in this chapter deiineate the central story of race and

Othemess produced in white Nova Scotia in the era preceding, accompanying and foiiowing the destruction of .i\fnaille. Many elements of this story suggest that the regulation of black

63ThenHalifax Mayor John E. Lloyd, quoted in David Lewis Stein, 'The Counterattack on Diehard Racisrn," Maclrail 's, 20 October, 1962,92. 66 communities and their spaçes was considered imperative, particularly in this rnid-century era of ürban renewal'. The narratives themselves form the justification for spatial regdatory practices such as poIicing and dislocation. They also demonstrate that this was cloaked in the

IiberaI rhetoric of progress, modernization, social reform, improvement of housing and living standards, and racial integration. The theoretical frarne established previously aids in the understanding of both the forms racial knowledge assumed and how this knowledge and its productive results were spatialIy organized.

Part 1 of this chapter concentrates on white knowledge-construction about black Nova

Scotians ~enerailyfrom the late 1950s to the eariy 1970s - that is, during the period in which

.4fticville's fate was determined, the community pdually removed, and residents forced to adjust to their new lives. [t examines racial discourses which were established and circulated through planning studies, acadernic work and the news media, in order to offer a sense of the character of racism in the province at this time. Tnese studies are ovenly concemed with such things as blacks' 'educability', potential criminality, family structure and moral conduct.

WhiIe not suggesting that such issues are no longer prevaient, my analysis necessarily stays within the scope of this time frame in the interest of offering a detailed reading of some key sources.

Part U reflects on these discourses through the work of scholars and activists who have portrayed a history of racism and smiggie for Nova Scotian blacks, rather than one of self-iposed victimhood. Like many of my own crïticisms traced in the tïm section, the criticai sources here brace the contention that the intervd hmthe mid-1950s to the early 6 7

1970s was a time of fervent planning, survey, and debate over the proper placement of blacks, geographicaliy and socially.

Finally, Part LI1 centres the knowledge produced by whites about Afncville, in particular, during the earlier years of the sarne period. While the process of relocation itself is ro be explored in the ne* chapter, the aim here is to determine dominant ideas which existed in the white community about Afncville before it was destroyed. Naturally, these narratives lead into the reasoning behind the relocation, and it is difficuit to separate the two. However, sources here reflect white 1950s' and 60s' views as to the character of Afiicville and its people, while the following chapter will review in detail how particular plans and policies destroyed the community. In general, this chapter emphasires what was saki, while

Chapter III tackles what was dom. Due to the similanties in how Afiicville and other black communities are discussed. cornmon threads must be drawn throuçh the general, specific and critical sources before movinç on to theorize what happened, and this is the present task. In this era of upheaval, concerns over housing conditions and service provision nteet narratives of poverty and social disorder; radintegration spurs the construction of new boundaries.

And whiIe planned or comrnissioned under different auspices, vanous intensive studies of black and poor populations comprise a body ofknowledge about Afiicville and other black cornmunities on which judgements about their natures and decisions about their htures cm now be based. These discourses are pedagogicai, providing ways of seeing marsjnalized cornmunities fiom mainstrearn and 'expert' perspectives. This chapter can be seen as both a 68 description of the sources fiom which they stem and an analysis of the education they offer the white public about blackness and black spaces.

It should be clear that knowledge production occurs on many levels. The black population in Nova Scotia has been centralIy responsible for many educational projects to remember and celebrate Afiicville's hinory over the las two decades. However, at the time of the 'relocation' program, black voices were Iargely silenced in the public media and in the decision-making process, and knowledge of a positive nature about Afncville and other black communities was not widely circulated. This was not due to a lack of critical perspective or community spirit, but rather to lack of access on the part of residents to media, academia, and govemrnental influence which wouId validate and spread knowledge stemming fiom within the community itself It was principaily white joumalists, academics, social workers, urban planners and city officiais who were able to voice what could be known about Afncville in the broader white community. OAen these professionais saw themselves as speaking for the communities they studied, and their conclusions were presented as simply objective observations of reaiity with Iittle reflection on how their own subject positions shaped the telling of others' stories. Still. in an era in which civil rights were at the forefiont in the

United States, Nova Scotia couid hardly escape the influence of this growing rnovement, and some critical sources by both black and white writers contribute, particularly in section JI, to the context established hem. Other work by former Mricville residents and their descendants, other black comrnunity members and their non-black supporters, has been produced recently in a more comrnemorative tone; this will be discussed in the final chapter. Method and reading practice

This project attends to both primary sources of information such as govenunent documents and acadernic surveys, and secondary sources, such as theoretical interpretations which have appeared in academia, the press and popular discourses. These sources were seIected due to their prominence in every investigative site 1 encountered, whether archival work, Iibrary searches or other writers' analyses. The texts discussed here are taken fiom a vanety of disciplines and media. They constitute the majority of writing relating to ficville during the period in question, and were certainly the most visible. The planning studies in this chapter are referred to in much work 1 have seen; they are cited as evidence of the state of affairs of blacks, and of Afiicville specifically, during the 'relocation' years. Articles from the news are referred to in other theses, and in the comprehensive Rclocatiorr Report, which will be discussed in more detail in the next chapter. Some sources overtly build upon others, for instance, Alben Rose's report, to be considered in Chapter Ut, cites an important viewpoint on Africville from a planning study discussed here.

In general, these sources were chosen in li&t of my disagreements and dissatisfaction with the scope of other attempts to explain why ~cvillewas destroyed. As wiIl become clear throughout the work, I am centralty concemed with the foundations of knowledge upon which white people have based their interpretations of Afiicviile's life and death. It was necessary, then, to ask what sources other works employed, to compile them, and to read them closely for myself. In doing so, I beçan to note cornmon discourses which ran through alI or most of the work. While the views and the tems used to descnie them are not always 70 identical, a core body ofnarratives, in various fomms and across different discursive sites, began to take shape. I see these narratives as foundational to the construction of knowledge about black cornrnunities, AfncviIle itself, blackness, ûthemess, marginal spaces, difference, poverty, culture and many related concepts. They function together to form a knowledçe base which cornes to be seen, in the dominant white community, as one of objective fact gleaned from impartial research and observation. When a better understanding of this knowledge base is developed, it is possible to examine what this information enabled whites to do, and how they made sense of their positions and their actions.

I am, in a sense, completing a 'tertiary' reading ofdata which is not new, but which I feel requires deeper critical scrutiny. The primary sources are, of course, the studies examined here, while the secondary sources are analyses and employrnents of the prirnary sources which kindled my interest in returning to them. My re-reading develops a sense of how blackness was viewed and talked about by whites in the mid-twentieth century, how this structured and supported white thinking about Aficville, and how specific actions resulted tom this knowledge. This chapter. then, builds a fiamework to illustrate the 'cIimate7 of racism in

Nova Scotia with regard to several pivota1 issues in the planned devetopment of Halifau. It explores pubIic texts put forth by and for white rnainstream society to form the 'official story' of race in the period of Afiicville's destruction.

A 'text', here, may be any example in a range of materiai, including books, theses,

newspapers, conference papers, radio and television reports, poetry, interviews and informal public tall~.~'A discourse, or narrative, is the story told by a text; 1use discourse in a broad sense, to depict common themes which run through many or most texts in a body of work. In this project, 1 am concemed with discourses depicting the black population in particular ways.

This is similar to Teun van Dijk's definition, which points to two main forms of discourse operative in the reproduction of racism: discourses befivren majority and minority groups, and discourses aboirr minority groups. He writes, of the latter:

Such discourse is largely addressed to other whites, although minonties rnay indirectly be addressed, or may overhear it, as is the case in al1 public discourse. In this way, ethnic power relations are not so much implemented as such, but rather presupposed, comrnented upon, and communicated. The major functions of such discourse about minorities are persuasive, that is, speakers aim to influence the minds of their listeners or readers in such a way that the opinions or attitudes of the audience become or remain close(r) to those of the speaker or writer. . . Once we understand these processes of ideological reproduction, we also have insight into the underlying mechanisms that monitor more direct forms of discrimination or racist action, inciuding text and talk directed against rninority group rnember~.~~

Extending this precept, Goldberg is concemed with how racial ideology resuits in the raciaiization of groups and manifests itself in the spatial control of these groups. He investigates the "institutional implications of racialized discourse and racist expression for the spatial location and consequent marginalization of groups of people constituted as races."86

The narratives investigated here, aithough the centrai foci of this chapter, are not simply benign forms of 'taik' among individual racist whites, but are identified in order to facilitate

uWhile [ did not carry out interview research for this project, I bill at times refer to interviews quoted in other academic studies, al1 of which are published.

%an Dijk, Elite Discortrse, 30-3 1.

86Goldberg,Racist Cthre, 187. 72 the analysis of what theyprodrrce (that being, the marginalization, neglect, abuse and displacement of ficville).

Similarly, in describing an 'official' story, 1 refer to the product of popular white discourses which have corne to dorninate in mainstream society and its institutions. 1 have discerned the cornmon threads of this story through consideration of various questions and issues as 1read. Sorne of these will be obvious afier the tirst chapter's methodological introduction, with its focus on narratives of the slum, reform measures. the marking and exclusion of racialized groups, the transgression of boundanes, the constmction of Other spaces, and the cotonizinç 'gaze'. In questioning how truth cIaims about black cornmunities came to be formed and professed, i also examine how some sources and authors tvere positioned as 'expert'. 1 read, in these sources of expert knowledge-making, how language is employed to suggest cultural pathotogy and how moral concerns underpin the study of objective circurnstances. For instance, even when sources claim to be scientific, they are interspersed with speculative comments for which there is [iule or no evidence, and which have moral and ethical implications. i consider, then, how studies which purport to be

'scientific' utilize this authority to exude a subjectivdy mordistic stance. 1also read for the overd 'tone' of writing about bIacks by whites, asking, for instance, '1s it patronizing? 1s it written as ifblacks themseIves wouId have no understanding oftheir iives? Does it suggest that ody white experts can 'correct' their circurnstances? Does it cIaim to have no information in areas where black communities could easily have been consuIted?'- 73

In reading these texts, 1 also look for language which excludes certain goups, or is addressed implicitly to speciflc audiences. For exampIe, is there one way of life or standard of living which is positioned as the nom, and to which different standards are compared? 1s the work written as if only the more priviIeged goup will be reading it? What are the race-, class-

, and gender-based assumptions made about how goups should live? On whose terms are the Iives in question to be improved?

This analysis employs two different, yet cornplimentary, ways of reading discourses. 1 am concerned, on the one hand, with the operation of te'as; on the other, with the authors of texts themselves. Texts are organized to constmct specific knowledge, and thus specific actions which cm be backed by this knawledge- Authors are implicated in the construction of texts: it is crucial to remember that ideas do not sirnply 'appear' but are created and circulated by people with invested interests in their subject matter and, oflen, in the outcornes their ideas might produce. This is not to suggest a direct relationship benireen knowledge creation and ail its end results, for no one can predict ai1 the uses to which a particular study rnight be applied. However, there is accountability, for instance, in a study which poses a great deai of speculation as to the nature of a 'culture of poverty', and then suggests that .4fncville must inevitably be destroyed. There is accountability when one conducts a very imprecise and superticid study of the community, whiIe relying only on 'knowledge' produced beforehand, and then prescriies its destruction. WhiIe 1 acknowledge that responsiility for a failed project can never be located in one body, 1 also stress the importance of locating and naming racist actions in specific practices and examples. A centrai argument in this thesis is that most 74 work on ficville rehses to name accountability for anything that happened to blacks. AS wiIl be seen, it is more common to hear of vaguely 'unfortunate' circumstances, nemming fiom long ago discrimination which is not seen to continue. I argue that deliberate processes and decisions can be traced. This work would do a disservice to a comrnunity if it were to simply diiute agency over so many umamed cornmittees and bureaucraties that it once again disappeared. This tendency is precisely what I set out to disrupt.

Naturaily, the stories of Atncville told by its tonner residents and those who support them include a history of racism, stmggle, comrnunity survival, and important memones.

These, however, are not the narratives commonly told in mainstrearn journals, magazines, newscasts and white public discourse. Those who define and circulate the dominant officiai story Locate no racism; we must apply a new criticai gaze to the places where it is coded.

Part L: Regarding the Other

The "highest and best use"

Throughout North America in the 1950s and '60s, planners and governments began to exhibit a dramatic concern with urban regeneration. Of centrai interest was the removal of decrepit, rundown areas and the movement of their residents to ptiblic housing project~.~'

STDonaldClairmont, LLficville:An Histoncai Overview," in Thçt Spirit of AfricviIk, ed, Afncviiie Genealogical Society (Halifau: Formac, 1992). 75

While improvements in housing, services, access to education and job opportunities were assured, and no doubt wanted by their potentid recipients, these promises frequently dissolved into the simple removai of rundown areas for the sake of ridding the city of embarrasment and creating economic opportunity for business and industry. Populations uprooted and cleaned out were usually low-income families and many were racial rninonties. These families typically lost their homes and were placed in rental units in public housing. Halifax posed no exception to this pattern; during the 50s and 60s tour major housing projects were built and several urban planning and housing development studies completed.

Urban renewal, when closely examined, continued the colonial project of spatial management and containment in important ways. Since it operated under the nibric of liberal ideas about integration, this aspect has often been overlooked. The concerns of urban reformers and social engineers consistently reflect racial marking, although it is sometimes coded in general langage about the poor. These ideas, which were incorporated in government policy, backed an assumed need to better control deviant populations, whose values and behaviours would tamish respectable white urban space. Goldberg has studied slum administration as an extension of the colonialism of earlier periods, positing that spatial technologies have merely chançed, whiIe the effect of containment on racialized populations is simiIar. He defines a shifi in urban planning motives in the West afler World War CI from concems with city beautification to an emphasis on social efficiency, until roughly 1960.

Around this Mie, concerns with efficiency were developed into a more compIex rational system of development and resource management- Weacknowledging that planning 76 ideology did not develop simply in response to the desired control of marginalized socid groups, Goldberg demonstrates the effects of this shift on the racially marked, as well how issues of race have considerably influenced the growth and utilization of such planning initiatives." This has been evidenced in the development of slum administration discussed in the first chapter; here it is more apparent how racial discourse fbnctions within and alongçide planning rhetoric.

In 1956, Professor Gordon Stephenson, of the Town and Regional Planning

Department of the University of Toronto, was commissioned by Halifav City Council, the

Provincial Govemment of Nova Scotia, and the Centrai Mortgase and Housing Corporation. to study housinç conditions in the City of Halifu. His mandate was to susgest which areas required redevelopment. how families occupying these areas should be rehoused, and how the cleared areas would best be used.

While this document did not reach the general public in the same manner, for exarnpte. as a news report. it was widely circulated and is ofien referred to in studies on .cUncville. As will be noted in Part III, Stephenson's brief statement about .4fiicville has become one of the most widely quoted depictions of both the nature of the community and the alIeged inevitability of its destruction. It is also referenced by Dr. .Albert Rose, who was called in severd yem later to review and confirm plans for the forced relocation of Afncville.

Designed for use by al1 three levels of government - municipai, provincial and federal - as weII

88GoIdberg,Racisr Culture, 189-90. 77 as for the general public of Halifax, the report is introduced by the author not as a comprehensive set of plans, but as a vehicle to promote greater understanding of the City's developmental need~.~

Stephenson's A Rrdewlopmeni Stl@ of Halifax of 1957 conveyed gave concems over the management of poor and rninority families. It was carried out shortly derfederal legislation had ben changed to allow greater local tieedorn in city planning. FormerIy, federal hnding for redeveloprnent could only be obtained where land would be used for low-cost housing; under the new policy, land could be funded and redeveloped for its "highest and best use," the determination of which was lefi to municipal authorities. At the same tirne, federai policy on national defence had been expanded, creating a demand for dockyard and harboufiom space, as well as for improved railway facilities to and from these site^.^ The city was spending increasing time and hnding on welfare, health and safety concerns in slum areas close to the downtown core, and econornic conditions and rapid growth demanded serious reconsideration of housing patterns." These factors appear to have lefl the municipality in a good position to centraiize businesses, justiQ industrial expansion and rernove neighbourhoods deemed undesirable. Taking stock of what the city had been meant considering what it wanted to be, and shaping this foresight according to current and desired

89GordonStephenson, A Redwelopmerit Strrdy of Halifax, Nova Scotia (Ha1ifia.x Corporation of the City of Haiiiax, Nova Scotia, 1957) viii. vaiues. Reading the report, one can begin to surmise where minority populations were assumed to fit in the modem scheme of development.

What is interesting in Stephenson's account is not so much that the housing conditions he cites are surprising or new, but the way in which mord concems are transparently comected with race and class regulation through narratives of slum-living and poverty. For exarnple, children living in poor conditions are assumed to receive little discipline, a fact attributed to "'bad parents' and 'bad' children, with a generai background of poor living and broken homes." Stephenson continues, "Ail over the City, children gradually have to leam to distinguish between right and wong. The tendency to ignore the rules of society is ever pre~ent."~'On contrast, the author claims that in wealthier neighbourhoods it is usually sufficient just to 'warn parents' of a disciplinary problem, which they are then capable of resolving on their o~n.~~Specific middle class standards of family, respectability and moraiity are firrnly in place, making it easy to see how the benefit of the doubt wouid be afforded the parenting skills of more privileged goups.

Susan Houston has traced the roots of such discourses about juvenile delinquency in nineteenth-century Canada, exarnining their dependency on race and social class status. One cornmentator expressed a popular view, stating that a great number of lower-class children in

931bid., 38-40. Note that he cites no studies or statistics on these presumptions; these parts of the report read like an informal, speculative conversation. AIso see Larry Bennett and Adolph Reed Jr., The New Face of Urban Renewai: The Near North Redevelopment Initiative and the Cabrini-Green Neighborhood," in Without Jlrstice for AII, ed. Adolph Reed Jr- (Boulder. Westview Press, 1999), for a discussion of cornmon theories about social pathology, including the alieged irresponsibility of parents in the ghetto. 79

Canada were growing up '%thout receiving any education or training to fit them to act their part in life as honest and usefirl ~itizens."~Centrai topics of debate of the day became the management of delinquent or "incom~bleyTchildren and the establishment of reform schools and agencies to conduct the sociaiizing work which parents of the lower-classes were seen to

neglect. One address. corn a 1903 conference on "chm-ties and correction", States, "The

children of the nch make mistakes and often transgress the law, but there is always sufficient

influence at hand to Save them fiom the error of their way, while the children of the poor have

but few fiends to take their part, otherwise they, like the others, might live down their wons-

doing and with names untamished attain to positions of usetUlness and h~nor."'~

In Stephenson's report, poor children are said to "roam the streets" and get into more

trouble. It is not considered that wealthier neighbourhoods are capable of providing a veneer

of respectability, and of protecting their privacy, while poor and racialized children are both

more publicly visible and more suspect in the eyes of the law. The report links the moral

character of residents directly to their poverty as the filthy conditions in which they live are

assumed to create inferior behaviour and an unsuitable home environment. The consequences

of deficient child-rearing are discussed as costly to the state, which rnust deal with removing

them fiom their homes and supporting them through social welfare agencies.

A Meredith, "Annuai Report of the Board of lnspectors of Asylums, Prisons, etc. Province of Canada, Sessional Papen, No. 19 (1862)." in Susan Houston, ed., Fmiiy, School and Society m Nineteenth Centrrry Cmda (Toronto: Odord University Press, 1975) 27 1.

9'J.I. KeIso, 'Reforming Delinquent Children' in Susan Houston, School and Society, 290. 80

Stephenson himself admits that many of his moral judgements are the products of speculation, not research. For instance. reflecting on the relationship between poor living conditions and the cost of policing the city, he States "It is not possible to make an evaluation without more evidence... tt is, however. reasonable to surmise that there is a direct. if cornpticated, reIationship."% He goes on to make hrther speculative evduations. In addition to the above disciplinary problems, he writes that in slum areas the men tend to stay away from the home, and the women -get into squabbles with neighbours." Discussing the criminal elernent, he supposes that '*overcrowdingand shockingly bad sanitary conditions must produce ~trife."~'Somehow, disturbances and assaults are linked cognitively to shed conditions of filth, while a strict definition of proper Family Iife is put fonh, centred around '-a man, his wife and their ~hildren''~~who couid not possibIy live in "harmony7 while poor.

Stephenson concludes that "the cIearance of the worst housing should reduce the work and the costs of the poke force-.w

While these assenions are not e'cplicitIy connected to race, they comprise common narratives of the radslum, and the report makes dear a concem with minority populations in particuIar. The 'squabbhg women' bring to mind stereotypes of dornineenng black women who drive their husbands away, creatins the problematic single-mother households so commonly criticized in this era.lw Discussion of the discipline of children and their state- sponsored removal fiom their homes extends narratives of dependency beyond economic poverty, to suggest that the poor are incapable of taking care of their families in moral terms as ~ell.'~'

In keeping with the nature of the study and the character of racism at the tirne.'"' social problems are not blamed overtly on the class or race origins of the residents, but on the conditions in which they live. Using only one reference, to a professor whose work itself is not identified. Stephenson declares that "Juvenile delinquency is a siçn of mental il1 heaith.''IU

The psychology professor he quotes, Sir CyriI Burt, refers to delinquent children as 'patients'.

He argues that psychologists and social workers consistently find the moral and emotional character of a child's home, much more than socio-economic circumstances, to be central in creating delinquent behaviour. The result of these assenions is something of a medical mode1 of crime and delinquency which is removed frorn its social cause and contea.

lWSeeDaniel Patrick Moynihan, The Moyliihmi Report: Thr Cme for Nmiorrrrl Actiutz eds. Lee Rainwater & William L. Yancey (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1967), for an influen~al analyses which attributes the problems of 'the black family' largely to absent male household heads and dominant single mothers. This wilI be discussed in more detail shortly.

'"See C. R Brookbank, "Mo-Canadian Communities in Halifax County, Nova Scotia: A Preliminary Sociolo@cal Survey" (masters thesis, University of Toronto, 1949)? for speculation on the morality of black communities and the removal of children Iiom homes.

'02See Stein, "Diehard Racixn," 26, for discussion of the more covert racism emerging in the period, whereby white citizens perceive themselves to be non-racist and will not explicitly admit racist attitudes. This is also discussed in the following section (Part 11).

'03Stephenson, Redevefopment Sfidj, 3 S. 82

Stephenson's study presents a good exarnple of how conditions and resulting social ills are attached to the bodies of the poor and racialized in dominant discourses, even where the city is allegedly held responsible. By concentrating on housing alone, the report bypasses the systemic causes of the housing problem, such as poverty and racism, and, like reformers in

AFncvilIe, then assumes it can be cleaned up through the treatment of individuai cases and

through physical removal. This scheme treats the result, not the problem, and does so with

only superficial acknowledgrnents of accountability.

Human bookkeeping

In the text of the Halifâu Region Housing Survey,'@' canied out from 1960 to 1963,

the author strongly criticizes the lack of legal enforcement of building codes and housing

standards. Urging the imposition of harsher restrictions and the removal of 'blighted' areas,

author H. S. Coblentz stresses that Halifax can grow no tùrther without careh1 urban

planning. His recommendations include the establishment of a Region or Metropolitan

Government Council to oversee the actions of the three major municipal planning bodies

already at work. The ahof this governing body would be to uni@ housing guidelines to

"harmonize the hture competing demands for land."'05 Due to a marked increase in

population since the early decades of the century and the limited potential for outward

'@%.S. Coblentz, Hniifmr Regio!i Koiising Sitmry (Halifau: Dalhousie Institute of Public Miirs, 1962). 83 expansion due to the city's location on a peninsula, the need to examine the requirements of various groups could hardly be disputed.

The standards the study took as its yardstick were particular and stringent, concerned with health and safety, the condition of facilities, building quality, lot sizes and square footage per resident.lo6 A detailed systern of grading was applied, and it was found that housing conditions had greatly improved over the past decade in the city as a whole. This yardstick revealed, however, drastically substandard conditions in the residences of many low-incorne and black families, exposing the degree to which these groups had long been overlooked.

The report is not limited to slum areas but takes detailed inventory of the city at large, making recommendations for 'neighbourhood beautification' in some areas, through tax incentives for residents to improve the outsides of their homes.107It also recornmends a certain number of playgrounds and recreation areas per neighbourhood, including low-income areas. At the same time, it is obviously of greaten concern that slum areas be reconditioned where possible and demolished where conditions are past the point of rehabilitation. As sorne slum areas have already been targets of clearance, the relocation of displaced residents is discussed in some detail. Coblentz notes that some areas demolished, particularly in the downtown sector, have not been refurbished with new housing, but slated for business and 84 commercial development, inchding parkine lots. Residents had been placed in the new public housing projects - a recent and ~owingdevelopment in Hahfzc~.'~~

The report is not unsympathetic to the situation of these populations. It is highiy critical of the haphmrd, case-by-case manner in which housing had been structured up to this point. kt recommends keeping neighbourhoods together where possible, and cautions that residents should be followed-up closely before and dertheir moves to document any adjustment probIems. The author acknowledges the possibility of increased monetary demands being placed on the reiocatee, and wms, "to require the consumer to buy more housing or reiated facilities than he wants is both an intnngement of his liberty and a mal- ailocation of reso~rces."'~He also notes ihat minority populations will face special dificulties if displaced from their homes, which can be seen as an acknowledgement that racial integation would not result from a simple redistniution of bodies throu$out the area.

At the same time, aspects of this repon suggest how one niight question the 'good intentions' of planners aiming to improve quality of life for dl. While it is noted that minorities !%ce difficulties, there is no detail of what these difficulties are, and they are cited as being of particular concern because of the cost they might pose to the city itself, and due to the effect they have on other neighborhoods where residents might end p.^''' (This effect is not spelied out in specific tems). Concern is stated that organizations like the proposed

"fiid., 20. Four hundred si?-fourpublic housing units were constructed between 1959 and 1962 for the purposes of rehousing displaced fdes. 85

Metropolitan Government Council fiequently face problems when 'minority' interests prevent progress iiom being made on "controversial issues."LL'It is stated elsewhere that some replations are intended to keep "undesirable" people out ofneighbourhoods, yet no further definition is offered of this term."' No matter the level of empathy expressed for the problems of substandard housing, the report maintains solutions in line with those already being carried out, offering public housing as the single solution to the problems of the poor. It is interesting that whiIe ta. incentives are discussed for some neighbourhoods to encourage beautification, people in Africville had been petitioning for years for methods to improve their homes, both through better city services and personal labour, with no mention of ta. breaks.

Whiie other areas are encouraged, Afncville is denied, and the very conditions at issue cited as the reason for its necessary displacement.

An interesting term chat arises at various points in this report is -'human bookkeeping."

This is explained as the maintenance of detailed records of human movement and living patterns around the city. in response to the current lack of such documentation. However, the author recommends it specifically to track lower income and racial minority groups as to what occurs when they move fiom one area to another - for instance, to see that another slum area does not develop. Coblentz later notes that Haiifau particularly comrnanded these statistics

"since the region has the highest percentage of negroes in Ca~~ada.""~While it is not 86 explained why the black population requires this extra documentation, one rnight think it is attributable to poverty and the desire to cornprehend conditions. The report does recommend financing hrther study of the situation of blacks aRer relocation, in conjunction with cornmunity services. However, no suggestion is made for preventive programs, nor of community involvement in the planning process, nor the irnplernentation of specific programs to promote employment or education. hstead of surveying the conirnunity as to its current needs and desires, a fiinher 'study' following displacement suggests a 'watchdog' approach rather than concem with the improvement of living conditions.

There is a clear awareness in this report that large numbers of black people have been and will be displaced over the next Few years. Plans to move Aficville are specifically mentioned in this regard"'; however, their own "kture demands for land" are left at a point far from harmony with the City's. It is noted that greater caution is required in relocation processes; however, no tangible strategies are put forth. This, dong with the overwhelming lack of organization in ~cville'sdestruction, to be esplored in the next chapter, attests to the overt emphasis on surveillance and regdation over any progressive strategy.

The administration of values

In cntiquing these studies 1 am not suggesting that some form of planning or organization within communities is itself unnecessary, nor that changes in the living conditions of the poor are unimportant. Rather, the way in which raciaiiied spaces and residents are

""Specific reasons cited for displacement are land clearance, urban renewai, residentiai conversion to business use, highway development and housing code reinforcement. depicted reflects a 'top-dom' view of helpless people incapable of any input into their own de~tinies."~To examine the kinds of information produced and circulated about these populations is, in some ways, a fascinating throwback to the nineteenth century slum reformers discussed earlier. In both cases, these depictions lead to assumptions that the populations under scrutiny must be tightly controlled.

Representations of blacks which were circulated at this time led to other projects which compounded the spread of racial knowledse. The Housing Survey resulted in a course being offered at Dalhousie University to educate students as to the '~aluesinherent in community revision of maps and preparation of reports were undertaken and medical and law students were supplied with the new information to aid in their rotations through the community. The Stephenson report, too, is ofien cited in materials about

.4fiicville both from the 'relocation' period and recently. to justiQ the decisions made. This is to say that the knowledge produced about poor and racialized communities for the use of more privileged members ofsociety reaches a broad public audience. As well as directly influencing govemment policy, it is picked up in influentid professions such as education, law and medicine, and is conveyed widely in news reports. Statements such as "no objection can

'15~tthe same time, the inclusion of residents in planning processes does not necessarily constitute a better system. For discussion of alternative modes of planning involving citizen participation, see Barbara Cruikshank, 171e WiiI to Empowec ciemocraric ciri:era anci orher mbjects (Ithaca: ComelI University Press, 1999). She discusses how 'self- help' progams which involve the poor have ofien represented the desire of the weaIthy to 'do good', and have often become coercive means of studying the poor with a view to managing diierence. 88 be made to çuch standard^...""^ construct a set of cornmonsense beliefs (after dl, who could deny that the implied heaith and safety improvements are important?). While the value of biight removal, for example, may seem indisputable to lawyers, doctors and town officiais fiom rnostly white middle class homes and neighbourhoods, the multiple problems created for those who live in 'blight' are erased. The values inherent in comrnunity planning comprise knowledge about racial groups and racialized spaces which are presented as universally shared vaiues, whiie those in positions to influence outcomes are overwhelmingly tiorn groups to whom these values will seem normal and good. At the same tirne, these presumptions require interwoven racist and class-specific discourses in order to make sense. It becomes natural for middle class whites planning "tiom above" that blacks are more likely to have problems controlling th& children, or that poor people are more Iikely to get into fights. And there appears to be ample evidence to support these beliefs, because the slum does see more obvious strife. and that strife is reported in panicularly visible ways. So, despite the speculative nature of Stephenson's judgements, they appeal to the white majority's common sense.

"Embourgeoisement," a term used by Clainnont and Magill in the AfXcvilIe Relocation

Report. refers to the enforcement of middle-class noms in family and living arrangements, which were imposed on communities such as Africville as assumed improvements. The term captures the imposition of material and moral standards on those who cannot af-ford them and whose quaiity oflife may be better served through various other models. For instance, values

"71ùid., 6. These are the standards referred to earlier which included the barring of "undesirabIe persons" fiom neighbourhoods. 89 such as privacy and personai space are implied in the reports as obvious, universal noms and as necessary quaiities of a 'normal' heaithy lifestyle. The fact that poor communities may benefit ffom the closer sharing of resources and skiIIs, which is not necessary in more privileged groups, is absent tiom consideration. It has often been noted, for instance, that

Africville's sense of community came in part from the extended family networks that developed over the years through sharing of living space, handing down of properties, and the cooperation required to suMve with few financiai resources. Older people tended to be cared for at home, and children tended to find food and shelter in the houses ofvarious friends, which would be reciprocated in their own. In urban planning models, extended families living in shared spaces are considered evidence of a community's degeneracy. In the 1950s and 60s. and ofien still, heterosewal marriage and the patriarchai nuclear tàmily form the ideal type of

heaithy household. While "unhealthy" models rnay no Longer be explicitly blamed on essential

racial characteristics, it is assumed that under ided conditions, no one would choose such

ways of life.

"Educability"

in 1962, the Dalhousie Institute of Public Affairs, which supported the Stephenson

report, also produced a study entitled "The Condition of the Negroes of Halifax City, Nova

S~otia.""~This report was concerned Ui part with the correct enumeration of the black

population, which was found to number about 1600, having been comrnonly underestimated at

"*Institute of Public Atfairs, Dainousie University, The Cotrdition of the Negrws of Halijax C@ Nova Scotia (Halifax: Mtute of Public Mairs, Dalhousie University, 1962). 90

900."' It deals with the two main geographic areas where blacks reside - AfiicviIIe and the

"mid-city" - documenting in great detail the kinds of housing, living conditions, income, household structure, employment, education and childbearing patterns shared by most blacks in Halifax. The text reports that large farnilies are common in both city and Afiicville populations, that unemployment is significantly higher than the provincial average (which is significantly higher than the national average), and that incomes are substantially lower, rarely above the poverty level. AFricville blacks are reponed to have more dficulties in finding work than the average black city-dweller.

Reference is made to the Stephenson report's finding on housing conditions, and it is concluded that over half of the black population lacks batfüng facilities, while about three quarters have no hot water. While many city people own their own homes, the report States, most of these require major repair, and although renters pay low amounts, they still receive

Iess space and quality for their money than those in other parts of the city."" In this period teading up to AFncville's destruction, blacks in other parts of the city had already been relocated to housing projects, ofien to condemned areas siated for dernolition thernselves, and some families were forced to double-up to meet their housing needs.'" Still, it was found that many blacks in the city reponed enjoyment of their neighbourhoods due to family and fiendship networks, proximity of work and facilities, and the general farniliarity of the area 9 1

In Afiicville, too, most families owned their own homes and reported preference for their area due to the fiesh air. the view, the open space and the sense of community.'"

WhiIe the authors of this report exhibit some awareness of the problems of data collection, they propagate some racial narratives common to the other reports and to general racist beliefs. For instance, even though some discrimination in ernployment is acknowledged, the authors speculate that blacks may perceive discrimination where it does not e~ist? While wrongtùl perception on a case-by-case basis is always possible, perception does not develop in a vacuum, but fiom a society which gives reason for such fears and a history in which they have often been found valid- At another point, the report cites "unrnamed mothers who keep their babies and work only sporadically" as an exarnple of the socio-economic problems

"associated at least partly with race."'" How these choices and employment patterns relate to race, particularly in a society where many mothers do not work outside the home at dl, is not clear.

Perhaps the most problematic area of research here concerns what the report terms the

"educability" of blacks. "Educability" itself implies that the centrai question is whether or not, and to what degree, blacks can be educated in the first place. While some attention is given to overali employrnent prospects and the pressure from peers dropping out of school, focus is 92 aIso placed on the lack of "normal fady pattern^."'^ While they conclude that biological race does not seem to influence intelligen~e,''~the researchers ernphasize class differences as indicative of the reai gaps in educational attainment, subsuming race under class.'" The report did find that differences between whites and blacks in achievement scores are smaller within the sarne socio-economic bracket. SM, the fact that a much greater proportion of blacks fail into this çroup escapes attention. Rather than examining how race and class tùnction toçether, the researchers attempt to distinguish the "independent" effects of race, without success; when they find it impossible to separate, they attnbute this to the relative unimportance of race. The report concludes that without outside assistance, black children, like poor whites, will be destined to repeat the "limitations and disabilities" of their parents."'

It ends with a waming that unskilIed intervention may be met with "hostility" rather than bLgratitude.''13

Like the other reports that i discuss, this study had fa-reaching influence as well, constituting a key educational tool for several years. Many professors From various disciplines were acknowledged for their assistance or comments, and eight masers theses were produced

'"Ibid., 19.

"6The authors never rule-out the possibility that it may. In contrast to this doubt, a '-Teach-In Report on the Black Man in Nova Scotia," a few years later, cites various studies canied out dunng the '60s and earlier which concIusively dismiss biological inferiority.

'"lnstitute of Public AEairs, Negroes of Halijiw, 20.

'"Ibid., 2 1. 93 by social work students who conducted research for the main project and then wrote about their findings. Clearly, the black population was a popular object of observation and survey by white institutions and individuals at this tirne. While these studies provide some important data, they must be viewed in the context of an era of urban renewal during which white officiais and experts commonly determined the destiny of black and poor communities.

Further, they were camed out at a time characterized by ambivalence toward integration, when maintenance of the distance between groups was complicated by shifts in spatial management.

An article about interracial marriage appearing in the Halifax in 1966 confirms a sense that integration is an issue receivins senous attention dunng this period, no matter how one sides politicaily. In this report, various white ministers €rom around the province are interviewed as to their own and the church's views on the subject. While a few state a polite tolerance, repudiating the un-Christian value of discrimination, most have reservations, and a few blatantly oppose it - also citing the Bibk as a morar guide which denounces the mixing of the races. Concem is expressed for the children of mixed race parents. who are assumed to be placed under "strain." The middle gound suggests that such unions not be encouraged, but supported when they do occur. The generai consensus put forth is that interracial maniage, if it is to happen, should corne about naturalIy and not be "forced." This seems an odd conclusion considering the absurdity, and the paucity of evidence, of such marriages being

"force$ on anyone; much to the contrary, it is ckar fiom the article that mere tolerance is at

LM"~nterracialmarriages: accept, but don? encourage - churchrnen," Halifax Mail Star, 27 June, 1966. issue."' Perhaps the sentiment simply coheres with fears of the unsetding dissolution of distinct boundaries between white and black taking place at the time.

A distinct society?

Published in 1973, Frances Henry's book Forgorrerl Cmrarl'iasrs'" documents her study of Nova Scotian blacks over the last years of the 1960s. The author, a white academic, situates her study as an investigation of the 'values' of the black cornmunity, the purpose of which is to detemine if there is a distinct black subculture, different from mainstream white culture. Henry situates her mdy within a body of work stemming from Oscar Lewis' well- known theory of a self-perpetuatinç "culture of poverty" among the p~or.'~~Henry engages in a prevalent, ongoing discourse, popular in social science at this time, around the origins of the values of poor and racial minority groups. She discusses theorists such as Hyman Rodman who subscribe to the 'Value Stretch' view.IY This theory suggests that lower-class groups

13'In an interview. a white iUncville man told Clairrnont that he lived in tUncviIle because of his interracial maMage, which precluded living easily or comfortably elsewhere in the city. Donald H. Clairrnont aL Demis William Magill, A.icvil[e: the lijk atld death of a Canadian black commtriiiy. Y' ed. (Toronto: Canadian Scholars' Press, 1999) 60.

13'Frances Henry, Forgotterr Canadiam: The Blacks of Nova Scotia. @on Mills: Longan, 1973).

'330scarLewis, La PÏdn: a Piferto Rican farniiy in the crdtrfi-eof poverry - San hart and New York (New York: Random House, 1966). Lewis was noted for various studies of Mexican families, for example, The chrldrei~of Sanchez; mtobiography of a Mexicun fmiiy. (New York, Vintage Books, 196 1), Five familicis; Itlexican cnsr stiidies in the crrltrrtr of povery (New York: Basic Books, 1959).

LuKymanRodrnan, "The Lower Class Values Stretch" Social Forces 42 ( 1963); See also Hyman Rodrnan, Lmfer-dassfamilies :the ctrlt~ireof poveny in Negro Trinidad (New 95 adopt the values of the middle class but, since these values are often unattainable, adjust their tolerance level to accept circumstances and behaviours which may be incompatible with dominant value systems. Such adaptable behaviour is eqlained, by some theorists, as a way of preventing the potentiai hstration caused by social and econornic obstacles; that is, because the goals of the middle ciass are unattainable, biacks adjust their values to make their inferior goods and circumstances feel more acceptable. On the other hand, Henry identifies theorists who have adopted a 'situational' explmation in their work with the p00r.'~' This expianation pays less attention to values and sees behavioural pattems as originatinç From the social constraints faced by the goup. Henry identifies her approach as a combined situational-value-stretch mode1 resuiting From these two senerd anaiytical positions.

Through participatory research, living in severai different communities for months at a time, and havins graduate students interview the black population, Henry concludes that Nova

Scotian black culture has no distinct content. having simply grown fiom the values and beliefs of white society. Deviance fiom white, middle-class values, however. is practiced and accepted. She attributes this to the necessity of adaptation in order to reduce hstration. while noting that the inability to achieve dominant noms stems fiom structura1 pattems of racism. She takes the United States bIack cornmunities as sites of comparison and attributes

York : Odord University Press, 1971).

135CharIesA Vaientine, Ctrlmre and Poverty (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1968); See also Herbert Gans, "CuIrure and Class in the Study of Poverty: An Approach to Anti-Poverty Research," in Ott üirderstmdittg Poverty, Perspecrivesfim Social Scierrces, ed. Daniel P. Moynihan (New York: Basic Books, 1969). 96 an deged lack of cohesiveness in Nova Scotia to the absence of historical plantation slave culture, which forced Amencan blacks to unite and develop separate subculturai traditions.

Henry purports to be a voice for her research subjects, bringing attention to their plight as a poverty-stricken minority. Claiming an objective approach, the study aims to dispel myths and to raise awareness. it does dispute some negative stereotypes, reporting, for example, chat the black populations studied exhibited no more illegai behaviour or

"ilIegitimaten births than the population at large.136However, other racial discourses are created or upheld.

The methodology used to determine similarities in values is problematic in several ways. First, the study makes various assertions which are not viewed in comparison with any other groups, nor with the white society in Nova Scotia. For instance, Henry writes that blacks are highly critical of anyone among them who strives for upward mobility, engaginç in putdowns which she calls "leveling." This strategy is designed to keep the offending individuai in his or her 'place' and to jeaiously discouraçe anyone Fiom 'moving ~p'."~

Henry also writes that blacks engage in a great deal of go~sip,'~~that young men otten brag about their semai exploits and that the people taik about sex Fieq~ently,'~~that the

137tbid.,157-58. See Donaid H. Clairmont & Dennis W. Magill, Novcï Scoriar~Biacks, which addresses this cornmon stereotype of blacks and refùtes it with regard to the Nova Scotian community they study.

138Henry, Forgotten Candians, 553. 97 population is comprised of heavy drinkers and that many people believe in wit~hcrafl."'~Since the study has identified a central goal as the dissipation of myths and the accurate reponing of objective data, and since some stereotypes have already been thwarted, these assenions are lent an air of credibiiity. Even where Henry is subvening stereotypes, at times she presents values in a patronking manner which suggests surprise, for example, that people think critically, understand provincial and federal politics and have opinions about them.I4'

Cmportantly, the author utilizes highly arbitrary tools of measurement, such as a "race relations scale" and a series of "vaIues picnires," tiom which to draw her conclusions. For instance, interviewees are shown a picture of a younger and an older man who appear to be having an argument. When the majority suçgest that this is a fatherison argument. Henry concludes that this is evidence of a large amount of fatherison conflict in the community, even though there is no point of cornparison with other communities."' When asked to choose a pretèrred picture fiom two. one with a family in which two men are arguing, and one with a farnily calmiy watchins television together, interviewees chose the second. This was seen as evidence that they preferred a "happy, contented and quiet home."t43 Besides failin9 to indicate how these values differ fiom those of the rest of the population, these simplistic tests

'%id., 36.

'"fiid., 99-100.

'"fiid., 11 1.

143 ibid., 112. 98 struck me as tools with which a child psychologist might approach very young children who have difficulty expressing themselves.

The overall impact of the researchers' own positions is not cntically considered, except in explaining that black graduate students were sent to help with interviews. This is seen to prornote the comfort level of respondents, but it is never acknowledged that these students are still educated strangers, ffom Toronto, occupying decidedly privileged positions compared with poor rural and urban-tnnge black Nova Scotians. The responses fiom inte~ewsare taken strictly at face value without regard for how people might shape their answers according to the perceived positions of the researchers.

The study's mode1 of questioning, too, is decidedly brash, asking, for instance, if residents consider thernselves to be poor, as weIl as if others consider them poor. There appears to be no sense arnong researchers that such questions rnight be considered personal or embarrassing. or to elicit responses that make the subject appear and feel more 'respectable'.

[nstead, interviewees are said to have responded with "hostility." Similarly, sorne questions demand whether residents consider thernsehes to be"as good as whites," asking them to rate a senes of comparative statements as tme or faIse. When the majonty report that they are indeed as intelligent and capable as whites, Henry concludes that their degree of self-hatred is low. Such surface-value readings overlook the paintiilness and unconscious or semi- conscious nature of intemalized racism, chiseling dom a cornplex history of oppression to a few presumptuous values, determined by a white outsider. Sirnilar questioning is applied to the issue of black attitudes toward whites. When the vast majority claim, on surveys, to have 99 linle problem with whites, it is contended that blacks fail to see the racism around them and simpIy accept their inferior positions as a natural part of life.'U

Perhaps rnost problematic is this study's sweeping conclusion that Nova Scotian blacks have no cultural tradition of their own. This assumes a one-way transfer of values, igoring that black culture may have influenced white society, and it never leaves the parametres of white rniddle-class culture as a defining frarnework. This is particularly potent when Henry discusses "deviant behaviour," assumed to be any behaviour contrary to white middle-class values. This is explained through the 'value stretch' theory, as an adaptive

strategy designed to accommodate the gap benveen aspirations and opportunitie~.~~~Again,

the order of value adjustrnent is predetermined with middle-class standards as the yardstick; blacks do not, perhaps, have different values which they have cultivated thernselves, or a more

complex negotiation of noms.

Having developed "no ultimate value systern with which to guide their live~,"'~and

lacking "a clear-cut black identity,"'" black Nova Scotians, Henry posits, forego the political

awareness of their U.S. counterparts. With the questionable measuring tools used here and

the decided lack of critical reflection on her methods, she leaves them in a role devoid of

agency- The study ends by reporting, ironically, that black communities are often suspicious

"%id., 133. For instance, a survey testing these attitudes asks whether "coloured people should hate al1 white people." 1O0 of outsiders due to the negative publicity they have received by researchers in the past, or to the Iack of social change instigated by researchers who corne in, collect information and never contact them again. Henry States that questions about the usetiilness of her own research were ofien raised by participants,'" which suggests to me thar these much-studied communities were growing weary of their objectified roIe. tn keeping with these concerns, the intended vaIue of her research is indeed unclear. What is the purpose of determining whether or not blacks have a 'distinct identity'? Who wants to know? What ends will this knowkdge, tme or false, serve?

In spite of Henry's disregard for a separate black culture, she does travel to a separate space. speaking of its inhabitants in terms of "us and them," consciously or not. It is clear that even without their estabrished traditions, in her mind, these people are not the same as whites, and very distinct narratives of blackness and black space emerge. SimiIar to other studies, this work emphasizes Iack of awareness and self-determination, dependency and a child-Iike character, whkh suggests chat the simple adoption of simiIar ways of life does not make people equal.

Welcome to the jungle

Similar qualities can be found in a smdIer-xaie story, which appeared in the Iate

1950s in the popular Canadian news magazine, Maclemi kL4'However, Edna Staebler, who

'"gEdna StaebIer, "Wouid you change the lives of these peopIe?," htaclean '.Y, 12 May, 1956, 30. spent about a week studying the inhabitants ofNew Road settlement, wrote in more blatantly racist temis of their situation. While this study was not of the magnitude of a book, it would have reached a much wider body of citizens through Canada's most erninent news magazine.

While planning reports and academic studies target specific audiences in their disciplines and in govement, I found that national magazines and news articles often echoed similar values and grew Rom similar epistemological assumptions. For instance, the author of this article begins from a premise that sornething must be done to and for the blark comrnunity she studies Rom 'outside'. The spatial boundaries between races and socio-economic classes are clearly represented, and her journey to an Other space very rneaninghl.

The article begins by foregrounding rurnours the author has heard about New Road, ii community of black people living outside Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, in the Preston area.l5'

These are feu-inducing tales of vioience, including women fighting with one another, of cults beçun by superstitious residents, and of police and city workers' fears of going in. Described as "the most depressed area in Canada"'" where "no one çoes," New Road's attraction for

Staebler grows with each new mmour she hem. Soon she can "hardly wait to get out there, no matter how dangerous or dirty it mi@ be." StaebIer describes the joumey into a strange and exotic place "almost as obscure and sinister as a village in an .Jfnca.n jungle," adding later her discovery of 'ijungle paths linered with excrernent." She reports in close detail the

'S?reston is one of the main, original areas where black Loyalists and those fiom the War of 18 12 were allotted land.

'"It is interesthg to note that many studies descnied their principal sites as 'the most depressed.' It was fiequentiy said of ficdle, and also by Frances Henry of the viiiages she visited. 102 characteristics of every body she encounten. First is a "very dark man," soon foliowed by a

"dark brown young wornan" and some "ebony black boys." Her subjects range in colour

"From jet black to light brown with geen eyes," and she details plaited hair, wom-out clothes and manners both good and bad.

Although she is asked by residents not to take inventory in their community, Staebler perseveres, keenly intent on taking information back to the outside world. She visits family after farnily, describing the state of houses, particularly any bad smells or signs ofdirt, and depicts few residents without raciaily-explicit adjectives. One wornan is a "broad negro mammy" while a young girl is a "splendid young creature." She notes that someone has children out of wedlock and mentions the backwards lettering on gravestones in the village's cemetery. When residents request that she not photoçraph them, she ignores them, citing their superstitious fears of the camera and noting the "suspicious hostility in their black eyes."'5%er facing, such anger, she wanders about alone for awhile, "meditatinç on the bittemess of discrimination." She tells a brief history of blacks in the region, positing that their current poverty and "helplessness" stems from their inability to adapt to a new culture derhaving become "accustomed to the lash and the plantation system." In addition to closely resembling the comments of Govemor Dalhousie a century earlier,Is3this is particularly far-fetched considering that a plantation economy never existed in Nova Scotia, and these residents are rnuch too young to have been slaves themselves. It seems to suggest

'"lt is never validated that residents acnially have fears of being photographed for LL~~perstiti~~~nreasons.

InSee note II; Clairmont & Magiii, Jhova Scotimi Blacks, 30 103 that a sort of 'slave mentaiity' is passed down geneticaily, not to mention the onus placed on the cornmunity itself to adapt to the poverty and racism imposed on it by others.

Another offensive aspect of the article is Staebier's appropriation of residents' voices.

Attemptinç to report their comrnents in their exact words, she transcnbes black vernacular phoneticaily, using her own gratuicous interpretations of accents and sounds and spellinç words differently in their voices even where it would not noticeably change the so~nd.'~It results in a linguistic caricature which represents the speakers as primitive imbe~iles.~~~AS if to solidi@ the community's responsibility for its own plight, she ends with quotations from a black man who compliments whites and asserts that the cornmunity suffers no racism.

However, Staebler herself remains a victim in the last line as a group of angry children again rehse to be photographed, shouting wamin_es and threats as she leaves.

Perhaps most interesting about this work, for the purpose of an analysis informed by space theory, is the author's consistent emphasis on her own bravery and daring in visiting this dark, other place. The politics of 'looking' and their concomitant power relations have been examined in Chapter I through such figures as KathIeen Kirby's "cartesian subject", Mary

Louise Pratt's "seeing man", and the uhan reformers of Stallybrass and White's work. E.

Ann Kaplan, too, describes the "imperiai gazen of white travelers in her discussion of cross-

"'For example, tvhen a black child asks her not to take pictures, she spells it "pitchers" in the quote, as if imagining he could not possibly know the correct word.

"'While a black Nova Scotian vernanilar does exist, there are also Linguistic particularities to white English speech in the region which distinguish it fiom those in other parts of Canada, Undoubtedly these speech patterns have influenced one another. cultural film viewership.'" While attemptinç to delineate the lessons and the problematics of such a gaze, she examines the position of white Western critics who either impose their culturaily-infonned views on the object of their gaze, or, aitemately, believe they have grasped, and can then relay 'the Other's' point of view."'

Staebler's work is rneant to engage the white middle-class reader who is seen to exemplify the average Canadian, and to bring the shocking reality of this slice of 'degenerate

Afiica' within white, Western civilization, into the mind and home of this subject. She has taken a daring risk in order to supply this information about a dangerous other world. As a woman, her bravery may be doubly remarkable, as these activities have principaily been enacted by white men.'" She mentions entering the community despite warninçs, going back

&er a less than welcorning reception by some residents, returning day after day, and persisting in her questioning and photography asainst the people's will. The reader is asked to

'"E. hnKaplan, Looking for the Other: Femiriism, Film, ard the Imperiai Gaze (New York: Routledge, 1997).

"'For an excellent analysis of how blacks in North America esperience and reciprocate the white gaze, see bel1 hooks, "Representations of Whiteness in the Black Imagination" in Black Looks; see aiso Frantz Fanon, Biack Ski)?, tyhite M.sh (New York: Grove Press, 1967) (trans. Charles Lam Markamann), and Sherene H. Razack, Lookhg Khite People iri the Eye (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1998), which discusses the politics of the gaze in a variety of contexts, not only between blacks and whites.

"'Many feminist scholars have andyzed colonial travel accounts of white women who asserted their independence and Iiberation fiom white patriarchy in relation to the bodies and spaces of people of coIour. See E. An.Kaplan, Lookingfor the Other.; Inderpal Grewai, "Empire and Women's Suffrage" in Home mtd Harem.; Antoinette Burton, "TheWhite Woman's Burden, in Wesfenr Womert and Imperiah, eds. Nupur Choudhury and Margaret Strobel (Bloornington: Indiana University Press, 1992) 137- 157 .; Dea Birkett, Spirisrers Abroad (London: Basil BIackwelI, 1989). 105 admire her efforts, to empathize over her encounter with such hostiiity. Care is taken throughout to cl@ that the "colony" is the space of the racial Other, exotic, opposite, wild and dangerous. Because of her daring adventure, the rest of society can share in this inside information which does not seem to have any purpose beyond voyeurism, but in fact accomplishes a widely-spread pedagogy of racialized spatiai separateness and helps to solidify dominant understandings of power. Staebler emerges (though just barely) safe and mastefil.

Wild and Unruly

While the studies ofacademics, planners and joumalists present several similar angles of mapping the black community in Nova Scotia, a quite different project was initiated at the sarne time. Nevertheless, it arnplified and reinforced some cornrnon racist beliefs about its targeted populace. In the mid 1990s a report was obtained by the Canadian Press documentinç undercover surveillance that had been carried out by the RCMP on the black community of Nova Scotia during the 1960s and 70s.lS9 Charles Saunders, a prominent local historian, writes that police were alarmed over a supposed influx by the Black Panther organization, which might incite rebellion in what they considered the "normaily dociley'black population of Nova Sc~tia.'~~While a few people in Halifax had contact with a few of the

Black Panthers, who had come on one occasion to observe and discuss black activism in

Halifax, there is Iittle evidence that the rnajority of the black community held Links to this

'59AIanJeffers, "BIack activism terrified RCMP," Hulifàr Da+ Nws, 1 1 April, 1994.

160CharIes Saunders, "RCW snooping no surprise," Hal* Da[& News, Sunday, 17 Apd, 1994,73. organization. As both Saunders and Rocky Jones, a black activkt, assert, the movement never gained significant weight in Canada and the population of Halifiw was too small to create enough interest or support for the gaup's radicd views.16*

Even if RCW felt obligated to investigate, their surveillance e'ttended well beyond the boundaries OFan isolated visit by 'foreign agitators'. It was carried out over years, and much data collected had to do more with the character of black communities and families than with any rebeHious activity they might plan. Rocky Jones and his wife Joan Jones, both politicaily active in Halifax, were dosely monitored for eleven years, ducing which time their phone was tapped, they were followed home and their mail was intercepted. They reported fiequently seeing officers on stake-outs in front oftheir house. During this period. their store was ransacked and their home set on fire twice.'6'

Police, through a network of agents and informants, rvent undercover into black nightclubs, attended cornrnunity meetinss and kept a close eye on university campuses, airports and the Canadian border. Other communities, weIl outside Hdifav and apart fiom the scene of aiieged political unrest, were watched closely. A July. 1968 file. about Guysborough blacks, mes. -'ln this particuhr goup, the women tvork steadily to support the farnily, which usually numbers quite a few srnaII children, whiIe the men work Iong enough to rnake money for another liquor binge. The children of these families are iefl to their own resources,

16'Ibid.; Nso see Barry Dorey, "Sorry ain't good enou&' Hniifm Chroriicie Herdd, 21 My, 1994, Al-

'6%arry Dorey, "Sorry"; In this article, the couple wonders if the RCMP were involved in the fies and ransacking; in any case they state that the RCMP turned a blind eye when the incidents occwred. 1O7 becoming wild, umly and ur~clean."'~~It iater continues, "The Negro birthrate is extremely hi$ and the number of individuals striving for education beyond Grade 8 is very low. It is not for the lack of education facilities or poor standards."

Other mes, from 1970 and 1969 respectively, show that the police have been tracking the precise activities of one person "since quitth school," and of two ".4merican negroes" who visit their families in the Preston area each ~ear.'~Files reveal a great deal of fear that influence fi-om U.S. organizations could result in violent rebellion locally, and they follow youths in srnall groups as well as individuals thought to have any radical political sentiments.

For example, an August, 1969 report States: "There are a few colored youths in this area who like to think of themselves as Black Panthers. This group, at the most 10 people, occasionally roll a drunk, etc. I suppose they feel it is more flattering to be referred to as Panthers than as thie~es."'~'They speculate on the character of people beIieved to be potential activists, stating that one is "a heavy drinker with a problemy' and concluding about another: "Aside from (name deleted), (name deleted) seems to be the only enthused new Panther with a marked degree of intelligence. -4lthough the Black Panther movement is gaining ground, their disciples consist mainly of the illiterate, semi-illiterate and h~odlums."'~

'"3Reported in Man Jeffers, "RCW snooped on rights a~tivists,~Haifkr Chronicie Hdd, 1 1 April, 1994, Al.

'@%id.

"%id.

'%id.; many names had been deleted in the files released to the press. 108

Despite the secretive nature of this period of study, the racial knowledge produced and bolstered within it pulls common threads through the different methods of information gathering discussed herein. Discourses of violence, ignorance, docility. filthiness, disorder, laziness and dependency are ever-present, shaped by sexism and middle-class family noms.

The tools of surveillance, while diverse, involveci much crossing of boundaries into racialized spaces, btinging along one's methodological microscope and carryin~back images of a strançe and pathological ~orld.'~'

In 1994 afler the offending files were released, the RCW apologized, under much pressure and through the media aione, to the bIack community. The Nova Scotia legislature publicly denounced the former surveillance practices. However, no apology annuls the tàct that, during the 1960s and 70s. black Iives and spaces were besieged by an intensive and unrelenting white gaze.

Part 11: Talking Back

Precedents of fear

Despite the intensified nature of surveilIance during the 1960s and '70s. commentators and members of the black community who had been targeted fiequently pointed out that

I6'See Gary Kinsman & Patncia Gentile, "III the iiiteresrs of the srate " :the ami-ga): anti-lesbimr iiatiotial sea~rirycampaign in Canada :a prelimriiary research report (Sudbury: Laurentian University, I998), for andysis of sinda.police surveillance of gays and lesbians; also, Lorne and Carolie Brown, Ati rinazrrhon=ed hi sr or)^ of the RChP (Toronto : James Lewis & Samuei, 1973). surprise over its occurrence was unjustified. Reachinç a little tùrther back, Boudreau unearths a history of policing which supports their point. Documenting the treatment of criminality in

Halifav in the earIy twentieth century, he presents the cnrninalization of racial rninority groups as a factor which tùrther entrenched their marginality. Their presence provided the police with a ready pool of scapegoats in an era of social and economic unrest, when concem for rnaintaining social order reached prodigious height~.'~'

While the working class white man was constmcted as a prime suspect, the small black and Chinese populations of the city were recipients of a disproportionate amount of policing, suspicion and violence korn white citizens as well as the RCMP. Boudreau amply dernonstrates the Ionç history and contemporary legacy of this climate of fear and violence through documentation of various racist acts. He cites the attempted Iynchinç of a black man mmoured to have attacked a white child in 19 18,'~'as well as other such threats or attempts. including one incident of a cross-burning by the Ku Kl~xKlan outside a Halifax church in

1932.''~ He cites various raciai nots in which white citizens attacked Chinese laundries or

'6%lichaeIS. Boudreau, "Crime and Society in a City of Order: HaIifau, t 9 18- 1935" (Ph-D. diss., Queen's University, 1996) 415482.; For a detailed account of racism in the justice system, see Wilson A Head and Don Clairmont, "Discrimination Against Blacks in Nova Scotia: The Criminal Justice System," 4" report prepared for the Royal Commission on the Donaid Marshall, Ir., Prosecution. (Halifax: The Commission, 1989).

16?30udreau,Crime arxiSociq, 425: the man was rescued just in tirne by police and was never convicted.

'%id., 4 15- 16. For discussion of the rise of Ku Klux Klan activity in the Canadian West in the eariy twentieth century, see Mariana Vaiverde, "RaciaI Purity, Sema1 Purity, and immigration Policy," in Age of Light, which also notes how white Canadian women in the international Order of Daughters of the Empire (T.O.D.E.) organization expressed fears over white women's safety in a society with a ''Negro population.' Also see William Caiderwood, restaurants, believing them to be fronts for ilkit gambIing, dmg smuggling and prostitution of white girls. Sheridan Hay aiso notes an incident From 1946 in which a black Atncville man was shot in the back as he ran away From poIice derbeing pulled over while driving without a license."' The report of this violence in the local paper appeared under the heading of, simply, "Afiicville," even though neither the driving charge nor the shooting took place there.

Feus surrounding a supposed influx of white siavery found both Chinese and Black men as their targets, although no significant evidence of this has been found.IZ Commonly, black men were singled out as the culprits of prostitution, while no fault fell on the systemic nature of the practice or the white johns who upheld it, and no assistance was afforded the raciaiized women working in it. Similarly. charges of gambling operations fell heavily on

Chinese businesses while white gambling in various downtown hotels was overlooked.

Racist ideologies permeated cornmon-sense public discourse about communities. whether in positive or negative lights. For exampIe, empathy expressed for the Chinese who fell victim to laundry raids was attribured to theü 'docile* nature. seen to make them undese~ngof attack despite their low econornic contribution to s~ciety.'~The defence of a miired-race man accused of murder asked that the court take into account "the character of

"Pulpit, Press and Political Reactions to the Ku KIw Klan in Saskatchewan," in The Tweuties in Western Cutzuda, ed. Susan M. Trofimenkoff (Ottawa : History Division, Nationai Museum of Man, National Museums of Canada, 1972).

'"Sheridan Hay, -Black Protest Tradition in Nova Scotia, 1783-1964" (master's thesis, Saint Mary's University, 1997) 147.

"%oudreay Crime and Society, 434 111 the half-wt~ite."'~~Many similar examples are documented, which construct the racial Other as an imately criminal ekment of wkch abhorrent acts are ody to be expected. Similarly, the pIaces inhabited by minority groups are sites of IawIeçsness.

Boudreau also posits a conflation of criminaiized populations, whereby minonty groups are relegated to the status - and the spaces - of drunks, gambien, and prostit~tes.'~~

Spatiaily distinct from respectable society, these groups compnsed what Clairmont has described, in reference to ficville, as "deviance service centres": spaces apm tFom the umal function ofmorality and law, which could be visited for the consumption of illicit goods or activities. Making links with .Anderson's work, Boudreau speaks of a smali-scale Chinatown in Halifau, which was seen From outside to present simi1ar threats to white society through the corruption of its young women and the promotion of drugs and garnbling.'" He speaks sirnilady of Pfncville's reputation as a place beyond the law where whites travelled to gamble or drink, but whose character was upheld as infenor, yet threatening to white society in general. This allowed clear Iines to be drawn between the respectable and criminai; while whites couid participate Freely in deviant activity, the criminal character could remain attached to the space and bodies of the slum, while whites, who belonged elsewhere, escaped-

Even aside fiom the RCMP surveiliance, accounts of the e.xpenences of blacks in public spaces during the ie950s, 60s, and into the '70s, suggest that their criminaikation in the 112 eyes of the dominant society has faded little. One report, which attempts to point to improvements in black experience in Halifav by the 1970s, includes many references to people being followed and rnonitored in stores and having extreme dficulty in renting apartments.

Black men report being called "nigser" in public on a regular basis. A young black woman describes having rocks thrown at her by a çroup of white children, and feeling whites move away when she sits next to [hem on buses. tronicdy, this article is entitled "Waiking Black

Through Halifax," but is written by a white journalist who accompanies and interviews blacks in their everyday Iives. Allegedly attempting to understand the feeling ofbeing black in a white dominated society. he continually questions and doubts their accounts of racism. attributing the incidents to benign factors or disrnissing them as paranoia. Still, their voices corne through, attesting to increases in political activism, black pride and opportunities in some areas of employment and education. At the same time, interviewees report acute, continued awareness of their Otherness and greater cornfort in their own communities. This reality is echoed in a New York Times article which appeared in 1964.'~Statinç that black residents of Halifax are e'ccluded fiom service in some restaurants, barbershops and hotels, the report also cites poor housing conditions, low incomes and meniai jobs. While this piece reproduces many racial stere~types,'~~it focuses most heavily on the intense segregation in the

lnhc~ovaScotia Hides a Racial Problem," Nav York Times, 14 June, 1964,64.

'78Forinstance, it repeats that New Road (caiied "Long Road" here) is a hostile place where one cannot t&e pictures, and descnies a "docile coloured population", which is "primitiven and "inbred. 113 province which is concealed and denied by white Hdigonians. The reporter who visited i-fdifa~notes that blacks "know the niles" as to where they can and cmot be seen.

Knowing the Enemy

A few years fier Edna Staebler's venture into black Nova Scotia, ~bhacfeatr's published an article about Toronto lawyer Alan Borovoy, a white human rights activist.'"

Borovoy was inteMewed about his work and accompanied by the journalist on a trip to

Halifax. Here. he met with Africville residents and members of the black community generally, attempting to discem the needs of t he people with resard to the anti-discrimination legislation for which he was fighting. Borovoy described a particuIarly Canadian flavour of racism during ttiis period, refening to "the gentleman bigot," who practices discrimination in a seemingly "couneous and disarming manner." He found the nuances of this discrimination harder to locate and fiat than the more overt foms. Still. it seemed that both overt and covert attitudes presided over Halif~x'sblack community. While there, Borovoy encouraged residents to carry out experiments to build up evidence for the violation of their rights, such as attempting to rent a number of apartments in different areas or entering white restaurants to observe the service given blacks. A phone survey found that ody two out of fourteen

IandIords were wiIling to rent to blacks, and a few restaurants would not serve the black men who entered. 114

The generai sense gieaned fiom the article descniing Borovoy's visit is, again, that blacks are more cornfortable in their own neighbourhoods where they "know the rules." In contrast to the Dalhousie lnstitute report's intimation that blacks may imagine racism where it does not exist, this suggests the problem is one of uncertainty; there is always a reasonable chance of encountering racism, blacks never know what to expect, so encounters in white spaces are stressfui wherher or not any attack occurs.

The article detailing Borovoy's visit coniirms that 1960s Halifax is in the midst of massive redevelopment, and pays particular attention to slum areas Iike Afncville and the

North End. Rather than subsuming racism under class-based socio-economic concerns, it articulates that white skin can be a passport out ofthe slum, whiIe black skin secures one's place within it.

These overall conditions ofblacks throughout the province are confirmed in a 1969 Teach-tn conference held at St. Francis Xavier University in Antigonish, Nova Scotia.'" Focusing on

'The Black Man in Nova Scotia" this conference consisted of a senes of speakers covenng aspects of life fiom settlement patterns. educational history, black leaders and anti-racist philosophy to past and current struggles for equality. tt affirms that the 15 000 black residents of the province Live below the poverty level, in smaiI communities outside the major toms and cities, and receive few or drastically inferior services. One speaker particularly

'80X-Project, "The Black Man in Nova Scotia: Teach-ln Report7' (collection of papers presented at St. Francis Xavier University, January, 1969). The X-Project was a student volunteer organization addressing minonty group needs, which planned the teach-in. See aiso, Wiiiiam P. Oliver, "A Brief Summary of Nova Scotia Negro Communities," (Halifax: AduIt Education Division, Nova Scotia Department of Education 1964). 115 addresses the need, in the current ciiiate of urban restructuring for pater consultation with communities affected by p~anning.'~'He States that poor and rninority residents surveyed in the city emphasize the ne4 for jobs, çiting their disdain for welfare. At the same tirne, it is acknowledged that Canada ~anpower'~is a problematic facility in chat poor residents find it inconvenient and intirnidatinç to go there. This seerns indicative of an ongoing tension between the desire for integration on the one hand and the inaccessibility and hostility of white organizations and neighbourhoods toward blacks on the other. The hi& level of segregation discussed in Maclean's is, in 1969, still very much an issue; one conference discussion considers, for emple, whether or not blacks could stay in a hotel in a particular area. and similar issues.

Besides researching some contentious ihemes, such as the hesitation around racial miang, the press occasional1y reports positively on the activities of IocaI black activist ~oups, which affirrns the fact that these stmggles are centrai in the period. An article on the Colored

Citizens Leagels3recounts a long history of activism in the areas of educationd desegregation, cumcuIurn reform, speciai progarns and recreation for children, equal job opportunity and the integration of police and fire senrices. Leader B.A Husbands is credited with an approach unlike the "doctrinaire attitude which in late years has become so rewarding

'81X-Project, "Black Man in Nova Scotia", 9.

'=Canada Manpower is a federal govenunent agency which administers unernployment insurance and access to the labour market.

'sk'Colored Citizens League Faces New Chailenges," HaIifmc Mail Stm, 28 Decernber, 1963, 7. LI6 and fashionable." While this comment is not further explained. it seems suggestive of media disdain for more radical politics.

More evidence of increased activism around issues of poverty and racism is to be seen in smailer and alternative newspapers and journais, particularly during the early 1970s. The magazine ne Foitrth Estotr, in 1972, discusses a housing conference organized fiom a more grassroots level and aimed at educating non-specialists about the intricacies of land development. A major goal is to acquire input on the needs of different groups fiom their own perspectives, including the conditions of public housing tenants. Around the same time, a magazine cailed Blcrck Imighr was launched in Halifav as a forum for black writers and their politics. Part of the Black Research and Action Cornmittee, a network of groups across

Canada, the work takes a fairly radical approach in dealing with both personal and social issues simultaneously. Influence is placed on hentage and the lack of black history in school cumcula as well as on critique of the media both for the misrepresentation of black people and the failure to report their progress and achievements. r-\rticles remind the reader to think in terms of systemic and institutionalized racism rather than simply individuai discriminatory acts, although specific acts, too, are documented as part of the larger picture. The work comprises a strategy for returning the intensive scrutiny of the white gaze, keeping track of race issues locaily and around the province. The arrest and alleged racist treatment of bIack youths in

Kentvüle are noted, as is the removai of a clause preventing the burial of blacks and "lndiansn in cemeteries in Windsor. 117

Another article deals with internalized racism, encouraging blacks not to becorne caught up in striving for white acceptance. It is noted elsewhere that sorne black intellectuals are felt to be pawns of the white government, having abandoned their own people. Strong concem is expressed over retaining black identity and honounng black history and elderly people. Views here also reflect a sense that a 'polite' Canadian form of racism exists wtiich pays lip service to minority interests and promotes some token blacks in decision-making positions. 'Subtle racists' exercise caution in revealing the hl1 nature of their views in order to prevent widespread analysis or protest. Reflecting a view expressed by Roc@ Jones at the

Teach-In conference, these authors do not advocate complete separatism, but ask that whites concentrate on educating their own communities about racism, fighting it 'in their own backyards', rather than irnposing their solutions on the black cornrnunity.

In 1970, Donald Clairmont and Dennis Magill published a usefiil overview of Nova

Scotian black history.'" This work places statistics about the poverty level and population distribution of black communities in context, finding, for example, that in the Haiiiwhite population. 25% live below the poverty level with incomes under $3000 per year, while their biack neighbours number 90% in this category. The report also documents poIitical activism arnong bIacks throughout the 1960s; it notes the increasing influence of the Nova Scotia

Association for the Advancernent of Coloured People (NSAACP), and reports on achievements in the areas of housing rights, professional training, school integration and desegregation in public areas, as weU as public marches and dernonstrations. In this way,

------

'"CIairmont & Magill, Nova Scotian Blncks. 118

Clairmont and Magiil credit black activists with a measure of agency otlen overlooked in white studies. They also maintain that, while locd blacks recognize their situation to be distinct fiom the U.S. in some ways, they giean support and inspiration fiom the Amencan civil rights movements, which have gained momentum in recent years.

Perhaps most importantly, Clairmont and MagilI retùte several theones which attributt: the continued oppression of Nova Scotia blacks to the dleged apathy or cornpetitive

"leveling" noted earlier in discussion of Henry's work. In addition to citing a lack of evidence that blacks prevent one another fiom succeeding economically. they question Robin Winks' assumption that blacks have been divided according to their historical settlement periods, for instance, into Loyalists and refùgees. They a1so interrogate Winks' assertion that blacks have historicalIy failed to understand the racism they face, and to organize around it. While Winks attniutes this to the lack of a motivating, Iegally-sanctioned system of slavery similar to that in the US, Clairmont and MagiIl remind the reader that blacks in Nova Scotia share a heritage of slavery in both the U.S. and Nova Scotia, and of hostility and discrimination locally for two centuries.

In a recent thesis, Sheridan Hay focuses on white ignorance of black agency throughout Nova Scotian history, to argue that a tradition of protest. while disavowed and otlen ovemddea has always e~isted.'~'Judith Fingard, too, follows the beginnings of school desegregation through

lU5Hay,"Black Protest Tradition." 119 the efforts of an upwardly-mobile group of bIacks in the late nineteenth cent~ry.'~~

Emphasizing their role as tax payers and property owners, they becarne embroiled in cases of injustice, one of which involved the firing of an unsatisfactory white teacher in a black school. another criticizing a white woman teacher and principal who frequently questioned theu children as to the moral qualities in their homes and their parenting abilities.'"

Similar to earlier analyses of the nineteenth century slum, Fingard's work makes apparent that moral discourses around black degeneracy were in place in Halifav well before the era ofurban renewal. Further, whiie they reaiized some degree of success, even upwardly mobile home-owners taking active interest in the education of their children found little receptivity in white society to their carefully-presented class distinctions. These activists never fully escaped the stiçma of the slum. which sigals the error in thinking one cm elude one avis of oppression by distancing fiom another. Lamy Bennett and Adolph Reed have recently examined the legacy of sociological theories surrounding urban poverty which developed throughout the twentieth century.ISg They find class and race to be Intenvoven both rnaterially and in the academic theories they read, which have identified the nature of

"social pathology" in shm and ghetto areas.

i86J~dithFingard, "Race and Respectabiiity in Victorian Halifax," Jorrntd of Imperia( cmd CommomveaIth Hisroty 20,2 (1992):169-1 95. 120

At the sarne time, Bennett and Reed write that sexual noms intüse these theories, illuminaring the body of work in ways which make the urban planning studies discussed in Part i quite unsurprising. For instance, racialized notions of proper gender roies contributed to a view of the black family as unviable. Susan Precious, speaking about Xfncville women, argues that "separate spheres" models assume most women have had to struggle for the right to work outside the home. Black women have historically been viewed, through slavery and beyond, as fit for any required labour, in contrast to white women, whose assumed vinue and delicacy require prote~tion."~As discussed in the last chapter, the figure of the 'lady' has historicaily depended on the labour of lower class and black women whose roles and personas reflect the antithesis ofher subjectivity. At the sarne time, black women's roles as wage- earners and household heads have been used to pathologize the black family, depicting black men as lazy and incapable of providing for their families, and black women as shrewish matriarchs.

This formulation of black culturai pathology has been articulated stronçly in the latter half of the twentieth century, as cultural explanations have replaced bioloçicai theories of racial difference. Philomena Essed has examined this shift, positinç that while the legacy of biological theory remains, blacks have more recently been targeted by newer discourses. She writes:

'89Precious, "Women of ficviUe7'; (see Chapter 3, ''Workn)

KWJoyceA Ladner, "Racism and Tradition: Black Womanhood in Histoncai Perspective," in Liberarttg Womeir 's Hisr0g.r Theoretical and Critical Essays ed. Berenice A Carroi (Urbana: University of illinois Press, 1987); Lhda Gordon, Pitied But Nor Entirled. Cultural arguments are used more and more to blarne Blacks themselves for the situation of poverty and their slow rise in the system compared with White immigrants and Asians. . . Underlying th& discourse is the implication that Euro-American cultural standards are uncritically accepted as the nom and positive standard. The traditionai idea of genetic inferiority is still important in the fabric of racism (Duster, 1990), but the discourse of Black inferiority is increasingly formulated as cultural deficiency, social inadequacy, and technologicai underdevelopment (Rodney, 1982).19'

Theories of cultural deficiency were gaining credibility in governmentai and planning discourses by the time of rUncvi1Ie's destruction. The fact that poor and raciaiized groups are so ofien concentrated in detined urban spaces has been identified by Goldberg as perpetuating this way of thinking.

The concentration eEect exacerbates the products of a raciaily exclusionary poverty by concentrating them in a containable space easily avoidable by those not so confined. Conservative commentators largely emphasize the pathologicai character of the raciaiized poor as the ovemding causal consideration in extending their poverty. So the concentration effect is not just spatial; it is also ideologicai. Those lefi or pushed into that container space are defined as having a11 the pathological characteristics supposedly acquired by vinue of being so concentrated. Indeed, ideological containment assists in isolaring the racially identifiable threats within the space of ~ontainment.'~"

The thinking Goldberg describes is based in the 'culture-of-poveq' theories discussed earlier. Bennet and Reid trace its origins to the early nventieth century in the Chicago

School, pointing out that it presumes a "static and narrow mode1 of healthy social

~rganization"'~~against which popuIations can be judged morally and sociaily inferior. When

"' Philomena Essed, Utrdermmdi~gEveiyoby Racism: An Interdiscipiinmy Theory vol. 2 of Sage Series on Race and Efhnic Relrliorrs, ed., John H. Stantield U (Newbusy Park: Sage, 1991) 13-14.

I9'David Theo Goldberg, Iirrciai Stïbjects: WrÏfing on Race in AmerÏca (New York: RoutIedge, 1997) 15.

'93Be~ett& Reed, "Urban Renewd" 187 122 looked at in this way, other tiinctionai modes of Iiving are dismissed as evidence of social

"breakdown." The authors contend that this approach dso fails to consider the influence of public policy and political action in shaping the supposedly "natural environment" in which residents live. Instead, concentration is focused on the physical surroundings and on individual and family circumstances which are more easily discernible. They trace this theoretical bent to the formation of narratives about the 'deserving' and the 'undese~ng* poor. It is this junction at which some populations become more explicitly racialized, creating, for e'iarnple, a narrative of the black ghetto as the home of lazy, uncontrolled, degenerate, and therefore undeseMng people. The latter are seen to bring poor conditions with them wherever they move,Iru meaning that any space they inhabit will be potentially at risk. The control of space. then, is a primary mode of policing the borders between respectability and degeneracy.

This analytic approach, consurnmated in the 1960s. has been influential well beyond sociologicai academic circles, making its way throughout public debate and into policy decisions. The Moynihan report on the black fh~ily.'~'for instance, took up the cultural argument in proclaiming social pathology as the cause of black poverty, launching approaches to policy and research which emphasized individual defective behaviour and values among the poor black population. Social reform, then, became Iargely a matter of rehabilitating the individuais and areas in question, rather than the systemic causes.

'%Goldberg, Racist Criltzrre, 200.

Patrick Moynihan, irlre Mopihm~Report. 123

Underscoring that the shifi fiom biological to cultural theories had come full circle,

Bennet and Reid substantiate that narratives of social pathology enabled an appearance of empathy and non-racist sentiment. They write, "Lewis's culture-of-poverty formulation gave those who were uncornfortable with fraiikly racist stereotypes a way to embrace a fundamentally racialized theory of the defective poor while avoiding the stigma of racism.

Culture became a pr0.q for race."'% In this vein, the 'gentleman bigot" couId support research initiatives in favour of displacing poor and racidized groups while espousing concern for their conditions. The well-meaning social theorist could indulge an interest in the plight of the black community, tip her hat to anti-racism, yet never leave the causal parameters of the community's own borders.

A shift from biologicai to culruraI rationaiiiations for racial inferiority does not erase the narrative of inferiority itself. nor does it necessady direct responsibility for cultural problems to those who created them in the first piace. Further, conditions in economicaily deprived areas still become entangled with the identities of residents and cognitively attached, in the white imagination, to the body of the racial Other. it is this process which the term

"racidiation" encapsulates. In this context, it foregrounds how blacks and the areas they inhabit are marginalized and marked as Other; whiIe whites are not required to acknowledge their membership in a me; this is the nature of dominance.

In some ways, this era must have heightened the mistrust of whites arnong blacks in segregated cities lie Haiifax. With job opportunities unlocked through civil rights' influence, 124 neighbourhoods more integrated and public places more accessible, shared space must have felt like a contact zone of mercurid tempement with the constant underlying threat of harassrnent and violence. For dong with the elevation of black anti-racist politics and the slow, steady achievernent of some goals, there rernained an insidious racisrn with the authority to destroy a community while 'saving' it. Faced with this force and its near-impermeable fictions of black cornmunity, it is hard to imagine how .4tncville could have successtùlly fought back.

Part m: The Other as Africville

A life apart

There is a little Frequented part of the City, overiooking Bedford Basin, which presents an unusuai problem for any community to face. [n what rnay be described as an encampment, or shack town, there live some seventy negro families... The citizen5 of AFricville Live a life apart. On a sunny day, the srnaIl children swim in what amounts to their private Iagoon. In winter, life is Far fiom idyllic. In terms of the physical condition of buildings and sanitation, the story is deplorable. ShaIlow wells and cesspooIs, in close prolàmity. are scartered about the dopes between the shacks. There are only rwo things to be said. The families wiil have to be rehoused in the near hure. The land which they now occupy will be required for the tirture developrnent of the City. A solution which is satisfactory, socidly as welI as econornically, wili be dificult to achieve. Afiicville stands as an indictment of society and not of its inhabitants. They are old Canadians who have never had the opportunities enjoyed by their more fortunate fe1l0ws.~~'

197Stephenson, Redmelopmenr Sm&, 27-28. 125

This excerpt, fiom the Stephenson report, has been quoted ofien in news articles, theses and books about Afncville. It comprises the oEcial story about the cornmunity put forth in the white public domain and accepted among some blacks as weI1. It is comrnonly read as a rather benîgn summary of most public sentiment, taken at face value as a representation of reality whether the reader agrees with its proposed solution or not. Because the author acknowledges social responsibiiity for the conditions in AFricviIle, it is easy to overlook the other knowledge he upholds. As it is the aim of this section to examine how Aficville is delivered symbolicalty to the white community, and as the Stephenson report has been placed in context already, it is wonh a more complex review.

It is surprising that in the various quotations of this passage no one has questioned its textual contradictions and inconsistencies. In constructing an aviom that the area must be cleared and redeveloped, the author does not approach a seemingly obvious question: why can the space not be restructured for the current owners' benefit, as had been requested for de cade^?'^^ if the land is to be used to develop the city, it is implicit that the space cmbe rendered adequate for the city's standards, while the bodies cannot. This irnplies that habitation by these families is the problem. Further, the report does not elucidate the

'unusual' nature of a peripheral, underprideged and neglected black population in a North

Amencan urban centre.

L9"LResidentswant to keep homes in -Mîcville," Hulifar Mail Sfar,9 Auçust, 1962, 1- Residents expressed the desire to maintain land and to build on it "according to City specifications." 126

The depiction of Afncviile as a problem "difficult for any comrnunity to face," suggests what is considered to be - atdtiot to be - Zhe community." Its "life apart" begs the question, 'apart from what?' Indeed, this view belies either subjectivity or objectivity, obiiterating human existence in a place seen as "Iittle tiequented" while home to 400 people.

Visiting researcher Albert Rose, too, found it "hard to believe that a community existed," and stated, "You might just as well assume no one was living there,"lg9much the way Edna

Staebler had sketched New Rsad as a place where "no one7' went. While these tums of phrase may not be designed to exclude segments of the population. it is precisely their easy, unconscious articulation which makes them interesting. The emptiness of racialized space, then, is naturalized.

Imposing on land coveted for 'development of the city', and threatening the city's borders (even thou& it was there first), iVncvilIe becomes ,rot part of the city. The representation of an 'encampment' connotes impermanence, which is antithetical to the progress and development of 'society', and which is already undernood to be no(-fi~ville.'~

Despite the gesture toward social responsibility, the abrupt solution proposed upholds a top- down 'expert' formulation of social problems. Similarly, even where editorials or articles of the time mention the City's responsibility in producing Afncville's intolerable conditions, they

'wClairmont & Magili, Life and dearh, (Y" ed.) 156

'OoSee David Sibley, Oiitsiders. 30, for discussion of 'outsider' societies as antitheticai to 'development'. suggest paternalistic solutions which consistently overlook the perspectives of residents."'

The Stephenson report's sweeping disregard for any possibility of the commu~ty'ssu~val is achieved in one brief and conclusive paragraph in a lengthy report which devotes detailed analysis to the upgrading of many other areas of Halifau, some of which are identified as exhibiting "the worst" conditions in the city."'

A similar tone can be read in the Haiifav Region Housing Survey, as discussed earlier.

Only passing reference to ficville is made, and this explicitly assumes the community is already slated for removal. Other ihan its parenthetical sesture toward the problems involved in moving racial minority groups, this survey does not leave room for debate on Miicville's fùture. Although published well before official decisions were supposedly made about relocation, the sense in both reports is that destruction of AfncviIle is a fair accompli, and therefore unworthy of fùrther study. Similar sentiments are put forth in a study by Dr. Albert

Rose, who is introduced as a prominent social worker and welfare expert fiom the University of Toronto. Rose was also known for addressing similar issues in Toronto through his study of the Regent Park a~ea.'"~In a detded relocation plan, Rose recornmends spreading

'O'For example, hlail Star Editor Frank Doyle's editorials, to be analyzed shortIy, consistently chastise the city for its lack of attention to AfiicvilIe, yet support the imposition of invasive solutions. See also, "Lener to the Editor: AfncviUe May Disappear by Year's End," Halifar Mail Star. 5 lanuary, 1966, which expresses similar sentiments. A Letter to the Editor, simpiy entitled ".4tncvilIe", on 7 June, 1963, however, is a strong indictment of both the City's responsibility and the clearance scheme, and makes recommendations for supporting and developing the comunity on site.

'02Stephenson, Redevelopment Srr&, 552-

1113 Aibert Rose, Regent Park: a rtridy itz slrrm clearance (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1958). 128 residents throughout the city's new housing projects in a ratio of one Afncville family for every five present.Im No rationaie is offered for this dispersai, and news reports suggest only, for example, that "social necessity and sound financial reasons require integration of the a~a..."'~~In the words of another, the goal is a "comprehensive urban comrnunity."

Whether by reporters, social scientists, mdents or municipal authonties, conditions in

~cviileare narrated through the larger discourses of the slum. As the following sections explore, its material poverty is detailed, complete with the depiction of a life of scavenging centred around the nearby dump. Filth and the risk of disease are always underlying, while the appearance of residents. the activity of children and the 'strange' family composition are scnitinized. Reports fiequently allude to the community's criminal element, its alleged composition of squatters and transients, and the failure to comprehend its own inevitabre demise.

Gloom and "Doom"

The executive editor of Halifax's local daily newspaper, Frank Doyle, wrote fiequently on the situation in .4fiicville throughout the relocation years. His observations, which ofien appeared on the fiont cover, include one particuiarly descriptive report following a personal visit to the comrnunity, during whîch it appears that he observed ficville going about its

'w'End Africville Btight Welfare Expert Advises," HnIifi hfail Sm, 18 December, 1963,O.

"'sLAtncville District Takeover Being Viewed As Necessary," H4fifàxhfail Star, 1 August, 1962, 1. daiIy routines, but never spoke to anyone. Doyle opens his story with a reminder that

AfricviIle is cut off fiom the city in location and by raiIway tracks. He continues to describe the sights:

Seagulls were there, hundreds of them, soaririg to the cIiff of mbble which is the city dump - gulls jreyed by the murky water. There are trees in sections of the seulement, bare now, disclosing more clearly the shacks into which people are crowded. Not many folk were around - a woman hanging out washing in the wind, bitter in spite of the sunshine. Two or three men sawed waste Iumber into stove lengths. Children were not to be seen, it was much too coId for the younger to be out of doors; the older were in school; the shining buses were in sharp contrast to the rickety stmctures as they passed through, Ietting out the chiidren to find their way to dwelling places ohen as not across the rail Iines on the slope... There were other men there, several salvaging materials fiom the dump, using al1 forms of transport... their shoulders, wheelbarrows and trucks. Others sat by a fire for wannth or wandered about seeking what is throw-away material to some but to [hem, if not riches, then something to use or to sell. "30Smoking on the Dumps," said a sign, as if a cigarette aRorded greater danger than the open flames. At that it was not the only place where there was burning; plumes of smoke rose in another place to be whipped away on a wind high enou& to send a can scunying across the highroad and to whiten the waters of the basin where they were not dingy rvith muck ... In the midst of al1 this, the church ...stood forlornly, and so did the bare "Christmas trees" which topped the rotting mess called the dump. They seerned not (sic) more out of place than the three trucks which drove into the "roped in" area to be loaded with discarded doors, timed stuffs ... There were not as many trucks taking away as unloading; not everything found there cm be put to use whatsoever (sic). A geat deal is IefL The growing acres of wasteland are proof of that and someday Halifax may use them purposetÙlIy. The reg of the scene is bucolic, the Iast rural remnant in Halifax peninsula, even idyllic, that is, Zeyes are closed to the piaces in which peopie find it necessary to Iive. ïhese, however, are doomed. They Say so at City HaiLm

I quote this portion of the story at Iength as 1 feeI it embodies a white gaze which becomes more poignant as the descrîption gains momentum. The romantic, melancholic narrative

-Frank Doyle, "ilfncville's shackdom shows lack of action," Hal* Mai( Star, 10 February, 1965, 1. depicts a pIace very much 'of somewhere else'. lt imrnediately brought to my mind television ads in which images of poverty-stricken, malriourished children in Afica are shown while a voice-over preys upon western sharne and pity, pIeading for donations. These spaces, too, are

Other. They are not spoken or written of in a tone one would use for something taking place in 'civilized' temtory. to depict the lives of those fiom the same place or space.

Similar to the Stephenson report, the anicle defines a 'place apm', and the displacing nuances in boch allow a white interloper the privilege of explorhg and retuming. He 'looks' with a colonizing gaze in which linguistic and conceptua1 distancing are particularly necessary since this population is rlot far away, is in fact nearly in his backyard. He reports with an authorship. an authority. that fiords the privileçe of persona1 distinction.

Like Pratt's "seeing man,' Doyle engages in an anthropalogical viewership which cannot be retumed. A writing tactic such as describinç how cold it is, as if it weren't the same temperature where you corne kom, Jives the impression of distance. Mentionhg the shacks into which peopte are "crowded" creates a menta1 picture which is not ody inacc~rate'~~but more commonly associated with far-away, sensationalized spaces of playes, natural disasters or famine."' Tum of phrase such as children 'finding their way' home through treacherous

'07The Africville population from this time period wos approlornately four hundred people, Iiving in eighty households. This would mean an average of five persons per home. See Institute of PubIic AfFairs. Condirimr of Negrws, 7-

-08 Furthemore, from photogaphs, I have been continuaily surprised at how unexceptionai hfncville housing appeared in the context of Nova Scotia There are white- inhabited coastai viiiages in worse repair to this day, and areas around my own humetown have Iong been in more fragile condition than many houses pictured in books and in the photo exhibit of Africdie shomn in Nova Scotia's Black Cdtucal Centre. conditions and men using 'dl foms of transportation' make these normal daily activities sound unusual, aimost primitive. The retèrence to the church, '*Christmas trees" and trucks not seeming out of place made me wonder why they would; what was unusual about this scenario, knowing the dump exists nearby, knowing that it is not Sunday so there is no reason to be surprised ifthe church is empty? The story Iacks an interna1 cohesion here, as it does in citing the idyllic scene after taking great pains to describe the deplorable blight- [t is not dear how one might 'close one's eyes' to the places in which people "?mi ir tiecessary to live" - an image which suppIants any respect for their chosen homes with assumptions of their fate, seaied by "doom."

Doyle and his newspaper were consistently supportive of the relocation program, otlen urging faster action on the destruction of Afric~ille.~~While at times he appears sympathetic to residents, Doyle tiequently reiterates descriptions of the slumlike conditions in ficville,

and he takes care to diseredit the length and significance of Afncville's history,"" citinç no

evidence more specific than "civic records.""' Many dernands for the removal of Africville,

pubiished in irhr Mail Star, sugçest an overall feu of the influence and spread of blight to rest

'Trank Doyle, "Procrastination on Africville should be ended," Haiifax hiail Star? 3 1 May. 1963, 1; Frank Doyle, +'Attention to .Afiricville Old Story." Hafifmr Mod Star, 7 June, 1963, 1; Frank Doyle, "Sugsests action soon on MïicviIle," HaliLfax Mail Stm, 1 ApriI, 1964.; "AFncviIIe: Time For Action 1s Now," Hafifa Mail Star, 13 December, 2963.

""Frank Doyle, "Dwellings at dump not very historie," Haiifm Itfaii Stur, 18 January, 1963, 1.

"'Such records were not ofien kept conceming biack communities, in which not al1 residents could prove title to their homes. The tack of a recordai history was used against Afiicde. of the city. The space of Afncville takes on a tom rnuch Iike the purported "tumour" of

Vancouver's Chinatom. Funher, f'requent urges far the city to -.stop procrastinating"'L' dong with citations of Afncville as an embarrassrnent to Halifi~$'~suggest an unrnanly inability to regulate its own flairs - or its own unruly minority.

A thankless task

... we knew al1 about segreçatiun But we didn't look at ourselves as a segregated community. We just Iooked ar ourselves as a community. .hd when the people From the Progressive Club and others like thern held out integration like some kind of Holy Grail, we told them we weren't sure exactly what intesration could do for us as a community. And the fact rhat we wouId raise doubts about it - well, that kind of shacked 'em."'

Much like the urban renewal studies, news reports from the time depict a growing urban econorny in whicb Aficville is already out-of-place. and residents simply ignorant of its inevitable future. For example, an article states: "Some of the conditions which influence the desire of the families to remain in the area will disappear as more attention is focussed (sic) on the ma.""' A sense persists that residents will eventually be forced to understand the loçic of their situation, and to appreciate the leniency they have so far enjoyed. Another article, also by Doyie, states:

"'~rank Doyle, "Procrastination."; Frank Doyle. "Suggests action."

"3hstïtute of Public Affairs, Coriditiotr of Negrors, 6.

'"C. R Saunders, "ReIocation and Its Mermath: A Joumey Behind the Headlines," in Afi-m~lle:A Spirit thLivrs 011,17.

"LAfkcville District Takeover," Haljfmr Mail Star ... some spokesmen for the Nego people who occupy the shacks Say the municipal authorities have more than a usuai responsibility in dealing with the community. The latter tolerated, if they did not actuaily encourage... construction; they alIow scavenging on the dump, an income-yielding occupation that holds many in the area. They even ignore a resolution passed Nov. 15, 1932, by City Council. Conceming the dump, then in another nearby place, it said that "the city engineer be requested to instruct his man in charge of the dump not to allow anyone to remove anything from the dump ..." Yesterday at one time, a dozen or more scavengers were at work. How many were engaged in this occupation through the day, no one knows, but there was much coming and going ... They find many things - a barre1 of over-salted meat occasionaily, sometimes fiuit is discovered - a real pri~e."~

EIsewhere, Doyle writes, of material saivaged fiom the dump, "much of that waste is converted into litter scattered through the ~ommunit~."'" In later interviews, .4fiicviIle residents told Clairmont that such depictions oftheir scavenging were incredibly insulting, since eating food directly fiom the dump was unthinkable to them. Funher, the majority of residents did not depend on the dump, and most used it only occasionally."~~oyle'sabove report goes on to describe a well-dressed Afncville woman who claimed her clothes had been saivaged from the durnp, and states that she and others would naturally not want to Ieave

"such riches." Tt continues to stress how city council has aiso overlooked the building of homes in the community, for which permits would normally be required. It fails to mention that requests for permits by Afncville residents were routinely tumed down. Denid and neglect are rewritten as patience and tolerance in a tone which infantihes AfKcvilleans by

'16Frank Doyk, "DweIIings at dump."

'"Frank Doyle, "Suggests action?

"'Clairmont, Life and death (3* ed.) 1 16, 134 humouring their practices. For instance, when descnbing how residents use dump materials to improve their homes, "improving" appears in quoration marks, as if "we," the rcaders, intuitively understand how ridiculous the notion must be. In a sirnilar tone, waste materials are cited as "riches," much as fniit tkom the dump is "a prize." Another article reports on a tire in Afridle, stating that three children were killed when their "home" burned do~n."~

These tiequent unnecessary quotation marks ridicule the conditions residents consider normal and depict them more as children playing 'house'.

Likewise, residents' understandings of their social context are tiequently discredited.

An article by Susan Dexter in Macleatz ti explains an example of "so-called" discrimination in

Halifav as simply merchants' fears that white customers will avoid stores with black workers.= hother report is headlined "Africville Residents Want 'Promises' Kept.""' This title also allows the municipal government a clear "out," suggesting publicly that the promises in question were merely a skewed perception by ~cvillepeople. A beiief in the community's ignorance is preserved as definitions of racism itself are removed from the arena of those who know the expenence, and authored by officials and reporters from the dominant group. As in DoyIe's story, the authontative depiction relies on a sense that the viewer can see "beyond" the apparent conditions, to know the reality of inhabitants of the space, as well as what is good for them, better than they themselves.

"%ank DoyIe, "Procrastination.''

"Osusan Dexter, "The black ghetto that fears integratioq" hIacIearr's, 25 My, 1965.

"'Jim Robson, "AfncvilIe residents want 'promises' kept," Hal$kr Mail S~ar,3 October, 1969, 1. 135

Dexter's article is puzzling as it fluctuates between negative portrayals of both

Aficville and the municipality. She reports city counciiiors' shock that people have accused them of negiecting Atncviile, and that their generosity has been met with distrust, fear and reluctance to move. While it is not clear whether or not she feels this shock is warranted, or that gratitude was owed these officiais, her unflattering portrayal of ficville itself does not help the community's cause. She cites "negro apathy" as the culprit which prevented compensation for residents in the past, and which allowed their unsafe sewer system to prevaiI. She quotes studies demonstrating that blacks would be accepted more easily than they perceive in Halifax neighbourhoods, while locai blacks explained that the rents were so hi@ in the areas cited that landlords could fiord to speak liberaily, never having to worry about blacks afTording their housing. Dexter continues to portray the city as generous, specifj6ng the unnecessary $500 compensation offered to residents who are "not owed a cent." She clearly sees residents as uncooperative with the city in their failure to attend meetings.

Specific choices of wordinç in newspaper reports also sugest bIacks' intemalized cultural pathology, embodied in the apparent inability to think rationaily about their antiquated

Iifestyle. For example, "ficville residents do not want to leave their homes Ïrr the shndow of the cis, dmp (emphasis added).l7= Speaking of the final decision on forced relocation, another article States, "Unfortunately, even the latest plan, which appears to rnany Haligonians to be both just and humane, is running into some opposition - fiom the residents of AfiicviIle."

""Residents want to keep homes," 9. 136

The same article suggests that moves made to demolish Atiicville over time have been made

"difficult" by residents, but congratulates the City on managing the tasks despite this. The author conchdes, "It is going to take sorne courage for the aldennen to move persons who do not want to be moved - persom dmosr everyo~~efeeis hmte been pushed nromd nfrem@- even when it will surely be for their own good (emphasis added)."" This suggests not only that Aficvilleans must be taught a lesson, but that a supposed widespread sympathy For their plight eicists, and that ir is misplaced. Again, the city's impotence is suggested in order to urge action; courage and sympathy are positioned as the two dichotornous paths in the debate.

Much sirnilar public rhetoric is affirmed in a thesis by Bernard MacDougall, a social work student involved in the study Thr Co,iditioti of the Nrgroes of Ha@m Ciy. Focusing on the results of the 'relocation' program by interviewhg residents about their feelings, the work clings tirmly to the foundationai assumption that urban renewal prograrns are beneficial and necessary. Mer situating the study within an era of concentrated restructunng, he emphasizes that social workers must be centrally concerned with the psycho-social impact of relocation on populations affecteci.=' Thus he sets out to incorporate the "human needs" of concern to the larger rnovement. The dificulties his interview work encountered are attributed to what is seen as the. social disorganization of ~cvilleans.Since families were living in various non-nucIear arrangements. it was "extremely dEculty' to determine what

=Mary Casey, "ficviIIe awaits the wreckers."

"Bernard MacDougaii, "Urban ReIocation of ficville Residents," (maser's thesis, Maritime SchooI of Social Work, 1969) 6- 127 their actual make-up was. This disorder is cited as "family breakdown"~- much in line with the social theories put forth by the Chicago School - although there is no clear evidence that families tvere actually suffering Fiom interna1 conflict~."~Rather, it seems that the problematic of combined families and extended networks has become a common narrative for those researchers attempting to make sense of these arrangements, and that the assumed tumoi1 they create is read as part of the social pathology of black community.

MacDougall emphasizes examples which support the 'degeneracy' of lUncville people, for instance, a former resident who felt people drank too much to be effective in decision-making. He reports frequently on the "hostility" eqressed by residents toward the city and sussests their illiteracy and unintelligence in explaining the lack of successfil relations.

The thrust of this thesis is that relocation problems can be overcome by gaining the cooperation of displaced residents, who can then be "rehabilitated."-"f The author is supportive of the relocation system, and where he cites flaws tvithin it, they are attributed to

residents' lack of comprehension, illiteracy, hostility toward the city, and attempts to cling to

their former ways of life within their new communities.

E61n Clairmont's study, residents cited lack ofjobs and financial WO~~Sas by far the greatest challenges they faced. Familial problems were uncommon. See Clairmont & Magiti, Lye and death, 207-246.

ZZiMacDougalI,"Relocation of ~cville,"18. 138

More dlbe explored with regard to this perspective when the relocation is theorized in the next chapter. 1cite it here to note how knowledge produced about black community follows dominant tropes of the day, namely that their failure to understand reason prevents blacks Liom proper subrnission to white authority. The inability of residents to adjust from

dyshnctional to normal living patterns creates their unhappiness, thus probiems lie not within

the relocation structure itself, but in the city's inability to execute better discipline of its

relocatees. Even in this suggestion the thesis is delicate, apologizing for even a trace of

criticism.

The unreasonable nature of residents is echoed by Frank Doyle in an article

contrasting .4ilic\iIle with a former run-down Halifax neighbourhood which had been

removed years before."' .4t this site in the south end, he claims, residents were willing to

sacrifice their homes, many of which they had built themselves, for the greater good. He

wntes, "the residents of Greenbank submitted to the will of the cornmunity which was that

those causing the demolitions should be commended for acting in the interests of ail." This

issue, he reports. did not divide citizens or provoke accusations of "di~crimination."~While

he continues to scold the city for its procrastination and fear of angering people on the

MiicviIIe issue, these statements clearly suggest that an attitude problem on the part of

ffi-cvilfe residents is largely at fault.

=~ra.nkDoyle, "Problem can be solved by closing the dump," Hdifmr Mnil Star, 3 1 January, 1963, 1.

"qle does not state the rads of residents of Greenbank. 129

Given descriptions of the disciplinary problems, un-bourgeois family systems, and dificuit attitudes among ficville blacks, a picture of cornplete chaos must have met the eyes of white "relocation" workers. In addition to the already-shifty Iiousehold patterns, it is not cornrnonly noted that a handful of AFricville residents were white, usually due to rnived rnamages. While studies of Africville have not specifically cited this as evidence of family breakdown, it would be socially unacceptable, in the Iiberai approaches they use, to do so- [t is important to recall, however, that values expressed by religious leaders of the day made racial requirements in marital status and behaviour far fiom insignificant in the formation of families and their integration into the rest of society. Not only were famiiy systems seen as inherently abnormal and gender relations somewhat ~ubversive,~~but the comrnunity lacked an ordered existence whereby it seemed 'anyone could live anywhere' regardless of race. gender, semai relationship or family ties. Moreover, the shifiing of these arrangements would seem analogous to the 'transient7 and unstable nature of the community - a notion already accepted among much of the white population. MacDougall's finding of 'breakdown7 is hardly surprising in this conten.

Seen to be entrenched in historical patterns of deviant living, i\fncville's alleged disabilities in comprehending and determiring its situation are rendered simple cornmon sense.

It is only unfortunate, the white outsider must realize, that because of a disgracetll situation

'30Clairmont & Magill, L@ arrddemh, 53. The authors note that in rnixed marriages, black wornen usually kept their maiden names and titles to homes and land were in their names. 140 which has spiraied out of control, black residents are not competent to recognize and appreciate efforts to help them.

Across the tracks

While simply 'hume' for the black community, through a racist lens ficville was made to si@@ many things - a slum, a repository for the waste of Society, a site of danger and degeneracy, a 'social problem', an object of pity and attempted rescue, and, 1 would argue, a looking glass through which the white community came to 'know' its superiority.

Consonant with statements in the relocation report, some white Haiigonians have described to me informaily the place Atncville held in their imaginations as youths. Courting danger on an adolescent journey into the community seems to have encompassed the ultimate quest for daring adventure. One acquaintance described the curiosity in their gaze as "treating it like goinç to the zoo. real1y.-." A black non-resident, in an interview with Clairmont and

Magill, stated, "people of dl sorts used to go to Atncville. It had a kind of attraction because it was kind of weird; no Iaw enforcement. One went out there at one's own risk. It reaily was the other side of the track~."~'A city official described a high schooi practice of driving to

AtncMlle, turning out the headlights, and then turning them on to watch the rats ~un.~'Other outsiders, both black and white. noted the cornmon practice of going to Afi-icville for 'women 14 1 and al~ohol";~~many mentioned only the bootlegging, partying and drinking for which the area was rekno~ned.~It was aiso reported that various prominent white citizens ventured into the community and were ofien assisted by residents when they got drunk.

As a space ofso-called deviant activity ~cviIIeoffered both escape and risk for the white cornmunity. However, its dleged ddness is questionable; residents tended to describe it as simply "a place to have a good time," and related many examples of tiin which were not illegal, such as singing, dancing and visits from musicians like Duke Ellingtoii. The community's reputation as a wild and dangerous place is thought to have developed in its last two decades. following Wodd War II. This is attnbuted to an influx of transients and squatters who increased the level of bootlegging, drinking and fighting, giving the media a chance to condemn al1 of .4fncviile for these activities. Clairmont and Magill note that the crime rate in Aficville was not particularly high and pison sentences were unc~mmon.~~

Further, no measure has been made of the prominence of drinking, bootlegging or partying in

Afncville compared with other rural or somewhat isolated communities. Such a value judgement also relies on a set standard - again based on white rniddle class noms in a generaily conservative and religious province - for how much 'tiin' and socializing are acceptable before they are considered a problem. Further. .c\tncville residents reported fiequent incidents in which whites passed out on their doorsteps and required their overnight

33Donald H. Clairmont & Demis W. Ma@, @ïcviIIe Reiocation Report (Halifax: hstitute of Public .Wairs, Dalhousie University, 1971) 123.

%nid.,79. 191. See aiso Clairmont & Magil, L@ arddruth, 125.

3ZClairmont & Magili, Life and dmh, 125. 142 care. Thus, even though it appears many whites took part in 'th' activities in Afncville, contnbuting to its defective reputation, the stigma ofwild socid deviance remained with those who lived there, while whites retumed unscathed to their respectable spaces. Ironically, while whites ventured into Africville in ways ,4î?icville people could never reciprocate, it is the community itself which is seen to "spread to infect other realms of life in the city.

A blend of exoticism, fascination, revulsion and fear feeds the venture into Other space, from which the dominant subject can return, having survived the danger, to profess expertly on the situation across the border. A key component in this process is an establishment of innocence. achieved through the very Iack of connection to the objects of study. For instance, Frank Doyle, in describing .~cvilIe'sconsumption of what may be

"throw-away materiai to some." leaves unspoken the question of who rnight be the subject who "throws away." For AfricviIIe to be seen as a space apart, it must be seen in isolation, as unconnected to his own life and CO the lives of others whose material privilege is reaiiied through ..Vncville's lack. The slurn e'usts before you enter it: it remains, unchanged, after you leave it. its traces invisible on your body.

Conclusion

Educationai messages are not Iirnited to the lessons learned in schools, but can be broadIy regarded as teachhgs which reach and instruct the general public through various discursive sites. How the white public came to be educated about .AfkïcvilIe is amiutable, lar~ely,to daiiy newspapers and magazines: however, the formulations of knowiedge 143 presented through such media came tiom experts who generated studies and surveys of black communities, and from oficials and social workers who interpreted and utilized the information in specific ways. The management of diierence made possible by these discursive practices is theorized in Foucault's concept of g~vementality.~Foucault explained the

State not as a unified body which simply exerts power over its constituents, but as a labyrinth of many agencies and institutions through which power relations and modes of governance are produced. Cameron McCanhy and Greg Dimitriadis employ this notion to insist that the public school system is part of, not separate fiom, a network of socializing agents which constitutes and manages racial difference in ways consistent with popular culture and policy- making. The State, as a de-centred body, is not only Iegitimized as a goveming mechanism but it produces, and promotes or suppresses, the identities which are to be rnanaged.

McCarthy and Dimitriadis study, in particular, an herican educational initiative in which top-ranking, mainly middle-class students from eIite universities are recniited to teach in underpriviieged rural regions or racialized inner city ghettos. The inner city is configured as a dangerous area in which students are already 'at risk'. Mer only a few weeks of trainin3 the graduate-teachers, who are not necessarily fiom education or teacher-training programs, become 'civilizing agents', entering the new terrain tu displace the inferior teachers who, purportedly, are normally attracted to these areas. The idea behind the program is that the

'best and bnghtest' should be encouraged to serve Amenca through the school system and to

mFor ftrther explmation, see Graham BurcheIi, CoIin Gordon & Peter Miller, eds. The FozicmiIt Effect: Stirdies iiz GovernmeiitaIity (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 199 1); Michel Foucault, Powr -KnuwIedge:Selecred interviews and other ivrisÏngs, 19724977, ed- Coli Gordon (New York : Pantheon Books, 1980). compensate for the inferior education of poor children; it is put forth much the way working in the armed forces is fiarned as service to the nation. The concept of the 'best and brightest' stands as aiornatic and is not interrosated as to its underlying race and class implications.

Likewise, the authors state, problems of the Iower social classes are increasingly identified in popular culture as persona1 issues of low self-esteern or inter-farnily struggies to 'get along'.

Inner city children, then. simply need good instruction to deveiop and nurture the middle-class skills and values which will raise their prospects for productive participation in society."'

While this discourse concerns schooling. it is remarkably similar to the urban pianning rhetoric discussed earlier which depicred the disciplinary problems of the pom and rninority communities whose 'family' and 'home' situations were found to be at fault. Thomas

Popkewitz deploys an image of pedagogy as a "scaffolding" of discursive practices which converse in constniçting a conceptual 'space' in which children are located. For instance, to rcfer to a child as being 'at risk', he notes, is io draw on a web of interconnected ideas and concepts fiom a variety of sites which construct the space that child inhabits. and from which she or he can be evaluated, 'known' or addre~sed.~'Sirnilarly, the scaffoiding which defined and 'placed' AfricviIle assembled 'knowIedge7 brnmany places, discourses, disciplines, and

37Cameron McCarthy & Greg Dimitriadis, "Governrnentality and the Socioiogy of Education: Media, Educationat Policy and the Politics of Resentment," British Jour~~afof Soc~ulogyof Eüucatioii 11,2 (1000). See also Thomas S. Popkewitz, Stnrgghg for the Socil: The Politics of Schoolirrg mtd the Consin~citoirof the Teacher (New York: Teacher's College Press, 1998), which critiques the teaching pro- described above, examining ways in which educators' thinking constnicts some chikiren as always and aiready excluded in relation to the figure of the 'normalized' child. The normdiation process, he &tes, works through the generation of what are sen to be universai principles against whch al1 cMdren are judged.

D8~opkewi~Striigglitrig for rhe Sail, 2931. 145 practices; this knowledge concerned many social constructions, including race, place, class, gender, sex, moraiity, respectability, degeneracy, agency, intelligence and rationaiity.

Discourses generated by the news media, representing the thinking of mainly white planners, academics, and social workers, were insidious and persistent in their pathologizing of ficville and its residents. Where AfnMIle voices were recorded, they were usually portrayed in parody - as sentimental, ignorant or hostile. In most white accounts, Afncville's conditions were tied to an alleged interna1 lack of industriousness and rationality. Whether entering Aiticville to study it, change it, to enjoy its difference or in atternpt to appropriate it, white subjects expressed both their longing for and €eu of Othemess, and exercised their unquestioned dominance and access. Upon return, they authored their experiences and perspectives, subsuming residents' subjectivity in white configurations of knowledge about blacks.

While not ail of this knowledge was straightforwardly neçative, sorne was blatantly racist, some was contùsing or contradictory, and much was arrogant in its presumptions.

Frequently, what were presented as liberai ideas of progress, integration and assistance rnasked other agendas, reshaping racism in ways that took time to umave!. What is interesting to unpack is how spatiai practices are responsible for knowledge production, while this knowledge is then fiindamental to further spatiai reguiation. Let us look at a brie€history: black communities were traditionaiiy dlotted isolated areas with poor soil. This positioned them as already 'outsiders', antithetical to society and progress. Provision of services to them was seen to be unnecessary; when their lack of services determined their substandard Living 146 conditions, this solidified a sense of their backwardness. When they developed a new settlement more suited to their needs and not as far away, city garbage and other waste were dumped on their doorstep; they were then said to live in flth. When they developed coping mechanisms, such as scavenging. they were said to enjoy profit fiom this flth, to consider the garbage of whites a pnze. While law enforcement and protection were denied, the community was recognized as a site of deviant behaviour, residents were deemed immoral.

Further, knowledge produced in the white public realm referred to intellectual perspectives as well as behaviours and lifestyles. When Aficville residents failed to complain or were unheard, they were said to be docile and apathetic; when they did protest, they were called paranoid and bitter. CVhen they analyzed their oppression. they were assumed to invent or exaggerate it; when they questioned the white-defined solutions imposed upon them they were called irrational. Perhaps most appallingiy, when they rejected these arrangements, they were condemned as ungratehl.

The community of .4f?icville is widely known in Canadian history. This work is hardiy the first to reflect upon it, nor the first to criticize what was done to it. However, former theories have stopped short of linking the management and manipulation of infotmation to the careh1 regulation of both bodies and spaces; they have not articulated how these Linked phenomena portray the dominant group as not only faultless, but innocent, generous and vastly misunderstood. This construction of innocence is achieved not onIy through concrete regulation of space and its concomitant Lfe practices, but through the formulation and circulation of raciai discourse, and its subsequent sculpting of the interpretive story that is to be known afterward. In this, past, present and hreare braided; space, identity and dominance intertwined. Chapter ïII

The Destruction of Africville: Fusing racial discourse and spatial management

With a sense of the racial discourses in operation prior to iüiicville's destruction, it is possible to think more cnticaily about the technologies of spatial management which they enabled. These discourses also make possible the telling of a particular story about not oniy what was done, but why it was necessary. As a precursor to examining the demolition of hfncville, the previous chapters have attempted to intempt any propensity to displace events from history. It is crucial, for example, to remember the ongoing spatial regulation and displacement of blacks in Nova Scotia over time, the history of slavery and the mentality of a slave-holding society, and the many racial discourses which both stemmed from and fed decisions about the management of blackness. As this chapter aims to demonstrate, the project of demolishing ficville, while fiamed as a liberal, progressive move toward

inteçration and the betterment of lives, actuaily achieved the continued monitoring and

containment of a community seen to be internaily disordered and inferior.

Decision-makers in Atncville's story were, directly and indirectjy, those who

completed the studies and reports on the black community discussed previously. They

supplied and received expert advice, and concurred with the elements of anaiysis which best

supported their own agenda. They constnrcted the officia1narratives to be leamed and

circulated about Afncviile and received in their rnoming papers depictions of a vile and

dangerous place, occupied by ignorant people with strange and revolting habits. They, dong

with the generai public, opened their nationai magazine to Ieam of a suiister jungle in their 149 midst, in which residents were uncooperative and ungratefbl over efforts to save them. And whether or not al1 of white Nova Scotia had consciously accepted these depictions, they had inherited a history in which racialized segregation and violence were naturalized, one which made the space of the Other seem empty, as if awaiting their civilizing imprint.

-4s the story of LLrelocation''reveds, this process was thoroughiy determined and overseen by whites who consulted with ALiicville residents in oniy the most trivial manner.

These dominant officials planned a program in which Afncville voices would be heard not only too late, but as minor, bothersome inconveniences. Pan 1 of this chapter looks closely at the process of destruction, relying, in many ways, on the 1971 work of Donald Claimont and

Demis Magill. These professors were commissioned by the Nova Scotia Department of

Public Welfare, in conjunction with the Department of National Health and Welfare, to conduct a detailed study of the entire relocation program. ïhey were provided with administrative support by the Dalhousie Institute of Public Mairs, which produced several of the urban renewal studies discussed in Chapter 2. Requested in order to judge the success or failure of the Afiiaille movement, the AFricviIle Relocation Report was camed out at the project's tail end. While I disagree in a nurnber of respects with the reasons it posits for relocation, the sheer volume and detail of the research far surpasses any other source; therefore, i both use and critique this report. While any story is consuucted based on the resources and theoreticd bent of its teller. 1 have attempted to check infiormation, where possibIe, against news accounts of events, retrospective works by black writers, official letters 150 and minutes of meetings, and a visuai representation of Africvlfle's history at the Nova Scotia

Black Culturd Centre.

Clairmont and Magill had access to both bIack and white voices which are not, to my knowiedge, recorded elsewhere. They inte~ewedresidents, city oficids, planners and visiting scholars. They were able to document city cound meetings, for instance, and then obtain different participants' opinions as to what occurred within them. They obtained first person accounts of meetings in AtiicvilIe concerning views of the fiiture move. ïheir report has been converted ta a book which is now in its 3d edition, and Clairmont has gone on to colIaborate closely with the black community in producin%cornmernorative work.

The centrality of this research is, of course, a consequence of racial domination, whereby white academics have FrequentIy had greater access to information about the black community's fate than blacks themselves, often cornpiete with monetary payment and career advancement. 1acknowledge the similarities in this and my own position, and have struggied with the question of what another anaiysis by a white scholar might offer. With the use of different theoretical tools. and of course a hindsight informeci by much black scholarship on race, this retellinç aims to unearth and develop some of the underlying themes of the relocation decision which have gone IargeIy unconsidered in the white community, the press, and academic scholarship. This is the centrai goai ofpart [I. Here, 1consider the analysis in the Relocation Report, several theses, and various other dominant media discourses on

Afiicville's destruction. i augment or depart fiom these accounts in significant ways, given my focus on the interactions of spatial orderings and raddiscourse. Through consideration 151 and critique of the e-qlanations offered thus far, my andysis culminates in a re-situated understanding of Afiicville's destruction. This represents an interrogation of the intentions of city oficiais, the integrity of the liberal discourses of the time, and what 1 feel to be an overail lack of evidence that this project was designed to improve either Life conditions of Miicville people or race relations in Nova Scotia.

Many sources critique the AtiicvilIe dislocation for its failure to provide well for residents or for its lack of follow-up. Some, such as Clairmont and Magill, do acknowledge a general cultural context in which racism exists and has historically shaped the destinies of blacks in Nova Scotia. However, even when racisrn is acknowledged, they have been hesitant to suggest that it fùndarnentaily permeated the Mcviile decision at every stage. Further, concepts such as progress, the slum, crime or degeneracy, for instance, are presented 'dong with' the existence of racism, but are not seen to be shaped by it. %lile more than one factor can be seen to influence the destruction of Afticville, what is missed is how various factors must support one another - for example. racial Othering nrldurban renewal nrrd white paternaiism together - in order to produce the destruction in question.

Where some racism in the communities of whites is mentioned, it is rarely located in speciftc actions or bodies, nor is it seen as a continuous facet of everyday life over tirne. More commonly, a generalized 'history of racism' is acknowledged as a factor in the socio- economic circumstances of Afiicville blacks. This history is seen to have created the present situation, which officiais must now correct; racisrn is not brought into the present, and it is not explicitiy ünked to the 'knowledge' underpinning the decisions of individuais and governing 152 bodies in the 1960s. Marty statements on the part of officiais are taken at face value only, and the deeper narratives overlooked. For instance, statements by interviewees and City officids quoted in the Clairmont and MagiU report are ofien 'reported' without comment or hrther analysis. The function of the work seems to be that of making al1 voices and viewpoints in the process available to the public. This is an extremely important role, providing crucial data; my project is to use it to posit a new analysis.

In the reiocation report, some theses and other work, race is treated delicately; pains are taken to make clear that none of the decision-makers intended any hm. While this rnay be true, the result is a disembodied, amorphous racism that sirnply 'occurst, like natural disaster, or one that was enacted by whites only far in the past. 1 suggest that .4fncville must be claimed by whites as a part of our history of racism, as a moment in a continuum of systernic discrimination, which we must analyze and rernember. We cannot seriously consider the operation of racism unless it can be located in specific practices and sites. When it remains a 'fiee-floating' concept, isolated in the past, there are no responsible parties, no implicated bodies, no conscious decisions, and no harm. As long as a veil of innocence is permitted centre stage, this sort of accountability cannot be examined, defined or claimed. This is not to suçgest that individuals or groups were always fiilly aware of the consequences of their decisions; it is to assert, strongly, that researchers and decision-makers operated within a contekT of mcism which had been so firmly in place for centuries as to make it quite natural, and thus invisible, to them. 153

At the same time that 1 question assertions of an unqualified positive intent ?O desegregate Halifax and to improve the lives of Afidle people, 1 also acknowledge that discursive and spatial practices have far-reaching effects which cannot always be predicted.

There is no simple dichotomy between 'good' and 'bad' intentions which can be defined or compared. Thus 1 am not suggesting that researchers or officiais in the Afncville decision operated out of bnd intent, but rather that the almost unrelenting insistence on their gooù intent, at the time of forced relocation as well as in the present, diverts serious consideration of the consequences, hmand racism in their actions. 1 am sugçesting that the emphasis on benevolence must be tabled and that investments in innocence musr be relinquished, in order to analyze how, regardless of what decision-rnakers thought they were doing, they did it within a context of racism, tùeIled by racist ideology. Funher, as this chapter demonstrates, their plans and actions had harmfitl consequences. Before these considerations are addressed in a meanin,$Ùl way, we can never be assured of preventing funher Afncvilles.

Part 1: The Destruction of Africville

The pretense of decision-making

Like their formation, the demise of spaces ofien seems to corne about naturally, evolving with necessity and the 'obvious' progression of tirne and society. In response to many analyses which suggest Afncville's destruction was simply an 'unfortunate' event, 1 have 154 seen it necessary to map the intricate and deliberate planning process of white people in dominant positions who were able to subjugate and destroy a community.

It was early in ficville's life that whites building the Intercolonial Railway first imposed srnaiier scale dislocations. A petition from William Brown of ficville, dated EvIarch

2 1, 1860, requests compensation for land exproptiated by the City six years earlieP9 and an

1855 report States that several families had been moved but had yet to be compensated. In some cases, railway trustees provided nearby land for relocatees but did not siy it over to thern for five year~.''~By 1901, the City had forced five families to move ro make way for more railway tracks and before long several sets of tracks had been built through the centre of

Afncville, meaning residents were forced to cross them to visit neighbours or attend schoo1."'

Besides the noise, pollution and danger of the railways, Afncville had soon to contend with a nearby prison, an infectious diseases hospital, the nearby dump and the city's night

~oil.'~'A trachoma hospital was built in the Afncville area afler other city residents complained about its proposed proimity to their own homes. requesting that it be isolated on the ~utskirts."~Halifax, by 1907, had purchased properties on ail sides of iüncville. This

3$ublic Archives of Nova Scotia, iüncville File, document I.

'mIbid-, 13 1.

%id., 134

2a'CIainnont & Magill, Lïfi and death, 100.

''31bid., 109. 155 placed the city in a good position to bargain with rnanufacturers wishing to expand; tfiis expansion in tum produced odour and waste and in some cases required additional railway construction. Due to the demands for employment in Afncville and the dernand for cheap labour by business persons, many Africville men worked in the construction of rail Iines, and uthers gathered the ni@ soi1 tiom Halifax. necessarily bringinç it home with them.'u Thus the relationship of AFncvilIe people to those who encroached on their space became one of dependence, with Afncville hosting the city's dirt, relying on the meagre wages offered and having to fight for compensation when its employers destroyed irs homes. Meanwhile, Halifax expanded its industry and transportation, and contained rnuch of its waste in a separate, racial slum on the outskirts of the city while avoiding the expense of providing seMces to those who lived there.

The construction of industry in this area contributed to fùrther spatial class and race divisions as former white north-end residents flocked to the southem neighbourhoods to avoid the blight and decay of the north. With a conscious agenda to expand the north end as an industriai site, the city government refiised improvements in Afncville's living conditions. saying the land was slated for industriai use in any case. City Council minutes suggest that municipal officiais had long planned AfncviIle's hture as an industrial zone. The City

Engineer, in 19 15, stated this intent, adding "we may be obiiged in the tiiture to consider the interest of the industry tir~t.""~However, as plans to take over the Iand were not to become

"Ibid., 100.

"'Halifax City CounciI, Mirilites, 9 September, 19 l5,2I 1. 156 officiai policy until the 1960s, Afncville was forced to Live in an uncertain state, growing fùrther endangered by fire hazard and contaminated water, while officiais dodged questions and avoided head-on confrontation of the issue. Other than the occasionai rurnour of rnass dislocation residents had Little glimpse of what they might face and neither the nor resources to prepare.

In the decades leading up to AfiicviIle's destruction. various negotiations took place over the use of its land between the city and industries, none of which involved discussion with residents themselves. Smail plants and industries continued to operate or shift hands, and the city dump was moved more directly ont0 Atncville land, with no consultation of ilfricville resident~.'~The City maintained a steadfast control over its Aiïicville-area propenies, retùsinç offers of purchase from ptivate citizens. When Atncville's pastor requested land to rebuild the church, City Council members agreed, on the advice of the City Engineer, to Iease the land on the condition that it be aIlowed to revoke the space and destroy the church

"prornptly" if need be. They also rented unserviced lots to severai Afiicville families, thus continuing to collect rental income in the interim period while planning appropriation. For a period, there was discussion of 'redeveloping' the area as a residential site. A 1945 CiMc

Planning Commission report recommended the removal of ficville, the City Prison and the abattoir, in order to build "a most desirable residential section."'47 However, Council adhered, in prînciple, to its industria1 plans.

'*'~rea Residents Anxïous to Have Rights Honored", Halifi Mail Star 16 October, 1962.

'"Clairmont & Magili, Relocatimt Report, 146. 157

Oddly, other uses of Afiicville land were occasionally approved and then deserted, as if Council were paying Lip service to other ideas without intent to see them through. In 1948, after a city-wide rezoning, plans were oficially approved for the extension of a water line into

Afncville, but were never put into effect. In the early 1950s, the City Manager presented a report to council involving plans for the movement of Afncville people to a nearby area just to the southwest of the community's curent site. This plan budgeted for water lines, sewerage, proper lighting and the construction of sidewalks, curbs and gutters. It provided for large lots on which two-story houses would be built and sold to residents at pnces believed possible for them. This plan was accepted by Council, but was also never implemented.

Council's reasons for the abandonment of this and the 1948 water line proposal are not offered in the Clairmont report. or elsewhere to my knowledge. They seem only to have quietly joined the City's proverbial graveyard of promises, existing and upcoming, where

Afncville was concerned. Again, they had been drawn in the absence of negotiation with

Atncville residents. Govemment officiais continually discussed AfncvilIe as a 'problern' which they would solve Iargely among themselves and with the supporting advice of outside experts. They proceeded with invitations to Canadian National Railways, the National

Harbours Board and the Port of Halifàx Commission to participate in detailed planning around the development of the industr trial Mi1e."IU

'48HalifaxCity Council, Minutes, 17 September, 1954. 158

At the same time, the two decades leading up to Afncville's end saw many changes in the social structure of the village. According to both residents and researchers, a nurnber of transient people arrived atler Worid War II, bringing with them more drinking, bootlegging and crime."g Those not indigenous to Miicville were seen as representative of the community, and the 'deviant' behaviour became a generaiized assumption on the part of other

Haligonians. Given the pre-existing raddiscourses about .4fncville as a slum area, the lack of services and, now, some social Fragmentation, the tirne was seen as ripe for the community's destruction. City officiais, armed with the inteçration rhetoric of the day, the various urban renewai studies and much research about black cornrnunities, could justiQ clearing what most whites considered a fiIthy and degenerate radslum.

By the mid- 1950s. it was clear within Council that the expropriation of Mricville lands would soon be close at hand. One area in Afncville had been purchased by 1957, and the

Stephenson Report, echoing both plans for industriai developrnent and concerns about community viability, had been released dunng the same year. From this penod on, city officiais appear to have spent much time discussing, in the words of one aiderman, "a great urgency in securing title to these land^.""^ The plan to build an Industrial Mile was soon adopted and eventually incorporated into the greater North Shore Developrnent Plan. By

1962 this agenda included plans for an eqressway ntnning through the AFncvilIe site, a certain amount of industrial deveiopment, a housing section constnicted on the City Prison's

'4gClainnont& Magill, Li& md dea~h,127-124.

'-"Halifax City Councl Mimites, 16 May, 1957,338-339. 159 lands3' with a primary school in the former prison building, and ample recreational facilities.

In this plan, released to the press in February of 1962, the removal of Afncville is said to be slated for spnng of that year. Clairmont and Magill, however, document that no concrete reIocation plans were drawn until 1963. As we wiii see, this apparent confusion over the nature and timing of plans is not an isolated case.

The pretence of consultation

The only solution to this problem was to get the people out of there and into sornethin~that more approximated a normal way of life.'s'

The Housing Policy and Review Cornmittee, in 1961, recommended the establishment of another department to oversee the demolition of .ficville. The DeveIopment Department, which would administer urban renewal programs, was formed a few months later.

Development Officer Robert Grant began his term with a focus on three major areas: the downtown redevelopment, Uniacke Square - a housing project for relocated residents. and

Afncville itself Interviewed severai years later by Clairmont. Grant reported that he had perceived three possible directions from which to begin planning in Afiicville: he could undertake another survey, he could compose a report without knowing anything about

AtiicvilIe, or he could attempt to learn about Afncville "in an indirect way, without getting domto the reai individuai problems... but to define generally what the situation was in some

"'The prison was slated for removai and a new structure was to be buiit to hold ail County, HaIifa~and Dartmouth inmates. Clairmont & MagilL RefocationReport, 156.

"Aibert Rose, quoted in Claimiont & Magill Relocation Report, 222. I6O more rneaningfd way than by r~mour."~~Feeling that the first option wouId be fnritIess and would "create more hostility," and the second irresponsible, he undertook to lem about

AfncviUe indiredy. Grant's plan consisted of scheduling "several discussions with a young gentleman who had been a resident of Afiicville as a youngster and pretty well knew ... what their circurnstances were, not necessarily up to date, but generally the ~ituation."'~~Mer these conversations, with one former resident who had lived there only as a child, Grant wrote a report to City Council descnbing the people and the conditions in Afncville, and recommending its demolition "despite the wishes of many of the residents.""'

His report begins with the excerpt fiom the Stephenson report quoted in Part CI1 of the previous chapter; Grant uses this summary of conditions and his own 'research' as the basis for his decisions. He foregrounds the legal machinery by which buildings could be ordered vacated and demolished, and land expropriated. Three options are put forth as overall policy toward AficMlle, including the plan to continue to do nothing. A second option is to use hl1 statutory powers to remove the blight and to lirnit compensation to "the absoiute minimum required by law." Third, the option recommended - and thereaîler quoted fiequently - is to use statutory authority to "remove the blight and, at the sarne time, temper justice with compassion in matters of compensation and assistance to the families affected."" in this, the

"'Robert Grant, "City of HaIifax, Development Deparnent Report, 23 July, 1962," in CIaùmont & MagilI, Relocatior~Report, Appendi il l6 1 city is able to go beyond its official obligation, to remove Africville while appearing not only concerned but generous. Caution is advised, however, in making sure gratuitous payrnents of

$500 go only to "dese~ngpersons." This would be determined based on their ability to obtain w-ritten proof From a minister (or other "responsible persod') attesting to occupancy of their homes for at least five years.'57 Despite his meagre research, Grant later told Clairmont and MagiII that he had been determined to avoid "rebuilding a coloured ghetto on the same land."38 He admitted his reasons were "pretty primitive" but did not elaborate.

The Development Department Report was released to Thr Mail Star on August 1,

1962. One week later, nearly one hundred Alîicville people met with M.L.A. Ahem Frorn

Halifax North, at his request, to discuss the proposed plans, unanimously rejecting the move.

Residents, afier years of petitioninç for services and building permits for their community, again expressed their desire to improve the homes they owned according to city specificati~ns."~Ahem was one of very few government officiais sympathetic to their concerns and told the press he felt it unfair to take a home someone owned and replace it with one rented fiom someone el~e.'~'

The release of the Report sparked a more intensive focus on organization around the impending relocation plan. However, activism had long been underway dready. Influenced

srfiid., A7.

"8CIairmont & Magill, Relocnriorl Report, 163.

3s'Residents Want to Keep Homes,'? HalmMail Star

'60Clairmont & Magill, Relocation Report, 165. 162 by contact with the National Cornmittee on Human Rights, some Afncville residents formed a

Ratepayers Association. In response to Afncvilleans' cornplaints about their inabiIity to obtain building permits fiom the City, the National Cornmittee's Associate Secretary advised more intensive organization of leadership in Afncville, and sent a lawyer, Alan Borovoy, to meet with residents and city officiais to study Afncville's situation. His visit, as discussed in the previous chapter, involved some research into the nature and level of racism in HaIifau.

He also encouraged intemal initiative and was able to spark the formation of the Halifax

Human Rights Advisory Committee (KHRAC) by introducing some key Afncville leaders to

City activists, both black and white, who showed interest in protecting residents' rights.

However, Borovoy, like most social reformers of the time, stressed the importance of racial integration and opposed the rehabilitation of Afncville as a comrnunity. When intewiewed later for the Clairmont report, he admitted having had little knowledge of AFncviIle upon his amval and that he had perceived the community as a slum and its residents as "squatters and transientsV*Borovoy, who accepted that the cornrnunity's destruction was inevitable , focused on the achievement of a fair deal for residents upon relocation, their successfùl integration into the rest of society and the implementation of fair employment and accommodation Iegi~lation.'~'

'6'Stem, "Diehard Racism"; Clairmont & Magiii, Relocarion Report, 175; Howard McCurdy, "AfncviIIe: Environmental Racism," in Faces of Ettvtro~nnenialRacism: Cot~fiontingImres of GlobalJi~stice,eds. Laura Westra & Peter S. Wenz (Lanham, Md. : Roman & Littlefield, 1995)- The Halifax Human Rights Advisory Cornmittee, organized in the wake of Borovoy's visit, consisted of a core membership of ten people - four whites and six blacks - onIy three of whom were fiom Afncville. Other citizens attended various meetings at different times over the group's six-year existence, but in general, membership remained low. The group's mandate was to protect the interests of Africville people, to investigate alternative living accommodations and to provide advice and technical information. Ail but one of the non-

Afncville members were proponents of racial integration. At no point was the çroup considered by Afiicville residents to represent their position; the Afncville group members were not elected or appointed by community residents, and consultation with the community was extremely 10w.'~' The HHRAC did, however, attempt to giean a clearer picture of the city's intentions regarding Africville, and to discern their reasons t'or expropriating the land based on questions arising From meetings in Afiicville.

In HHRAC correspondence with Robert Grant, the Development Officer represents the city's mandate as principally humanitarian in nature, with the ahof improving living conditions for .4fncville people. Redevelopment of the area in an 'orderly' way is a secondary benefit. He rerninds residents that had they not been historically "unique" as a community, the lands would have been taken much earlier and the people lefi to fend for themsel~es.'~ïhe onset of the correspondence seemed to delineate a marked shift in the city's reasoning behind

x'Clairmont & Magill, Relocatim Report, 3 77. The authors report that the majonty of AfiicdIe residents said they had never had contact with the HHRAC;virnially none were involved in the planning process once the relocation program was underway.

=Robert B. Grant to Donald F. Maclean, correspondence, 22 January, 1963, in CIainnont & Ma@, Rrlocation Report, Appendix D. 164 its relocation agenda, from industrial development to urban renewal for the purposes of integration. Athough at times both reasons were cited, it becarne increasingly more common to hear about the appalling conditions in ficville and the need to establish a healthier way of life for the community. Industrial developrnent, which was never achieved on a large scale, seemed to fa11 by the wayside once the integration discourses of the 1960s became more centrai?@

Meeting with the HHRAC following this correspondence, Grant consistently vetoed the committee's alternative suggestions for new housing. One member requested the investigation of building new homes which could be purchased in the North End, rather than public housing. When the development oficer replied that there was no reasonable basis on which to subsidize homes, it was suggested they be built "as an act of reparati~n."~'This,

Grant replied, would require a policy decision beyond his responsibility. Although that is hardly surprising, the idea could have been taken back to Council and raised broadly.

Apparently, it went no tùrther.

During this meeting, the HHRAC expressed concern that negotiations with landowners had begun to take place on an individuai basis, rather than in an orgaanizzed group effort. Throughout the relocation period, it appears that the city's method of dealing with residents one-on-one conuibuted to the difficulties of organizïng as a coiiective, and

2MWhilethis has not been stated opedy by City officiais, I noticed a shifi in the discussion as relocation drew nearer. Later, in chapter IV, 1 discuss the former mayor's denial that indusuial development was ever seriously considered.

'6SClaùmont & Magili, Relocation Report, 207 165 sometimes resulted in divisive suspicion and bitterness within the community. When Grant met in AfncMlIe shortly after the issue arose, he reported that residents had nothing to Say and felt that the HHRAC members were the only ones who appeared "disturbed" by the city's actions.'66 Rather than consider the obvious imbalances of power in the meeting between a city official wlio had already decided their tùture and residents who had no political clout, he appears to have taken this as a sign of indifference on their part.

In the meantirne, folIowing the release of Grant's document, the mayor accepted various reports tiom city officiais, including the City Manager, City .Assessor, Commissioner of Works, Commissioner of Health and the Public Service Com~nission.'~~He considered the

Dalhousie report on the 'Conditions of Negroes' dong with the views of these individuds, before calling an official meeting at which the destruction of Afiicville was adopted, unanimously, as city policy. When the HHRAC expressed outrage that neither they nor the people of Africville had been consuited about this policy decision. Mayor Lloyd replied that the meeting had been held only "to set the machinery in motion to procure the views and wishes of the residents before a final decision is made by Co~ncil."'~~By this time, dthougi~a large pomon of .4fricville's land had been expropriated, the city continued to collect tax money from residents living there. When this additionai concern was brought up, the mayor simply agreed that no fùrther decisions would be made untiI residents' views had been kIly 166 considered. Despite this, City Council met the very next day and adopted specific yidelines concerning the procedure of 'rel~cation'.'~~

While the iUiR4C was unrepresentative of the majority of Afiicville residents' desires, they did appear to put significant effort into researching alternatives to the city's plans. Over a period of about eighteen months, the comrnittee explored options such as cooperativc housing, condominiums, private homes, and the rehabilitation of -fncville on site.

Some were rejected by the city due to expenses; cooperative arrangements were seen as impossible by the comrnittee due to ~cville'slack of money, skills and empl~yrnent."~

Finding no apparent viable options. the committee consulted another outside expert, Albert

Rose from the University of Toronto School of Social ~ork,"' Rose visited Halifav in

November of 1963, equipped with a knowledçe of Afiicville gleaned from the reports explored in the previous chapter, including articles fiom Maclean S. Part of his mandate was to indicate any alternatives to relocation which rnight e'ùst and to suggest whether tùrther research would be usehl in finalizing the decision on Atncville's destmction.

Rose told Clairmont and Magill that he spent no more than two hours in Afiicville, and described it as "the worst urban appendage [he] had ever seen," and "a bottomless pit," in which resource investment would be wasted." The rest of his visit was spent interviewhg

'"'""Expert To Seek Solution For Alncville issue," Halifix MdSm, 13 September7 1963. I.

"Clairmont & Ma& Relocation Report, 214. 167

6ve city officials, two social workers and two university specialists, and speaking informdy with other sociai work colleagues. Rose, tike other white 'experts', was of the opinion that segregated housing was unthinkable, and discouraged ~cvillemembers of the HHRAC fiom pursuing federal or provincial tùnding to rebuild the comrnunity.

Rose had been in the position of convincing Afiicvilie residents that no more options lay open to them and that relocation was inevitable. He reported, in Clairmont and Magill's interview, that residents had questioned him repeatedly, "desperately dutching at last straws," to find a way to save their community." Despite this, his report to City CounciI following the visit srated:

The residents of Mricville appear ready and to some enent eager to negotiate a settlement conceminç the ultimate disposition of their community ... The leaders of the community readily admit that Miicville is a slum, that it should be cleared and that it would long since have been cleared if the inhabitants were of a different racial backgr~und.'~'

Following this appallingly false statement, which it noted but not specifically critiqued as a contradiction in the relocation report, Rose advised against a Iarser study of Afncville. He stated that most of the necessary facts were already known by city officials, whom he felt possessed a great knowledçe of conditions in Aficville. WhiIe he admitted otticials had had little direct contact with families in Atncville and knew little about their kinship systems, basic attitudes and social relationships, he reported that tùrther survey would only delay the cmcial

-'I1~IbertRose, "Report of a Visit to Halifax with Particuiar Respect to Afncvüle," in Clairmont & Magiil, Relocation Report, Appendix F, A62 See also "End AtndeBIight," ha^^^ Mail Star. 168 process of relocation. Among his reasons for supporting hll-scale dernolition of the cornrnunity, Rose wrote: "Can a minority group be permittecl to reconstitute itself as a segregated community at a time in our history, at a time in the social history of western industrialized urban nations when segregation either de jure (in law) or de facto (in fact) is almost everywhere c~ndemned?""~ Thus, by appropriating civil ri@s discourse and appealing to the views of many Iiberals who embraced it, Rose positioned any impetus to save

Atiicville as primitive and racist. He proceeded with a detailed outline of recommendations to make the rnove, in his view, as painless as possible. They included the hll-scale destruction of iUiicville between April 1, 1964 and December 3 1, 1966.

While the Rose report was seen as the linchpin in the Alticville relocation, -4ibert Rose himself stated in retrospect that he had never considered his work to be a final or rnaster plan and was surprised when the city treated it with such reverence. He criticized that the city had accepted onty the aspects of his report which directly supported their agenda. However, both an HHIWC member and the development officer reported that they suspected Rose had been clear about his support of the city's decision before he ever visited Halifax. The media capitaiized on this confirmation ofthe City's goals. providing wide coverage on the Rose report and the City's consequent acceptance of it. Shortly der Rose's visit, the mayor was quoted as stating that the takeover "WouId not in any way be breakinç the wishes of the 169 people there.""6 Robert Grant ciearly felt Rose to be an important outside source of confirmation of the city's existing intent. HHRAC members dso reported that his view dispeiied doubts and confirmai their support of relo~ation.'~This is unsurpnsing in Light of the copious references throughout correspondence and inte~ewsto Rose's superior expertise in the area oFreIocation and housing.

Within six weeks of the report's release in December of 1963, Halifax City Council formally accepted its recornmendations. Mayor Lloyd, at this time, urged fast adoption so that legislation could be prepared in time for the next meeting of the Nova Scotia Legislature.

However, as a KHRAC member pointed out, the committee had oniy received copies of the report at the start of the meeting and had not had time to read it. Council agreed to take no funher action untir the comrnittee had had this opportunity, and then ordered the legislation drafied anyway. The HHUC met irnrnediately following this meeting and unanimously accepted the Rose report."'

.Afiicville residents were called to a meeting &er the HHRAC's approvai of the report. Thirty-seven residents voted to accept it after much explmation by the committee of the lack of alternatives. The HHRAC reported to City Council the following day that the

"b'Ontario Professor to Snidy Comrnunity," HufifmrhfuiISfar,20 November, 1963, 1.

'-"Clairmont & Ma& Rrlocatiorl Report, 227. The city paid Rose $500 for his brief study and his 10 page report, which mainiy echoed their existing views and plans, This was the same arnount of money offered to many Aâicviiie residents who were considered 'transients' without legal title to their homes. 170

Rose Report had been accepted unanimously by the cornmittee and by 90% of Atncville residents present. They neglected to mention that this 90% consisted of ody thirty seven people, and Iess than 10% of the PLfncville population overail. About one week later, the

HHRAC approached Councit with some additional concerns of Afiicville residents. The mayor refiised to engage with these issues, vaguely commenting that this was not the time to address specific points, but to establish "broad principles." He continued with general assurances that the City was prepared "to look after the people" and do the best they could to make the transition work smoothly. When asked specificaily by an elderly Aîîicville woman about the problern of affording new homes, he responded only that the rnatter would be "kept under continuous study" and that problems would be resolved as they tran~pired.'~A motion was then passed to remove Pfncville within the exact time fkame proposed by Albert Rose.

The process of dernolition

If you ever watched someone you love die slowly, day-by-day, hour-by-hour, then you know what it was like being in Africville during the rel~cation.'~"

i think you get an atmosphere where you are reaily operating by consensus. Whoever does the initiai report ... is reaily making the decision. That was reaily the atmosphere in which it was d~ne.'~'

'SoCharles R Saunders, "A Visit to Afiïcville," in AficviIZe: A Spirit rhat Lives On. 18.

'8'AIderman, quoted in Clairmont & Magill, Relocation Report, 272. 17 1

Taking up one of the suggestions of the Rose Report, the City of Halifax appointed a social worker to oversee negotiations in housing arrangements and the transition of -Micville residents to their new homes. Peter MacDonald took t his position within the City

Development Department in mid-1964 as the relocation was underway. Shartiy after his arrival, Development OEcer Robert Grant created a policy statement clari@ng the relocation

duties of both the department and the PSriMIle Subcomrnittee of City Council. While the

Development Department was to focus on broad, overarching issues, the Subcommittee was

to ensure the hlfilment of the City's duties to AFricville residents. Provisions were made for

compensation for both properties and relocation expenses. The Development Depmment

was to be responsible for finding new homes and moving residents, as weII as weIfare

assistance "for such a period as appears necessa j':28?the City was to fom rehabilitative

programs in education and employment.

Overall, both the DeveIopment Officer, Robert Grant, and the relocation social

worker, Peter MacDonald, were the most influentid players in the process of demolishing

Afncvilie. MacDonald was the only outsider to have reglx contact with ilfricville people,

and he was responsible for negotiating the temof their compensation. MacDonald reported

directly to Grant. who had uItimate authority on matters con ce min^ the reIocation program.

Grant's role was described as that of "supporting, justi@ing, and implementing City Council's

Afrkville poIicy-" A member of City Council's MiicviUe Subcommittee described his

approach as concerned with the City's interests and designeci to "keep the costs dom, get the

'S'Clairmont & Ma& Rebcatton Report, 146. 172 thing cleaned up with as little controversy as possible, and therefore not Ietting tao much information out."'S3 Another member of the Subcommittee told Claimont and Magill that he had sometimes feIt uncomfortable with Grant's involvement and suspected some reports fiom

MricviIle to have been "whitewashed" in favour of the City. The solution to this concem, however, had been to insist that MacDonald, whose view was trusted, write the reports. This, of course, meant that the information was stili circulated within the same office, among a kw people working in concert.

Grant himseIf reported that the negotiation of each settlement took place among Peter

MacDonald and the individual resident in question, was reported back to him, and was accepted or rejected by himseif and MacDonald before it went on for broader committee approvai.

In Januq of 1965, ihree middie-class bIack members of the HHRAC joined the

.4fiicville Subcornmittee in planning the relocation prograrn. These members were chosen in order chat it not look "as if white people were doing the whole thing."'" From this point onward. the new comrnittee of black organizers and Council rnembers became the body responsibIe for final decisions on .%cville settlements recomrnended by MacDonald. The vas majority of cases received unanimous approval within the comrnittee. Grant attributed this easy agreement to the fact that "these were sensible people,"'85 md committee members themselves consistently reported a view of MacDonald as the expert who knew the community and clearIy offered the best solutions. .Mer the Subcornrnittee's approval, settlements were reviewed by the Finance Committee of CounciI and then passed to City

Council, where they were rubber-stamped.

The fact that discussions over compensation were carried out almost solely between

MacDonaid and individual residents or families was felt by some Africville leaders to contniute heavily to an atmosphere of division and mistrust among residents. In many cases, residents were unaware of different settlements taking place and uncenain of the comparative taimess of their own deals. The City employed different methods of dealing with individuals.

In some cases, older residents who were seen as community leaders were approached and bought out first in the hope that other residents would follow. In later interviews, some city officiais admitted to offerinç extra good deals in initial negotiations to inspire other residents to consider leaving. hother official observed that the social assistance tùnds offered residents by the relocation social worker were intended for this purpose.

C think in many cases the effect was to soft-pedal or sofi-pad the transitionai period. to perhaps conceai Eom people really the fully impact of the economic burden and so on which they would have to encounter, making the entire relocation more acceptable to the people and in many respects unredistic because these ftnd were terminated with the termination of [the social worker's] empl~yment.'~

One elderly man, Aaron "Pa" Carvery, held out longer than any others in his Atncville home. He was finaily sumrnoned to City Hall by officiais who took him to a pnvate room and 1 71 offered him a suitcase tirIf of cash.'" When he retùsed to accept this, City officials raised the amount slightly and stated that the land would be taken whether or not he accepted the offer.

When he asked that his house be moved to a nearby site, they agreed, oniy to change their minds later.

As Clairmont and Magill have ascenained, the overall tone of the City's plan lefi no room for either colIective action or a cooperative approach. Likewise, subcommittee meetings were not open to residents as, City staffexplained, the persona1 circurnstances of residents being discussed were of a confldential nature, and they feared some residents might not treat them as such. This seems hi_ghly absurd in Iight of their own invasion of .4fncville lives.

Settlements themselves were inconsistent and simply developed by precedent as the process unfolded. City Council consistently avoided specific and detailed plans, sticking to benigi, generalired statements such as "taking care of people," and "for as long as it seems necessary." No guidelines e'asted because, the development officer explained, no set amounts could have been legally justified for the properties. The relocation cornmittee claimed to have accepted AfncvilIe residents' stones of their land ownership in cases where proof was not available; however, most residents told Clairmont and MagiU in surveys that they had never had contact with the Subcomrnirtee and were distrusthi of the sociai worker. While Grant stated that the age, ernployment status and the number of children in families were taken into

"'kid-, 297- The City Iater issued a statement of regret over the incident, but denied any üi intent. 175 account, another member of the committee reported that "characte? and "reputation" of residents were also important factors: "Sometimes a Cornmittee member would indicate that a certain feilow had a reputation as being very irresponsible, even though he had a family. If he got a grant of so much money, it would end up back in the provincial coffers via the liquor store, or something like that...'''xg

Grant's own view of Afncville undoubtedIy imbueci his notion of undeserving citizens.

He referred to Afncville as a slum made up of shiftless people who kept goinç mainly through their "common misery." He eqressed both class- and race-based disdain for the lower orders in general, stating about Afncville, "They had a tendency to live for today, and not worry about the consequences. 1 suppose it is not unlike some of the mining towns. . . You talk to a group of miners, you know, you Say, 'Why do you do this?' And they Say, 'We like it,' and they [ive for today."'" The latter statement is panicularly offensive considering, first, the

City's annihilation of Afncville's fbture, and second, their overwhelming failure to instigate any long-range plan themselves.

While some residents received above market value for their homes and land many, who could not demonstrate clear title, received "moral claim" payments of $500. Furniture allowances were offered, but when the City learned of some cases in which these tùnds had been used for other expenses, they insisted on holding the money and having tùrniture stores bill them directly for the purchases. Similar to the moral judgements used in determining compensation, this tactic is overwheImingly paternalistic. While other services, such as Iegal and reai estate advice, were ostensibIy provided for residents, most residents surveyed were unaware of these and under 15% had used them. This seems tied to the extremely Iow level of communication between residents and both their alleged allies, the Halifm Hurnan Rights

Advisory Cornmittee, and the City itself CIairmont and Ma# also foiind that Atncvilleans, even when made aware of these options, had been actively discouraged from using thern, as the social worker was positioned as the oniy tnrsnvonhy source of assistance. Without a network of contacts and resources throughout the city, most fell back upon his çuidance. In the words of Aaron "Pa" Carvery:

The City gave the AfricvilIe people no deal at ail. Some were put into places far worse than what they lefi. Nso, when people iived in Atn'cville, they were not on welfare. .. now, practically everyone is on wdfare and in debt because of high rents and the cost of living... 1 never did like charity, it robs a man of s~rnething.~

In total, the City of Halifa~paid out just under $608 000 in the process of removing

Afncville, including the cost of the church, in addition to waiving $20 600 in hospitai and tau

bill^.^' The estimated cost of the process in 1962 had been between $40 000 and $70 000.

The estimated cost of providing the community with streets, services and new homes on a nearby site had been in the vicinity of $80 000.~'Despite the vast discrepancy between what was expected and actually paid out, most residents continued to Iive in poverty. Despite this,

=Jim Robson, "Last AfncvilIe Resident: If I Had Been A Little Younger City Would Never Have Gotten My Land," HaIifm Mail Star 12 January, 1970.

31Clairmont & Magill, Rttiocation Reporr, 28 t.

=fiid., 150. 177 the City has long maintained that because they went far beyond their expected budget, they were empathetic and generous. This claim, however, discounts the fact that they grossly miscalculated the cost; it was a mistake, not a magnanimous act. The claim also fails to acknowledge that this settlement figure includes welfare payments which were necessary as a product of relocation, and that the waived bills included tar monies charged on properties which received no city services. Further, the majonty of welfare payments were the product of a cost-sharing program between the local, provincial and federai governments. The City's expenditures comprised approximately 25% of the LI1 co~t.~~

Although it is difficult to ascenain an amount, some medical bills would have been incurred from the living conditions in .4m'cville, including fires, contaminated water and poisoning by unde heating methods. On the whole, monies spent were the result of Halifax having refused its responsibilities in ficviile for over 100 years. AI understanding of compensation can no more be divorced ftom tiistory than one of forced dislocation itself

However things are calcuiated numericaily. the Facts aiso remain that residents were not given a choice but were threatened and humiliated, and that no price could be placed on a sense of home and community. A more recent docurnentary film, Remember ilflicville, makes ctear how the psychological effect of witnessing a slow and unpredictable decay of one's surroundings is a violence most potent in the minds of former residents. One man speaks of coming home fiom school as a child to End that the church had been bulldozed and running to tell his mother, who had ais0 been unaware of the plan; another describes never knowing when a nearby home rnight disappear. Physical danger was aIso a tangible fear; one resident remembers being inside a shed where he and his fiends fiequently played when the city began bulldozing the building.* Peter Edwards, a leader in the AfncvilIe community and a member of the HHRAC, reported that the city had threatened to bulldoze people out were they not cooperative in moving on their o~n.~'In this light, defining the negotiation process as one of agreement or contract is extrernely suspect.

The move itself occurred çradually, with the community slowly disintegrating around those who remained - as one city alderman toId a reporter, "the bulldozer is there almost before the ink on the agreement drie~.''~~The emotionai impact of this imposed decay has been noted as a tùrther catalyst which worked in the City's favour to speed up the departure ofsome people. As housing in the Halifax area was scarce, rUncville people were ofien forced to wait for months afier settling with the City before a unit became available. Ofien this meant living temporarily in another area slated for demolition. When moving companies retùsed to enter the community, the City sent garbage trucks to collect the people's belongings.

While some residents were able to afEord their own homes in Halifav or outlying areas, the majonty went to public housing projects - most comrnonly Uniacke Square in the city's

*These stories are also transcribed in Afncville Genealogical Society, ed., The Spirit of Afir'cviIIe (Halifax: Formac, 1992).

'95Clairmont & Magili, Rrlocation Report, 194; Peter Edwards is a pseudonym used in the report.

=~eterMeerburg, "Afi-icviiIe more than halfgone," HaI@r Mail Star, 24 June, 1966, -, 3. 179

North End. While most people had owned their homes in Africville, less than one third remained homeowners afler the rno~e.~~Forced to pay rent and other new expenses for the first time in their lives, the meagre settlements many had received 6om the City were spent quickly. Levels of unemployment remained hi@, and Afncville's former sense of community and cooperation had been ail but destroyed. The number of those requiring welfare payments quadr~pled.~~While some follow-up programs were announced by the City, few were put into effect, and resident participation in these dwindled. Essentially, the end of the relocation saw the end of what little city assistance had been available at ail.

Aftermath

In mid-1967, MacDonald's term as relocation worker ended and he exited by sending a letter to each relocatee, abruptly stating that they should contact the City Welfare Office when they required assistance in the türure. This presented an acute crisis, as the Welfare

Director had an entirely different perspective on severai counts. First, the Welfare Director claimed he had never been consulted about this shifi of responsibility; MacDonald had not once approached him or forewarned him of the notices he had sent to Afncvilleans. Second, he had been opposed to the Rose Report and the dislocation from the beginning, and felt the

City should have provided for the specific needs of relocatees, which did not meet the reguIar

3TClainnont & Magill, Rrlocatiorr Report, 33 1.

?bid., 3 17. It had long been a point of pride among Afncvüle residents that almost no one in the community required weltàre assistance. 180 criteria of weifare fiinds.?99Another problem arose in that the duration of payments had not been made clear to Africvilk peopie, nor, it seerns, within Council itself SimiIar to the vague

"officiai" answers on other issues, the Development Officer claimed they had merely wamed relocatees that welfare "would not be available indefinitely."m

With a lack of definitive pIans, dwindling financial compensation, their abandonment by the relocation social worker, and the end of the HHRAC and the AFricviIle Subcommittee, dislocated AFricville people were leIt to their own resources. City officiais, in interviews, stated that they had expected the provinciai govemment to take responsibility for foIlow-up progams. MacDonald had purportedly sent a letter recomending such foIlow-up to Council, which was approved but never instituted. How this matter, approved only by City Council, was supposed to engage Provincial Govemment support is not explained in the relocation report. Rather, it seems that al1 involved in administrative positions ctssurned another department was looking afier the post-relocation recommendations, or at Ieast they cIaimed this assumption when questioned as to their own inaction. HHRAC members expiained that they, too, had assumed follow-up was taking place afier their disbandment, and that

MacDonald had Iefi with a long-term plan in place to assist relo~atees.~~'

Mer some months of floundering about, realizing no one else had taken responsibiIity, the City established a Social Planning Department under the direction of a social worker, IS I

Harold Crowell. This department established a follow-up program, to be directed by Nexa

~c~onough,~'also a social worker. The program first engaged in meetings and discussions with residents and other concerned citizens in attempt to establish the gravity of the situation.

They found Afncville relocatees had incurred an enormous debt load due to their negiected needs and unpreparedness for increased living expenses. Funds were petitioned from the provincial çovernment, with some supplementation by the city, and the Seaview Credit Union was established to deai with debt payrnents. This Union was largely unsuccessful, however, as unstable employment, inflation, illnesses or other difficulties prevented many residents from meeting their financial commitments. There also existed a common rnistnist of the institution, on the part of Afncvilleans, as another city-sponsored pr~ject.~'~

At the sarne time, the Afncville Action Committee, composed offormer residents, was fonned to demand compensation and the tûlfilment of promises made by the City.3MThey brought to Iight three major promises that had been broken: one year of fiee rent in their new accommodations, a tûmiture dlowance of $1000 per family, and a review of the Afncville land values, from which any adjustment should be placed in a trust fund for former re~idents.~~According to these residents, revaluation and compensation for expropriation of land had been promised until 1987. The latter promise, however, had only been indicated

- - 30'McDonoughis currently ieader of Canada's New Democratic Party

303Clairxnont& Magill, Relocarion Report, 326-327.

3iWJ'unRobson, "Want "Promises" Kept."

305Clairrnont& Ma@, Relocnfion Report, 32 1. verbally by the -4tncville Subcommittee and the Finance Cornmittee, and was not legdly binding to the City. The former, of rent payment and fùrniture ailowance, were denied by the mayor, who claimed they were not recorded in council minutes. The majonty of residents, it was deterrnined, had received Eee rent for about two months ~nly,"~and one reported being sent to a welfare Iine when he requested tùrther rent payrnent~.~'The fùrniture allowance had not been administered tùlly, as some residents were later billed directly by tùrniture stores and, unable to access city fùnds, had no choice but to pay. Some residents held signed letters from the City Clerk pledging city assistance with mortgages or other bills in the case of illness, disability or unemployment. and these had not been honoured. The social worker Later confirmed chat such letters had been sent, and also that the payment of tùrniture money and the review of land values had been valid ~laims.~~*Other residents were angry at the ignorance of City officials as to promises made in their own homes by the social worker or other officiais.

OveralI, various administrators appear to have promised different methods and amounts of compensation at different times, on an informal and individuai basis. Some were signed, some were simply verbal agreements. Arnendments to the Rose Report, which had been demanded on behaif of residents by the HHRAC, seemed to have been lost in

%An older comrnunity resident later stated that they had received rent for one month ody. Africville Genealogical Society, Spirit of Africvillr, 88.

307JimRobson, "Mayor to Probe Afncville Claims; Seeks Way to Help," Hal~kcMail Star, 3 October, 1969.

M8JiiRobson, "Follow-Up Could Have Averted Relocation Problems," HaIifkr Mail Sm, 4 Octaber, 1969, 1. 183 bureaucratic chaos, and the foiiow-up progams discussed in the report, such as employment and training. merety allowed to quietly recede.

Dispersed through a predominantly white cornmunity, Afncville blacks faced intense hostiIity in several ways. [n one case, a white neighbour is reported to have begun a petition

CO oppose the entrance of a black family, whde another black relocatee was tf~reatened.~~

One man received a letter composed of words clipped tiom magazines, waming that his new house would be burned down if he and his family moved in. It was signed, simply, "tiom the white people of Wamrnonds Plain~."'~~omewere rejected kom public housing by the

Housing Authonty due co "unsuitability,'* which seerns to have stood for a clash in acceptable notions of family and home life. Even thehfaii Sm,which tended to report positively on

Afncville's destruction, noted Peter MacDonald's statement that some landlords had been concerned their white tenants would not like new black nei~hbours.~"Claimont and Magill write. "the fluid social structure of .4fricviIle was at variance with the cut-and-dried style acceptable to the housing authority. AFRcville residents had a tradition of extended families, consistinç of several generations and quasi-extended famiIy household f~nnation."~~'In the words of the relocation social worker:

The fimille people generally were always able to make room for one more. By that I am particularly thinking of the older people, the gandfather, and the grandmother,

3m'Woman Fined for UKK-Type Threat," HalipaKMaiI Star, 22 February, 1966.

3'0Sheila Urqub, "Ghetto Going On Schedule," Hal@x Mail Star 3 January, 1966.

311bid+

3'2CIairmont & Ma@, L@ ami Dearh, 226. and the aunt, and the uncIe who were elderly. These people were looked afier ... When they were thinking of moving out [relocating] ... this was one of the factors that they thought about first, that they would have to provide a room for so-and-~o.~'~

Judged against white middle class values, Afncville people suffered Rom the messages and consequences of the racial discourses around the family discussed in the previous chapters. In line with the urban planners' concerns around social disorder, crime and the discipline of children, Afncville residents were pressured to abide by narrow lifestyle definitions. to which their new spatial arrangements were conducive. For instance, there is evidence that some single AfiicvilIe mothers were required to marry the fathers of their children in order to obtain money for tù~niture.~'~Various single women with families were forced to accept welfare for the first time, whereas they had previous1y su~vedby living in elctended family homes or with parents who were able to help them. One family reponed having to send several children to live with friends or relatives in order to adapt to the hancial and spatial constraints of re~ocation;~~'one woman was unable to afTord the added rental cost of allowing her teenage pdsonto live with her as they had ~lanned.~'~Several other families reported grief at the break-up of homes which had included extended kin, boarders or fiiends. In oniy two cases were large families maintained afler the move, and it 185 became comrnon for households to survive by taking in boarders or welfare recipients they didn't know, for which they received a 'guardian payment'.

Clairmont and Magill point out the irony of fadies giving up close kinship ties in exchange for sharing their limited space with strangers in an act of social service. At the same time, the government was forced to make up, through welfare dollars, many of the costs of living previously met through the sharing of resources and space in homes Afiicville residents owned. Indeed, the design of the new housing projects seemed to compress families into a mold of middle-class, 'respectable' dwelling. In response to the "unsuitability" of sorne residents for their new surroundings, the City placed them in old, decrepit and unsafe quarters, many of which were condemned short1y after they arri~ed.~"The Social Planning Department proposed plans for housekeeping courses which would prepare them to care for a public housing unit and, while a hl1 program was not put into effect, two families were assisted in

"uppding their housekeeping ~tandards.''~"

Meanwhile, the Iocal press continued to emphasize the need for faster dispersal of

Africvüle, and featured stones in which residents were depicted as content and ~atisfied.~'~

The relocation social worker was cited in the Iocal paper as stating, "...there is every indication that the younger generation will become completely seif-sufficient in its new habitat

3171bid.,228-229.

3'8CIairmont & Magill, Relucarion Report, 337-

31%id., 361. 186 beyond the raiiroad tracks and the city durn~."~Efforts to fight these dominant images comprised an uphiii battle. While the Afncville Action Cornmittee was initially successful in bringing some problems to light, it was made up of former residents who had Iittle internai cohesion and no extemai advice or support. With residents spread out over the city and province, most struggling under severe poverty, it was dicult to maintain initiative in fighting an unrelenthg power structure. The long reels of red tape involved in merely pinpointing the appropriate department to address with each specific concem must have presented an overwhelming obstacle. Moreover, most residents had more pressing concems over employment, housing and mere su~valin the immediate sense. Many of the

Cornmittee's demands for fiirther material compensation, report Clairmont and Ma@[, were neither accepted nor rejected, but merely put off until they faded away with the bulk of the tenuous govemrnentd commitments.

While the later 1960s and the 1970s saw heightened black activism in Nova Scotia generally, the new radical politics came too late either to save iUncvüIe or to effectively rally on its behalf for better housing or compensation. Rather, the outcome of the dislocation served as a catalyst for organizing and for a more widespread awareness that other black communities might be vulnerable to similar plans. At the time of Afncville's existence and that of its destruction many whites and blacks alike subscribed to the Iiberal rhetoric of integration. Some Afncviiie residents reported to Clairmont and MagilI a perception that

wrquhart, "Ghetto Going." 187 many other Haiii blacks were unsupportive of their cause:' and the black activists working on the Human Rights Cornmittee were persuaded to support the goal of integration. The rise of militancy seems to have occuned, understandably, at the tail end of didocation, when the

City's broken promises were becoming more apparent and as the ttiriving Black Power movement ofthe United States reached a relatively isolated population. Given the deceptive and chaotic way in which the city demolished Africville, it is not surprising that hindsight might offer a clearer view of an incomprehensible program of eradication masqueradinç as rescue.

Part CI: Cnterpreting the Destruction of Africville

Why do they, I thousht, only talk about racism, as understanding us, doinç good to ''us"? Why donTtthey move from the experience of sharing our pain, to narrating the experience of afflicting it on us? Why do they not question their own cultures, childhoods, upbringngs, and ask how they could Live so "naturally" in this "white" environment, never noticing that fact until we brouçht it home to them?'"

3"CIairmont & Magill, Lij2 amicitath, 255. This is not surprising as Afiicville was also knom in some other black communities as a place to avoid; some blacks told Clairmont and Magill in interviews that their families wmed them not to go there, and various people made distinctions between themselves and the Afiicville people, being quick to identifi as residents of HaIifm, nui AQimiIie. This suggests not ody the powerfbI influence of racial discourses on racialized communities, but how differences in both socio-economic class and 'place' can be seen as one way, under extreme oppression, to estabiish a measure of 'respectability'. For more on the struggle for respectabitity as a raced, classed and gendered phenornenon, see Fellows and Razack, "hce to Innocence."

3"rriani Banneji, "Re:turnïng the Gaze," Resomces for Feminist Resenrch 20, Y4 (1991) 10. 188

Much writing on the destruction of AfncvilIe aims to make sense of what happened, to discern the reasons behind the City's poricy and to judge its success or failure based on the outcome. The Relocation Report by Clairmont and Magill was commissioned for these reasons, and various theses, articles or reports using other media make their own evaluations.

Other work aims to explore aspects of the comunity's life which have been largely neglected in histoncal accounts; for example, Susan Precious has studied the roles and contniutions of

Afncville women. Both her work and that of Sheridan Iiay broach relations among black and white women and both authors point to the systemic and ongoing nature of racism. Many accounts of the story by black writers focus on the life of the community, well-known people born there, or the political resistance which has stemmed fiom the Afncville experience.

Commemoration recovery of missing stories, and the preservation of history, community spirit and al1 it stands for are the dominant messages in works which acknowledge Afiicville's life and destruction.

This project is written From a pIace of support for these crucial efforts, while not aiminç to replicate or expand on them. it focuses, rather, on a role I feel a white scholar mi@ play: tracing the dislocation as a program of intense regulation of blacks by whites, and interrogating the motivations of the dominant group at a deeper level than do more common face-value readiigs. While whites too mu9 lem tiom black cornmernoration and teaching about ,4fncviiie, we risk the faiIure to make any comection between this and our own histories, to see, for instance, why the garbage dump is not located in our backyards, and how our bacbards enable the existence of Affide's space- As long as this is the case, whites in 189 positions of power will never move pst the defensiveness and denial that characterize responses to ongoing challenges to racism in Nova Scotia and eisewhere. More specificaliy, accountability must be analysed and accepted before any systemic change can take place.

This section aims to critique some commun ways of reading the Afncville destruction with a view to clanQing my own analysis. It rests on the premise that it is not rnerely the conclusion we corne to that matters - for instance, that the destruction of Afncville was

'wrong' - but how we arrive there.

The subject of racism

The fact of racism as a primary organizing principIe of social relations in Nova Scotia is oAen forgotten or obscured in white interpretations of iüncville's story. Nthough it is commonly acknowiedged as part of a broader "context," or one of many probiems tri society, there can be a faiIure to connect it at the root of the dislocation decision, as Fundamentai to the structure of the process. The relocation decision was a microcosm of the way in which society hnctions as a whole; it embodies the Iarger set of technologes by which whites carry out the spatial regdation of blacks. More oflen, however, racism is seen only as a complicating factor which contributes to the problems of AFncville people and the way they were viewed by the white media and the general public. Further, when acknowledgements are made that racism was present in society, and even that the City of Halifax treated Afncville badiy, racial discourses are not explored. This makes it difficultto see how the destruction was intricately tied to existing and persisting notions of racial difference. 190

Racism has been taken up in white accounts of Afncville as, variably, a set of individuai beliefs, as whites simply believing themselves to be "superior" to blacks, or as something which occurred "in history." When defined as an attitude problem, it can be confined to certain bodies seen as exceptional and "bad." MacDougd1, for instance, discusses segregation as a result of individuai prejudices in some neighbourhood~.~As a complicating issue in what happened to the black population, racism remains a legacy of the past, not something which continues to be reproduced in different terms. When it is seen as an ongoing struggle, it is sometimes characterized as a problem in "race teIacions," implyins that different groups sirnply have trouble getting dong. Riou speaks of the "unpleasantness" of this

~onflict.~'' This 'equalizing' narrative sidesteps the discomfort of naming who is enacting dominance. The problem of racism can be seen as sirnply an entity existing 'out there'; it is effectively disconnected €rom the process of dislocation in important ways.

For one, racism is seen as responsible for the historicai oppression of blacks, which has resulted in their current poor economic conditions. These economic conditions, in tum. become the prime source of their troubles in the present. It is these current problems which city officiais rnust effectively treat. Further, racism is disconnected From any actors in the relocation decision. Even when sharpty criticized for the 'mistakes' they made, officiais and piamers are seen to be dealing with the problems created by historicai oppression; they are not enacting dominance themselves but, quite the opposite, are in the process of correcthg it.

E4Ch&opher Riou, "'Respectable Voices': Race, CIass and the Politics of Progess in the Destruction of iVncvilIe7*(master's thesis, Dalhousie University, 1998). 191

Perhaps most blatantIy. the City utilized specific mechanisms for controlling against accusations of racism, atternpting to completely reverse such interpretations. They attributed the long existence of Afncville to the special treatment it had received based on the race of its inhabitants, ciaiming it would have been demolished much sooner had the residents not been black. The city also ernphasized the history of leniency in allowinç deviant activity, such as dnnking and parties, to proceed, and aliowing "scavenging" on the dump against city ordinance. Such 'charity' ivas e'ctended during the relocation era, as the city constantly reiterated its concern in doing more than was IegalIy necessary, going beyond the requirements of compensation. This was backed up in the Iocal paper, which fiequently cited the city's fairness and ~enerosity.[t is exemplified in one Ietter stating, "...the people of

Africville seem to think their part of'HaIifax has been singled out ... for specia1 treatment. This is tnie only insofar as the Board, on humanitarian çrounds, has recommended that the full weight of the law 'be tempered with understanding and natural ju~tice'."~" When Albert Rose visited Africviite, he Iater told Clairmont, he wamed the mayor that the relocation pian risked being viewed as "negro rernoval" and specified ways to avoid this label. [t was admitted that the use of black oficids on cornmittees was intended to prevent the accusation.

The termination of Afkicville is Frequently seen not only as a product of a history contributing to the present, but to a somewhat uninteUigibIe "system" which failed to îûnction properiy. For instance, Clairmont and Magill, while acknowledging the reality of racism in society, stress the fault of "bureaucracy" and its confusing and disorganized nature, in îâiiing

3""'~fncvilleSettiement Must Go," Halifar Mail Star, 1 1 August, 1962. 193 to produce better results. They nate that blarning individuals would amount to merely unhelptùl "~ca~e~oating,"~'~since problems lie in the overall structure OC the plan. Wtiile 1 agree that no single individuai cm be blamed, 1 want to challenge the assumption that it is wrong to criticize individual actions. Bureaucraties are made up of individuais, responsibiiities exist on every level, and at some point, individuais must be held accountable for their roles. Otherwise, bureaucracy and "the system" become amorphous, intangible structures which can seem to simply overwhelm human agency. Rather than a criticd interrogation of how the system might be changed 6om within, we are allowed detachment ftom a larger depersonaiized entity, thus fiom responsibility. Similady, 'history' and even

'racism' itself can aid this detachment, when it is not specified by whom, and toward whom, the action is directed.

Christopher Riou, too, assens that the dislocation was not a conscious racist decision among whites, but had to do with a long history of neglect and "ignorance." Again, the interpretation of the relocation as a corrective approach to an historical problem is upheld. tt is forgotten that history is created and written by human beings. tt is assumed that a clear cut- off point exists between past and present. In attributing Afncville's end to the commonplaceness of urban renewai at the time, we can fail to see how urban renewd is structured epistemologicaily by racid discourses similar to those that structured colonialism and which continue to stmcture spatial management.

%airmont & Magill, Relocation Report, 3 73. 193

Eüou's thesis is centraily concerned with the notion of 'progress' in determining

Afncville's end. He conducts a detailed critique of one newspaper's reporting on the

'relocation', concludiig that the paper was instrumentd in upholding the City's dominant beliefs and plans. Mainiy "oflicial"voices were quoted, whiIe Af%ville residents' views were aimost completely absent. This is similar to my own observations. Riou argues that respectable voices were those who were able to define and implement "progressive" policies, whether the speakers were black or white. While I agree, the work fails to analyze how blackness itself was viewed to be incompatible with progress and respectability. Historicai racism is, again, seen as a contributing factor in the poor Iife-conditions of blacks in the present. The fact that the black community remains outside notions of progress in contemporary society is attributed to these conditions, not to blackness itselfl, race remains one step removed. The failure to how see these notions interlock seems a natural consequence of the faiIure to closely examine racial discourse. It was specific narratives about the degeneracy of blackness and black community which fueled white explanations for the spatial regulation of the subjugated goup. Racism and the drive for progress do not sirnply exist, each separately, at the same time. Rather, race structures how proçress can be conceptualized. Similady, Eüou and others locate racism in the 'exclusion' of blacks tiom public Iife. However, white citizens are not simply engaging in the contemporary reconstruction of white spaces and Ieaving blacks 'behind'. Blacks me excluded, but they have significance in enabhg progess in the white imagination, providiig a backdrop against which understandings of the respectabte and progessive white self can be understood as 194 legitimately dominant. Riou, then, engages in an analysis of respectability which is not raced."

Afncville is often portrayed as having been 'stuck in the'. Due to the lack of modem services, the (alrnost) dl-black population, its spatial segregation and some enduring traditions, it was seen to be in need of outside intervention in order to be brought up to date.

Susan Dexter's article is pointedly titled "The Black Ghetto that Fears Integation," suggesting the community to be clinging to its past, irrationally intimidated by modem living.

This obscures that residents had long been petitioning for modem services, were more than eager to grow as a community, and had already accepted many changes over the years.

"Fears" of integration were, of course, more than rational considering the enducingly hostile climate of Halifax; however, these fears were clearly not the reason for any delays in the dernolition process since the city did not consider residents' views in the first place. Riou aIso suggests that iVncville wished to maintain its 'traditional' lifestyle. Although his position is clearly açainst the destruction, the notions of tradition and modemization in this and other work are never unpacked; for exarnple, how was ficville more "traditionaï' than any white community, which also had "traditions"? And how did the ongoing struggie for modem seMces and buiIding permits for the upkeep of homes signie a desire to simply remain the sarne? Again, the community was forced into stagnation and then Iabelled with a fear ofthe

mFor more on respectability as a profoundly racialized consuuct, see FelIows and Razacic, "Race to innocence." development process which was constmcted without its involvement. There is an overall dichotomy drawn between Atncville's traditionai nature and the city's modemizing impulse.

This misrepresents Micvilleans' expressed desires and suggests their lifestyle was seen to be

merely antiquated, when in fact it had been deeply pathologized.

An idea persists that the time had come when 'something needed to be done' about

d fric ville.^'^ However, the white community overlooked that residents were more than

aware of this, and had been proposing soIutions and attempting positive steps for decades.

The reality, then, was Iess that the time had come, than that whites had finally conceded what

Atncville had known al1 along. Mer ignorins the requests of years, the City felt a need to

take control and impose its own panacea. The Relocation Report acknowledges a paternal

attitude, which is exemplified in city officials' responses to questions about their intent.

Clairmont and Magill openly asked officials,"why did the city relocate Mricville?" Their

answers centred on the improvement of living conditions and desegregation, echoinç the Mai/

Sm's declaration that "social necessil and sound financial reasoning require integration ..."3?g

The mayor confirrned that industriai development kvas not a concem, stating that, had that

been the case, ficville would still exist. Officiais also spoke of the uncontrolled nature of

Afiicville's growing problems, fiequently stating that people could no longer be "pedtted"

to live this There is a deep sense of moral outrage that things had been allowed to

- - -

"&'Afncville: Time for Action is Now," Ha/vmMail Star; Doyle, "Suggests Action."

3'Jk'~fncvilleDistrict Takeover," Hd~xMail Star.

"°CIairmont & Magill, Relocution Rrport, 234-237. 196 spiral out of control. This tact is attniuted to a shameful neglect which, while tme, serves to emphasize the inaction, rather than the action of the city in making AFncville as it was.

Attributing conditions to the City's "ignorance" ailows the view that Afncville slowly disintegrated on its own due to its isolation fiom the City, which knew Iittle about the consequences. It ignores the conscious planning in placing the dump, for instance, appropriating land for rail lines, building factories and incinerators, and refiising services.

Again, it allows us to escape naming the action, the planned destruction.

A prevailing theory among white commentators suggests that the City oFHalifar, while perhaps insensitive or naive, desired the integration of the black community into white society, along with the improved quality of life and opportunity for blacks. That is, the underlying motive is seen to be improvement, the promise of inteçration upheld as the central impetus. Based on the evidence I have explored here, and the proliferation of racial discourses about .4fncvilIe and the black commu~tygeneraily, it seems clear that integration was not a key interest in the City's move to demolish AFncville, regardless of what was said.

The rhetoric of integration appears, rather, to appropriate black political tems in describing a project of white regulation and containment of black people. While this contention will not be new to most blacks affected by Afncville's history, it is disturbing to the liberal notion of many whites who maintain that commu~tydemolition was sirnply a product of its the and a remit of mistakes which are long resolved. 197

The Relocation Report and a resukinç thesis by Magi~~~'state the many positive aspects which should lead one to accept the City's carefÙI, detailed pianning approach. The authors cite the advice of Rose, a 'nationdy renowned welfare expert', the many discussions about the probIems in AfricvilIe, and the formation of the human rights cornmittee of black and white professionals. They note that city oficials were required to clearly articulate their pIans, and that many iayers of debate ensued before any action could be approved. They aiso mention the employment of a trained social worker and his avaiiable assistance tùnds, which were to cut down on the bureaucratic problems of obtaining emersency money for residents.

The pian included employment and educational programs and was purportedIy geared toward the improvement of life opportunities for bIacks.

[n the report, the official liberal weifare rhetoric of integration and organized social change are accepted as the dominant concerns of officials and activists involved. Al1 these factors are seen to illustrate the benevolent objectives behind the progam. Wethe authors do conclude that the plan was largely unsuccesstùl, the foundational assumption of positive intent is not dismpted. Rather, senerd bureaucratic issues are identified. which are not linked to specific persons. For example: "the relocatees had to negotiate setttements wi~ha City agency that had neither the official mandate nor the resources necessary to undertake a broad

UtDermisWilliam Mafi, "The Relocation of Afncvilie: A Case Study of the Potitics of Planned Social Change" (Ph-D. diss., Washington University, 1974). Magilïs thesis resulted fiom this research. Its teKt is almost identicai to his and Clahont's report- 1have not used it separately because it duplicates the relocation report and 1 saw no place where it provided additional information or analysis. 198 prograrn of planned social change."33' This cornmon passive tone leaves the impression that the lack of mandate and resources are at fault, much like the above "bureaucracy" and

"system." Again, an exploration of racial discourse wouId sufise these abstract phenomena with a deeper sense of how the system operates. challenging one to consider, for instance,

how officiais and planners looked upon, studied and spoke about Afncville, and how this

shaped policy.

Interestingly, Clairmont and Magill's research has demonstrated more than any other

source the explicit actions of individual people and the views and concerns of al1 involved.

These researchers had at their finger tips more than enough evidence to demonstrate the

deliberate displacement of racialiied bodies. Without a critical race analysis, however, we are

lefi unable to name the racism present.

[n the foreword to a recent edition of their book, Clairmont and Magill reflect that

their views have changed over the years, that they no longer agree with the rhetoric of

relocation itself However, they still maintain the altniistic forethought of the City.

MacDougall, in his assessment of the program's results, similarly addresses the city's

reasoning at face value. His thinking is steeped in a belief in the benefits of urban renewal

programs and does not question the structure of the plan itself Aiming to primarily to

consider the "humad' side of relocation, the author cites farniIy breakdown as the dominant

problem, Ieaving any failures in the program largely upon the heads of residents, whose

chaotic Iifestyle made their adaptation impossible. The chalIenges noted are those faced by

mClairmont & Magill, Relocarior~Report, 303. 199 authorities in getting Africville residents to cooperate in their plans. This sentiment is echoed in news reports citing, for instance, the many "setbacks and disappointments" faced by authorities during the dislocation.333 Clearly, moral judgements were in eEect as to how well residents were seen to cope with their new surroundings. hother news article States that many families had "satisfied authorities that they are really trying to adapt to a new Life."3u

Like Clairmont and Magill, MacDougall defends the process as having been contemplated carefully over a long period of time. This and the advice of experts is seen as suthient to validate the project's worth. He, however, is less sympathetic to residents' concems, stating that they had been willing only to hear information which would prevent relocation, and that they expressed "widespread hostility and suspicion."

The city is portrayed as compassionate and patient, being willing to negotiate and consult with residents. Their investment in legal aid and the many meetings they heId are seen as evidence of their commitment to positive change. The great length of the planning process is cited strongly, over and over. This work is selective in reponing the views of maidy residents who did not mind moving, and a few people who spoke il1 of AlncviIle. MacDougall evaluates the success of the relocation in terms of how well authorities communicated their plans to residents, and how weU residents were able to understand information about what wouId happen. Another factor was the simple fact of being able to move people in this large-

"3Sheila Urquhart, "Ghetto Going."

mLAûicdleMove Slows," Halifax hiail Star, 12 September, 1966. 200 scale manner. Since Atncvilie had been deemed a popuIation of "low geographic mobility," the city's capability in moving them is seen to be admirable.

MacDougaills only point of contention is that the city could have been more successfiil in gaining the trust of the people. Thus the aim is to improve upon relocation models so that fiture projects will result in fewer cornplaints. His solution is that. in future. residents should be educated about relocation by "their own kind of people"335who have themselves learned to deal successfully with relocation.

Like some studies discussed in the last chapter. MacDougall's work, and Clairmont and Magill's approach, fail to address the methodologicai issues behind the authors' subject positions as relatively privileged, white researchers entering a poor, biack community. It most often goes without saying that al1 involved have simp1y reported their 'tme feelings'. Projects like these require intensive consideration of the extrerne power differentials with which authors are working. For instance, might people in black comrnunities have shaped their answers to protect privacy, to avoid comlict with whites or CO appear more respectable?

Further, as noted earlier, the residents had been studied to no end and were exhausted by whites who interroçated them but whose work never resulted in benefits. and sometimes caused harm. In the period immediately following relocation, it is doubtfid that residents were enthusiastic about yet another study, particularly when Iittle follow-up assistance resulted.

It is a logicai extension of beliefs in the City's motives that so many people were shocked at the Iack of follow-up to the dislocation program. Given the historicai context, the

33SMacDougaIl,"Relocation of ficviile," 73 - 20 1 desire to remove Africville, the racial discourses structu~gthe decision, and the manner in which the move was carried out, I would argue, this surprise is misplaced. My initial reaction to reading of the process was also one of shock. Even aside from my abhorrence for the community's destruction, I could not beiieve the overwhelming mess of disorganization and bad planning. It was only after more reflection that 1 realized my own reaction was inconsistent with my analysis. Ct was never built into the structure of the program that the move should be followed up. It was never part of the plan that residents' lives should be greatly improved. These empty promises never attended to specificities, and never resulted in concrete planning or consultation. Looking more closely at what was said during meetings and in letters, one realizes, for insrance, how the official discourse becomes general and vague when residents ask about panicular pIans. It is apparent that meetings in ficville were scheduled afler decisions had been made. One notes how promises were not recorded, or were portrayed in newspaper articles as misguided notions made up by bitter ficville people.

One reads the Development Oficer's mandate to "get the thing cleaned up" without controversy. An analysis of how the City might begin to attack the problems of ..VricvilIe at the systemic level, and a conunitment to policies based on residents' own volition would be incongruous with the management of dserence. What occurred was more or less elcactly what was intended: Mcville was bulldozed, most blacks were contained within the "black area" of the cïty in public housing projects, City officiais rid themselves of the embarrassment of the segregated slum and washed their hands of their 'racid problem'. In this light, the plan was not disorganized; it was just organized enough- A geography of racism

Patterns of living developed over the years can't be broken down oveniight. This is an economic, psychological, educational integration into the community as a whole, which necessarily takes time and cooperation between City Council, the established community and ficville re~idents.~~~

.. .when the cornrnunity is broken up, some of the better elements in the community may be influenced by their neighbours to improve their condition^.^^'

The above statements encompass a variety of common explanations offered for the destruction of Atncville. They suggest that integration will produce a positive result as blacks are influenced by the superior environment of whites. The former suggests the relocation proçraxn is a contractual agreement between ail parties, who are working toçeîher. The latter makes moral distinctions between 'better elements' and a largely hopeless population. it upholds the belief that whites offer the best solution as well as the best social environment, and squareiy supports the 'social pathology' theories comrnon in the 1960s wtüch blame community cohesion for the continued stnfe in racialized areas: Culture, as a stand-in for race, creates its own flawed conditions, and only through its interruption and dispersai can individuais begin to imagine corrective measures.

The forced dislocation of Africville residents and the destruction of their community never transcended the parametres of such racist paternalism. Framed as inherently chiId-Iike and helpless, residents were excluded from every facet of planning and were portrayed as

336PeterMacDonald, relocation social worker, quoted in Sheila Urquhart, "Ugly Shacktown GoinswHafifax Mutl Star, 8 March, 1965.

337HaIifa~Director of Development, quoted in Clairmont & Magdi, Reiocafjo~Report, 734. ignorant and uncooperative when their views slipped through the media's filters. These qualities serve to validate the dominant group's perceived need to supervise and correct other ways of life. Ail such reform was canied out by white officiais with spatial arrangements as a centrai organizing principte. When exarnined as part of a larger historicai context in which the spatial management of Nova Scotia's black population has been the dominant trope, it is easier to contest a more common view that white officiais suddenly became concerned with irnproving the conditions of blacks and wished to integrate them into white society.

From the outset of black residency in Nova Scotia, those who were not slaves were allotted poor quality space on the outskirts of white toms. The infertile soi1 made su~vai off the land impossible and the areas of settlement were isolated from other employment opportunities. These areas were rarely rnarked on maps, were considered "approaches" to the

Iegitimate spaces of toms and cities, and were seen as expendable and available when required by whites. They were comrnonly conceptuaiized as empty, unoccupied. In

Goldberg's words:

The conques of racialized space was often promoted and rationaiized in terms of (where it did not itself prompt) spatiai vacancy: the land's emptiness or emptying of human inhabitance. The drive to raciaiize populations rendered transparent the people so raciaiized; it left them unseen, merely part of the naturai environment, to be cleared tiom the landscape - urban or rural - Iike debris."'

At the same time, govenunent retisais or delays in granting land titIe kept people stagnant, unable to move, unable to iegtimately pass on property to family, and uncertain of their rights ?O4 of tenancy. With no legai hold on the land, blacks could be removed or repositioned when deemed necessary.

Due to white resentment that blacks took up any govemmentai resources or employment at ail, violence and hostility were the comrnon responses to their presence among whites, particularly those from the struggling working class who saw them as competition.

Middle and wealthier classes ofwhites could aord black servants, and necessarily rnaintained the spatial boundaries which distinguished themselves tiom the servile classes and races, upholding segregation. It was these classes who held the authonty to determine spatial divisions as they planned communities, roads, garbage durnps, and institutions. Black communities, as European and Nonh Arnerican toms and cities developed, were seen by whites as threats to sanitation, health and social order. The notion of public heaith administration beçan as a çuard against the spread of disease and a justification for containinç the raciaiited poor in slurns and shettoes, separate from the rni~instream.~~'

When Africville was finally established, it was, of course, regarded similady. Polhted with industries and waste products, it became what Marcuse has called the "residual city," an outside place which receives the unwanted elements tiom within. Seen as a "place apart," it

quickly became, in Howard McCurdy's words, a prime target of environmenta1 racism."

Ris practice survives through a mutually constitutive relationship between spaces of

degeneracy and spaces of respectability. For example, before the days of indoor plumbing, the

"%id., 190-

Woward McCurdy, "Environmentai Racism." 205 nightly faeces ofwhite Haliiav neighbourhoods was dumped on Africville's doorstep.

Funherrnore, ficville men were employed to come and pick it up. This makes a clear delineation between the pure and undefiled space of whiteness and the polluted and contaminated space of blackness, complete with a social process which designates some bodies as subservient while others appear deseming of senice. Due to the systernic poverty of black people, such distasteful jobs were needed and, much like the domestic arrangements explored in Chapter 1, they depended on the spatial divisions between different groups. Like the bodies of domestic servants in Razack and Fellows' work, black bodies could be seen to absorb the dirt and genns, in this case by literally taking the waste home with them. In understanding oneself as a dominant subject from a respectable space, it is essential that your excrement not be deposited next door, that it not be collected by your neiçhbour. The metaphoric and actual lines between black and white both maintain a needed distinction and are upheld by the historical distinctions already in place.

Further exarnples of environmental racism abound. As mentioned previously, the city dump was housed near Mricville - later directly in the community - and manufacturers of al1 types set up in the surrounding area. Two hospitais for patients with infectious diseases were built nearby and the sewers from these poured ont0 Mricville land. Halifax was quick to buy land encirchg Afncviile and to advenize the space as a prime site for industriai building. As

Goldberg has noted, surrounding slum areas with open spaces, rail iiies or other non- residential sectors is a common tactic of govemment designed to set them further apart from legitimate urban space. It remïnds the cïty of its boundaries, and the iines across which dety 206 is threatened. It keeps different populations separate and allows consistent monitoring of the minority group, which is compressed into a designated area and can expand no further.

As in the nineteenth century urban reform discourses mentioned in Chapter 1, realities about Afncville's space becarne bound up with the identity of its residents. Despite brief qualiMng statements that the city was to blame, the life practices Afncville people were forced to develop to adapt to their unsenced and stkpatized space were used to deprecate them and to tùrther position them as Other. Recall the news report which mentioned hit fiom the dump seeming "a real prize," and the various reports of scavenging on the dump as

;\fncville's central source of livelihood. Newspapers portrayed the dump as an object of delight for Afiicville residents, who were seen to live quite naturally off the wastes of others.

In this understanding, the role of the City in forcing this manner of sunival is forçotten. What is visible to the eye as filth. the slum. is ail that remains.

The City's refusal of services to Atncville îbnctioned in concert with its pollution to create not only slum-like conditions, but physical danger. Forced to use the dump in whatever ways possible, and depnved of proper heating, some residents burned discarded batteries for wmth, which resulted in lead poisoning in several instances. Fires were frequent, resulting in injuries and deaths, as they couid not be extinguished in an area with no water lines. The onIy action taken by the city against contamination in the village's water supply was to post a sign warning residents to boil the water before drinking and cooking. 207

In the end, the imposition of these conditions was effectively erased and, as decay in the community was seen to increase during its last two decades, the situation could be used to make its removal axiomatic in the eyes of the dominant group, and of most Haligonians. At the sarne time, arguments about the supposed defective lifestyles of ficville functioned to portray them as helpless and infantile, in need of others to make decisions on their behalf. For instance, although residents had been effectively forced to Iive day to day, occupied with irnmediate survival, they were branded by the most inîluential relocation officia1 as having a carefree, irresponsible outlook on life. never planning for the future. This constituted one more way in which the City needed ody see what seemed immediately apparent; its own role was effectively erased. Similarly, residents are said, in the relocation report, to perceive their lack of power and a 'randomness' in the world of white a~thority.~Thus, even in a critical document, the City's actual. extrernely random approach to the program, and its clearly disempowering treatrnent of Africville, were effectiveiy obscured.

While whites took advantage of the precarious law enforcement in Africville, they were able to contain their deviant activity in a separate space, protectinye the putity of their middle class homes and neighbourhoodç. As Sherene Razack has theonzed, illicit behaviour occurring in society's degenerate zones remains attached to the bodies and spaces of this sector, while the interloper lems and enacts his dominance upon the bodies of the oppressed.

Since the space already e.uists before he goes in, it is assumed to be a product of its

"'Clairmont & Magill, Relocation Report, 282. 208 inhabitants, of their immordity and cuItural dysfunctionality. Since it eiusts after he leaves, it cannot be something attached to him.

Clairmont and Magill have concluded that so-caIled deviant activity was tolerated in

Afkicville due to the raciai stigrna which made it seem only natural. They write, "Such indulgence by the authorities reflects not liberality but. rather, a view that the minonty people are 'different'..."3J' The consequences of this view were rwo-fold: while some degree of fieedom was allowed, officia1 police protection was denied. Thus, bodies belonging to the spaces ofdegeneracy were atready outside the domain of i-ights and protection. As Razack demonstrates in her analysis of the murder of an Abonginal prostitute by two white men,

"What a spatial analysis reveals is that bodies in degenerate spaces [ose their entitlement to personhood throu& a compIe.-process in which the vioIence that is enacted is naturaliied."'"

Participation by dominant group members in 'degenerate' activity is uninterrogated.

As Goldberg has suggested, spatiai technoiogies of managing difference change over tirne. The 1960s saw a drastic increase in the diagnoses of social pathology among poor and raciarized populations by white experts. This does not symbolize a humanitarian SMon the part of these e.qerts, but a social and mord panic that conditions in negiected and abused slum areas had grown out of contrd and threatened to impede the development of healthy cities. As StalIybrass and White have theorized, the slums of urban areas had long been

N2Clairmont& Magill, Lifr mid demh, 120.

"Razack., "Gendered RadVioIence," 129. viewed as contarninating agents, capable of spilling their crime and imrnorality upon the upper classes. The excision deemed necessary involved figuring out the most effective rnanner of containing the disorder, reforming it where possible. As Goldberg w-rites:

Whether the bodies of the racialized Other were to be killed or colonized, slaughtered or saved, expunged or exploited, they had to be prevented at ail costs fiom polhting the body politic or sullying civil(ized) society. Impurity. dirt, disease, and pollution ... are expressed by way of transgressing classificatory categories, as aiso are danger and the breakdown of order. Threatening to transgress or pollute established social order necessitates their reinvention, first by conceptualizing order anew and then by reproducing spatial confinement and separation in the renewed term~.~

This renewal saw the onset of project administration as a means of containing social deviance, creating an appearance of integration by placing residents in the city, often in the centre of white neighbourhoods which made possible the closer observation of their activities. -4s evidenced in my earlier quotation, the dominant group also hoped residents might be positively influenced by their white sunoundings.

As stated above, there is no reason to beiieve that the ideologicai bent of these programs involved significant moves toward equality. As can be seen in the 'relocation' era, no long term plans were in place for ernployment programs, educationd opportunities, retraining, or independent housing initiatives. Certainly there was no focus on anti-racism education in the white community or in the recently integrated schools. No attempt was made to work with the historicaiiy subjuçated group, to learn of its needs or interests, or to facilitate its abiIity to fiirther independent goais. None of these avenues was explored in any detail no 2 10 comprehensive plan existed and no plan discussed was put into effect in any long-term manner. What was planned was the coercive movement of people, the bulldozing of their homes and their placement in sites where their lives would be more restricted, their moral and bodily habits more easily policed.

Atncville's designation as a space outside Society was cemented in the process of neçotiation and settlement. Throughout the process of dislocation, Afncville people were kept at a spatial distance consistent with their historical treatment. The boundaries between the city proper and Mricville were traversed by whïtes only for the purposes of study, or to convince the people of their one option to move aîcer the decision had been largely tinalized at

City Hall. Decision-making itseIFoccurred in a far-removed, 'respectable' space, and residents were occasionally invited in when the purpose suited city officials. Those who represented their interests aiso maintained their distance; over 80% of residents told Clairmont they had had no contact whatsoever with the Halifax Human Rights Advisory Committee, including its black members. Most community members were never aware that people were purporting to fight for them, or of what in particular they were asking on their behalEM5

One wonders at the beliefs of white citizens who entered the Afncville debate in defence of the community, particuiariy given that their orginkation was largely unrepresentative of Afiicville voices and quite ineffectual in protecting them. Committee members admittedly knew Iittle about AfricvilIe, and their contact with its residents was lirnited mainly to the few people working with them as activists. Members mentioned the lack

UsClairmont & Ma&, Rr~ocat~*ot~Report, 377. 21 1 of services and resources in the comrnunity, but knew little of day to day life. One white man recalled having been to Atncville only a few times, "usually at night," while another had only occasionalIy "driven through." One man, when asked if he knew people from ..Vncdle, recalled having an Afncvillean maid in his home who had come to work badly beaten.3G hother member reported, speculatively:

I think there was a lot of escape there, through heavy drinking ... [ heard reports about policemen who were unwilling to go into Afncville unless there were two or three of them ... Physical violence, I understand, took place, Bitter rivalries between certain individuals apparently developed through the years ... Just imagine not having running water. Imagine being so much cut

Without discounting the concem of these community members, it must be noted that their answers are suggestive of the kinds of racialized power relations endernic to Halifav at this time. They are frequently underscored by rumour, pity and dominant stereotypes. Their perceptions and experiences are organized around spatial divisions which encode the race and class divide. When asked their reasons for wanting to help, whites spoke of outrage at the appalling conditions in the community, and a belief in the need to provide equal opportunities for dl people to reach their potential. Black members, several of whom were motivated by concern for their race and a high degree of politicaI consciousness,up more explicitly criticized the City and praised Atncville's comrnunity spirit. Still, al1 non-Afncville members knew little of the community's residents, saw their fùtures as inevitably doomed to disIocation, and 212 agreed with desegregation. While they were undoubtedly more sympathetic than the City and explored more options for AfiicvilIe, they occupied a representational position which was largely imposed on AFncville, and they saw forced integration as the only solution.

Importantly, the temtory in which decisions occurred and the space between it and

Africville contained risks nu white person need consider. For instance, the sumrnoning of Pa

Carvery to City Hal1 positioned one black man against a cornmittee ofwhites, in their space, on their terms, his body signifjmg to them an utter lack of authority, their proposal to him laying bare their disdain. What does it mean to be summonec! to cross the physical and metaphorical boundary between white and black space when one is cIearIy the disadvantaged player? What does it mean in an urban space known for verbai, physical and legal racist assaults, a space in which this man might not be served in a restaurant or leased an apartment?

When an act such as this is situated in histoty, in conternporary society, and in space, it means much more than an unacceptable business proposal between equal parties. Complete with the psychological tonnent already infiicted on Mr. Carvery and his cornmunity, and with a threat of the violent expropriation of his land appended, this act constitutes yet one more link in a chah of evictions of .4Fncville Fiom its own spa~e.~~

The process of dislocation was never designed to facilitate participation by Africville residents. While the city justitied this exclusion through a guise of respect for privacy, they had ravaged Açicville land, invaded Africviiie Iives and defined for the peopIe what privacy,

U %Ir.Carvery walked out of the coercive meeting described here. After much negotiation, he uisisted city officiais corne to his home to present him with a cheque. 213 respect and space itself must mean. Even the alleged concern for racial equality was a discussion in which blacks, in this instance, had little voice. Segregation, in the white perspective, was bound up in the cultural pathology of black community, and responsible for a destructive cohesiveness which kept the people in their hpoverished state. Desegregation, presented as a positive liberal aim, actually camouflaged the cornmon rhetoric of black degeneracy, with its abolition contingent upon white esample and rescue.

The justification for paternalistic disdain for lUncville was seen as evident in its landscape. In a cyclic manner, the community was deprived of resources, forced to cope with less, and then blamed for the way it survived. Poor conditions hmed AficvilIe as a bad investment for the city, thus things were never to improve. MoraIity becarne intricately tied to the apparent social disorder of the space. Lower settlements based on the alleged immoral character of particular residents are a good example of this; in depriving some of better compensation, the city again placed responsibility for the state of peopIe's lives squarely on their own heads. Supported by the human rights cornmittee, who adrnittedly knew almost nothmg of Atncville, the City obscured its own centrai role in creating conditions in which the people suffered, ody to tûrther deprive them based on the situation they were in. Through moral judgement, spatial distance, exclusion fkom the decision-making process, intimidation and rnanipulative portrayds of character, rVncville was rnaintained as a site of the "internai

to be feared, controlled and ultimateiy destroyed. As Goldberg has noted of sIum situations generally, social wekeworkers were felt to be the sole civilking agents and,

3MSeeHesse, "BIack to Front and Black Again." where possible, new, more orderly arrangements had to be created before their influence could be properly felt. Further, once displaced in its new state of order, the resident community had less and less control or opportunity to resist domination.

Goldberç writes:

As the social margins are (re)coIonized or cut Ioose, the peripheral is symbolically wiped away. With no place to gather and dislocated fiom any sense of community, it becomes that much more dificuit for dispossessed individuals to offer resistance both to their materiai displacement and to the rationdizing characterizations that accompany the disl~cation.~~'

As previously stated, ficville residents found organization for compensation and other community goals increasingly difficult foIIowing their forced move. While a number moved to

Uniacke Square, others were dispersed throughout the province, and the trials of day to day su~vai,the adjustment to a new environment and the fractious stresses imposed on community relations by the city's divisive relocation settlements. had taken their toll. Their marginal community was simply recolonized in a few different sites and with newly imposed controls.

The new projects into which many residents were placed enabled the imposition of stricter standards with reçard to famiIy composition, order of households, individual expression3" and community cohesion. Much poverty continued or worsened, and these projects quickly developed an enduring racial stigma of their own, suggesting support for the

352Residentstold Clairmont and Ma@U that the new apartment managers did not ailow them to make small changes to suit personai taste without permission, and that the housing authority imposed strict regdations and sent inspectors into their homes fiequently. (Lfe und death, 236). 215 view that social problems simply move with the poor and racialized, rather than with the

City's regulatory policy.

Conclusion

The process of demolishing .4ficvilIe was a prograrn planned by whites to shift the strateses by which a small biack community could be rnanaged. It was bolstered by racist discourses, yet carnouflaged in the promise of racial integation. The process was geared toward saving face for the city by hiding its racial problern, while making no rnoves to establish the promised systemic chançes AFricville residents required. Instead, the discursive focus on slum clearance masked the city's crucial role in creating the community's impoverished conditions, and relied on radstereotypes in preserving a confiation of black community itself with moral and social degeneracy.

1 have suggested here what the racial discourses exploreci in the previous chapters enabled whites to justiS, doitrg with regard to .4fiïcville. Further, 1 have posed ways in which the moves made in dislocating Afiicville have been justified or rewritten. Forced dislocation is enabled throuçh a variety of techniques: a thdamental racism which sets a group apart physicaily and metaphorically fiom the dominant community; the manufacture, through both

neglect and strategic planning, of a space against which progress, identity, entitiement, purity and virtue can be measured; a program of displacement supported by the majority of citizens, based on the above tàctors; and the appearance of a ming edge, humanitarian motive, It is

hrthered by built-in controls for deflecting critique or accusations of race discriminatioq and 216 the reliance on expert, respectable opinion. With these factors fidyin place, it is astonishing how easily the racism and negligence behind a particuIar endeavor can be masked, transposed into a story oFempathy and benevolence.

The deficient planning and apparent incompetence of officials in the Africville program were not rnistakes but part and parce1 of a conscious wish for Afncville to sirnpIy fade away, for the visibiliry of segregation and poverty to subside. Given the ideological climate and history, and the way in which plans were carrieci out, there is no reasonable basis fiom which to accept that the problems following relocation were unintended or, at the very Ieast, could not have been foreseen. There is every reason, however, to suggest that a program of white displacement of black peopIe, which maintained their spatial regulation and social disenfianchisement, was simply the logical continuation of race domination. The liberal rhetoric of integration and renewal, never reaiiied, was in fact a discourse of erasure fiom si@ and site. Chapter IV

"A Place to Dream Their Dreams": Forgetting as 'reconciliation'

The subject of the dream is the drea~ner.~'~

ficville's story does not dissolve in the failed promises of 1968 or fade with a docile black population. Rather, a united and politicized black comrnuniry has emerged over the last two decades as the force behind comrnemorative and compensatory efforts. AFncvilIe has corne to stand for comrnunity, resistance and suMvaI, and it has been the subject of many artistic endeavors. With such widespread dialogue and remembrance, this chapter asks, how have racial discourse and the story of Afncville changed among the dominant white population? How has the city responded to ongoing challenges, and how have whites generally chosen to remember or forget? While the black comrnunity necessady and vocally tells its own story, there is, 1 argue here, a continuing story of race and regdation to be toId.

This is a story of the dominant group's çrappling - or disençaçing - with the impact ofracism and of ficville on the past and present; it has received Iittle or no critical attention arnong white or black writers. While forms of discussion around tUncville may have shified, much has remained the same, material gains for former residents have increased Iittle, and white accountability for the past and present has yet to be claimed. This chapter, then, demonstrates how the physical space of Afncville continues to be regulated by the City, and how this has significant implications for the story of dislocation which can be told- How dominant subjects engage with and lem tiom the stories of subjugated groups is deeply influenceci by narratives

3nMomson, PIayi'ng in the Dark, 17. of inriocence which operate through the containment of 'mistakes' in the past and the suppression of stories of domination.

Like the liberal good intentions of the relocation era, attention to commernorative initiatives does not lead seamlessly to rnaterial progress for the dominated group, nor to the rethinking of hierarchical relations among the dominant. On the contrary, the reconstruction of memory occurs through cornplex negotiations over social spaces, pedagogical positions, ideological backgrounds and matenal resources. It is never divorced fiom the historical relations among dominant and subjugated groups which originally underpinned the events being remembered. lntroducing his analysis of postwar Germany's struggle over newly- uncovered sites of mernory for Jews, Henri Lustiger-Thaler writes:

One group's need to remember is ofien grist for another's desire to forget. It is not surprising that acts of public comrnernoration have as much strategically inscribed within them as they have excluded. Memory and forgetting are hence part of an embedded historical discourse that evokes as it simultaneously erases, inevitably unfolding on many different social registers and in different "memory encounters" between groups, as they attempt to articulate their sense of (dis)location within the pre~ent.'~.'

Considerations of such "memory encounters" now constitute a growing field of inquiry into the politics of how stories of violence are to be written and re-told, and by whom.

Contestations over the use and reclamation of social space are directly implicated in these confrontations. For example, Lisa Yoneyarna has studied efforts at urban renewal in modern- day Hiroshima which are entangled in the City's desired presentation of its history and

35'1HenriLustiger-ïhaIer, "Remembenng Forgetfully," in Re-situatitzg Identities: the polirics of race, erht~icip,atid crrltrrrr, eds. Vered Amid-Talai & Caroline Knowles (Peterborough: Broadview Press, 1996) 190. national narrative. Through attempts to de-centre memory of the war and to downplay the nearly-auiomatic cognitive conflation of the City with the atom bomb, Yoneyama argues,

Hiroshima has ensaged in a project of reforming the cityscape to cuve out "new knowledge and consciousness, as well as amnesia, about history and ~ociety."~'~While occupying very different contefis, fiom each other and hmHalifax, the elvamples of Hiroshima and Germany assert that the regdation and reconstruction of space are inextricably linked to how mernory and forgetting cmoccur. As Jennifer Schirmer shows in her discussion of women's peace movements, space figures centrdly in the polincs of protest and tesistance as well. She writes, "[Just as] ideuIo= is resisted through counterideological practices so, too. is the stare's control of public space resisted by forms of spatialized disobedience, primarily through the use of speech and the body."356

This chapter emrnines different ways in which blacks and whites in Halifa~encounter the memory of Afnctille. It traces the erasure of Mricville's former site, the establishment of a park and a monument to the black community in this space, and City responses to the continued 'spatiaiized disobedience' of Mkicvüle's bodies and voices despite these moves.

Whiie I applaud progress made by the black comrnunity in spreading its story, my task is to explore ways in which whites generally cmot hear the story as one wkh is comected to our

355LisaYoneyama, "Tarninj the Memoqscape: Hiroshima's Urban Renewai," in Remuppirgho: île Politics of Timespace, ed. Jonathon Boyarin (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1994) 103.

356JenniferSchirmer, "The Claiming of Space and the Body Politic within National- Searity States: The Plan de Mayo Madres and the Greenham Common Womea" in Boyarin, Remappitlg Memury, 185. own lives, aibeit in various ways. While public symbols of acknowledgment and commemoration now exist, they are limited in their abihy to instill a sense of collective memoriai space for a variety of reasons. These reasons are rooted in the historical racial narratives and spatial arrangements which constitute the Other os Other, and the dominant group as 'us', and as innocent. It is necessary that dominant group members understand how we come to the lessons of memory by a very different route korn those re-telling their history.

We must recognize that receiving new information is insufticient when it fails to deepen our grasp of complex power relations and our own positions within them.

Part I of this chapter is an oveMew of some centra1 forms and themes of black commemoration of Africville. While a thorough analysis of black Iiterature and other art forms is not the focus of this work, it is important to understand sornething of the contemporary place Africville hoIds in a cornmunity still fighting to survive. It is cruciai that black voices remain the centrai template upon which white outsiders consider our responses and responsibilities in rernembenng. Further, it seemed necessary to establish outright a sense ofthe strong black voices shaping dialogue about hfiicville today, lest my focus on white discourse nsk obliterating the agency of these activists or suggesting only their victimization.

The foiiowing sections examine responses fiom white community officiais to ongoing critique and the demand for compensation. This requires two complimentary paths. The tïrst,

Part II, explores narratives which arise in eqlaining away the past and deflecting cnticism. It examines responses given by whites in a conference, in a report reviewing the Afncville decision and in news coverage. The second, Part üi, examines City actions taken in attempt 27 1 to define the officiai history of Afiicville. This includes discussion of the establishment of

Seaview Park as a public recreational site, and various disputes over its use and preservation-

This analysis also considers how the media have employed dominant racial narratives in conveying the events. Thus while there is significant overlap, the second section aims to establish ongoing racial discourses, while the third focuses more explicitly on the central acts they have accompanied or enabled. The chapter concludes with consideration of the monument to Aficville in Seaview park, which 1 see as both an actual and metaphoric tool for defininç how memory can be articulated. The reconstitution of the land in particular forms, and the continued regulation of AfiicvilIe's space help to dictate how memory cm be relayed to the public and thus what elements of the story can be heard.

My use of 'we' and 'our' in this section is strategic, not unconscious. I do address white readers specifically, insofar as the themes presented here constitute a particular challenge to them. I acknowledge my membership in this group as well, and my own stnrggle with this challenge. This does not intend to exclude non-white readers, onIy to acknowIedge that the kind of analytic and personal work to be undenaken does not apply to them in the same way, and that 1 do not purport to know what work is needed within their communities.

However, witnessing consideration of how whites receive and respond to Afn'cville's story is possiily usefùl to any reader, and may be a contribution to strategies of resistance for black activists as weil.

1 am also cognizant that the categories ofwhite and black are never so clearly divided.

For instance it cannot be assumed that all bIacks feel sirnilarly about Afiicville, nor that no 222 whites consider these questions or attempt to work for change. Some efforts at justice and commemoration have been colIaborative across communities. Some AFncville residents feIt abandoned by blacks in other parts of the province who didn't rally to help them at the time of relocation. 1 am, however, speaking of definable, general patterns which remain strong. This rnay be difficult to take for ganted if one is unfarniliar with Haiifav or the small toms in

Nova Scotia, which are still dmost completely, visibly segregated. Having lived in large

Canadian cities for more than a decade, where a mixture of races in public space is part of the landscape regardless of the ongoing racism, the whiteness of most public space at 'home' has become giaringly apparent in contrast. Thus, what is obvious, even dangerous, to someone inhabiting a non-white body becomes visible to me ody when 1 have a new point of reference or am otherwise forced to recognize it. in this Iight, 1 will proceed tvith some generalizations, attempting to acknowledge them while keeping in mind a space in which white and black and the boundaries between them, matter a great ded. Part 1: A Keystone of Community

1 am AtncviIle says a woman, child, man at the homestead site. This park is green; but Black, so Black with community- I taIk Africville to you and to you until it is both you and me till it stands and [ives again till you face and see and stand on its Iife and its forever Black past.j5'

While City views were always contested, it has becorne more common to read black critique, to hear commemorative words and to witness organized resistance to racist acts of the past and present. A rich body of titerature, artwork and music, dubbed by writer George

Elliot Clarke the "Afncadian Cultural Renaissance," now depicts the contemporary meaning of iUncville as a site of protest. a point of black pride and a Iesson for ail. The above stanza, from a poem by Mavine Tynes, encompasses what many AFncadian writers have caIled the

"spirit" of AfiicviIle. They refer to the power of shared history in bringing people together, e~chingtheir cornmon struggles. i\fricviIle has come to be a rallying cry for the btack

community, a syrnbol of what cmbe done to them if they are not vigilant and organized in

their own interests. Tynes' work asserts that .4fkviile now matters most as history to be

passed on and as a symboi of black unity and resistance. Charles Saunders, too, writes,

3nMaxine Tynes, "Afncville" (excerpt), in Womm Talkilig Wom(Lawrencetown Beach, NS.: Potterdeld Press, 1990) 62. "Afr-icville is not a memory fiozen in the amber of history. it's continuing to grow, to evolve, just as it did from the 1840s to the 1960s. Once it was a place. Now it's a spirit, an icon, a metaphor, a

Opened in 1989, an exhibition at Mount Saint Vincent University in Halifav reffected these values, telling the stories of former residents and depicting the daily life of the community through photos, artifacts, audio-visual aids and wrinen documentation. This exhibit was the result of collaborative efforts between black Mcville Geneaiogicai Society members and both black and white researchers and artists. Now housed in the Black Cultural

Centre of Nova Scotia, it is a rich ponrayal of memory in the form of a 'walk' through the cornmunity. Such narrative brinçs a heightened sense of the concreteness of Afiicville's life, igniting a stronger redization that something very much alive and wonhwhile has been lost.

Pictures seem to present 'evidence' in a way oral claims alone cannot, bringing to life the stories tord in an accornpanying catalogue. These stories have since been set to music by jazz artist Joe Sealeqs9and published in a book which includes analytic wori?'.

Shortly ahthe e.uhibition, a National Film Board docurnentary was produced, entitled Remember .,lfric~iIle.~~'in this film the way of life in the cornmunity is again

3s8CharlesSaunders, Blrrck mi Bltre~iose:irhe Contemporaty Histoty of a Commwtity (East Lawrencetown, NS., Pottersfield Press, 1999) 205.

359~oeSealy, '4 fncvï[ie S~riite,Seajam Records, 1997.

360AfncvilleGenealogicaI Society, Spirit of Aficville.

36'Shetagh MacKenzie, Remember AfncvÏIIe, 35 min. National FiIm Board of Canada, L 99 1, videocassette. 225 depicted through stories fiom older residents, live footage and photography. [t also covers interviews with residents conceming their feelings on being removed fiom their community, and foiiows a contemporary conference between biack community members and City Council, in which residents interrogate the City as to its actions during the destruction of Afncville.

Here, residents suggest their comrnunity was an expenment in social design and they the yinea pigs. They attest to the great emotionai loss and physicai fear surrounding relocation.

A former mayor of Halifa responds with rhetoric strikingly similar to that used in the 1960s.

Reading directly fiom a transcript, he tells residents that the City merely followed the advice of experts in the field of urban renewal, naminç Albert Rose and others, in line with common values of the tirne. He assures them that iVncville would be treated differently today, that were the situation to arise again. their views would be sought firsthand.

Black interviewees in the film assert the value of Afiicville as a home and community; they express their anger at City neglect and appear fiustrated at the remaining absence of a thorough explanation. In essence, they ask that the mayor and other officiais corne out fiom behind their documents, respecting them enough to address deeper 'truths' about the nature of the decision. This concem is only partially engaged by the mayor, who once adrnits the City's

"embarrassment" over the existence of a "slum."

The importance of land possession is a strong theme in both these interviews and older quotations. As one man noted, a slum is a place where people are renters and care little for the upkeep of the property, in contrast to hardworking AfncMlle people for whom land and home ownership was a symbol of pride and independence. As horneowners, he States, 226

Afncviiie residents were "not second class citizens." Particularly poignant in the film and subsequent book is the knowledge among former residents that they were regarded as incapable of self-determination, and their land as too valuable to remain 'black space'.

This concentrated series of cornmernorative events - the art exhibit, the documentary, the book and the conference - marks an important turning point in the history of Afncville's struggle. In effect. it beçins a pedagogy which potentially transcends geographic and racial boundaries. Nowhere is this more apparent than in an excellent Teacher 's Guide, published in

1993 by a group of black and white educators, addressing the use of the film and book as educationai resources in classrooms. Aimed at middle-high school students (approximately grades nine and ten), this guide suggests questions, classroom exercises and assignments which challenge students to engase with the material within different subject areas. For instance, the "Geography" section involves an activity in which students reflect on the meaning of 'home' and what makes a community important to those who live there. They then trace the storyline told by former residents alonç the map of Atncville provided in the book, identifjing the location of specific homes and other sites. This section aiso introduces the concept of"environmentai racism," asking students to identiQ how Africville was deprived of services and targeted as a site of waste.

The "Economics" exercises in the guide are desiged to identi@ the poverty leveis of

AfiicviIIe residents and spark discussion about the meaning of home ownership and personai property. The "Sociology" section suggests students survey mernbers of their community about their attitudes toward Atncviile, assessing whether or not the program of relocation was successful, and for whom. It also asks that students attempt to identify biases on the bas% of race and gender in the film and book, and in particular in the words of some white officials. Tn

"Politicai Science" they must discuss the differential access to power among different groups, the existence of racism in political systems, and the issue of appropriate redress for ficvilie residents.

While analyzing the film and book, the student must consider questions such as

"Whose voices, images and perspectives are heardlabsent?", "Who is identified as an expert?", and "Who will benefit if we accept the story as it is expressed?" Overall, the guide is designed to engage the class in identifjing the various interest groups - City Council, the urban planners, the .cUncville residents, civil rights leaders, the outside Halifa~community - and their particular investments in the Afncville decision. It consistently develops an understanding of systemic racism as the bais for distinguishing between the interests, and the gains or losses, of these groups.

Both the documentary film and the book, 7he Spirit of rlfricidlti, depict the poignant physical surroundings of the community, thus students and other audiences are faced with a history retùsing fictionalization. Residents attest to both the good and the bad. While they are sometimes accused by other Haligonians of romanticizing Afncville's Iife in hind~ight,~ these works spoke to me of unsurprising and realistic contradictions: The community was in a beautifil site, yet was polluted by outside forces and unequipped to maintain itself weiI:

&'For example, see Robert I. Britton, Letter to Haiiiax City Council, Re: Africville Genealogy Society, 28 October, 1994 (Halifax Public Library, Aficville file); See also Saunders, BIack md Blirrtlose, 2 10. 228 residents had high Ievels of poverty, yet a strong senss of collective cooperation and support to help them sunive. Interviewees do not feign a seamless, united voice, but speak of divides among comrnunity members as individuals were treated differently by the City. They acknowledge a degee of uncertainty in their feelings about relocation at the time. some younger members adrnitting they looked forward to what sounded Iike a wonderful new house and neighbourhood. Different expectations and hiçh hopes. however, hardly invaiidate their loss.

Similar issues are addressed in an essay by Maureen Moynagh, who theonzes

Afiicville as, in Benedict Anderson's term, an 'imagined comrnunity'. By this she refers to the symbolic meaning the community engenders although it no longer exists in concrete for~n.~~

Anderson's concept encompasses the broader meaning of nationaiism, with the nation as an intançible idea held in cornmon in the imaginations of its citizens. As Moynagh expIains,

"Nationalism, then, is a simulacrum of community where not only geography but social difference effectively precludes that mernbers should know one another or interact face to face."3a From such communities, people feel part of a larser body, gamerinç a particular identity in which to Iind pride and belonging. Moynagh's essay emphasizes the meanins ficville has corne to hold for its residents and their descendants, not the matter of definable

%ie" conditions which may or may not be completeiy accurate in retrospect. Like Anderson,

363GeorgeElliot Clarke. too, has pointed to the Afncadian culturai construction of Atiicviiie as a “bal comrnunity" for those who were unable to view it Ersthand. Saunders, Bhck urid Blmtose, 9.

MI Maureen Moynagh, "Afncviiie, an ha-hed Cornmunity," Cmodiair Literanrre 157 (1998): 15. 229 she hoIds that imagined community cannot be evaluated against 'real' community, as its imagined status is "a product of necessity not falseho~d."~~~She refers to Spivak's notion of

"strategic essentialism" as an approach to demands for justice and redress, positing that

Afncadian writers, like many in subjugated groups, reconstruct their community in fighting the pervasive racist discourses of the mainstream.

In Moynagh's findings, black literature speaks back to a body of Nova Scotian folk culture centred around the histories of white settlers, and especially around the Celtic tradition. This dominant white culture has been positioned by whites as the central identifjmg motif by which Nova Scotians both understand themselves and are understood by tourists and other outsiders. The recent rise in black cultural production challençes its heçemony by reminding the public of black history and white racisrn. Moynagh's analysis makes an important distinction between dominant forms of nationalism amonç majority groups and the strategic construction of nation in response to oppressive conditions. In this. the author is delineating a canon of works speaking to the nature of black comrnunity and against the attempted dominant erasure of memory in the wake of ficville's physical defeat.

A clear component of such remembrance is a revaluation of the rural physical surroundings of ficville. In this, ficadian artists such as David Woods and George EIliot

Clarke have maintained a rural flavour in common with white cultural production whiIe protesting their exclusion from the tourism-sponsored discourse of foik cuIture. A recent play by George Boyd also engages themes of modernity, portraying one black farnily's conflict 230 over the prospect of leaving MiicvilIe. While the young woman is descended from generations of Afncville people, her husband is a newcomer, there because of the maniage.

He is amenable to the potentially profitable deals mmoured to be available fiom the city and to the modem opportunities an urban centre might offer, whik she wishes to remain in her home.

The play portrays the confiict between desires for upward mobility and for valued community traditions, as weli as the rneaning of place. When the young couple's baby dies fiom environmental contarninants, a dispute ensues as the City forbids thern to bury the child in

Afncville, which is not 'consecrated ground'.

While most works focus, unsurprisingly, on black identity, Boyd's Comecrated

Gro~rtrdbegins to address the inner complexities of white privilege and guilt through the prominent character ofthe white social worker. Entering with drearns of iaunching a noteworthy career through his rescue of the underclass, the sociar worker's consciousness develops as he begins to see the reality of what he bas been sent to do.366 While the young man is to perfom the hands-on dirty work of his superiors, he is tom between the upward climb to inclusion in this dite group on the one hand, and his shame in the face of black

3661tshould perhaps be noted that this character is not based strongiy on the real-lie social worker. While the character is very young and inexperienced, directly out of university, Peter MacDonald was forty years old and had been practising social work for sixteen years. The character is from a weaithy Halifax family, whose strong social and poiitical connections got him the job. MacDonald was the son of a steel-worker, thus working class, and grew up in Cape Breton. MacDonald does not appear to have discussed personal stnrggies or feelings of guiit when inteMewed for the relocation report. This is not to Say that MacDonald acted diierently fiom or similady to the character in his dealii with Afncville residents, only that it is a fictional ponrayal, perhaps designed to encapsulate a broader and more expiicit black experïence of white subjectivity at work. 23 1 residents who, rather than depending on hm, critique and resent his involvement. Men disillusioned about his former self-concept as saviour of the oppressed, he suffers something of an emotional breakdown and takes to diinking heavily. The viewer is asked to see not simply a tenant of power, which he evilly enacts upon those 'below', but a complex characterization of the white subject's stniggle to comprehend his position. We are lefl to ponder the ugliness upon which dominant identity rests, and, at the same time, a self-indulgent guilt which is neither fruithl nor progressive.

Consideration of this rich body of work can hardly help but raise the question of its reception in the dominant community. In light of my focus on both racial discourses and memory, it has been crucial to consider iF, and how, the tone of discussion about ficville has changed in the white community in recent years. At first glance, it appears that some progress has been made. Black voices are no longer completeiy absent in the Halifav mainstream media; their messages are no longer uniformly portrayed as irrational or childlike protestations. An article such as Edna Staebler's would not likely appear in h1acien~~'stoday.

Charles Saunders' carehl following of Afncville potitics and related events is instead allowed a prominent place in Halifax papers. The commemorative art exiubit has toured the country, while poetry, the play and public testirnonies receive coverage in the local papers and the documentary has received nationwide acclaim. Clairmont and Magill's book appeared in 1999 in its third edition, while annual AfncvilIe reunions on the former site have been taking place for years. Most Iiberal-leaning whites would acknowledge that rnistakes were made in

Afncville, sometimes that the community's destruction was a tragedy. City officiais have 232 insisted that Africville would be treated quite differently today. Why, then, be concerned over its memory? Are these ideological shifts insufficient or insincere, and what might they really mean?

While the mandate of this project is not to conduct a comprehensive survey of contemporary white attitudes about hfricville, several important observations can be made.

Halifax has never forrnally or publicly apologized to .MicvilIe residents for the destruction of their community. New promises have been made and broken. City officials have abdicated responsibility for the past. iüncville's space remains in control of the City of Halifax, which deterrnines how it is to be used and enjoyed, as weIl as the educational message its memorial aspect conveys. The city has attempted to silence protests where possibIe, and criticized or dismissed them where visible. Mthough various commemorative works have permeated the rnainstream community, perhaps tweaking the emotions of a guilty white public, Afiicville has not been incorporated in white Nova Scotia's history as a disgraceful fact of our racist past and present. It is to a demonstration of this fal1acy which the next sections turn.

Part II: Innocent Voices, Benevolent Forefathers

The City of Halifax stands strong and proud that we're a good corporate community, and 1 don? think the city would treat their people unfairiy. 1don? think it7sever ha~pened-'~'

367Dep~tyMayor Fat Pottie, quoted in Charles Sairnders, "Africville story deserves honorable ending," HafifaDai4 Nars, 1 1 September, 1994. 23 3

The above statement in response to the AtncvilIe issue was made in 1994 by the

Deputy Mayor, it can be interpreted in two ways. Either the City remains in complete denial that any mistakes were made in the treatment of Afncville, or .cUncville residents are simply not considered to be .rhe City's people." Two related strands of examples attest to the fact that both assurnptions are common among Halifax's governinç body. First, racial discourse, that is, what the City scrys in response to Africville's questions and challenges, shows important similarities to the way these issues were treated in the 1960s. Where it has changed, the transformation is not necessarily more progressive but more a response to other social factors. These issues are examined shortly. Second, it is cruciai to look at what the

City has dotle in response to ~cvilIe'sretùsai to fade with the passage of time. These concerns are dealt with in Part III.

.As was noted above, a conference documented in the film Remember ilfricvillc and the book Tjle Spirit of A#icviIlt! showed former residents questioning the actions of City officials. Altematinp footage of the contemporary didogue and on-camera statements by officiais fiom the time of .4fiicviIleTsdestruction is revealing of how the story has been translated. Mayor Lloyd, in the 1960s, explains that, aIthough "you certainiy don't coerce people. . . people need to be shown things aren't in their best interests." While former Mayor

O'Brien is, in 1989, more carefùl, stating that things would be done more sensitively in the present, he reads a statement recitine the expert advice behind the City's decision. The text of his talk is published in fLll.368 Perhaps most interesting is O'Brien's grappling with the oficial

------36Rfi~villeGeneaiogicai Society, Spiriz of Afncvdle, 98-100. 234 position on why the City wished to clear AfricviIle land. He positions himself as a central decision maker, and clarifies that he has not come in a spirit of "either pride or apology," but to explain the way in which the City saw its actions at the time.

It should be noted that speculation over the City's use of AfncMlle land had continued over time. The lingering rumours about residential or industrial development and a more recent one about the construction of the new Halifax-Dartmouth bridge al1 fed public confùsion over a possible underlying motive. As 1 noted in Chapter 3, industrial development ceased to be a concern as the relocation decision drew nearer, and O'Brien confirms this fact.

He notes that many proposals passed by City CounciI remained on paper only and were never put into effect. Sirnilarly, he denied that the bridge construction was a factor, as officiais at the time wished to place the bridge elsewhere, in the city's south end.369

O'Brien proceeds to compare the Micville relocation to that of a downtown area, in which low-income white residents had been forced out to make way for the Scotia Square shopping and office complex. Against this example, ficvilIe is positioned as a more progressive and sensitive operation because a social worker was employed to oversee negotiation and because compensation was based, in his words, on 'need'. First, not addressed is how the involvement of the sociai worker, who was not a 'neutral' party but worked for the City, made the process more just. Second, the former, downtown relocation was completed for a definitive reason; no proposals for use of the Africville site were officially

x9This is also conlïrmed in a quotation fiom the Mayor's interview with Clairmont & MagîU, Relocation Report, 223- 23 5 passed and Iiffle use has been made of it since. In short, O'Brien obscures that the white downtown residents were given a demonstrable explanation - the maIl was built, it does exkt - while residents of ficdlewere lefi to speculate among various rumours and promised only irnproved living conditions, which thy did not for the most part experience. Race, even as a relevant factor, is never mentioned.

Of particular interest in a discourse analysis is the way in which O'Brien's speech maneuvers to suggest alignment with the other side right &er the opposite impression has been given. For example. immediately afler quing that Afiicville was treated better than the white downtown neighbourhood, he States, "Maybe that does not sound right today and i agree that there is a lot about this that does not sound right t~day."~~This is nonsensical, as the original argument was desiged to susses the action was 'correct'. He then dosses his defense by moving imrnediately from the specific to the çeneral, suggesting agreement on many other (unnarned) elements.

Racism does not factor in the euplmation at any point althou* it is coded in the 'tnie* explanations offered. O'Brien admits the City's embmssment over the so-called sium and cites a belief that integration and public housing would prevent the rise of 'ghettoes'. When the dialoge moves too ciose to race, however, the decision-rnakers are distanced hmtheir task. Discornfort with the stum is said to have been a probIem of'lhe total HaIifa'i community;" therefore. "as a result. some action was pushed on us by that particular

3mAfii*~lIeGeneaiogicai Society, Spirir of Afiicvilk, 99. 236 feeling."37' Social worker Peter MacDonald, speaking in the documentary film, attempts to introduce a reversai of responsibility, similarly separating decision-makers fiom the outcome of their actions. He States that "you didn't go in and say, it's your day to rnove." but that most such pressure came fiom within the cornmunity itself as neighbours began to leave. He does not address the forces under which neighbours left in the first place. making this a true addition to the common innocent sentiments of O'Brien and others. O'Brien ends his statement on such a note - thrit of the untortunate difFerence between the City's intended

'good' actions and their implementation.

In contrast, the other major white official involved in this conference speaks at some length of the mistakes and regrets of the City. Fred MacKinnon, who was deputy welfare rninister at the time of relocation stresses the importance of cultural identity and the need to honour the potentiai for survivai and growth within existing cornmurtities. He critically compares the "manipulation" of .iVncviIIe to that of native children sent forcibly to residentiai schools and foster homes, projects in which he was ais0 personally involved. He cnticizes the lack of follow-up to the relocation, and the mistaken belief that culture and traditions couid be transformed successtùlly fiom outside.

While these sentiments begin to suggest personai accountability and the desire for change, they are. at the same tirne, situated oddly in the context of this conference.

MacKinnon is addressing an audience of many black former Africville residents who are an-gy, frustrated and requesting explamions for what was done to them. in choosïng to 23 7 focus on the "lessons" learned fiom ficville, he ends up proclaiming to this audience the approach that is needed when 'tire" attempt to rescue an impoverished community. For instance, he states, "I think we have to leam that many such communities, and Africville is a prime example, have a cultural identity, a personal identity and an emotionai place in the hearts and minds of their people ... 1think the first fundamental lesson to be learned about such communities is that social and economic change cannot be manip~lated."~"The lessons of which MacKinnon speaks are lessons for the white officiais and decision-makers of the city, as well as other outsiders who went dong with reiocation. Elements of such reflections wouid thus be useful in makinç a speech to Council, but AFricville residents hardly needed to Ieam these particular lessons. Further, such analysis is aniculated in black critique and resistance; while the speaker may have righttùlly Iistened and gieaned new perspectives from this, they are not of his own authorship.

Later MacKinnon states, "Social and economic change for me personally, or for a community, has to begin not where you or someone else thinks that I should be ... but where i am. Now you may not like where 1 am ... but if you're going to effect social and economic change with me ... you have to begin where I This positioning of identities - in an exarnple where he is the oppressed and the 'Others' are instructed in how to properly help hirn

- reverses, thus obscures, the race relations being addressed. The speaker must perform these awhward discursive maneuvers CO lead the taik away f7om the accountability of whites, 33 8 beginning with acknowledgment of who has erred, hinting at who has been wronged, but then assernbling the past into a genedized -lesson for dl'. Neither the bodies under discussion nor the bodies in the room have races. Afiicville residents are simply fellow citizens, coming to the discussion on a ievel playing field. learning their lesson alongside "us."

This tone of analysis indicates the ease with which wll-mening and regretful white authorities may unconsciously maintain a sense of "us and them." Though praising the comrnunity's own values, they still know best how these values are to be utilized. Similady, the attempted manipulation of other communities is identified mainly as something which

'doesn't work', not something: that is wrong or which officiais had no business attempting in the first place.

Finally, even the more 'sensitive' analysis assumes a project underscored by the good intent to make things better. It never addresses the racist discourses of the day, the complete

tack of communication with the comrnunity. or the Iack of attempt to instate viable plans.

Regardless of MacKinnon's personal feelings of the tirne, or how those feelings rnateridize

now that he has regrets, it is still a risk to assume the overall slant of the program was one of

concern for the well-being of Afiicville and its people.

The eme within which we define what occurred aIso defines what questions can then

be asked about it. The Iiberal framework of positive goals that simply 'didn't work' is so

firmly entrenched that it is impossible for critics to meaningfully questior. the foundational

intent. Residents, in this conference, are questionhg the very foundation of the decision, of

'why they did what they did'. To answer this honestIy wodd mean to state racism, to 23 9 relinquish the 'good intent' foundation. No one in a position of authority has done this, which is why the answers are so rarely satisfying.

Responses to former residents recorded in the film and book are echoed in a 1994 document prepared by the Halifau Director of Social Planning for City Council. This study was prepared in response to two demands fiom the Afncville GeneaIogicaI Society: the allotment ofland for the rebuilding of the community's church3'' and the establishment of a scholarship fUnd for ~cvilledescendants. Both requests are recommended to Council in the report.

The report proceeds to review the 1960s decision and to justi@ the City's role. To this end it sets out to establish a "context" in which the events must be placed. It States that the "bulldozer approach to social relocation was simply the accepted rnethod of the day, and that the advice of "esperts" was the bedrock from which Afiricville was uprooted. While it claims today's approach would be "more sensitive," the older method is clearly justified in its day. The different options perceived at the time are reviewed and the final decision, that the

city would use its statutory power but "temper justice with compassioq" is again put Forth.

This establishes the tone by which officials are reassured their çood intent has been

acknowIedged and is the foundation of al1 other discussion. "Compassion" is reported to have

been shown at al1 stages of the program and compensation is cited as "at least very fair and

perhaps generous." They are again reminded that the relocation program cost much more

j7%e provincial government had promised, in 199 1, to erect a replica of the church; the City, whîch now owned the space, was responsible for offenng the parcel of land where the church would go. Saunders, Black and Bluenose, 220. 240 than the estimated cost at the time of planning, and this is upheld as evidence of generosity.

This section concludes, simply, "On compensation, the City did the right ti~ing."~~~

This report raises doubts as to the tnie nature of Afiicville, positing that rnemory has been reformed into "rnyths" of an idyllic, self-reliant comrnunity. These rnyths are deerned to have grown "over time," a conclusion which ignores the many examples of such community values, including some From the social worker and other outsiders, in the early relocation report. In addition, residents' impressions frorn the time about compensatory measures are said to be misguided as the City lias no records of such promises. Concerns raised by residents about housing arrangements are recorded in the report, but never addressed, and what is called "the education cornmitment" is said to have been solved through a small education Fiind and by giving former residents access to Halifax public schools. The latter is particularly absurd as ficville children had already attended Halifa schools for years.

Further, public education is, by law, available to al1 children; this was hardly an extra reward.

The report's -official story' conclüdes, "TheCity of Halifav does need to recognire the reality of Afiicville in its history, celebrate the contributions the AfriMlle people made to the

City, and to continue to seek and help in their hl1 participation in the life of the City."376 it then presents alternatives to the proposed plan, which include the options to review and revise it or to do nothinç, which, it is warned, "will likely contniute to the festenng animosity

375RobertI- Britton, Letter to Halifax City Council, Re: AfncviUe Genealogy Society, 28 October, 1994 (Haiifau Public Library- Afiicvilie me) 5- 24 1 behveen the descendants of the people of -\fncville and the City of HaEu. The City would ais0 be lefi open to considerable negative publicity.""

What is the reality of AtncviIle in the City's histov How are the contributions to be celebrated, and how is tùll participation to be sought and supported? With neither tùrther detail nor action, these phrases read like the vague rhetoric of the '60s with its promises to

'take care' of residents for 'as long as necessary'. While the report takes pains to establish the contes in which the decision was made, nowhere is the context of.4fncville1s economic and physical demise discussed; nowhere is there roorn for assessment of the community's life and needs beyond a moment in the late 1960s, from a white perspective. The City's responsibilities are seen to begin and end with the purchase of land and the movement of people. "The reality of Micville in the City's history," fiom this document, is that of a problem which won't go away despite its fair and compassionate soIution by the City. The compensation agreed to "in prin~iple"~'~can be considered a step forward, but it is awarded in the spirit of 'çenerosity' and the prevention of embarrassing confiict, not of regret or obligatory redress.

3nIbid., 6. Note that the people of ficville are ofien referred to as "descendants," although many of them were original residents. Most centrai activists in the genealogicai society were rniddle-aged at this time and had Iefi Afncville as teenagers or young adults. Various older residents were stilI living and were inteniewed in the 1991 documentary. A major speaker at the 1989 conference was Ruth Johnson, whose great-grandfather was the tirs settler, John Brown.

3'sThese motions were not passed at this time, aIthough the City had aliegedIy agreed to rebuild the church severai years earlier. To the present day the church has not been built- 242

A further issue arose in 1994 over compensation, when residents of Sackville, a community just outside Halifk-y were offered generous reparation payments for living near a landfill site. ATn'cville residents, who had lived much closer to their local landfill than many in

Sackville while suffering various other forms ofpollution as weU, began to ask why compensation had never been ofered in their case. A "hotiine" column in the Halifax Daily

News posed the issue to the public. Haiigonians could cal1 in and record their opinions, which were then published in the ne* issue. This poil found that seventy-seven percent of callers

(fiom a sample of 74) were against compensation for Africville. Some callers felt that

Afncville had aiready been adequately compensated. (i-iowever, any former measures had addressed other wrongs. On the issue ofthe dump, no reparation had been made.) Other callers commented that Afiicville residents "chose to Iive where the garbage was best," that they were only "squatters,'' or that they had been "savage~."~~

Overall responses to .iUncMlleYscontinued campaign have summoned the racial stereotypes, both implicit and explicit, of the 1950s and '60s discussed in Chapter 2. The integration argument is common, exemplified in the conference speeches and in the 1994 words of Mayor Ron Wallace, who stated, "If Aficville remained today, the city would be severely reprirnanded for promoting segegati~n."~~As Genealogicai Society president Irvine

Carvery replied, other historically biack cornmurtities remain, and are not felt to be "promoting segregation." The Society has been clear that a renewed residentiai community on the 343

Afncville site would not be black-only, nor would al1 former residents choose to move back; they would simply iike first opportunity to re-establish themselves on the land, which would then be open to anyone.

However, the fear of outside perception remains, while other racial narratives repeat themselves when pressure becomes too forcetùl. Justifications today are barely more sophisticated than at the time, consisting of white-defined 'integration', slum clearance. and the desires and fears of white citizens generally. The explanatory contexts being established articulate the concerns and positions of the dominant society, while Afncville's contextud story is dismissed as a romantic myth. Generosity, compassion and justice remain in the tiay, while historical distance allows both a Iack ofaccountability and the construction of innocence in positing that we now have leamed Our lesson and would next time do it right. But if the major lesson leamed is only that the former approach didn't work, what is to prevent the

City's 'good intent' tiom inviting itseif back in some new guise?

Part HI: A Place to Dream Their Dreams

Seaview Park was established on newly-groomed Afncville soi1 in 1985, at a cost to tavpayers of approximately one million doIlan. Athough opposed by the current mayor and many members of Council, its construction had been approved six years before by a different administration. Under pressure kom a few north end aldermen, it was built arnid contention over the appropnate use of the space and ongoing pressures for industrial devel~pment.~~'

Seaview is an open field of low knoUs with scattered young trees, grave1 walking paths and benches overlooking the water of the Basin. It has a paved parking lot and public washrooms. For a time the City discussed buitding a swimrning pool on this site which had been denied water lines. Upon opening day, the deputy mayor of Halifax, who had fought for the park's existence, declared it a space "for young and old, a place to dream their dreams," thus Seaview was made a public site of recreation, open to "everyone."

Former residents of AFncville seemed conflicted over this designation. One woman present replied, "Who wants to drearn about uprootinç people?", while others located the sites of their former homes and expressed sad mernories. Some asked the obvious: if this rnoney could be spent on the park, why couldn't Africville have been provided with services? Others conveyed a mix of regret and anger with a sense of satisfaction that at least Atncville would be commemorated in its former space3= Regardless of their insights, fifieen years after the last Micville home was bulldozed, black space becarne "public space," a process descnbed as the transformation of an eyesore. The city parks and recreation department received a Board of Trade landscape award for its work on the site.ja3

ri ri an Underhill, "Seaview Park gers go-ahead," Hnlifca Mud Star, 2 1 January, 1983, 1.; Brian Underhill, "Alderman accusinç ciry staff of 'foot-dragging' on northend park," HuIifm Muil Star 19 November, 198 1.

3k-LeeMacLean, "Seaview o6ciaIly opens," H4Iifa Md Star, 24 lune, 1985.

383SusanLunn, "Eyesore transfomed to award-winning parkn Hafifa Mail Sm, 7 June, 1986. 245

Despite some contradictory feelings, Seaview has become the site of the annual

Afiicville reunion, at which former residents and their relatives meet for severai days each summer. The gathering has included, over the years, picnics, parties, musical performances, church services, the launch of the book The Spirit of Africville and, in 2000, a wedding. A monument to Afiicville has been erected on the site as well, placed by the City in memory of the area's founding black families.

Although former residents have made the best of their park, its existence has met difficult times. Having achieved some measure of recognition of their story, the people of

.cVncville and their few supporters in Council were soon to realize their commemorative space was no more immune to the intrusion of commercial and industrial interests than had been their former comrnunity itself In the early 1990s, the park became an object of renewed contestation when the City announced plans to build a new watefiont seMce road directly through the area- The road was to cross the exact sites of Seaview Church and the former elementary school. bisecting the land on which Afncville residents were lobbying to one day rebuild the comm~nity.~~Vigilant protest fiom former residents, now more organized than ever as the ficville Geneaiogicai Society, took place over months, during which City officiais voted down proposais for a public hearing on the issue and pressed the importance of the road for industrial development. The people of Afiicville finally achieved an agreement with the City by which the road would be rerouted around the park, and a replica of the

3aCharles Saunders, "The dream of a new Afncvüle," Halifm Dai& Nrws, 3 December, 2990; Charles Saunders, "Battle hes are drawn," Halifax DaÏb Nms, 19 May, 1992, 146 church would be built on the site as a mernorial. These accomplishments made the 1992

AFricville reunion a cause for special celebration; it was attended by Martin Luther King III, who helped to break the ground where the new church was to stand.385Nearly a decade Iater, the park space has been preserved. Discussion of rebuilding the church, which was to be tùnded by the provincial govemment, surfaced throughout the 1990s, but action has never followed.

1994 saw a resurçence of contestation when two brothers, former Afncville residents. occupied Seaview Park in support of ongoing demands for redress and renewed claims on the land. Victor and Eddie Carvery, who had been teenagers when they were forced to leave ficville, set up first a tent, Iater two trailers, on the site of their former home, where they remained for the next severai years. This action coincided with increased pressure on City

Hall from the Afiicville GenealogicaI Society to renegotiate with residents for compensation and related requests. Some demands included the empIoyment of former Atiicville people in the park itself, and individua1 consideration for those who had received inadequate pay for their homes. ültimately, the M?îcville activists wished to re-establish a community on the site.

The brothers vowed to stay until an ageement was reached.

News reports of the tirne reflect a daily preoccupation with the presence of the

Carverys in the park and cite complaints fiom other Haiii residents who claim the protest

385CharlesSaunders, "AfncvilIe:the spirit is stronger than ever," HalÏjm Daqv Naus, 2 August, 1992. "interferes with their enjoyment" of the ~pace.~"Mayor Fitzgerald had already threatened to evict them by force if necessary, although no law existed to justiS, this. The City had also losked the park's only wa~hroorn.~~'Some Haligonians angrily expressed a beiief that the

Carverys were receiving special treatment because of race,38gseeming not to notice the absurdity of such a remark given how ficville had ben 'specially' treated because of race in the past.

In 1994, the Halifav City Manager agreed to rneet with -4fncville representatives in order to hear their requests and concerns. Covering this dialogue in the north end of the city, the media depicted the City Manager as having been "under fire" during a meeting "dominated by anger and emotional outbur~ts."~~~Another article describes the Manager as having been

"under siege" and çiven a "t~n~ue-Lashin~.'*~~The hostility and bittemess of the black cornmunity is central, and the article States of A4tîiMIleresidents, "None steered the session to collecting ideas, nor did they ask what residents should do to earn a sympathetic council ear..." (Obviously residents are not yet, after 150 years, deserving of such reception.) In

386CameronMacKeen, "City responds to protest over Seaview Park land," Halifm Chrouicle Hrrald, 112 May, 1995.

387MichaelLightstone, "AFricviIle showdown brewing," Hal+ Dady N~vs,12 February, 1995.

3g8~harlesSaunders, 'The law of the land," Hnlijar Dai& Nrws, 2 April, 1995.

389 Shaune MacKinlay & Jim Rossiter. '-City official saw 'hm,' Carvery says," HaIifa Dai& Navs, 29 August, 1994,3.

3%arry Dorey, "Coopersmith gets tonge lashing," Halifm Chrorricle Herald, 29 August, 1994. 248 contrast, the City Manager is the cairn voice of reason; he is said to have "led off the two-hour session by saying he hoped both sides could embark on a 'co-operative venture' and not become conûontational-" FolIowing his explanation to residents of the City's past "fair and equitable" financiai rewards, it is said that "anger and venom flowed fieely." The article ends with a report of violence: In the preamble to a question, Eddie Carvery had been explaining his curent welfare status, when another man in the audience intemipted and insulted him, stating that he did not pay his rent. Carvery, apparently, waiked up to the man and punched him, then returned to his seat to finish his question as the other man was led out.

My argument over the reporting of such events is not that the media should ignore negative incidents or comments in a meeting. However, the majority of news reports on

Mcville protests depict oniy the anger expressed by residents, ignoring the complex historical context in which it has, unsurprisingiy, developed. Activists like Eddie Carvery are frequently belittled as irrate children who Iack a reasonable analysis, much the way Afncvilie residents during the relocation era were deemed unable to comprehend their situation and act on their own behaif Such reporting operates discursively to imprint black bodies with excessive emotion and anger, and white bodies with intellectual rationaiity.

When reference is made to the history behind protests, it is fiequently in a doubtfiiI tone, and is usuaily followed up by reports of some 'generous' action by the City. Regardless of the many different issues that arke over Afiicviiie, news reports repeatedly close with reminders of the sarne two concessions made by the City, sometimes with an interesting twist.

For example, "to appease former Afncville residents council decided to provide land needed 249 for the church and also plan to set up a $100 000 scholarship fùnd for AtiicviIle descendants

(emphasis added)."39' This cornpletely overlooks the long fight residents had to gain these rewards, and that the building of the church had, at that time, already been delayed for several years. Many articles also close with rerninders of the 1994 report on the city's aIIeged faimess and generosity toward Afncville. A report of the nonh end meeting ends by citing the

Deputy Mayor who explains that the city has nothing to apologize for and simply has no money for this issue, thus there is no hope.

Commonly, white Halifax city councillors are portrayed as the rationai. caIm and understanding patriarchs, attempting to keep angry confrontations at bay. [t seems words about fairness and justice spoken calmly or read from an "official' document cannot be understood as provocative of angry response. It is never noted that these participants in the discussion are not those whose history is being denied, and whose demands have rarely seen

Iegitimate attention. Nor are they implicated in the same history which created Aficville's situation in the first place. They do not have to ask permission to speak, or how to "earn" a hearing of their concerns. They are not living in the aftermath of didocation on welfare, or in a coId public park. Yet in many reports they are portrayed as the victims of an angry black mob. And indeed, black 'anger' appears an unforgivable threat, rarely with actuat cause.

Whether or not Cmery acted violently, then, is not my concem. While not condoning any

39'CameronMacKeen, "Get out, protesters wamed," HuIijim Chronide Herald, 17 May, 1995.; See also Cameron MacKeen, "Mayor to act on situation at park," Halifar Chronicle Heruld, 3 May, 1995. 250 violent action, 1 argue that such incidents cannot be considered and judged only in the moment they occur, out of time and space.

Although the Carvery brothers' campsite was at first patrolled by police, the City had no legai recourse to evict the protesters until it actively created some. This coincided with planning for the upcoming G7 Summit to be held in 1995, and many have speculated that the

City feared embarrassment over its racial problem before an international audience.'= Halifax was busily renovating the waterfront, creating parking space and beautifjhg the downtown, meanwhiIe reaIizing its unsuccessful 1960s 'clean-up' of Aiïicville had resurfaced. Displaced residents had re-piaced themselves, the green space had been made black again. A few months before the summit, despite widespread protest From the black community, the City passed a bylaw which forbade citizens to camp in public parks ovemight. Mayor Walter

Fitzgerald cited the new ordinance as falling under the Protection of Property Act, announcing, before rhr Imv icm ncrlrallypasserl, "people are in the park illegally and we want them A letter to council fiom lawyers Burnley Rocky Jones and Evangeline Cain-

Grant, representing the Carverys, sums up the position of many blacks:

...the entire parks ordinance has apparently been manufactured around the objective of creating a legislative scheme to facilitate a second deportation of blacks fiom the AfEcville site and to suppress the protest of former Mncville residents on the only

39'Shaune MacKinIay, "AfncviIle protesters vow to fight on," Haiifax Da* Nervs, 3 1 Marck 1995.

393Citedin Saunders, Bluck and Bheirose, 2 12. occasion in many decades in which the international community will be focused on this ~ity.~~

The passing of this ordinance sparked active protest in the black community, creating an apparent rift when the Africville Genedogicai Society eventually supported the law. The difference in approach was reported in the media as divisive of the black community, and City councillors questioned whether the Genealogical Society was actually representative of

AfiicviIle people. IMne Carvery, Society president and brother of Victor and Eddie, explained that the Society did support his brothers' protest, although it was not the group's chosen strategy. They had felt compelled, however, to negotiate with the City in order to protect the rights of .4fiicviIle residents to continue their annud reunions, which involved camping ovemight in the park. This compromise resulted not in outnght collaboration between the

Society and the City, as some suggested, but in an amendment to the bylaw which protected their riçht to hold the re~nion.~~~

Protest against the bylaw ti-om other activists received coverage in keeping with other depictions of dismptive and emotional blacks. Black spectators at the City Hall meeting where the ordinance was passed were verbaily disciplined by the Mayor. As the coverage reports: "Speakers were allotted five minutes each and were signaied by the mayor when their time reached the last minute." He aIso "warned he would clear the councii chambers ifthe

3wMacKinlay,''ficville protesters."

3gsTeenaPaynter, "City &es Carverys the boot," Halifm Niorth Errd News, 24 March, 1995; See aIso Bruce Erskine, "Afnde Geneaiogicai Society backs protesters," Halifax Chronicle Herald, 18 May, 1995. 152

Carverys' supporters didnytrefrain fiom applauding speakers."3P6 A later article depicts protesters outside City Hall, while stating that city officials, inside, were taking steps "to repair relations with the descendants of Africviile re~idents."~'~These reparations consisted of the rezoning required to build Seaview Church, a promise by now several years overdue, and which was never carrïed out. Set against the calm and benevolent, hardworking oficials, the outside protest appears quite irrational.

During the week the bylaw was passed to evict the Carverys, an anti-racism ralIy was heId in celebration of the UN-declared International Day for the Elimination of Racial

Discrimination. Afier describing speakers who "bashed" City Councii over the new law, as well as some coverage of other issues relating to Africville and racism, the mayor is again -ziven the final word: "Mayor Walter Fitzgeraid said yesterday the city is beefing up its anti- racism efforts." The article proceeds to announce a City-sponsored series of ami-racisrn public service announcements in the works, and a committee on race relations which the mayor says "is elrpected to becorne more active."J98

During the time of their 'occupation', news reports consistently portrayed nibtie and not-so-subtle biases against the Carverys' protest. This was achieved partIy through focus on other issues urrrelated to their cause, for instance, rumours that the brothers had neglected

3%ShauneMacKinlay, '"ScandaiousY," HaleDai4 News, 73 March, 1995.

397MacKeen,"City responds."

39gMchaelLightstone, "Afncville lives as rights issue," HdfCDaily Nms,22 March, 1995. their dogs who accompanied them at the site, complete with photos of the dogs' newborn p~ppies.~~~Another article closes with one line about how the park is being investigated as a popular cruising site for gay men. This appears completely out of the blue, rather than, as one would expect, being a separate issue wonhy of another article. No particular news has developed in the "ongoin%" investigation and no effort is made to even suçgest what it has to do with the Carverys. It may, however, succeed in building a general picture of the park space as imperiled by yet another kind of illegai activity, by yet another 'deviant', unconstrained gro~p.'~A later article focuses specifically on the mess the campsite has caused, showinç photos only of the protesters' çarbage,''' while others cite complaints fiom nearby residents about "fish guts" left lying about, and the condition of the brothers' trailers.'Oz

Despite these conditions, which the Carverys denied, Mayor Fitzgerald announced that he would not evict them imrnediately &er the new legslation was passed. Again he is positioned as patient and understanding, and quoted as saying the city has been sympathetic and fair in attempts to negotiate this sensitive terrain. He is ailowed to correct any

'%ay Smith, "Aiticville protesters haven' t lefi park yet," Hal* Chronide Herald, 1 November, 1996; Brian Flinn. nAiticville protesters move out," Hc1Iif.3~Ddv Abus, 3 1 October. 1996.

"'('Michael Lightstone, "Ex-AfiicvilIe residents squat in protest," HnIifmc Dailv Navs, I4 August, 1994.

*'"City to clean up Carverys' Seaview Park camp:' Halijii Daiiy Nms, 24 May, 1995.

*'Carneroi1 MacKeen "Get out." 254 misconceptions the public rniçht have of the term 'racism', which he claims is used too fiequently: "1 think ifs a few peopie who didn't get their way and they yell 'racism' ... There's not a shred of racism in this. They're entitled to their opinion - even ifthey're wrong." Still, the apparently fair-minded mayor appeared fleGble, stating, "if they can show us that we haven't given every sensitivity to this and bent over backwards, then that's ~omething."~'~

Sirnilarly, the aldennan who reported the above cornplaints from area residents stated,

"Everybody is human - 1 understand how they feel ... But they have to understand that 30 years ago and now are two different times."'"

Shortly afier the Iaw was passed, the Carvery brothers were given a notice of eviction.

The City's plans in this regard appeared to backfire somewhat as the brothers moved their protest just outside the park's border, to an area which did not fall under municipal jurisdi~tion.~~~Here, the Carverys noted to reporters, their presence was more visible, in contrast to their camp at the back ofthe park away fiom the main roads. As the City alone could not evict them without provincial and federal consent, they remained there for several more years. The Mayor's application to the provincial and federd governments remained unanswered for some tirne.

"Michael Lightstone, "Mayor: 'No racisrn in this'," HnI$ir Dnily Naq 25 March, 1995.

JMMichaeILightstone, "ficville showdowi."

M5CameronMacKeen, L'Halifaxalone can do nothing about Af5cviiie protesters;" Hdifmc Chronicle Herald, 3 1 August, 1995, B3. 25 5

During 1996, Edward Carvery was arrested after a conflict with environmental consultants working in Seaview Park.- He was alleged to have argued with and threatened them, as well as threatening damage to their equiprnent and vehicles. Coverage of this issue was detailed and emphatic; Carvery did not piead guilty and was given a year's probation afier his mal. He and Victor maintained their campsite until, in Febniary of 1999, Eddie Carvery

Fe11 il1 and was unable to stay there. As Charles Saunders reports, "When he retumed, he found that his camper, tent and boat had vanished. He went to the city to find out what had happened to his property. and was eventually directed ro a warehouse that later burned to the ground. When he asked for redress, or even an exphnation, he says he was told to 'get a lawyer'

By 1996, having found little success in atternpted negotiations, the Afncville

Genealogical Society had finally gathered the resources to launch a law suit against the City of

Haiifav with the Supreme Court of Nova Scotia, demanding compensation for the curent value of their lands.J08While details are dificult to locate. it appears to have been held up by lack of iûnding, difficulties in obtaining City records, and legal red tape. The suit has yet to be resolved.

-Kim Moar, "Seaview protester arrested after spat.," Halifax Dai& iVacls, 13 April, 1996.

Saunders, "Scenes fiom AfncvilIe reunion," Halifi Dai& News, 8 August, 1999,20. 256

The City's dealings with the Carverys and other protesters, and its establishment and

'defence' of Seaview Park, are not unique. Urban space in white settler societies is not easiiy occupied by dominated, displaced people. Particularly when such goups organize to demand reparations, to have their rights recognized, or simply to tell their histories through public installations, the disruption is ofien perceived as an invasion of both space and established white knowledge. Ernploying Lefebvre's concept oPL'abstract"space, Eugene McCann discusses how the central urban spaces where business and govemment operate are made to appear 'neutral', orderly, and free from codict, often at the expense of racialized and poor groups whose housing is cleared to make way for office towers and other commercial interests. Further, it ofien resuits in their ultimate exclusion tiom the sphere pretending to be

'public', and positions them as disruptive of the normai day-to-day hnctioning of dominant society. As Lefebvre asserts, "abstract" space is that without a history; it has been established, in opposition to the 'concrete' spaces of people's everyday lives and experiences, as space with a set of consensual assumptions about what is to take place within it. It is supposed to be non-violent, trouble-free, safe for business people to conduct their flairs.

Highlighting these assumptions, McCann studies the shooting of an unarmed black man by a white police officer in Lexington, Kentucky and the subsequent protests by Black residents, which moved at one point to the cental business district. These demonstrations interrupted dominant conceptions of what safe, orderiy, "absrract" public space is supposed to mean, and to whorn it is available. McCann dernonstrates how the racial geography of the city structured 357 the shock and outrage of white, middIe-class citizens when their space was invaded by anger and fnistration which is presumed to be contained in the racialized ghettoes.

Similarly, Samira Kawash demonstrates the designation of public space as a system of inclusion and exclusion in her study of 'the homeless body'."0g She discusses how public amenities are closed to those who live on the street and in public parks as a way of banning unwanted, and unentitled, bodies. This is accomplished through by-laws which regulate, for instance, panhandling and sleeping in public, and which lock public parks and washrooms, often with the backing of neighbourhood groups. The homeless, then, can exist 'nowhere', and these processes of eviction serve to constitute the bodies and spaces of entitlement through the production of the deçenerate and restricted.

The Carverys' protest, and black protests and meetings elsewhere in Halifa,,, contested the dominant management of space in different ways. Public protests inserted black bodies into the "abstract" spaces of downtown, City Hal1 and formal meetings. At the sarne time, in many instances they failed to behave as white authorities demanded and as white nonns dictated. This had the effect ofdisruption, but also of eliciting specific representationd practices on the part of the media. By examining. how 'different' behaviour was received and presented in 'respectable' space - as uncontrolled rage and irrationality - it is possible to see how racial narratives inform every facet of each encounter, as welI as the widespread images produced in its aflermath.

WgSamiraKawash, "The HomeIess Body," Piibk Ctiittire 10, 2 (1998): 3 19-339. 258

The Carverys, on the other hand, reclaimed their horneplace on site, and their presence challenged the way in which space had been re-structured to hide the evidence of past violences. These violences were again brought to the attention of the Halifax community at large. When viewed in a critical light, the citizen and government resistance to this uncovering of history is instructive: again, whites rushed to discredit dissenting voices by rendering them degenerate, disruptive, 'crary' and violent. The black bodies who re-occupied the space were

portrayed as re-creating the slum which the City had dedt with thirty years before. As these

narratives are so congruent with how Aficville residents have always been depicted, it is

extrernely dificult to imagine that an eviction Iike Afiicville wouid never take place again.

Conclusion: monumental Space

Such a space is determined by what may take place there. and consequently by what may not take place there..."O

In 1998, Seaview Park was endowed with an important symbolic honour when the

Historie Sites and Monuments Board of Canada named it a site of historicai significance for a

cultural community. While a crucial step to estabiish ~cville'shistory in the consciousness

of the nation, the integrity of syrnbotic moves must be questioned when they are continuaily

unaccornpanied by political pressure to make good on long overdue promises.

"%enri Lefebvre, "Monumental space," in Rrthirikingarchitectirre :a reader in cultural theory ed. Neil Leach. (London, New York: Routledge, 1997) 142. This chapter has aimed to explore how the racial discourses and spatial technologies discussed previously continue to determine how black bodies, their histories and their current dismptions of ongoing domination can be discredited and contained. Monumental space does not necessarily dismpt this pattern, but cmin fact mask history in its apparent homage to the black community. tt can be seen to replace materiai gains and to compensate for the past, symbolizing a reunion of communities. This space, too, is premised on the particular rnanner in which history is comrnemorated: Celebrations ofblack culture which are positive and jofil in tone, such as annual reunions, are allowed. Protests which cnticize the City's actions are not. Xfncville's dernise can be moumed, racism can even be occasionally named as a

'phenomenon'; it rnust not, however, be attached to specific bodies or groups. Its deliberate enactment cannot be named. Monumental space can present a newly-scripted story of its contents, which is, in keeping with its 'public' nature, palatable to the majority.

In contrast to its rneaning for the black community, a white outsider, or anyone unfamiliar with AFricvilleTshistory, wouId encounter few clues in the park to indicate how the space has become what it is today. The Iarge monument in the shape of a sundiai marks the former site of Atncville's church. tt is inscribed on one side with the surnames of former residents, and on the other as follows:

Seaview Memorial Park land deeded 2848-1969

Dedicated in Ioving memory of the first black settlers and al1 former residents of the community of Campbell Road, Atkicviiie and ail members of the Seaview United Baptist Church

First Black Settlers William Brown John Brown Thomas Brown

'Ta lose your wealth is much To lose your heaith is more To lose your life is such a loss that nothing can restore'

.~cvillefamilies have regarded this as their monument; it is understandably important as a rare acknowledçement of black space?cornmunity and roots. It is, still, a City-owned memonal; its message is somewhat obfiiscatory. For instance, except in a few cases, Halifax never recognized the land as having been deeded to black settlers, and none received treatment in line with this assumption. It is unclear whose loving sentiment is represented here, as history obviously attests to a quite different view of blacks by whites. The rather odd final stanza suggests a loss of human life, rather than that of a community, but never clarifies how this came about. Moreover, Afn'cville residents had little wealth to lose, and their health was put at great risk for decades by the City's negiect and environmentai abuse. What is an outsider to make of this message? Perhaps that the early black settlers, the other former

residents and the church mernbers were summarily wiped out in some u~amednatural disaster?

Just as the subject of the dream is the dreamer, the subject of memory is she who

remembers. Perhaps if one cornes to the park from the place of displacement, as a former

resident or a descendant, or one in whom the stocy of racism has been instilled as an organizing principle of one's history, the monument needs no fùrther clarification. However, what ofthose who come to the site as a place whcre they once dumped their garbage? What of those who 'knew' Afiicville through newspaper reports as a dangerous slum by the dump?

What of the tourist who

Ieaves thinking of Halifax as a "strong and proud" community which has never "treated its people unfairly," and has kindly chosen to honour its founding black families? And what of the memory of those who were instrumental in the destruction of .Mi~viIle?~"Multiple projections of memory are possible, contingent upon the particular identities of visitors. Al1 bring specific conceptual tools and histories to the open air of the park and the foot of the

monument. What, we miçht then ask, is the pedagogicai potential of such a public site for

those whose re-education is cruciai?

Jane Jacobs has examined public memorials and cornmemorative spaces in white settier

societies. She explores the contemporary narrative of 'reconciliation' which underpins the

public positioning of histories. In its attempr to unite historically colonized and colonizing

'"LVhiIe it constitutes an additionai theoreticai question, 1 wonder if City officiais and others involved in the Afiicville decision engage, to some degree, in what Renato Rosaido has called "imperialist nostalgia". RosaIdo defines this phenornenon as a process of "mourning for what one has desuoyed"; other examples are the romanticization of Native traditions and art by white North Arnericans, or the men's movement's reverence for a return to nature and the appropriation of Aboriginal rituais which they believe embody Other cultures, but without consciousness of their positions withui the power relations which objectie, commodifi and destroy these cultures. Such positions seem possible when reviewing the comments of officiais, in the documentary film Remembrr AfncviIIe, about their renewed valuation of community and their certainty that MicvilIe would be treated more deferentially today. See Renato Rosaido, "imperialist NostaIgia," Represetmtions 26 ( 1989): 107-122, 262 groups under a comrnon national identity, reconciliation "atternpts to bring the nation into contact with the 'truth' of colonisation - and this includes the attendant emotional 'truths' of

* *?JI2 guilt, anger, regret and hurt - in order that there might be a certain 'heaiing . As applied to

Af3cville, reconciliation is seen to have been accomplished in the compensation given origindly, in the memorializing of the community's former site, and in promises yet to corne, which are frequently cited but not always met.

In Jacobs' Australian study, reconciliation is a govement-sponsored discourse; elite political figures determine its rneaning and the events and artifacts through which it will be articdated. While some projects are meted out to Aboriginal people, they are necessarily compromised when the govenunent has final say in the narrative. This becomes apparent in the settings and censorship of these efforts. Jacobs examines "countermonurnents" as efforts to tell a rnarginalized perspective alongside or in place of traditional forms. For instance, she considers an "Aboriginal waiking tour" in the city of Melbourne, in which new monuments have been placed near existing colonial memorials, challenging the hegemonic story of the discovery and settlernent of Australia by white Europeans.

While rnany such monuments present fascinating challenges, they have been constructed within the bounds of municipal govement approval. Some monuments, felt to depict 'too much' violence, were censored, whiIe others were allowed only in particular sites away fiorn the central downtown region where they would receive the most exposure. Jacobs

''%ne Jacobs, "Resisting Reconciliation: the secret geographies of (post)coIonial Australia," in Geographies of Resista~ce,eds. Steve Pile & Michael Keith (London: Routledge, 1997) 206. 263 notes how the çreative Iicense of Aboriginal artists was Iimited by the collaborative nature of the project, and how the monuments are situated subtly, so that one must seek out the wdking trail and read the accompanying brochure to understand their intent. Uniike the imposing and centrai colonial monuments, one must consciously solicit the knowledge of an Other history, a fact which elicits Lefebvre's observations about the "abstract" space of commercialism which refuses confiict or disniption.

Similady, ficville's monument is contained in one site, and great effon has been spent in City attempts ta manage its narrative. In this, it is unconnected to the decision- making council in downtown Hdifau, the offices of the mayor, development oficer, other oEcials or socid workers. It remains in an underutilized park in an area of the city knawn as dangerous. Even here. it does not tell the fiill stosf of relocation. Like the Aboriginal waiking traiI, its message is limited pedagogicaIly by content and location.

Jacobs also notes how the new artworks and sites constructed in honour of AborkjnaI history have not resdted in land gants, nor in other legd riphts. She refers to the 'regulated geopphies' of Aboriginal views, pointing to how space itself is the forum through which

'subversive' Stones are managed or ~uppressed."~Nowhere is this more apparent than in

Seaview Park, where history is apparently put to rest, held down by the monument, while black protest must be silenced and banished. Like the Carverys and their supporters, protesting Aborigines in Jacobs' analysis are depicted as 'invading' white space; clearIy their hisrory does not beIong in the urban landscape. 764

Despite its Iimited scope, the discourse of reconciliation raises great anxieties among non-Aboriginals as to their understandings of their past and their place in the nation's history.

This serves to rekindle a more overt racism imbued with a sense that Aboriginal people now possess too much power and pndege. Would this sort of defensive hostility result fiom attempts to retell the truth of Afiicville's history in the public forum? Does the monument, along with more recent acceptance of memorials in the form of plays, music and art displays, incur a sense of reconciliation among white Haligonians, a sense that they have gone far enough in paying tribute to 'unfortunate' events of the past?

Halifax too has seen the appearance of heightened resentment toward Mricville residents' demands at the governmental level- in assertions that the city has been generous and compassionate where there was no racism to begin with. This comes afler relatively little visible disniption, considering the camp protest was mostly confined to the park, and the rather rnild memonal symbols are contained in that space. Still, as the lawsuit and its requests plod forward, delayed over years, white tolerance for the issues seems to recede more and more into a sense that blacks simply cannot put the past in the past. It is easy to overlook that the abundance of coverage does not equal an abundance of rights and privileges being granted- A sense eists, however, that this is the case; white fears and anxieties are easiiy aided by the common media representations showing the 'anger' and irnplying the potential viotence of black activists. The view that blacks have received ample compensation already is no doubt bolstered by the constant repetition of the same few concessions ptedby the City, with little follow-up as to whether they have actuaiiy been carried out. 265

There is little to combat these narratives in the daily lives of most whites. The easiest forms of consumption of news and events are those which portray such dominant images.

The alternatives must be sought, ofien paid for, and take special time and effort.

The park and monument to Afnctille residents and their early forebears should not be devalued. It is an accomplishment in any North American urban centre that black settlers should be honoured and remembered, that space should be memorialized which was once black space. It has come to stand for much more than destruction and grief, and for change, resistance and the commitment to seeing that history is not repeated. However, the meaning attached to any public object is different according to one's history and subject position. -4s an educational and commemorative tooI for the white community, indeed for anyone new to

Afncville's story, the monumental space teils little. It can appear to be the mark of a city that values its black history, or that simply chooses to honour the site of original blacks who made possible the eventual integation of their descendants into the rest of the community, thus symbolizing the progress for which the relocation was supposed to stand.

A dominant community forms not through exclusionary practice alone, but through, to borrow Sibley's term, "geographies of exclusion." Ct is the act of bud - indeed, a monument seeks to 'put to rest' - and of forgetting which forms a poignant link in the chain of ongoing evictions of AtncvilIe fiorn its own space. Through the desecration of space as black, the appropriation of space as white, the suppression of the story of this violence and the denial of accountability, the 13% of Aîïicviiie remains grounded upon a geography of racism and its 266 discursive organization. Like the proverbial lie, once told, the story necessitates the telling of a chah of 'maintenance fictions', complete with the management of space in such a way that the fictions prevail intact and that oppositional stories remain buried.

On the surface, the dream of reconciliation means the space can be re-scripted as something new and inclusive: -A place to dream their dreams' is a place given citizens by a caring municipality which appreciates its diverse history and cultivates the fùture hopes and aspirations of dl. This municipality struck down racial apartheid in decades pas. drawing fnghtened blacks fiom self-imposed isolation, while the rest of society awaited their contributions. These dreams do not include the nightmares of poverty, destruction and expulsion, nor the hopes of reparation and a chance to improve the tùture. These dreams are costly to some; they are premised on forgettinç what is buried, because a Stone has been erected to retell how this place has become what it is. Drearns rnay take place in this monumentai space, but some dreams may not be spoken.

We cannot be reconciled to this. Aftemord

There is . . . no euphernistic, polite way to say what must be said about racism."'

It is easy for white people to te11 a story of .ficville without speaking the word race.

Such stories are told often: They begin, variably, in the slum, which is a site of'rnisfortune'.

Those who live there have had difficult lives due to 'historicai circumstances'. They have few resources, Iittle income, and barely enough education to cornprehend their situation . They survive by banding together in shared deprivation, constructing shacks and scavenging off the larger cornmunity's giant waste pile. which just happens to sit at th& fiont door. Over years, the larger society has grown, evolved, and left them behind. It is now time to help them catch up. Experts and scholars have studied society long enoueh to know that segregation and poverty can be corrected with intervention, and that 'the poor'. being difficult to mobilize and having little knowledge of the real worid, require a firm hand frorn those who have corne to understand their lives.

City officials who execute slum clearance programs are acting on the advice of experts who they have ernployed. Rarely is the clearance their own idea, although they often agree with its necessity, as any 'reasonable' citizen wouId. When these programs fail, or are unsatisfactory to those who are removed fi-orn their homes, this is yet another unfortunate fact of life. It is possible, of course, that officials acted with insufficient knowledge of the comrnunity; however, they can rnake decisions based ody on the information provided to

a'4John O. Calmore, "Racdsm Lost and Found: The Fair Housing Act at Thirty," Chrivers@ of Miami Lmv Review 52,4 ( 1998): 1069. 268 them by those who perform research. The researchers simply observe and report the 'reai' conditions they encounter when they enter the sIum. The information they unearth and circulate is ail that is available. Any reasonable person also knows that the solution proposed and carried out was the only thing to do.

Still, the dislocated poor are enraged. They request explmations but are never satisfied with those offered. They continue to demand justice, not understanding that compensation hm alrent& been pid this was the focus of the whole endeavor in the first place. They have been rescued from thernselves, fiom history, brought not only to safety, but to respectable surroundings which may even rub off on them. However, the more this is explained to them, the more conhsed they become. Meetings have been held, City officiais have listened and waited patiently through various tantrums, and still they are accused of insensitivity. Not only this, but they are still asked to account for those 'histoncal circumstances' which are obviously we1l out-afdate, and hardly co~ectedwith them in any way. As more and more cgenerosity is show, the more angy the residents grow. It is almost as ifthey are incapable of understanding reason. almost as if they are simply 'different' fiom

'us' afler dl. in fact, it is quite possible that they rnay become violent; the City may be forced to take precautions, and so on.

As late as 1970, when it had become apparent to many Haligonians that the dislocation had caused irreparable hmto AfncviIle residents, fime magazine declared, "The buiidozing of Afiicville exemplies a determined, if beIated effort by the municipal and provincial 769 government, to right an historical injustice-""' This quite succinctly embodies the officiai white story described above. It teaches the public that the destruction of a black community against its will was done precisely for the good of al1 black people. It is about integration. the equalizing of opportunities, and the creation of a 'cornprehensive' comrnunity in which difference does not matter. These are quaiities anyone, Save the anornaious overt bigot, would embrace. Further, the City and Province, in this project, have acted not to correct any mistakes of their own, but to address those of 'the past', for which they are not even responsible. Perhaps they lefi it a little late, but there is still time - -historyT,once finished, isn't going anywhere.

The dominant white story is one without race. It is a story with some unspecified notions of 'difference'. but without hierarchies. It is not a story in which some groups are powerless and others privileged. It is one in which differences stem £Tom things others have done, well in the past. Although history exists, it does not continue, but stops at sorne unspecified point, after which 'we' can intemene and remange things. The dominant white story is one in which people have choices, a story out of space and time. It is a story about reason, about unavoidable disasters and about helplessness. Then it is a white story about unfounded blarne, about resentment and rage, about the irrational 'acting out' of children*

This story does explain why accountability is impossible, how misfortune can strike where welI-meanins subjects have merely tried to help. It is a story in which we acknowledge both sides of the arwment, but ody one makes sense- We cm shake our heads at the difficulties

"'"'In Search of a Sense of Community," Time, 6 April 1970. faced by ail, larnent how some people cannot get on with their lives, and, of course, wish disaster had never occurred. Maybe next time we can study harder, try to plan so that they won? be so angry.

The tehg of a story like this requires that one forget the racism, the history, the construction of difference, the segregation, the desegregation, the bodies, the spatialized production of Otherness, the deliberate exclusions and regulations, and the violence. These are the foundational elements of a story without race yet, in order for it to be toId, they must remain unspoken. This work has tried not only to reinsert race, but to submit that its invisibility in officia1 white discourses supports the constitution of white innocence.

Forgetting has required substantial work. It has meant Iegislating against protest, resurfacing landscapes, whitewashing cornmemorative statements. It has meant always having to point to where someone else, some other agency, sorne branch of govemment, went wrong.

However, in naming what has been forgotten, it becomes possible to see how these very elements constitute the hierarchies and relations necessary for racism and dislocation to be concretely enacted. The 'unspeakability' of racism is an essential cornponent of its c~ntinuation."~In other words, the usurpation of the word racism, or 'racist', as an unpardonabte insult to white people serves to siIence dissent and to render cases ofracism false or invalid before they are ever named. So, although it may seem that factors lie racism,

1'61 take the term 'unspeakability' tiom an article by Sheila Dawn GLI, 'The Unspeakability of Racism: Mapping Law's Complicity in Manitoba's Raciaiized Spaces," Canadiml Joirnial of Lmmd Society I5,2 (2000), which examines the expuision of an Aboriginal member of Manitoba's Legislative Assembly through a ruhg ajainst use of the word 'racist' in the House. The term was deemed %nparliamentary Ianguage." 27 1 spatial segregation, moral discourses, the construction of ûtherness and degeneracy, and so forth, are merely absent in the white story, it is important to see how their presence is crucial.

It is the act of forgetting these themes which is essential to understanding oneseifas a 'good', innocent subject. Their invisibility enables the story to be told.

The framework of a 'geography of racism' as utilized in this work is instructive as to how forge~tingis accomplished: Blacks are spatially separated and settled in specific areas; these areas are denied essential services and equal ri&ts and protections. As living conditions degenerate, they come to be defined, fiom the outside, as slums; the residents can then be

'known' as imately deçenerate and slum-like too. On this basis, they can be further denied resources; on this basis, too, they can be forced to move and their communities destroyed.

The residents can then be contained in new housing which is carehlly regulated. Since they are now more impoverished than before, the deciine of their current living conditions is inevitable; this too can be seen as evidence of their innate degeneracy. Meanwhile, their former space can be dramatically altered so as to 'bury the evidence' of what took place there.

It can be designated 'public' space which appears neutral and fair to all; a monument can be erected to give the impression of reconciliation and to appease former residents. Black protests cm be silenced because they are not iegily permitted in this new (implicitly white) space. We cm always be rerninded of the initial 'reality' of the sIum, as this information justifies what was done as a humanitarian gesture; thus, blacks appear ungratefùl and eroundlessly resentfùl. The intended Iogical conclusion has been accomplished through the k carefùl management of spaces and bodies: The black community is simpIy ingenuous, 273 irrationai, wibaianced, 'Other', after dl. The constructive eIements underpinning this geography of racism have been buried with the rubbIe of Afncville.

1 have defined such a geography as a history in spatial terms, but it is not only a linear tracing of the story through time and 'in space'. It dso develops the themes of spatial regulation, racism, and so forth, across different sites at points in time - for instance, in popular discourses, news coverage, officid govemment policy, and academic work. While not always identicai, these different areas have shown unquestionably sirnilar motifs and assumptions in the way they produce and replicate knowledge. .And we have seen how different disciplines rely on one another in broadcasting information widely - the urban planning work, for instance, showing up in course content for social workers or doctors; the news media picking up on govemment meetings, reporting selectively on the actions of either

'side' of debates or protests; the academics and the journalists venturinç, similady, into the wiid and foreign space of the slum. The continuities in white discourses can be seen, then, both dong a chah of consecutive events and across discursive terrain.

John Calmore is quite correct that to name racism is wholly impolite. A set of implicit rules seems to govern this narning: it cannot be named in the present tense, in reference to any person, group or goveming body. It cannot be named as a feature of society, nor as something which anyone or any group enacted against another. It cannot be an organizing principle of research or policy; in fact, it is not even a contributing Factor in present-day work or law. Racisrn can be named as an uncommon individuai anîtude problem, a 'dislike' of one group by one person or a few people. It cm be a 'force' that existed in society long ago, and 273 one which contributed to the 'misfortune' of a goup which has been unable to recover. It can be subsumed in slavery and seen to end with the institution's downfaII. Finally, 'racist' has become not a systemic feature of white society which harms people of colour, but a word appropriated and reinterpreted by white people to denote an insult to our persons, an

(implicitly unfair) accusation.

Such an 'accusation' is, unsurprisingly, contentious. It suggests one has acted 'badly', when the dominant story is one of 'goodness', of compassion and rescue. Funher, the charge cornes aerone has already perceived undue rage and 'irrational' requests. It cornes &er one has purported to aiign oneself with rhe stniggle of people of colour by correcting history, offering them integration, and derone has announced, clearly, that tthere is 'no racism' in the expulsion of protestors; on the contrary, the City is "beefing up" its anti-racisrn efforts.

I am Ieavinç open-ended the question of how one rnoves From this Ievel of 'innocence' to a place of accountability, From which Iegal issues of reparation might be senousiy regarded by dominant white players at this stage in Afncville's history. It is a question implied throughout this work, and a question white peopIe in Nova Scotia will have to face, particulariy if they hoId positions of influence in the provincid Supreme Court. It is aiso a question facing nations broadly, in particular at the upcoming Cinited Nations World

Conference against Racism in Durban, South Afiica. This conference sparked controversy earlier this year as both the United States and Israei threatened to withdraw over proposed sessions on "Zionism as racism".'" More recently, the U.S. has threatened to boycott if discussion of reparations is not rernoved From the pr~garn.~l~This is a striking example of a discourse rendered 'unspeakable', a story a nation at large can simply refuse to hear.

However, the issue rnakes no pretense of disappearing hmIocal and international agendas.

A rapidly gowing body of academic and legal work on reparations

supports this contention, and wiIl be centrai in many facets of 'race relations' discourses in the

coming rnonths and years."'

This has not ben a work about reparations. It does not propose a formula for

achieving reparations. It may, however, serve as a preparatory, supportive tooi for those

defending ciaims for justice. It Iends itself to additional work on reparations at a later date.

However, t remain convinced ehat before these claims are effectively addressed, a theoretical

rethinking of the case will be hittùl. For at the crux of a stmggle for compensation is the

%ephanie Nolan, "U.S. Plans to Boycott üN Racism Conference," Tororito Giobe, mici Md,9 March. 200 1.

''&'UN scrambIes to Save anti-racïsm summit," Torotrto Srar, 30 kly, 200 1

'"This body of work is too broad to explore comprehensively in a conclusive sumrnary when it is not a central topic in the work. However, some important sources to begin reading on reparations include: Robert Westley, "iMany Billions Gone: 1s It Time to Reconsider the Case for BIack Reparations?," Bostori Colicge Lmv RevÏav XL, I ( I998):429-476.; CharIes McClain, ed., nemass imernrnerir of Jupamse Americma mtd ihe pest for [egal redress, vot 3 of AsÏm ArnerÏcairs mtd the LAW: Historicai mtd Coritempurary Perspectives (New York: Garland, 1994).; Howard McGary, Race mtd Socid Jttstice, (Malden, MA.: Blackweii, 19941, particulariy Part [I.; George Schedler, Racist Sptbols and Reparatiom: PhiZosophical RejZections on Festiges of fieAmericmi Civil Wm (Lanham: Rowman & LittIefield, 1998).; Arnold Schuchter, Reparations: The BidMmijsto mrd Ifs Chcdle~igeto mite America, (Fhiladelphia: I.B. Lippincott Co., 1970).; Boris 1. Bittker, i he C.efor Black Reparatiotts (New York: Random House, 1973). 275 need to demonstrate harm, which iden the need to contest innocence. It is perhaps too obvious to state that innocence and reparatiuns do not go hand-in-hand. in exploring the former, 1 have hoped to ilIuminate a compIicated web of obstacles. In this, the Iatter becorne a plausible next step.

Whiie concrete, materid compensation is the ultimate goal for former Afncviiie residents, new critical race analyses can bolster the struggle toward this end. To begin, the refisai by white people of the 'official' white story must be embraced as a crucial, anti-racist, intellectual and poIitical stance. [t is neçiigent, dishonest, and cowardiy, and racisr, to persist in appropriating GFncville's demands as insults to white pride. The story of AFncville is not one of white pain. It is a story of whiteness and forgetting. If this work can be emphyed in the disruption of such a story in concrete social and legal spaces. perhaps there can be a place for scholarship, a possibility for aIliances across disciplines and races, and a new incitement to remember. Works Cited

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