(Re)assembling "Japantown": A critical toponymy of planning and resistance in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside By Trevor James Wideman A thesis submitted to the Graduate Program in Geography in conformity with the requirements for the Degree of Master of Arts Queen’s University Kingston, Ontario, Canada Final submission September, 2015 Copyright © Trevor James Wideman, 2015 Abstract For many, toponyms, or place names, appear to provide objective descriptions of locations on the earth. But for geographers, names and naming practices are imbued with meaning, and a recent literature of critical toponymy has emerged that studies and recognizes place names as discursive agents of power and resistance that perform active roles in the ongoing production of place. However, the critical toponymy corpus had produced very little theoretically rich empirical research focusing how urban planning and policymaking processes mobilize place names, or how residents fight against such activities. This thesis fills that lacuna, first by generating a novel theoretical framework (toponymic assemblage) that describes the emergent, relational, and spatially grounded properties of place names. It then outlines a robust, extended, and mixed method case study approach that uses archival/newspaper documentation, discourse analysis, and interview data to form a historically based, theoretically driven, and structurally aware study of toponyms in relation to planning and policymaking. The thesis then presents two empirical case studies based in Vancouver, Canada’s impoverished Downtown Eastside (DTES) that are centred around the name “Japantown,” a toponym that recalls the neighbourhood’s long- time inhabitation by a community of Japanese Canadians who were forcibly uprooted from the Pacific coast during World War II. Specifically, this thesis situates contemporary neighbourhood conflicts within a historical context by constructing an interwoven analysis of toponymic assemblages in the DTES (including “Japantown”), noting how they emerged over time in relation to interventions such as planning, policymaking, the media, and activism while highlighting their fluid, malleable, and potential qualities. It then focuses on a recently enacted Local Area Planning Process (LAPP) in the DTES to illuminate how toponymic assemblages ii like “Japantown” were mobilized through planning to change understandings of place at the expense of current low income residents. The thesis concludes by considering the theoretical and positional limitations of the research, then suggests directions for future study and activism by highlighting how a more complete understanding of toponymic power and its limits can inform rights-based engagement among disparate groups. iii Acknowledgements I begin by acknowledging that this research took place on the traditional unceded territory of the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), xʷməθkwəy̓ əm (Musqueam) and səl̓ ílwəta (Tsleil-Waututh) peoples. As a settler, I am sincerely grateful to those who share their land with me. I would first like to thank my supervisor, Dr. Jeff Masuda, who has guided and supported me since before I even began this degree. Your mentorship and attentive feedback has been invaluable, and you pushed me far beyond what I ever thought I was capable of. I would also like to thank Dr. Audrey Kobayashi and the rest of the Revitalizing Japantown? team, who provided me with encouragement and insight as I developed this project. Another important mention goes out to Dr. Nick Blomley and Dr. Jeff Sommers. Their thoughtful and perceptive research on the Downtown Eastside from the late 1990s and early 2000s inspired and guided me as I drafted this work, and it let me to resources that I may never have discovered otherwise. Heartfelt thanks to my research participants and all the other amazing people that I’ve had the privilege of meeting in the Downtown Eastside. I could not have done this work without your reassurance and guidance. Thank you to those who have been around to listen to me grumble and give me helpful input, in particular: Annika Airas, Dr. Tom Baker, Jenna Drabble, Kyle Loewen, Andrew Longhurst, Dr. Tyler McCreary, Dr. Cristina Temenos, and Dr. Heather Whiteside. Another huge thanks to the geography departments at Queen’s University and Simon Fraser University for welcoming and adopting me as one of your own. To my parents, who were always a phone call away - and to my Manitoba friends, who visited, called, and made me laugh. iv Thank you to the Social Sciences and Humanities Council of Canada, University of Manitoba, St. John’s College, and the Royal Canadian Geographical Society for financial backing. But most of all, thank you to Annika Airas, who has given me more love, care, and support than I deserve. v Table of Contents Abstract ........................................................................................................................................... ii Acknowledgements ........................................................................................................................ iv List of Figures .............................................................................................................................. viii List of Tables ................................................................................................................................. ix List of Abbreviations .......................................................................................................................x Chapter 1: Introduction ....................................................................................................................1 1.1 What’s in a Name? ............................................................................................................................. 1 1.2 Empirical Context and Research Objectives ...................................................................................... 4 1.3 How This Thesis Will Proceed ........................................................................................................... 7 Chapter 2: Literature Review and Theoretical Framework ...........................................................14 2.1 Introduction ....................................................................................................................................... 14 2.2 Critical Toponymy ............................................................................................................................ 15 2.3 Critical Planning ............................................................................................................................... 19 2.4 Toponymic Assemblages and the Production of Space .................................................................... 25 2.5 Conclusion ........................................................................................................................................ 31 Chapter 3: Methods ........................................................................................................................39 3.1 Community Entry and Research Timeline ........................................................................................ 39 3.2 Methodological Justification ............................................................................................................. 41 3.3 Ethical Reflections ............................................................................................................................ 43 3.4 Procedures ......................................................................................................................................... 44 3.4.1 Textual Analysis ....................................................................................................................... 45 3.4.1.1 Archival Documentation .................................................................................................... 46 3.4.1.2 Newspaper Research .......................................................................................................... 47 3.4.1.3 Local Area Plan and Planning Documentation .................................................................. 47 3.4.2 Key Informant Interviews .......................................................................................................... 48 3.4.3 Field Notes ................................................................................................................................. 50 3.5 Data Analysis .................................................................................................................................... 51 3.5.1 Archival Documentation and Newspaper Analysis ................................................................... 51 3.5.2 Local Area Plan and Related Documentation ........................................................................... 52 3.5.3 Key Informant Interviews .......................................................................................................... 52 3.6 Rigour ............................................................................................................................................... 53 3.7 Limitations ........................................................................................................................................ 55 Chapter 4: “Japantown” and the Toponymic Assemblages of the Downtown Eastside ................59 4.1 Introduction ......................................................................................................................................