Description
White Riot: The 1907 Anti-Asian Riots in Vancouver explores the conditions leading up to and the impact of a demonstration and parade in Vancouver, Canada, organized by the Asiatic Exclusion League and the ensuing mob attack on the city's Chinese Canadian and Japanese Canadian communities. Emblematic of a systemically racist era, White Riot reveals the social and political environment of the time, when racialized communities were targeted through legislated as well as physical acts of exclusion and violence.
Based on 360 Riot Walk, a 360-degree video walking tour by artist and author Henry Tsang, White Riot offers an intersectional approach to this pivotal moment in the history of racialized communities and a cultural and social context for understanding for the current wave of anti-Asian sentiment. It features photographs of the riots colourized by Tsang as well as those of contemporary Vancouver where the riots took place. Essays by Tsang and others speak to the colonial times that preceded and followed the 1907 riots, as well as issues that Chinese and Japanese communities (and other racialized communities) in North America are facing today. White Riot poses the question: in the current ethos of anti-racism and decolonization, what does it take to reconcile our collective histories within the legacy of white supremacy?
" White Riot is an unsettling, shattering must-read. This crafted justice project sets a new standard for voicing and unpacking the entangled cultures of British settler colonial violence, domination, and resistance. Storytelling brings about the reckoning of white supremacy past and present in a locally grounded, vividly accessible way." ―John Kuo Wei Tchen, co-author of Yellow Peril!: An Archive of Anti-Asian Fear
Table of Contents:
Introduction (Patricia E. Roy)
Walking the Fine Line with History: 360 Riot Walk (Henry Tsang)
Uprooting the Racism in Our Ranks: Reflections from a Labour Perspective (Asian Canadian Labour Alliance: Stephanie Fung, Anna Liu, karine ng, Chris Ramsaroop)
Why We Say Powell Street and Not 'Japantown' (Nicole Yakashiro and Angela May Kruger)
Anti-Asian Violence in Washington State (Paul Englesberg)
A Changing Chinatown: On Gentrification and Resilience (Melody Ma)
360 Riot Walk: Immersive Storytelling as Digital Activism (Sue-Anne Yeo)
Census Making and City Building: Data Perspectives on the 1907 Anti-Asian Riots and the Development of Vancouver (Andy Yan)
On Remaining (Jeffery R. Masuda)
Author
Henry Tsang is an artist who explores the spatial politics of history, language, community, food, and cultural translation in relationship to place. His artworks take the form of gallery exhibitions, 360 video walking tours, curated dinners, and public art. Henry teaches at Emily Carr University of Art & Design in Vancouver.
White Riot: The 1907 Anti-Asian Riots in Vancouver explores the conditions leading up to and the impact of a demonstration and parade in Vancouver, Canada, organized by the Asiatic Exclusion League and the ensuing mob attack on the city's Chinese Canadian and Japanese Canadian communities. Emblematic of a systemically racist era, White Riot reveals the social and political environment of the time, when racialized communities were targeted through legislated as well as physical acts of exclusion and violence.
Based on 360 Riot Walk, a 360-degree video walking tour by artist and author Henry Tsang, White Riot offers an intersectional approach to this pivotal moment in the history of racialized communities and a cultural and social context for understanding for the current wave of anti-Asian sentiment. It features photographs of the riots colourized by Tsang as well as those of contemporary Vancouver where the riots took place. Essays by Tsang and others speak to the colonial times that preceded and followed the 1907 riots, as well as issues that Chinese and Japanese communities (and other racialized communities) in North America are facing today. White Riot poses the question: in the current ethos of anti-racism and decolonization, what does it take to reconcile our collective histories within the legacy of white supremacy?
" White Riot is an unsettling, shattering must-read. This crafted justice project sets a new standard for voicing and unpacking the entangled cultures of British settler colonial violence, domination, and resistance. Storytelling brings about the reckoning of white supremacy past and present in a locally grounded, vividly accessible way." ―John Kuo Wei Tchen, co-author of Yellow Peril!: An Archive of Anti-Asian Fear
Table of Contents:
Introduction (Patricia E. Roy)
Walking the Fine Line with History: 360 Riot Walk (Henry Tsang)
Uprooting the Racism in Our Ranks: Reflections from a Labour Perspective (Asian Canadian Labour Alliance: Stephanie Fung, Anna Liu, karine ng, Chris Ramsaroop)
Why We Say Powell Street and Not 'Japantown' (Nicole Yakashiro and Angela May Kruger)
Anti-Asian Violence in Washington State (Paul Englesberg)
A Changing Chinatown: On Gentrification and Resilience (Melody Ma)
360 Riot Walk: Immersive Storytelling as Digital Activism (Sue-Anne Yeo)
Census Making and City Building: Data Perspectives on the 1907 Anti-Asian Riots and the Development of Vancouver (Andy Yan)
On Remaining (Jeffery R. Masuda)
Author
Henry Tsang is an artist who explores the spatial politics of history, language, community, food, and cultural translation in relationship to place. His artworks take the form of gallery exhibitions, 360 video walking tours, curated dinners, and public art. Henry teaches at Emily Carr University of Art & Design in Vancouver.