Garveyism and the UNIA in Canada
Manzah-Kyentoh Yankey
In the early 20th century, Black organizations in Canada challenged racist “Canadian Jim Crow” laws, policies and social norms that racially segregated and systemically excluded Black Canadians from or denied access to education, employment, healthcare, and recreational spaces (Jane-Mathieu 2010; Hamilton 2022; Henry 2019; McCorkindale 2022; McLaren 2004; Nzindukiyimana and O’Connor 2019). For example, in 1923, Black Canadians in Edmonton were banned from swimming in public pools (Henry 2019; Jane-Mathieu 2010; Nzindukiyimana and O’Connor 2019; Reynolds 2016; Toney 2010).
Marcus Garvey was born in St. Ann’s Bay Jamaica in 1887 (Martin 1976; Vincent 2006). In July 1914, Garvey established and became the leader of the Universal Improvement Negro Improvement Association and the African Communities League in Jamaica (Carano 2010; Ewing, 2015; Williams 2022; Vincent 2006). Marcus Garvey first visited Canada in 1917 to introduce the UNIA and his vision of Black liberation (Jane-Mathieu 2010). By 1922, Canada had 32 UNIA divisions and approximately 5000 members, which represented one-quarter of the Canadian Black population in 1921 (Carano 2014, 2018; Toney 2010; Williams 2022).
The UNIA in Canada played an important role in addressing anti-Black Racism in Canada by creating social and cultural spaces for Black Canadians to escape Jim Crow conditions (Carano 2014, 2018; Jane-Mathieu 2010; Toney 2010; Williams 2022). Due to Jim Crow conditions, the UNIA liberty hall was one of the very few spaces for Black Canadians to attend without facing exclusion (Jean-Mathieu 2010; Williams 2022). In the 1920s, the UNIA in Canada became well known for pulling together resources to address anti-Black racism in housing and employment (Carano 2014,2018; Toney 2010). Black Canadians were often rejected by landlords when seeking for an apartment and this resulted in having limited options regarding which neighbourhoods they could reside (Henry 2019). Some UNIA divisions, such as the New Aberdeen division in Nova Scotia, invested in properties to draw revenue to the organization and in return, would provide subsidized housing to Black workers (Carano 2018a). In response to the exclusion from labour unions, the UNIA hall became a regular meeting place for Black railway workers to create their own unions and fight for labour rights (Jean-Mathieu 2010; Toney 2010).
The UNIA addressed the educational needs of Black women because other black organizations ignored the educational and economic inequalities Black women were facing in Canada (Jean-Mathieu 2010). Until the late 1940s, Nursing schools often rejected Black women applicants due to the racist belief that white hospital patients do not want to receive help from Black nurses (Henry 2019). The UNIA in collaboration with Howard University, a well known HBCU (Historical Black College and University) provided scholarships and work placements for Black women in the UNIA (Carano 2018b; Jean-Mathieu 2010). Despite the decline of the UNIA after Garvey’s passing in 1940, the UNIA was an important hub for community organizing and advancing discussions about race and racism in Canada (Williams 2022).
References
Ewing, Adam. 2014. The Age of Garvey: How a Jamaican Activist Created a Mass Movement and Changed Global Black Politics. Princeton University Press.
Hamilton, Sylvia. 2022. “Stories from the Little Black School House” Pp. 313-332 in Unsettling the Great White North: Black Canadian History, edited by Michelle A. Johnson and Funke Aladejebi. Toronto: Toronto University Press.
Henry, Natasha. 2019. “Racial Segregation of Black People in Canada” Canadian Encyclopedia, Pp. 1-9.
Jane-Mathieu, Sarah. 2010. North of the Color Line: Migration and Black Resistance in Canada, 1870-1955. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.
Marano, Carla. 2010. “Rising Strongly and Rapidly: The Universal Negro Improvement Association in Canada, 1919-1940” The Canadian Historical Review, 91(2): 233-259.
Marano, Carla. 2014. “We Used to Meet at the Hall”: Assessing the Significance of the Universal Improvement Association in Toronto, 1900-1950” Journal of the Canadian Historical Association, 25(1): 143-175.
Marano, Carla. 2018a. “For the Freedom of the Black People”: Case Studies on the Universal Negro Improvement Association in Canada, 1900-1950” PhD Dissertation, University of Waterloo.
Marano, Carla. 2018b. “Black Cross Nurses in Canada” Canadian Encyclopedia, 1-5.
McCorkindale, Deirdre. 2022. “Black Education: The Complexity of Segregation in Kent County Nineteenth Century Schools” Pp. 331-356 in Unsettling the Great White North: Black Canadian History, edited by Michelle A Johnson and Funke Aladejebi. Toronto: Toronto University Press.
McLaren, 2004. “We had no desire to be set apart”: Forced Segregation of Black Students in Canada West Public Schools and Myths of British Egalitarianism” Social History, 27-50.
Nzindukiyimana, Ornella and O’Connor, Eileen. 2019. “Let’s (not) meet at the pool: A Black Canadian social history of swimming (1900s–1960s)” Loisir et Société / Society and Leisure, 42:(1) 137-164
Reynolds, Graham. 2016. Viola Desmond’s Canada: A History of Blacks and Racial Segregation in the Promised Land. Halifax and Winnipeg: Fernwood Publishing.
Toney, Jared. 2010. “Locating Diaspora: Afro-Caribbean Narratives of Migration and Settlement in Toronto, 1914-1929” Urban History Review, 38(2): 75-97.
Vincent, Theodore G. 2006. Black Power and the Garvey Movement. Baltimore, Maryland, United States. Black Classic Press.
Williams, Dorothy. 2022. “Universal Negro Improvement Association” Canadian Encyclopedia, 1-5.
About the Author
Manzah-Kyentoh Yankey is a PhD student in the Department of Sociology at the University of Alberta. She is a research assistant for the Anti-Racism Lab project, focusing on Canada. Her research interests include race, law, punishment, and inequality. Her doctoral thesis dissertation will be focusing on monetary sanctions (fees and fines) in Canada.