Canadian Identity and Ethnic Subcultures - Pearson Canada

Chapter 15
Canadian Identity and
Ethnic Subcultures
ETHNIC SUBCULTURES
AND CONSUMER IDENTITY
“New” Canadians have much in common with members of other ethnic groups
who live in Canada. They observe the same national holidays, their expenditures
are affected by the country’s economic health, and they may join together in rooting
for Canadian Olympians. Nonetheless, although Canadian citizenship provides
the raw material for some consumption decisions, other decisions are affected
profoundly by enormous variations in the social fabric of Canada.
This chapter begins with general concepts related to ethnicity and consumer
behaviour and an overview of the ethnic diversity of the Canadian population. It
continues with a look at French Canadians as an ethnic group with a long-standing
presence in Canada. Chinese Canadians and the relatively recent wave of Hong
Kong immigrants provide an example of acculturation processes as they relate to
consumer behaviour. (Although this chapter addresses only two ethnic subcultures,
the omission of other groups should not be taken to mean that they are not of interest
or importance. Canada is a mosaic of hundreds of diverse and interesting subcultures.)
The analysis then proceeds to a regional level. The chapter concludes with an
examination of how Canadian identity is manifested in consumer behaviour.
Ethnic identity is often a significant component of a consumer’s self-concept.
An ethnic subculture is a self-perpetuating group of consumers who share common
cultural or genetic ties which are recognized by both its members and others
as a distinct category. 1
In some countries, such as Japan, ethnicity is almost synonymous with the
dominant culture, because most citizens claim the same homogeneous cultural ties
(although Japan has sizable minority populations, most notably people of Korean
ancestry). In a heterogeneous society such as Canada, many different cultures are
represented, and some consumers may expend much effort to keep their ethnic
identifications from being submerged into the mainstream dominant culture.
Insights into the definition of ethnicity can be gained from a comprehensive
study of the issues related to the measurement of English- and French-Canadian
ethnicity that was conducted by a group of researchers at Concordia University. In
addition to a self-identification measure, ethnic identity was measured by language
use in various social communication settings, religious beliefs, social interaction,
upbringing/background, and spouse’s ethnic identity. The study suggests that the
best measure of ethnicity is language use and the weakest measure is religion. However,
language may not be the most salient dimension of a particular subcultural
group; for example, Jewish ethnicity may be better defined by religious beliefs. The
situation is complicated further when one considers that the 2006 census showed
that 52 percent of Montrealers (1.9 million) are bilingual; in fact, Montreal has the