C. Social and Cultural Diversity Within the Host Communities

As an immigrant receiving country, Canada exhibits a high degree of demographic and socio-cultural diversity. This diversity is mirrored, in varying degrees, in Canada’s urban centres from coast to coast. Table 4-6, compiled from different sources, compares the seven host communities on four major indices of diversity: percentage of immigrants (i.e., foreign born) in the population; percentage of the population with racial or visible minority status; percentage of the population with knowledge of non-official languages; and percentage of the population whose mother tongue is neither English nor French, but rather a "heritage" language. These indices of diversity will be discussed briefly in turn, but first, a few general observations about this table are in order.

The first observation that can be made from Table 4-6 is that on each of the four indices of diversity, Edmonton and Calgary are above the provincial average, while the remaining centres fall below this average (meaning that they are less diverse than Edmonton and Calgary). Second, on the indices under consideration, Edmonton is decidedly more diverse than Calgary. Third, if ranks are assigned to each community from high (rank 1) to low (rank 7) on each index, and then summed across the four indices and averaged, the average ranks for the seven communities would read as follows: Edmonton (1); Calgary (2); Lethbridge (3.25); Medicine Hat (5.0), Fort McMurray (5.0); Red Deer (5.75); and Grande Prairie (6.0). In descriptive terms, Edmonton and Calgary would be classified as "high" on diversity; Lethbridge would be classified as "medium"; Medicine Hat and Fort McMurray would be classified as "medium-low;" and Red Deer and Grande Prairie would be classified "low" on diversity.

Immigrant Population

Table 4-7 shows the total immigrant population in 1991 for the host communities by period of immigration (before 1961, 1961-1970, 1971-1980, and 1981-1990). Considering all periods, it will be observed that the most popular destinations have been Edmonton and Calgary, accounting for 40.1% (n=152,805) and 39.8% (n=151,745), respectively, of all Alberta-bound immigrants. A distant third is Lethbridge (accounting for 9,105, or 2.4%, of these immigrants), followed by Red Deer (n=5,285, or 1.4%), Medicine Hat (n=4,130, or 1.1%), Fort McMurray (n=3,870, or 1.0%), and Grande Prairie (accounting for 2,425, or 0.6%, of all immigrants to Alberta).

It is interesting to note that most of the immigrants to the five smaller centres have been recent arrivals, with the exception of Lethbridge and Medicine Hat. For the period prior to 1961, Lethbridge and Medicine Hat (and to a lesser degree Red Deer) attracted many more immigrants than in the decades that followed. On the other hand, Fort McMurray and Grande Prairie began to attract more immigrants in the 1970s and 1980s, but the numbers continued to be relatively small.

Government statistics show that, between 1991 and 1996, the percentage of immigrants living in Edmonton has increased from 18.5% to 22.5%, and in Calgary from 20.4% to 21.7% (data not shown in a table). During this same period, the percentages of immigrants in Red Deer, Medicine Hat, and Grande Prairie remained relatively stable, while those for Medicine Hat and Fort McMurray declined by about one percentage point each.

In terms of country of birth, Table 4-8 shows that in 1991 50.7% of all the immigrants to Alberta were from Europe; 4.0% were from India and 24.9% from other Asiatic countries, for a total of 28.9% from Asia; 7.8% were from the United States; 4.5% were from Central and South America; 4.2% were from Africa; 2.2% were from the Caribbean and Bermuda; and 1.7% were from Oceania and other countries. Again, in 1991, relative to the provincial average, Lethbridge, Red Deer, Medicine Hat and Grande Prairie had a larger share of immigrants from Central and South America; Edmonton and Calgary had a larger share of immigrants from Africa; Edmonton, Calgary, Fort McMurray and Grande Prairie had a larger share of immigrants from India; and, finally, Edmonton, Calgary, and Fort McMurray had a larger share of immigrants from Asiatic countries other than India. Notably, in 1991 about one-third of all the immigrants in Fort McMurray (and, for that matter, in Edmonton and Calgary) were of Asiatic origin. These census statistics clearly show that immigrants have become increasingly dispersed throughout the host communities in Alberta.

Unfortunately, the Canadian Census does not distinguish refugees from other immigrants, even though refugees constitute about 12.5% of all immigrants landed in Canada (Statistics Canada. The 1996 Census of Canada, The Nation Series on CD Rom, 1998). Thus, in all the preceding (and in most subsequent tables) the term "immigrant" refers to voluntary immigration as well as to forced immigration (i.e., refugees). There is, however, one source of information (the Landed Immigrant Data base) from which we were able to obtain precise figures on the number of refugees who arrived in the seven host communities in Alberta during the period 1992-1997. This information is reported in Table 4-9 and Figure 4-10.

We see that the overwhelming majority of government and privately sponsored refugees are destined to Edmonton and Calgary (6,236 out of a total of 7,351 or 85%). Lethbridge, Red Deer, and Medicine Hat receive roughly one-tenth the number of refugees as do Edmonton and Calgary. However, Grande Prairie and Fort McMurray receive even smaller numbers of refugees.

Considering the six-year period covered in this study (1992-1997), the largest number of refugees arrived in Alberta in 1992. This is also reflected in the refugee populations of three of the communities in the study. Calgary, Edmonton and Red Deer all recorded the highest percentage of refugees arriving in their communities in this year (Figure 4-10). However, Grande Prairie and Fort McMurray witnessed the arrival of the largest proportion of their refugees in subsequent years. Over one-third of Fort McMurray’s refugees arrived in 1996 and close to one-third of Grande Prairie’s refugees arrived in 1995. For the remaining communities (Lethbridge, Medicine Hat, and Red Deer), the numbers of refugees arriving annually in each city between 1994 and 1997 were roughly equivalent, excepting Lethbridge where the number of refugee arrivals was significantly lower in 1996 than in any of the other years.

Visible Minority Status

About 9 out of 10 Albertans identify themselves as white, while the remainder regard themselves as visible minorities (Table 4-11). However, there are notable differences in self-definition among cities. For example, 18.1% of Edmonton’s population and 16.5% of Calgary’s population identify themselves as visible minorities. At the other extreme, only 3.3% of Grande Prairie’s population and 3.4% of Medicine Hat’s population identify themselves as visible minorities.

In both Edmonton and Calgary, relatively large proportions identify themselves as Chinese or South Asian. In the former city, in particular, Blacks constitute a very large segment of the visible minority population. With reference to the other centres, the largest visible minority category in Fort McMurray is South Asian; in Lethbridge, Chinese or Japanese; in Medicine Hat, Chinese, Latin American and South Asian; in Red Deer, Chinese, South Asian, and Latin American; and in Grande Prairie, the largest visible minority categories are Chinese, South Asian, and Latin American.

While visible minority status is an important aspect of diversity, ethnic origin (or ethnicity) is also important. Scores of ethnicities are represented in the Canadian population; however, that kind of detail is not currently available for the host communities in Alberta. Nevertheless, Table 4-12 reports some useful information on ethnic origin for 1991. The most common ethnic origin reported for all centres is British, averaging about 20% of all the responses. However, those who reported multiple origins ranged from 40% to 50% of the population. Uniquely, Edmonton accommodates a large Ukrainian-origin community accounting for 6.3% of the population. Medicine Hat has a large German-origin community that accounts for 23.8% of the population. Fort McMurray and Grande Prairie have strong aboriginal representation (5.2% in Fort McMurray and 4.3% in Grande Prairie).

Knowledge of Languages

The 1996 Canadian Census shows 81% of the Alberta population being unilingual English speakers (Table 4-13). The comparable percentages for specific cities range from 73.1% in Edmonton to 91% in Fort McMurray. Focusing on the absence of English language ability, the Canadian Census shows that, in 1991, about 2% of the Edmonton and Calgary populations and less than 1% of the populations in the other centres did not know English (data not shown in table). It is noteworthy that the most bilingual centre is Fort McMurray. With particular reference to refugees, the 1996 Landed Immigrant Database shows that their knowledge of English varies widely. On average, however, only 3 out of 10 refugees destined to Alberta reportedly knew some English upon arrival (it should be noted that knowledge of English is based on self-report; there are no indications of actual proficiency levels).

Table 4-13
Knowledge of Official and Non-Official Languages
Selected Communities in Alberta, 1996

* Many of these people would also know English, or perhaps French.

Source: Statistics Canada (1998) 1996 Census of Canada: Nation Series

There are wide differences among the host communities in knowledge of non-official languages (Table 4-13). For example, 1996 Census data show that knowledge of languages other than English or French is ‘very strong’ in Edmonton and Calgary, where 24.7% and 19.5% report knowing a non-official (or heritage) language; ‘strong’ in Lethbridge and Medicine Hat where 14.5% and 12.4% respectively report knowing a non-official language; and ‘somewhat strong’ in Grande Prairie and Red Deer where 8.9% and 8.6%, respectively report knowledge of a heritage language.

Detailed statistics are not available for 1996; however, in 1991, the Canadian Census showed that German, Chinese, Ukrainian, Spanish, Dutch, Polish and Italian were among the most common non-official languages in the communities to which refugees have been destined in Alberta (data not shown in a table). But there are important differences in the mix of these non-official languages. For example, although knowledge of German is most common throughout the seven Alberta communities under study, it is highest in Medicine Hat and lowest in Fort McMurray. Chinese, in general, is the next most common non-official language in these communities. However, only in Fort McMurray is knowledge of Chinese more common than knowledge of German (mainly because the latter is low).

About 8 out of 10 residents of Edmonton, Calgary and Lethbridge report that English is their mother tongue (1991 Census data), compared to about 9 out of 10 residents in the remaining four communities (Table 4-14). Relatively small percentages report French, Chinese, German, Ukrainian, or Polish as their mother tongue. It is significant, however, that a range of 5%-11% of the population in the host communities report other languages as their mother tongue. Table 4-15 shows that the language used at home in all host communities is overwhelmingly English (ranging from 96.9% for Red Deer to 88.9% for Edmonton). The other home languages reported in this table include French, Chinese, German, Vietnamese, and Polish, and "other."