Abstract
Ethnic precincts are one example of the way that cultural diversity shapes public spaces in the postmodern metropolis. Ethnic precincts are essentially clusters of ethnic or immigrant entrepreneurs in areas that are designated as ethnic precincts by place marketers and government officials and display iconography related to that ethnicity in the build environment of the precinct. They are characterized by the presence of a substantial number of immigrant entrepreneurs of the same ethnicity as the precinct who line the streets of the precinct selling food, goods or services to many co-ethnics and non co-ethnics alike. Ethnic precincts are thus a key site of the production and consumption of the ethnic economy, a commodification of place where the symbolic economy of space (Zukin 1995:23-4) is constructed on representations of ethnicity and ‘immigrantness’. To explore some dimensions of the way that ethnic diversity shapes public space we present the findings of recent fieldwork in four Sydney ethnic precincts: Chinatown, Little Italy, Auburn (“Little Turkey”) and Cabramatta (“Vietnamatta”). This fieldwork explores the complex and sometimes contradictory relationship between immigrant entrepreneurs, local government authorities, and ethnic community representatives in shaping the emergence of, and development of, ethnic precincts. It demonstrates how perceptions of the authenticity of precincts as ethnic places and spaces varies in the eyes of consumers or customers according to whether they are ‘co-ethnic’, ‘co-cultural’ or ‘Others”. It explores relations of production and consumption within the ethnic precinct and how these are embedded within the domain of regulation in the daily life of these four Sydney ethnic precincts.
Highlights
Increasing rates of permanent and temporary immigration (Castles and Miller, 2003)mean that immigrant minorities are reshaping the built environment of urban neighborhoods and streetscapes of the cities in their host society where they settle
Ethnic precincts are places in the city that combine both private and public spaces and where the cultural and symbolic economy gain prominence shaped by the interaction of producers, consumers and the critical infrastructure (Zukin, 1995)
By producer we mean an ethnic entrepreneur who was owner-manager of at least one urban tourism industry organisation or enterprise that was located within the boundaries of the ethnic precinct and who supplied, directly or indirectly, products or services demanded by cultural urban tourists
Summary
Increasing rates of permanent and temporary immigration (Castles and Miller, 2003). mean that immigrant minorities are reshaping the built environment of urban neighborhoods and streetscapes of the cities in their host society where they settle. The spatial dimensions of immigrant entrepreneurship are in turn shaped by regimes of regulation from local, provincial and national authorities (Hoffman, Fainstein and Judd (eds.) 2003) These regulators make the urban planning decisions to confer on a part of the city an ethnic character and decide the way that this is represented in the public spaces of streetscapes and pedestrian malls and squares where monuments and other ethnic iconography are installed to demonstrate the ethnic character of that place. This planning process involves consultations with ethnic entrepreneurs and the local ethnic community leaders. This in turn attracts ‘co-ethnic’ customers to the precinct, adding to the ethnic character of the passing parade of the street crowd
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