‘Hey, Why Don't We Have a Bonspiel?’ Narrating Postwar Japanese Canadian Experiences in Southern Alberta through Oral Histories of Curling

Abstract

Southern Alberta is home to Canada’s third largest post-war concentration of Japanese Canadians. Many Japanese Canadians were relocated to this region between 1942 and 1949, and many remained to rebuild their lives and communities during the postwar period. Our study draws on oral histories conducted as part of the Nikkei Memory Capture Project, a multi-year oral history project that initiates the narration and analysis of the cultural and social history of Japanese Canadians from 1950 to the present in southern Alberta, Canada, to interrogate the cultural practice of curling, near ubiquitous and evocative in the memories shared, as a means and representation of Japanese Canadian integration, civic engagement, community building, resiliency and agency. In southern Alberta during the postwar period, curling, as a physical cultural practice, served several purposes: first, curling provided a social space for community renewal through–sometimes Japanese-only–events and gatherings; second, representations and experiences of curling reflect and contribute to the nisei goal of achieving full integration into Canadian culture; and third, it provided space for expressions of resiliency, agency, and escape through camaraderie and physical movements on the ice.