Webinars on African slaves and Chinese immigrants in Ontario available on Toronto Workers’ History Project Facebook page

The Toronto Workers’ History Project has made available on its Facebook page, Wednesday’s presentation, The Dearness of Labour: Enslaved Labour in Colonial Ontario, delivered by Natasha Henry, president of the Ontario Black History Society.

The 40-minute presentation is based on Ms. Henry’s ongoing PhD research at York University in Toronto.

Her dissertation, One Too Many: The Enslavement of Africans in Early Ontario, 1760 – 1834focuses on the enslavement of African men, women, and children in Upper Canada (present-day Ontario) between 1760 and 1834. She is examining the scale and scope of the enslavement of African people in early Ontario, contextualizing this historical reality within the global phenomenon of the Transatlantic slave trade, French and British colonization of what is now Canada and the “New World,” and the American Revolution, which resulted the Loyalist exile to British North American and the forced relocation of the Africans they enslaved.

Last month, the Toronto Workers’ History Project hosted the presentation, Chinese-Canadian Workers in Toronto, delivered by Winnie Ng, a labour rights activist, scholar, and Chair Emeritus, Ryerson-Unifor National Chair in Social Justice and Democracy. In her 15-minute presentation, Ms. Ng talks about the Chinese who came to Canada as indentured workers and Chinese immigration and settlement in Toronto.

More than 4,000 Chinese workers died building the country’s first transcontinental railroad, yet most of the Chinese community faced discrimination and outright racism. Laws were specially created to oppress and exclude them. Yet they persevered.

After the presentation, the panelists take the audience through more than a century of the experiences of Chinese-Canadians: fighting back, organising and leading the way for many others.

The main goal of the Toronto Workers’ History Project is to develop awareness and pride among working people about their own history and their contributions to Canadian society.

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