Julia Hune Brown graphic

See the Then Is Now project

Listen to the documentary

Julia Hune-Brown is a theatre artist, educator and storyteller. In 2019, she produced a documentary for CBC Radio about her grandmother, Gar Yin Hune, a Cantonese opera singer who became one of the very few people of Chinese origin to immigrate to Canada during the Exclusion Act years. During the pandemic, Julia and fellow artist Keira Loughran collaborated on a storytelling project entitled "Then Is Now," focusing on the experiences of Toronto Chinatown's female elders.

"For me, it’s looking at patterns, like with migrant workers now and with undocumented folks. I look at my grandmother's history, the fact that she had four kids in Canada, but was still not legally supposed to be here. And that history is repeating itself. We can forget quickly that this happened in your family. We are Chinese Canadian, but there are paper sons and paper daughters within our family realm. For me, it was humbling to look at my family history. And also to acknowledge that Canada hasn’t magically resolved many of the racist immigration and legal [issues] we have."

Julia Hune-Brown

Explore Paul Yee's books

Learn more about Paul Yee

Paul Yee is one of Canada's most prolific authors of Chinese heritage, having published dozens of history guides, novels, children's stories and special interest books that explore Chinese culture from a Canadian context. His numerous awards and honours include a Governor General’s Award in 1996 and the Vicky Metcalf Award in 2012. Paul was born in Spalding, Saskatchewan before spending his formative years in Vancouver's Chinatown.

“There is interest across the country to highlight this history. And certainly a lot of this interest is reflected from the racism that came out of COVID directed at East Asians. So I think Asian Canadians are more aware of the nature of racism in Canada, that it's lurking and could be stirred up at any time. Markers like [this anniversary] help to say, we can survive. Those people in the past survived. We must survive this and we will move on.”

Paul Yee

Learn more about the Chinese Canadian Museum

Dr. Melissa Karmen Lee is a visual arts and literature scholar and has played a pivotal role in the establishment and planning of Canada's first Chinese Canadian Museum, based in Vancouver’s historic Chinatown. The museum will fully open its doors on July 1, 2023, a century after the passing of the Chinese Exclusion Act in Canada, and will serve as a national hub for historical research, storytelling and community engagement.

"We want to appeal to all Canadians. We want to appeal to people that come and visit Canada and have them understand that Chinese communities are a large part of Canadian identity. What I hope happens when non-Chinese Canadians come visit is they understand the idea that there are untold stories in Canadian history. And what maybe you learned in school as the dominant part of identity that makes up Canadian identity is not really the full story. There are gaps in history and, hopefully, we can fill in some of the gaps."

Dr. Melissa Karmen Lee