On Monday, the City of Montreal held an event to mark the closing of the Asian Heritage Month of May. Yet, it felt like a question being opened, rather than a conclusion.
What does it mean for Asian communities to belong to Montreal, not only socially or culturally, but civically?
That question matters because heritage is often treated as something soft: food, music, festivals, and traditions. All of that matters. But heritage is also about public memory. It tells us whose histories are remembered, whose contributions are recognized, and whose voices are trusted when a city makes decisions about its future.
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Dr. Winston Chan, president of Quebec Asian Heritage Month Committee, thanked the City of Montreal for welcoming Asian communities into what he called “the home of Montrealers.” The phrase carried history. For communities whose presence in Canada was once restricted by law, policy, and discrimination, being recognized inside City Hall is more than symbolic.
Montreal’s city council now includes four elected officials of Asian origin. It is a milestone worth acknowledging, but not one that appeared overnight. Asian presence in Montreal goes back more than 130 years.
Stéphanie Valenzuela, borough mayor of Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce, spoke to the same arc. She described Asian Heritage Month as a reminder of the road travelled in representation and inclusion, pointing to the growing presence of Asian voices around decision-making tables, including elected officials such as Cathy Wong and Milany Thiagarajah.
It was a moment to ask what has changed, what has not, and what comes next for Asian Montrealers.
Many histories, one city
Asian Montreal is not one story.
It includes families whose roots in this city go back generations, and newcomers still learning how to make Montreal feel like home. It includes people who arrived through work, study, refuge, displacement, family reunification, and the hope of a different future.
It includes Chinese, Vietnamese, Cambodian, Laotian, Filipino, Korean, Japanese, South Asian, West Asian, Central Asian, and many more communities. Their histories are distinct. Their languages, faiths, migration experiences, and relationships to Quebec are not interchangeable.
That diversity matters. Too often, Asian communities are spoken about as if they share one experience. They do not.
Still, there are connections across these stories: the work of rebuilding, the pressure to adapt, the responsibility carried across generations, and the desire to be seen not as temporary guests, but as part of the city’s foundation.
Asian Heritage Month creates space for those stories to enter public memory. A city cannot fully understand itself if it forgets who helped build it.
Chinatown, and what it teaches
It is easy to see Montreal’s Chinatown through its restaurants, festivals, and storefronts. But Chinatown is also a record of exclusion.
For early Chinese immigrants, it was actually a place where community became protection.
Many early Chinese Montrealers worked in laundries, restaurants, and small businesses. Their labour was visible, but their dignity was often denied. Chinese communities faced discriminatory taxation, the federal head tax, family separation, the denial of voting rights, and the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1923.
These policies shaped generations. They told people, in very concrete ways, that their labour was useful but their belonging was conditional.
This history is one of the foundations of Asian presence in Montreal. Remembering it does not reduce Asian Heritage Month to one community. Instead, it helps us understand how communities create belonging even when institutions fail to offer it.
Beyond celebration
Celebration has its place. It is how communities share beauty, humour, language, and pride.
But celebration is not the same as power.
If Asian communities are invited to perform culture but not to shape policy, something is missing. If they are visible in restaurants and small businesses, but less present in leadership and governance, then inclusion remains partial.
The question is not about whether Asian Montrealers contribute to the city. The deeper question is whether those contributions translate into trust.
Trust is what allows communities to move from being represented in photos to being represented in decisions. It is what makes institutions ask not only, “How do we include you?” but also, “What do we need to change because of what you know?”
That is where belonging becomes more than a feeling. It becomes civic infrastructure for a more inclusive society.
When representation becomes influence
The presence of Asian elected officials at City Hall matters because it changes the visual language of leadership.
For younger generations, it sends a message that civic life is not somewhere else, reserved for someone else. It says that the city’s future is something they can help shape.
Representation matters because it shifts what people imagine as authority. It challenges old assumptions about who is credible, who is ready, and who belongs in the room.
In Montreal, public life is shaped not only through elections. It is also shaped on boards, advisory committees, and in nonprofits, universities, media spaces, and community networks.
These are the rooms where decisions are shaped long before they become public.
If Asian Montrealers are part of the city’s daily life but absent from those decision-making rooms, visibility is not enough.
What belonging asks of Montreal now
At City Hall, Chan invited Montrealers to “write our story together.” That invitation is at the heart of Asian Heritage Month.
The next chapter should honour the sacrifices of earlier generations, but it should not stop at gratitude. Gratitude looks back. Belonging must keep looking forward.
Belonging begins when a city remembers. It grows when communities are trusted. And it becomes real when the next chapter is written with Asian Montrealers—not only about them. A more inclusive Montreal will be shaped through honest memory, shared responsibility, and institutions willing to listen differently, act thoughtfully, and work collaboratively.
