Asian Heritage Month closes with a question about belonging
Montréal marked the end of May's celebration by asking what civic inclusion truly means for Asian communities.
The City of Montréal closed Asian Heritage Month on Monday with an event at City Hall that felt less like a conclusion and more like an opening question: what does it mean for Asian communities to truly belong to this city—not just socially or culturally, but civically?
Heritage often gets treated as cultural texture: food, music, festivals, traditions. Those matter. But heritage is also about public memory—whose histories get remembered, whose contributions are recognized, whose voices sit at decision-making tables when a city plans its future.
Dr. Winston Chan, president of the Quebec Asian Heritage Month Committee, thanked the city for welcoming Asian communities into "the home of Montrealers." That phrase carried weight. For communities whose presence in Canada faced legal restrictions, policy barriers, and discrimination for decades, being recognized inside City Hall is more than symbolic.
Montréal's city council now includes four elected officials of Asian origin—a milestone. But Asian presence in the city spans more than 130 years. Stéphanie Valenzuela, borough mayor of Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce, marked the moment by pointing to growing Asian representation around decision-making tables, naming elected officials like Cathy Wong and Milany Thiagarajah.
Asian Montréal itself is not one story. It includes families whose roots run generations deep and newcomers still learning the city. It includes people who arrived through work, study, refuge, displacement, and family reunification—Chinese, Vietnamese, Cambodian, Laotian, Filipino, Korean, Japanese, South Asian, West Asian, and Central Asian communities. Their histories are distinct. Their languages, faiths, and migration experiences are not interchangeable.
That diversity matters because Asian communities are often spoken about as if they share one experience. They don't. What connects them across difference is the ongoing work of rebuilding and belonging in a city still learning to see them fully.