Plotting “Nowhere”: Towards a Theory of Urban Folklore on Vancouver’s Gentrifying Frontier

Authors

  • Jeff Fedoruk McMaster University

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.14288/cl.v0i228-9.187585

Abstract

This article mobilizes a theory of urban folklore, that is, of structured narratives and “stories” that represent the beliefs, traditions, and ritualistic tendencies of various urban peoples and groups, to examine how policy actors and the ownership class along the Hastings Street Corridor in Vancouver have utilized a pseudo-grassroots urban folklore to make gentrification generalized and to strengthen their gentrification agendas, while an urban folklore from the perspective of extant residents continues to have the possibility of performing resistance. In this context, the ambiguity of gentrification as a process—who moves into an area and who gets pushed out—problematically persists. Here, along cultural lines, urban folklore readily engages the popular media that has shaped the Hastings Corridor as a gentrifying frontier with the fiction, poetry, and performances that represent a potential resistance.

Author Biography

Jeff Fedoruk, McMaster University

Jeff Fedoruk is a PhD student and SSHRC CGS Doctoral scholar in the Department of English and Cultural Studies at McMaster University. His dissertation project, "Fabricating Canadian National Identity within the Creative City Complex," examines the implications of Canadian nationalism on urban development and gentrification, drawing from examples of cultural production in Hamilton, ON and Vancouver, BC.

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Published

2017-03-22