How to explain Toronto?
Like many of you, I’ve been thinking about our city in the aftermath of the horrific van attack last week. They say you always find out who you are in a crisis.
We have seen the kindness and compassion that reminds me of how special this city is, and why so many people from so many places around the world and different walks of life want to live here.
I have been fortunate enough to witness this first-hand in my day job at Myseum of Toronto.
Since we have started as a museum without walls, it happens quite often that someone will seek out our location, and come to the office looking for the traditional history museum experience of exhibitions with artifacts. There is one conversation I had a few years ago, as a result of this, that still stands out to me.
We were presenting one of our nontraditional series of exhibits and events in the fall of 2016. The program included 350 images of people who came from almost every country around the world and call Toronto home.
One afternoon a young man came to the office after seeing the promotional cards on the subway featuring some of these Torontonians. He explained how he came to find out about Myseum and that he was hoping our museum would help him find a way to explain to his wife that she would “fit in” living in Toronto as a Turkish Muslim woman.
He was from Toronto originally, but had lived in Istanbul for the last 10 years and he met his wife there. He had come home to prepare for her to move and join him in Toronto. He told us he had been trying to explain how diverse Toronto was, and reassure her that no one would care that she wore a hijab, but she was not convinced and was very nervous about moving here and standing out as “different.”
Now, if you are from Toronto, you know that this woman would not “stand out” on the streets of our city, but this dilemma of explaining to a non-Torontonians who and what Toronto is, is one that lingers.
How does one explain Toronto? How would you explain Toronto to someone from away? I think this city has many facets to its intersectional identity, and one of the reasons that they all work well to form the whole of us, is because for some reason we make space for all those complex layers and perspectives to form who we are as a city.
To further complicate our intersectional identity, I believe we are a city that is still finding our way, much like an adolescent, and I believe our museums and culture organizations have an important role to play in helping to shape Toronto’s growth into adulthood.
Adolescents need elders who have history and memory. They need adults who can give guidance because they have a sense of the past and an understanding of the present. Adolescents need this type of guidance in order to imagine and shape their future.
I have spent most of my career working in the museums and culture sector, and I believe this sector is essential to a city because it provides the guidance necessary to shaping the character of a city. Museums and cultural organizations are required to know what is happening in the past and present to help people imagine their futures.
That visit to our office at Myseum has stayed with me. As an innovative city museum, Myseum takes our exhibitions and events out into Toronto’s communities. As we begin to plan for our hub space, we want that location to be a place where that young man could take his partner to begin the journey of exploring Toronto as an intersectional city, with multiple layers, that make up a complex and rich identity.
How does one explain Toronto? I want to ask you how would you explain Toronto to someone from away? What would you say about Toronto to someone who has never been here, that lets them know they, too, can live an imperfect, yet rewarding life here?