“A Little Island of Yiddishkeit”: Studying Jewish Migration, Belonging and Intercultural Encounter Through Montreal’s Back River Cemetery

• In Event: Evolution, Revolution, Space and Place

Abstract

This paper was co-authored by Naomi Frost, Concordia University.

This paper explores the history of Back River Memorial Gardens, one of the oldest continually operating exclusively Jewish cemeteries in Canada. We argue that the cemetery is an important site to help us understand the dynamics of migration, settlement and belonging of the local Jewish community, from the beginning of mass migration in the late 19th century to the present. Back River is located in Ahuntsic, a neighbourhood in the north of Montreal, far away from the local Jewish community. Despite its historical significance and its central location in Ahuntsic, its history is very poorly known, due to a lack of record keeping, as well as the disappearance of many of the burial societies or congregations that were once responsible for the space. Most local Jews do not know it exists. It is also poorly understood by the surrounding neighbourhood, where it is highly visible, as thousands of commuters pass by it daily, but where few understand what it is, nor have much knowledge of the Jewish community or its history more broadly.

The cemetery began operation in 1883, when Ahuntsic was still Sault-aux-Recollets, a rural farming community outside the city of Montreal. This therefore reverses the usual narrative of migration history, in which immigrants have to adapt to the city to which they arrive; at Back River, the immigrant community was there before the city. The history of Back River speaks to the stories of Jewish migration to Montreal, challenges in settlement and integration, and encounters with the French-Canadian majority. Its location at the intersection of the Jewish and French-Canadian communities means it becomes a place that is viewed through people’s anxieties about the place of Jews in Montreal and Canada. Through archival as well as oral history research, we argue that the evolution of this cemetery, and the very personal memories of migration, family, loss, and grief that emerge from it, help us understand how the Jewish community in Montreal has adapted and evolved, as well as how that has intersected with urban development, and the intercultural politics of the city.

Author

• Anna Sheftel, Concordia University