n. — Ethnicities, at times derogatory
a Canadian of an ethnic background other than English or British.
Type: 4. Culturally Significant — As an immigrant country, mixed ethnicities have been key to the development of Canada, despite racism and the implicit assumption of a white English or British norm (see in this context the 1929 quotation). Hyphenated Canadian has been used throughout the 20th century, as the quotations show, yet its uses have shifted from the white British immigrants of different backgrounds (French, Scottish or Irish versus the English "reference point" at the time). The term has a highly complex set of connotations that vary from negative (see the 1944 quotation in the context of acquiring full Canadian independence; the 1980 quotatoin) to the positive (see the 1997 quotation) to neutral (see the second 2005 quotation). Overall, the term seems to have carried more negative than positive connotations over the decades. The 2016 quotation and its call for current "assessment and re-examination" is a good conclusion to the complex situation concerning the term.
Despite the name of this term, many examples of this expression do not use the hyphen, e.g. "Austrian Canadian" rather "Austrian-Canadian" .
See also: French Canadian (meaning 1)
- The term "hyphenated American" dates at least back to 1891 (in The New York Times). Hyphenated Canadian was likely formed by analogy, although we have no conclusive evidence for this.