DCHP-2

visible minority DCHP-2 (November 2016)

• n. — Ethnicities

  an ethnic group that is visibly distinct from the predominant group.

  Type: 5. Frequency — Visible minority is a term used in the Canadian Employment Equity Act, passed in 1983 and amended in 1995. The Act defines visible minority as a group that is "non-Caucasian in race or non-white in colour", and excludes Aboriginal people (see Justice Laws reference). The purpose of the Act is to provide equal opportunity for groups such as visible minorities and women that may be discriminated against in the workplace. However, in 2007, the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination criticized the Canadian government for its use of the term, and suggested that it may be discriminatory by declaring, de facto, the "whites" implicitly as a default group (see CBC reference and the second 2008 quotation).
  Statistics Canada has not issued questions relating to visible minorities or ethnicity in the census since 2006, although their voluntary long-form census (National Household Survey) does. In 2011, the findings of the survey reported that 19% of respondents self-identified as part of the visible minority population (see Statistics Canada reference).
  Note that the term was long in use before its official adoption in the Employment Equity Act, but that it was more fluid, e.g. in the 1970 quotation visible minority expressly included Canadian First Nations members. Visible minority is used predominantly in Canada (see Chart 1).
  See also COD-2, s.v. "visible minority", which is marked "esp. Cdn".

  • 1963  Sidney Blum, research associate with the Hamilton Social Planning Council, told the meeting discrimination, especially aimed at what he called the visible minority groups, was widespread in many aspects of national life. Last year, he said, the Engineering Undergraduate Society of the University of British Columbia conducted an experiment which found that the 85 Caucasians in that year's engineering class received an average of three job offers each from national and provincial companies. For 17 Asiatics, there was a total of only four job offers. 
  • 1970  A review committee of THE ONTARIO HUMAN RIGHT COMMISSION will hear SUBMISSIONS under the chairmanship of Professor Frederick Elkin on the subject of EMPLOYMENT OF ACTORS, MUSICIANS AND MODELS belonging to visible minority groups (Blacks, Canadian Indians and Asians) IN MASS MEDIA ADVERTISING 
  • 1983  MP suggests end to visible minorities committee because it cannot grasp problems [Headline] 
  • 1998  Such affiliations create what Carleton professor Leslie Pal, in his study of government funding, Interests of State, describes as "the representational aura" that groups cast. This supposed aura, Pal notes, is actually a mirage; funded groups have no mandate to speak on behalf of women or visible minorities. Indeed, faced with a potential withdrawal of government funding, NAC, in an unintended parody of its claims to mass support, recently threatened to close its doors. 
  • 2008  Ottawa Well-educated recent immigrants to Canada appear to have more difficulty finding employment in Montreal than in any other large metropolitan centre, according to a new study of the latest census figures. While the study of census employment figures by Jack Jedwab, executive director of the Association for Canadian Studies, found that different cities presented different challenges, when it comes to new immigrants finding jobs, it was Montreal that had the bleakest overall picture. In several other cities, however, the employment picture varied significantly depending on whether the person was from a visible minority and his or her particular ethnic background. "As to the most recent immigrants (arrived between 2001 and 2006) with university degrees it is in Montreal that the groups have the highest rate of unemployment," Mr. Jedwab wrote. 
  • 2008  In the same vein, another taboo term: "visible minority." The United Nations has stopped using that description of groups whose skin colour is not white, "because of its reference to biology," and so should Quebecers, the commissioners say. 
  • 2013  Furthermore, almost 30 per cent of New Westminster's population identified themselves as a visible minority. The most common visible minorities included South Asian, Filipino, Chinese, black and Korean. 
  • 2016  It is even more disturbing when you include family income. This shows that the areas of the city that are predominantly white are also the areas of the city with the highest incomes. The result is that we have many schools in the city populated almost exclusively by white students from high income families and others containing predominantly black and other visible minority students from lower income households. This is essentially the same type of segregation found in American schools.