_Immigrant Community Spaces: Socio-cultural Manifestations in the Spatial Characteristics of Turkish Community Centers in Montreal

Communities of diaspora are identified by their distinct socio-cultural and religious values in a foreign setting. How they position themselves in the built environment of the host country is determined by the spaces that they establish for themselves. This study focuses specifically on Turkish immigrant community in Montreal from an architectural perspective to shed light on to their cultural and religious structure, challenges they face in maintaining their cultural identity, and the role space and architecture play in their negotiation process in a predominantly non-Muslim city. By analyzing specific community center and mosques, the study aims to understand the socio-cultural dynamics and reasons behind the establishment of these buildings by Turkish immigrant groups, and people’s interactions with their surroundings both physically and socially. Moreover, placing these buildings in relation with temporal community behaviors is important to establish the formation of Turkish immigrants’ cultural landscape in Montreal’s urban context. By making observations on the chosen locations that belong to Turkish communal life in Montreal, and by relying on the information gathered from conducted interviews, this study creates connections between theoretical ideas about the production of space and material culture, transnational meanings of mosque architecture, impacts of diverse demographics structure and people’s everyday lives, and religious and political ideologies. The main argument revolves around the premise that social formation of Turkish diaspora in Montreal, and the negotiation process between its cultural collective memory and its adaptation into the host environment can be traced and identified in the location, development, design, and spatial configuration and characteristics of its community centers and mosques throughout the city. Distinct design identifiers and role of architecture are then addressed in an interpretive manner.