Faith-based ethnic residential communities and neighbourliness

Three out of five were in the northwest quadrant of the metropolitan area, outside of the city of Toronto in the suburban municipalities. [...] For example, the communities around the Nugget mosque and the Malton Gurdwara were predominantly inhabited by immigrants (63 per cent in the Nugget community and between 50 per cent and 61 per cent in the community near the Malton Gurdwara), many of whom had recently arrived in the country. [...] CONTEXT The topic of this study falls at the intersection of a number of interrelated, yet seemingly distinct, areas of study, such as neighbourliness, the role of religion and places of worship in the lives of immigrants, and the impact of religion on space. [...] Our study relied upon elements of Hutchison’s indicators of neighbourliness, especially the level and type of interaction, length of residence, acquaintances in the area, and level of attachment to the neighbourhood, along with detailed probing concerning the role of religion and places of worship in motivating people to relocate to a particular neighbourhood. [...] In the following sections, each of these areas is discussed in turn through ethnographic descriptions of each neighbourhood illustrates and analyses of their social characteristics, the reasons for their formation, the influence of the place of worship, and the level of neighbourliness in each area.