African Americans in Canada

{{Short description|Community of black migrants from the United States to Canada}}

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{{Infobox ethnic group

| group = African Americans in Canada

| image = African American Distribution in Canada, 2021 Census.jpg

| caption = Population distribution of African American Canadians by census division, 2021 census

| pop = 9,900{{cite web|url= https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/89-657-x/89-657-x2024005-eng.htm|title= The Diversity of the Black Populations in Canada, 2021}}

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{{African American topics sidebar}}

{{Distinguish|Black Canadians}}

There is an African American diaspora in Canada.

Around 15,000 to 20,000 African Americans settled in Canada between the years 1850 and 1860.{{cite encyclopedia|title=Black Canadians

|url=https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/black-canadians|encyclopedia=The Canadian Encyclopedia}}

In the 1820s, Canada saw a trickle of enslaved African American seeking freedom and refuge from the United States. Eventually, these enslaved people from American slavery crossed into British North America in large numbers, using the secret routes of the Underground Railroad. By the time of the American Civil War, it is estimated that approximately 30,000 enslaved African American had escaped to Canada. In the late 1850s, around 800 free black Americans were invited to migrate from California to Vancouver Island to assist British authorities. They left California because of racial discrimination imposed by law in their state.{{cite encyclopedia|title=Black History in Canada until 1900|url=https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/black-history-until-1900|encyclopedia= The Canadian Encyclopedia}} The Underground Railroad was a secret network that helped African Americans escape from slavery in the South to free states in the north and to Canada.{{Cite web|url=https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/underground-railroad|title=Underground Railroad|website=www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca|access-date=4 January 2024}} Harriet Tubman helped enslaved black people escape to Canada.{{cite web | title=Underground Railroad | website=cbc.ca | url=https://www.cbc.ca/history/EPCONTENTSE1EP8CH1PA3LE.html | access-date=4 January 2024}}

Around some 1,500 African Americans migrated to the Plains region of Canada in the years between 1905 and 1912. The African Americans mostly came from Oklahoma, although a few African American families were from Kansas and Texas. They settled in small, rural communities in Saskatchewan and Alberta.{{cite encyclopedia|url= http://plainshumanities.unl.edu/encyclopedia/doc/egp.afam.005|title=AFRICAN CANADIANS|encyclopedia= Encyclopedia of the Great Plains}}

The Niagara River was a destination for formerly enslaved African Americans escaping slavery in the South.{{Cite web|url=https://www.nps.gov/articles/the-niagara-river-between-slavery-and-freedom.htm|title=The Niagara River: Between Slavery and Freedom (U.S. National Park Service)|website=www.nps.gov|accessdate=4 January 2024}}

The descendants of Black Loyalists and African American refugees still live in Nova Scotia and Canada in the present day but they suffer from the same conditions of inequality as African Americans in the United States.{{Cite web|url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-03-05/flee-from-trump-to-canada-if-you-want-but-there-s-racism-there-too|title=African Americans Have Been Fleeing to Canada for Centuries|date=5 March 2016|accessdate=4 January 2024|via=www.bloomberg.com}}