Canada as a new place: The immigrant's experience

A place is space that has been given meaning through personal, group, or cultural processes. It can be unknown or not experienced, as the new country is to a new immigrant. This paper reviews and discusses aspects of the physical settings that immigrants learn about and adapt in a new place (Canada, in particular). Immigration trends in Canada, theories of coping with an unfamiliar culture, and culture and environment relationships are reviewed briefly. An integration of literature on immigrants' learning and adaptation with respect to environmental cognition, adaptation to winter climate, leisure and recreation, communication via environmental cues, housing, and place attachment follows. Finally, current means by which immigrant settlement can be facilitated are discussed.