ABSTRACT

This chapter utilizes historical geographical information system to step onto the rich avenue of inquiry opened up by Henri Lefebvre with his observation that 'space' is both 'producing and produced by social relations'. The experience of the Black population, who were racially marked but not spatially distinguished, also demonstrates the power of social relations in creating, or not differentiating, racial spaces. The fort has disappeared; a city of the white race occupies its place. The mutually reinforcing power of space and social relations is apparent in the narrative of 'Chinese' in the newspapers. The 'spatializations' of social action suggest the immense analytical power of bringing space and social relations, geographical information systems and textual analyses, together into one field of vision. In the 1850s and early 1860s the town was bounded by a ravine on the north side, opposite the narrowest part of the harbour and across from the Lekwungen Village.