Iranian Canadians or Persian Canadians are citizens of

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by to ...

whose national background is traced from

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran, and also called Persia, is a country located in Western Asia. It is bordered by Iraq and Turkey to the west, by Azerbaijan and Armenia to the northwest, by the Caspian Sea and Turkmeni ...

or are people possessing

ian and Canadian dual citizenship. From the 2016 Canadian census, the main communities can be found in Southern Ontario,

British Columbia British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada, situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. It has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that include rocky coastlines, sandy beaches, for ...

, and

Quebec Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirte ...

. The vast majority, however, live in northern suburbs of Toronto such as Richmond Hill, Vaughan, Markham, and Thornhill, and in certain municipalities of Vancouver, including North Vancouver, West Vancouver,

Burnaby Burnaby is a city in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia, Canada. Located in the centre of the Burrard Peninsula, it neighbours the City of Vancouver to the west, the District of North Vancouver across the confluence of the Burrar ...

, and Coquitlam. a total of 97,110 Iranians reside in the Greater Toronto Area, 46,255 in the

Greater Vancouver Area Greater Vancouver, also known as Metro Vancouver, is the metropolitan area with its major urban centre being the city of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The term "Greater Vancouver" is roughly coterminous with the geographic area governed b ...

, and 23,410 in the Greater Montreal Area, with the remainder spread out in the other major cities of Canada, based on the 2016 Canadian Census. These numbers represent the people who stated "Iranian" as their single or joint ethnic origin in the census survey.

Terminology

Iranian-Canadian is used interchangeably with Persian-Canadian, partly due to the fact that, in the

Western world The Western world, also known as the West, primarily refers to the various nations and states in the regions of Europe, North America, and Oceania.

was known as "Persia". On the Nowruz of 1935, Reza Shah Pahlavi asked foreign delegates to use the term Iran, the endonym of the country used since the Sasanian Empire, in formal correspondence. Since then the use of the word "Iran" has become more common in the Western countries. This also changed the usage of the terms for Iranian nationality, and the common adjective for citizens of Iran changed from "Persian" to "Iranian". In 1959, the government of Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, Reza Shah Pahlavi's son, announced that both "Persia" and "Iran" could officially be used interchangeably.Yarshater, Ehsa
Persia or Iran, Persian or Farsi
, ''Iranian Studies'', vol. XXII no. 1 (1989) However the issue is still debated today. Majd, Hooman, ''The Ayatollah Begs to Differ: The Paradox of Modern Iran'', by Hooman Majd,

Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group Random House is an American book publisher and the largest general-interest paperback publisher in the world. The company has several independently managed subsidiaries around the world. It is part of Penguin Random House, which is owned by Germ ...

, September 23, 2008, , 9780385528429. p
161
/ref> While the majority of Iranian-Canadians come from Persian backgrounds, there is a significant number of non-Persian Iranians such as Azeris and

Kurds ug:كۇردلار Kurds ( ku, کورد ,Kurd, italic=yes, rtl=yes) or Kurdish people are an Iranian peoples, Iranian ethnic group native to the mountainous region of Kurdistan in Western Asia, which spans southeastern Turkey, northwestern Ir ...

within the Iranian-Canadian community, leading some scholars to believe that the label "Iranian" is more inclusive, since the label "Persian" excludes non-Persian minorities. The ''

Collins English Dictionary The ''Collins English Dictionary'' is a printed and online dictionary of English. It is published by HarperCollins in Glasgow. The edition of the dictionary in 1979 with Patrick Hanks as editor and Laurence Urdang as editorial director, wa ...

'' uses a variety of similar and overlapping definitions for the terms "Persian" and "Iranian".

Demographics

In 2021, there were 213,160 individuals in Canada who had been born in Iran, of which 70,395 had immigrated to Canada since 2011. Among all Iranian-Canadians, 103,560 (49%) identified as Muslim. Among immigrants since 2011, about 39,860 (57%) identified as Muslim while most of the rest did not identify with any religion.

Notable Canadians of Iranian descent

Persian Newspaper Shahrvand in Toronto Editorial Team 2014

Academia

Persian Plaza - Yonge Street - Toronto 2014

Payam Akhavan Payam Akhavan (Persian: پیام اخوان) is an Iranian-born lawyer. He is a Member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague. He is a senior fellow at Massey College at the University of Toronto and is a visiting adjunct at the ...

, pioneer in international criminal law and leading human rights advocate;

McGill University McGill University (french: link=no, Université McGill) is an English-language public research university located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Founded in 1821 by royal charter granted by King George IV,Frost, Stanley Brice. ''McGill Univer ...

* Kaveh Farrokh, historian * Ramin Jahanbegloo, philosopher and university professor *

Ali Khademhosseini Ali Khademhosseini ( fa, علی خادم‌حسینی, born October 30, 1975, Tehran, Iran) is the Director and CEO of the Terasaki Institute and former professor at the University of California-Los Angeles where he held a multi-departmental profes ...

, Associate Professor of Medicine; Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology * Shahrzad Mojab, Professor of Leadership, Higher and Adult Education;

University of Toronto The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution ...

* Reza Zadeh, computer scientist;

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is conside ...

Art and literature

* Hossein Amanat, architect, urban designer * Reza Baraheni, novelist, poet, critic, and political activist * Jian Ghomeshi, member of Moxy Früvous; former host of CBC's ''play''; former host of ''Q'' on CBC Radio 1 * Siamak Hariri, architect * Nazanine Hozar, writer * Ramin Karimloo, West End performer, playing the lead role in Andrew Lloyd Webber's '' The Phantom of the Opera'' and the sequel '' Love Never Dies'' * Navid Khonsari, video game, film and graphic novel creator, writer, director and producer * Fariborz Lachini, music composer * , painter, photographer and husband of ex-

Olympic Olympic or Olympics may refer to Sports Competitions * Olympic Games, international multi-sport event held since 1896 ** Summer Olympic Games ** Winter Olympic Games * Ancient Olympic Games, ancient multi-sport event held in Olympia, Greece bet ...

biathlete Myriam Bédard, convicted and sentenced in June 2007 for stealing paintings from the late painter Ghitta Caiserman * Sanaz Mazinani, photographer and curator *

Kaveh Nabatian Kaveh Nabatian is an Iranian-Canadian musician and film director, known as a trumpeter and keyboardist with the Juno Award winning orchestral post-rock band Bell Orchestre. Career As a filmmaker Nabatian is noted for his 2010 short film ''Vapor'' ...

, musician and filmmaker * Marina Nemat, author *

Ghazal Omid Ghazal Omid (Persian language, Persian ) is an Iranian Canadian, Iranian-Canadian author. She wrote an autobiographical work entitled ''Living in Hell: A True Odyssey of a Woman's Struggle in Islamic Iran Against Personal and Political Forces'' ...

, nonfiction political writer, nonfiction children's book writer, speaker, NGO executive * Fariborz Sahba, architect * Bardia Sinaee, poet *

Parviz Tanavoli Parviz Tanavoli (born 1937) is an Iranian sculptor, painter, educator, and art historian. He is a pioneer within the Saqqakhaneh school, a neo-traditionalist art movement. Tanavoli has been one of the most expensive Iranian artists in sales. Tanav ...

, sculptor and painter

Beauty pageants

Nazanin Afshin-Jam Nazanin Afshin-Jam ( fa, نازنین افشین جم, ''Nāzanin Afŝin Jam'', born April 11, 1979) is an Iranian-Canadian human rights activist, author and public speaker. She is a former Miss World Canada. She is also president and co-founder ...

, Miss Canada 2003, first runner-up of

Miss World 2003 Miss World 2003 was the 53rd edition of the Miss World pageant, held at the Crown of Beauty Theatre in Sanya, China on 6 December 2003. At the end of the event, Azra Akın of Turkey crowned Rosanna Davison of Ireland as Miss World 2003. It ...

, actress, singer-songwriter, human rights activist; wife of former Canadian Defence Minister

Peter MacKay Peter Gordon MacKay (born September 27, 1965) is a Canadian lawyer and politician. He was a Member of Parliament from 1997 to 2015 and has served as Minister of Justice and Attorney General (2013–2015), Minister of National Defence (2007� ...

Ramona Amiri The Miss World Canada contest is a Beauty pageant held annually in different incarnations since 1957 to select Canada's representative to the Miss World contest. In 2017 MTC-W Inc. obtained the exclusive rights to send the Canadian representativ ...

Miss World Canada The Miss World Canada contest is a Beauty pageant held annually in different incarnations since 1957 to select Canada's representative to the Miss World contest. In 2017 MTC-W Inc. obtained the exclusive rights to send the Canadian representati ...

2005, semifinalist of Miss World 2005 *

Samantha Tajik Samantha Tajik (; ) is an Iranian Canadian model, actress and television personality. She was crowned Miss Universe Canada 2008 on 28 April 2008 in Toronto, Ontario, and went on to represent Canada at the Miss Universe 2008 beauty pageant in ...

, Miss Universe Canada 2008

Business

Sea Life Cavern wing at West Edmonton Mall

* Ghermezian family, billionaire shopping mall developers *

Hassan Khosrowshahi Hassan Khosrowshahi ( fa, حسن خسروشاهی) , is an Iranian-Canadian business magnate, investor, and philanthropist. He founded Future Shop, a Canadian consumer electronics chain store that was acquired by Best Buy in 2001 for c.$580 mill ...

, founder of Future Shop * Karim Hakimi, founder of Hakim Optical *

Michael Latifi Michael Mehrdad Latifi (born October 1962 in Iran) is an Iranian-Canadian businessman. He is the owner, Chairman and CEO of Sofina Foods Inc., a Markham, Ontario-based manufacturer of processed animal products. Sofina acquired Lilydale in a C$ ...

, founder of Sofina Foods Ltd and owner of Nidala (BVI) Limited which holds a share in the McLaren Group. *

Shahrzad Rafati Shahrzad Rafati is an Iranian-Canadian chairwoman and CEO of BroadbandTV Corp (BBTV) a global media company headquartered in Vancouver, Canada. In October 2020, Rafati led BBTV to its initial public offering on the Toronto Stock Exchange. Earl ...

, founder of BroadbandTV Corp * Sam Mizrahi, real estate developer *

Shahin Assayesh Shahin Assayesh (born 1939, in Mashhad) is an Iranian publisher. Assayesh was educated at the University of London, the University of Tehran and the University of Mashhad. She was a secondary school teacher in Tehran before moving to the United ...

, publisher

Crime

* Omid Tahvili, kingpin and international fugitive

Entertainment

* Mehdi Sadaghdar, YouTube personality, electrical engineer

Journalism

ITC TV - Persian TV Station in Toronto 2014

Various Persian-language media (including TV and newspapers) are active in Canada, including Shahrvand and Salam Toronto, which cover local events as well. * Maziar Bahari, journalist * Farid Haerinejad, CBC former producer, documentary maker and current ِِEditor in Chief of

Radio Zamaneh Radio Zamaneh ( fa, رادیو زمانه) is an Amsterdam-based Persian language exile news platform and former radio broadcaster. "Zamaneh" is the Persian literary term for "time". Radio Zamaneh is an independent Persian-language exile media ...

* Zahra Kazemi, photojournalist *

Nikahang Kowsar Nikahang Kowsar ( fa, نیک‌آهنگ کوثر, born 1969), also known as Nik Kowsar is an Iranian-Canadian cartoonist, journalist, and blogger, currently living in Washington, D.C., US. Kowsar was also a reformist candidate for the second term ...

, cartoonist * Touka Neyestani, cartoonist

Politicians

* Ali Ehsassi, Federal Liberal MP for Willowdale, lawyer *

Majid Jowhari Majid Jowhari ( fa, مجید جوهری, born October 24, 1960) is a Canadian politician who was elected in the 2015, 2019 and in the 2021 Canadian federal election to represent the electoral district of Richmond Hill as a Member of Parliamen ...

, Federal Liberal MP for Richmond Hill, engineer * Amir Khadir,

Québec solidaire Québec solidaire (QS; ) is a democratic socialist and sovereigntist political party in Quebec, Canada. The party and media outlets in Canada usually use the name "Québec solidaire" in both French and English, but the party's name is sometime ...

Former MNA for

Mercier Mercier is French for ''notions dealer'' or ''haberdasher'', and may refer to: People * Agnès Mercier, French curler and coach * Annick Mercier (born 1964), French curler * Amanda H. Mercier (born 1975), American Judge *Armand Mercier, (1933–2 ...

, microbiologist * Reza Moridi, Ontario Liberal Former MPP for Richmond Hill, physicist, engineer

Sport

* Nicholas Latifi,

Formula One Formula One (also known as Formula 1 or F1) is the highest class of international racing for open-wheel single-seater formula racing cars sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). The World Drivers' Championship, ...

driver for Williams Grand Prix Engineering

Technology

Behdad Esfahbod Seyed Behdad Esfahbod MirHosseinZadeh Sarabi ( fa, سید بهداد اسفهبد میر حسین‌زاده سرابی; born September 27, 1982) is an Iranian-Canadian software engineer and free software developer. He was a software engineer ...

, programmer and creator of the HarfBuzz text shaping engine

Iranian districts in Canada

British Columbia

* British Properties, West Vancouver * Ambleside, West Vancouver * Lower North Vancouver * Coal Harbour * Financial District, Vancouver * Vancouver's Downtown South

Ontario

* Willowdale East *

Newtonbrook Newtonbrook is a neighbourhood in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is located in the area around Yonge Street and Finch Avenue in the district of North York between the east and west branches of the Don River. Officially, the area is divided into two n ...

East *

Don Valley Village Don Valley Village is a neighbourhood in the city of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is located in the former suburb of North York. Located north of Highway 401 and bisected by Don Mills Road, it is bounded by Sheppard Avenue to the south, Leslie Str ...

West *

Bayview Village Bayview Village is an neighbourhood in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is part of the federal Don Valley North riding and the provincial Don Valley North electoral district, and Toronto electoral Ward 17: Don Valley North. In 2006, it had a populati ...

Flemingdon Park Flemingdon Park is a neighbourhood in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located in the city's North York district. It is part of the Don Valley East federal and provincial electoral districts, and Ward 26: Don Valley East (South) municipally. In 2011, it ...

* Willowdale West * Parkwoods-Donalda * Woburn * Mount Pleasant West

References

External links

PM meets with representatives of the Persian-Canadian community

Iranians of Toronto website
{{Iranian citizens abroad Ethnic groups in Canada Asian Canadian West Asian Canadians