Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Unwrapping The Toronto Christmas Market: An Examination Of Tradition And Nostalgia In A Socially Constructed Space, Lydia J. Gibson

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Little research explores the creation of an outdoor Christmas Market, and the role that tradition and nostalgia theory play in this socially constructed space. This thesis offers an examination of the Toronto Christmas Market, an extravagant Christmas-themed pop-up market in Toronto’s Distillery District neighbourhood, and seeks to understand how the design or execution of the market serves to articulate the tropes of tradition and nostalgia. The market’s sizeable attendance for the 2018 season of an estimated 650,000 people is a sheer testament to the merit it has as a social event in a public space. Through a discourse analysis and …