From: The Encyclopedia of Canada's Peoples/Afghans/Grant Farr
The Afghan community is embedded in numerous intergroup connections. Immediately outside their own community they associate with peoples from neighbouring countries: Persian-speakers with Iranians and Pushto-speakers with Pakistanis. As Muslims, Afghans have some links with other Islamic groups in the Arab community. Afghans also form associations with the larger Canadian society along occupational or residential lines.
Commitment to maintaining the Afghan community, culture, and languages is strong among the first generation but gradually weakens with the second and successive ones. In the period immediately after immigration, concerns with a new culture and continued instability in the homeland encourage new arrivals to gather together and become more aware of their Afghan heritage. Commitment to being an Afghan and maintaining the community increases as sectarian and ethnic differences are put aside in the face of greater issues.
Despite the best intentions, however, the Afghan immigrant community in Canada exhibits a number of characteristics that work against group maintenance and continued ethnic commitment. For one, the community is relatively small, and its members do not live in enclaves. They are also divided into several subgroups according to language, ethnicity, religion, and politics. As time passes and the community begins to accommodate to the Canadian lifestyle, concern over being Afghan is replaced by preoccupation with individual achievement. The children going to local schools learn how to be Canadian, the extended kin system begins to break down, and commitment to the community decreases. As in many immigrant groups, time works against cultural or community maintenance.
