Sean’s introduction to neighbourhood houses came through his work as a sociologist at UBC, when a colleague introduced him to the concept as part of a research project.
“This was back in the early or mid to late 2000s. I didn’t know about neighbourhood houses at that time, but he introduced me to them,” Sean recalls.
“After that, I got interested in the neighbourhood house as a community organization. We did that smaller project and it turned into a bigger project that we worked on for a few years. And we wrote articles and books and things like that.”
Sean quickly became enamoured with the concept of neighbourhood houses, seeing them as fascinating spaces where different people and ideas intersect.
“Because there isn’t a mandate of serving particular demographics or particular kinds of activities, they are interesting organizations,” he explains.
“On a personal level I find those kinds of things interesting. That’s sort of why I got into sociology to begin with, because I was interested in the kinds of organizations that kind of bring people together. On a personal level I just enjoy hanging out at neighborhood houses.”
Sean’s involvement with neighbourhood houses grew further when the Association of Neighbourhood Houses invited him to join their board. During that time, the executive director was dealing with the challenge of preparing Kits House for redevelopment, which included organizing historical documents. That’s when Sean and a student of his took on the task of uncovering the rich history of Kits House.
“It was pretty fun. I enjoyed going through all these old documents and figuring out [the history of Kits House]. I learned a lot about the history of the neighborhood house. I think it turned into kind of an archive for Kits House,” he says.
As Sean delved into the archives, he uncovered some fascinating stories about Kits House’s past.
“We figured out that Greenpeace met at the house. One of the founders of Greenpeace wrote a memoir. And you can actually see he talks about it in the memoir. They always used to meet in people’s houses. And then they realized it was too big. So, they went to the neighborhood house,” he says.
“There was this woman named Jeni Legon who was a famous actress in the United States. She was in tons of movies and was famous for being a dancer. She moved to Canada and moved to Vancouver. And then she worked [at Kits House] for years and taught dance classes.”
Looking to the future, Sean emphasizes the importance of neighbourhood houses like Kits House in fostering community connections.
“It is going to be really different. It has grown and changed so much,” Sean says.
“There’s going to be so many more people coming in. Do [the newcomers] have a connection to their neighborhood? Do they know people in their neighborhood? Is there a sense of alienation? I feel like the neighbourhood house is kind of essential for this.”