Our guest editor for this issue of Canadian Architect is Edmonton-based Métis architect Tiffany Shaw
There has been a major shift since the release of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission?s 2015 report, with its 94 calls to action. While we are still in the thick of understanding terms related to reconciliation, conciliation and generational trauma, there are events now in place to help bring greater awareness to the many ways Indigenous people and their communities have been continually dismantled. Orange Shirt Day, the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls movement, Starlight tour awareness campaigns, Indigenous Peoples Day, the Sixties Scoop settlement, the First Nations Child Welfare agreement, Day School and Residential School testimonials and the continual horror of unmarked gravesites being discovered around Residential School sites reveal the many attempts to erase Indigenous language, kinships, sovereignty, and access to land and resources. These events remind us about the importance of reshifting our collective mindset on the inequities Indigenous people face daily in rural and urban spaces, and how we can be seeking solutions, rather than maintaining the status quo that perpetuates bureaucratic colonial structures. Indigenous communities?whether in cities or towns, on-reserve, in settlements, within treaties, on unceded land, or in Métis or Inuit Nunangat regions?often lack healthy spaces that encourage growth, healing and prosperity. The built env...