We gather keen minds in planning and several other fields, with insights from UBC, Vancouver, and beyond, to tackle the big challenges we face today and how our fields intersect to solve them. 

Next up, SFU Associate Professor Kamala Todd presents "Stories in the Indigenous City: Deepening knowledge, widening 'community'."

What dominant stories have shaped placemaking on these lands? Who are considered the citizens? How informed are planners and other city builders about the Indigenous lands which they have been empowered to shape (and why do they get to shape them?)? 

In this session Kamala Todd (Métis-Cree), a filmmaker and Indigenous planner with many years of working in municipal Indigenous relations, will share reflections on the importance of stories in truth-telling, decolonizing, and urban repair. 

Kamala has long argued that every Canadian city is an Indigenous city, being on Indigenous lands, and her work highlights the violence of colonial erasures and displacements at the heart of city-making--and the critical importance of Indigenous people's languages, laws, stories, and stewardship in building decolonized urban futures. 

Citing key moments in Vancouver's 'reconciliation journey' and UNDRIP Strategy, she will share examples of the transformative power of Indigenous stories (laws, oral histories, knowledge systems, cosmologies, etc.).

More about Kamala Todd:

Kamala Todd is a Métis-Cree mother, Indigenous planner, filmmaker, and educator born and raised in the beautiful lands of the hən̓q̓əmin̓əm̓ and Sḵwx̱wú7mesh speaking peoples (aka Vancouver). Her maternal family roots are in Red River, St. Paul des Métis, Lac la Biche, Edmonton, and other homelands. Her father descends from German immigrants. 

Kamala has a Masters degree in Geography from UBC, and works at the intersection of film and urban planning to support decolonizing and re-Indigenizing the city and narratives. She was the City of Vancouver's first Indigenous Arts and Culture Planner and Aboriginal Social Planner. Recently, she was honoured to be part of the Vancouver UNDRIP Strategy work with the City and Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh Nations, as consultant and writer. 

Kamala has taught at UBC SCARP and SFU Urban Studies as Adjunct Professor. She is Associate Professor of Professional Practice at SFU Urban Studies. Kamala is Director of Indigenous City Media, and her projects weave stories for truth, transformation, redress, and healing. Her film credits include Cedar and Bamboo, Indigenous Plant Diva, and RELAW: Living Indigenous Laws. She has written and directed for Coyote Science and Tansi! Nehiyawetan on APTN. Her writing credits include Truth-Telling: Indigenous Perspectives on Working with Municipal Governments (2017) and City Transforming (2023). Kamala lives with her family in Gibsons on the Sunshine Coast.