Greetings to those who have visited my website,

This page exists to honour and respect those who have lived on North American land long before colonizers, settlers and immigrants. 

My writing and work is meant to be inclusive of all types of people, including their race, gender, nationality, ability and disability, and indigeneity. To begin such conversations, it is only just to first start with a land acknowledgement.

My familial roots come from Quebec, back when my ancestors immigrated from France in the 1600s. Thus, it is my responsibility as a descendent of settlers to acknowledge the land that supports me and my livelihood, and even more so, the people who were harmed in the process of getting here.

We have built our communities and foundations upon land that is shared between all living beings: peoples, flora, fauna, ground and sky alike. A sentiment taught since time immemorial by indigenous nations globally. 

Here on Turtle Island, those indigenous ways of knowing have only just begun to regrow on the grounds long tended to by our First Nations, Inuit and Metis people.

The place we know as Canada is wrought with a history of colonialism that plagues stories hateful leaders and ignorant followers have tried to erase, and ones that are still being written. This includes genocide, cultural and physical, it includes the raping of land and people, centuries of manipulation, deceit, theft, neglect, and so much more. Indigenous people still live here, displaced and haunted by the actions of colonial settlers, and it is up to all of us to aid in the healing of these wounds.

Today I acknowledge the lands I speak from; the ancestral home of Treaty 7 Signatories including the Siksika, Piikani, and Kainai First Nations of the Blackfoot Confederacy, the Tsuut’ina First Nations, and the Stony Nakoda nation consisting of the Chiniki, Bearspaw and Goodstoney bands. This land is also called home by the Metis Nation of districts 5 and 6, Battle River Territory. The city in which I reside is a site called Moh’kins’tsis by the Blackfoot, Wîchîspa by the Stoney Nakoda, and Guts’ists’i by the Tsuut’ina; it is where the Bow meets the Elbow River, known in English as Calgary. 

Although born and raised here in Moh’kinstsis, I, like many others, come from a long history of settlers. Those of us here today, both invited and uninvited to these territories, I ask that you take more than a few short moments to reflect upon your own history, where your own people have landed, migrated, immigrated and settled. Take a conscious part in understanding how your connections to this earth have guided your path, and how you can do better to respect it and those who have cared for it before your time. This acknowledgement is only a small symbol of attempted reparations, something we must all strive towards.

Diversity and inclusion go beyond knowing the right language and how to use it; they go even beyond accepting all people in all spaces. We find true inclusion when we respect and nurture the roots of every individual, their stories and every ancestor those stories are informed by. 

Thank you.