Guided Walk: Walking as Land Acknowledgement

Join Saulteaux/Métis educator and memory activist Sam Howden and settler scholar and artist Andrew Lochhead on a guided walk, bringing the idea of Land Acknowledgements out of the Bata Shoe Museum’s walls and onto the Land itself, in the area currently known as The Annex. Land acknowledgements can be powerful. At their best, they affirm Indigenous rights, presence, and claims to Land, mobilize action toward addressing ongoing colonial injustices, and provide space to consider the connections between people and the more-than-human world around us. But as these practices become more institutionalized, they can risk becoming routine—words spoken without much thought given to what they mean and the relationships they propose. Together, we’ll follow the paths of buried streams, discover native plant species and traditional medicines, observe urban wildlife, and explore layers of local history and architecture. Along the way, we’ll reflect on walking as a form of witnessing—and consider the social and political complexities of moving through treaty Land, especially when the treaties that govern it have so often been broken. This is an invitation to slow down, listen closely, and think di