Creating Change, Centring Community: How Sam is Strengthening Community through Art and Action

"Aanii boozhoo kina weya, Kizhaay Manido ndizhinikaaz. N’Swakamok ndonjiibaa miinwaa Maniwaki ndonjiibaa. Gaawiin ningikenimaasii nindoodem. Nindaaw gekinoo’amaagan. Algonquin agokwe ndow.”

Sam (they/them) is a mixed Indigenous Two-Spirit person and grew up based in N’Swakamok (Sudbury, ON). They are an artist, an academic, and an activist. With deep engagement with their community, Sam contributes to activism-based events such as Pride x Black Lives Matter - Sudbury: Teach-In (2024) and the annual Pride Prom, hosted by Fierté Laurentian Pride. Sam is passionate about artivism, activism that is expressed through art. Their murals can be found around the city, such as Project Bird Strike at the Living with Lakes Center (a window mural series preventing window-strike bird deaths) and the Grow Your Knowledge community mural in partnership with Raven Debassige (a mural highlighting the harm reduction work of Myths and Mirrors Community Arts and Cannabis and Mental Health). Sam explains, “I am a strong believer that engaging in artivism, especially holding the identities I do, is really important since my art can live in spaces that aren’t always accessible to me or people like me. Since my art is inherently queer, trans, Indigenous, abolitionist, etc. It’s really important for me to bring that visibility into new spaces to keep those conversations going”.

Grow Your Knowledge community mural in partnership with Raven Debassige, Myths and Mirrors Community Arts, and Cannabis and Mental Health: https://cannabisandmentalhealth.ca/mural-project/?ModPagespeed=off

Based on Sam’s community work and personal experiences, they’re naturally drawn to helping others, which prompted them to pursue a Master of Social Work at Laurentian University. “I started a lot of meaningful conversations about change in my program and in the larger community, and I really wanted to see a lot of that through. Social work for me has been the most direct route into community work, which is what I’ve wanted to do for a long time”. Sam believes in rethinking traditional social work pedagogy and integrating decolonial knowledge into practice. They highlight their volunteer work with Black Lives Matter Sudbury, reading literature from abolitionist and harm reductionist “social workers” by Dr. Autumn BlackDeer, Robyn Maynard, and Dr. Tasha Beeds, and attending lectures as their catalysts for change. Sam explains, “[This] for me is very important since it’s essential to consider how our liberation is interconnected and can come from projects that center Black and Indigenous solidarity. I am extremely grateful to be able to support my communities by volunteering my time or sharing my voice at different levels, it's for me one of the ways I can give back”.

With Sam’s extensive leadership and volunteering experience, research interests, and their engagement within their community, they found work as a research assistant at the Benoit Lab after a mutual connection recommended them to apply. Sam is assisting with the second round of data collection and contributing to the qualitative work of the WHiSE 2.0 project.

“As someone who is Indigenous, queer, trans, etc., and part of this new generation of activists with intersectional identities working in harm reduction and abolition, it was important for me to be able to platform the people that have been sharing with me, and that have come before me”. As Sam continues their academic journey, they are committed to researching activism of racialized queer and/or trans people through a harm reduction and/or abolitionist lens in N’Swakamok (Sudbury), while applying Indigenous-decolonial methodologies.

We’re super excited to have Sam on the team and are looking forward to working with them. Welcome to the team, Sam!

Project Bird Strike at the Living with Lakes Center.