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Abstract
The lecture will use critical spatial discourses to unpack the colonial stories in Landscape Architecture and describe equity-based alternatives. Afrofuturism can be used as a framework to daylight and dismantle colonial narratives based in extractive and oppressive systems with methodologies for life-stewarding practices. It is rooted in ancient wisdom from Africa and around the world and operates at the “intersection of imagination, technology, the future and liberation” to imagine social change (Womack, 2013). As we envision equitable and sustainable futures, it’s important to design Landscape practices based in truth-telling, justice, reciprocity and care.
Bio
Divine Ndemeye (she/her) is a landscape designer with ancestral roots from Burundi. She is a landscape designer at space2place. She holds a Masters in Landscape Architecture from UBC School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture (SALA) since 2020, and a background in Political Science and Human Geography from the University of Alberta. She was the recipient of the 2020 Olmsted Scholar Award; the premier leadership recognition program for Landscape Architecture students in the U.S and Canada. Divine is committed to the advancement of social and environmental justice through place-based designs. She is continuously engaging in critical discourses and explorations of decolonized design paradigms which centre marginalized communities. She is the host of the Design unmuted podcast. In her free time, she enjoys long walks at the beach, cocktails and travelling.
She is Founder + Co-Director BIDC • Black + Indigenous Design Collective. Their mission is building capacity and celebrating the advancement of Black and Indigenous voices and ingenuity in the spatial design fields, and public art through place-making. As a social enterprise, their goal is to advocate for the visibility, well-being, and interests of Black and Indigenous peoples through spatial interventions, scholarship, community engagement, and decolonizing public spaces through art & design.