In this thesis I explore the theoretical, ethical, and practice-based implications of doing research with Indigenous, racialized, and LGBT2SQ+ youth and young people. This research traces participant conceptualizations of decolonial love, through arts- and land-based methods, within the context of ongoing settler colonialism. Through an Indigenous-led and participatory research project called Sisters Rising, I engaged in intimate conversations and facilitated research workshops with young Black, Indigenous, and people of colour (BIPOC) who reflected on their understandings of decolonial love as related to their own experiences, knowledges, and teachings. Their conceptualizations of decolonial love as inextricably tied to land, sovereignty, and resurgence disrupt settler colonial narratives that attempt to violently displace and disenfranchise BIPOC communities and undermine Indigenous intellectual knowledges as inferior or simplistic, particularly in Euro-Western academia. Through this research BIPOC young people’s understandings of decolonial love guide my praxis and ongoing learning as a frontline practitioner who is committed to cultivating and nurturing a politicized ethic of decolonial love in my child-, youth-, and family-centered praxis. / Graduate / 2022-07-05

In this thesis, I reflect on the ethical and theoretical foundations of researching (and re-searching) sexualized violence with Indigenous girls in remote communities in northern British Columbia, Canada, through a project called Sisters Rising, an Indigenous-led, community-based research study focused on centering Indigenous teachings related to sovereignty and gender well-being. Through an emergent methodology drawing from witnessing and borderland feminisms to conduct arts- and land-based workshops with girls and community members, I sought to unsettle my relationships as a diasporic frontline worker to the communities and lands I work with. To disrupt traditional hegemonic discourses of settler colonialism, I look to arts-based and collective witnessing, reflecting on how alternative, safer spaces for Indigenous girls can be created for resistance and (re)storying connections to land and relationships. / Graduate / 2020-09-12