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Glossary
- Community: A community is a group of people with a shared identity or interest, capable of collective action or expression.
- Indigenous peoples: In international or scholarly discourse, the term "Indigenous peoples" typically refers to persons of Indian, Inuit, or Métis descent in the Canadian context, regardless of their residence or official registration status. Self-identification is a fundamental criterion for defining Indigenous peoples.
- Indigenous knowledge/ traditional knowledge: Traditional knowledge refers to the knowledge held by First Nations, Inuit, and Métis peoples, the Indigenous peoples of Canada. It is specific to place, usually transmitted orally, and rooted in the experiences of multiple generations. This knowledge is determined by an Indigenous community's land, environment, region, culture, and language. Indigenous peoples often describe traditional knowledge as holistic, involving the body, mind, feelings, and spirit. It can be expressed through symbols, arts, ceremonial and everyday practices, narratives, and particularly through relationships.
- Intersectionality: The interconnected nature of social categorizations such as race, class, and gender results in overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantage.
- Disability: Defined as any impairment, which can be physical, mental, intellectual, cognitive, learning, communication, or sensory. It also includes functional limitations that may be permanent, temporary, episodic, visible, or invisible. When these impairments interact with barriers, they hinder a person’s full and equal participation in society.
- Marginalization: The process of relegating an individual or minority group to a peripheral position relative to a dominant social group.
- Queer: Historically, this term was often used as a derogatory and offensive label for homosexual individuals. In more recent times, it has evolved to denote or relate to a sexual or gender identity that does not conform to established norms of sexuality and gender, particularly those of heterosexuality.
