This arts-based research project investigates how settlers and organizations in Northern Ontario participate in contemporary colonialism through their use of surveillance technologies and deterrence methods (hunting cameras, signs, electric fences) for resource extraction and land management. More concretely, it revisits the settler history of the Greater Sudbury area, particularly in small rural communities like Nepewassi Lake, Markstay/Warren and St. Charles, to better understand how settlers contribute to changing in landscapes and may use surveillance technologies and logics to map property (private and public), protect land, and gather natural resources. Lakes are a great way of understanding how land is managed from a ruralist perspective. Specifically, Nepewassi Lake, a "man" made lake created primarily for recreation, is a case study of how we transform water ways for our own purposes. 

 

The project will summarize the colonial and present histories of the areas in question and bring attention to how they were created, review Treaties and Indigenous Traditional Territories, and create an understanding of how land is mapped, negotiated, and managed from the perspective of both ruralists, municipalities, policy makers, and professionals. 

​