In Conversation with Black Students in Design: Building Black Spaces brings together leading scholars Rashad Shabazz, Dr. Elizabeth (Dori) Tunstall, and Rinaldo Walcott to discuss the role of architecture in the spatialization of Black spaces, the history and contributors to these spaces and how we can all participate and advocate for the improvements of these spaces.

Black Students in Design (BSD) at the Daniels Faculty at the University of Toronto aims to create a community for Black students to de-stress, talk about racial issues in the design industry, and connect with one another.

Rashad Shabazz is an associate professor at the Arizona State University's School of Social Transformation. His academic expertise brings together human geography, cultural studies, gender studies, and critical race studies. His research explores how race, gender, and cultural production are informed by geography. His most recent work, Spatializing Blackness, (University of Illinois Press, 2015) examines how carceral power within the geographies of Black Chicagoans shaped urban planning, housing policy, policing practices, gang formation, high incarceration rates, masculinity, and health.

Dr. Elizabeth (Dori) Tunstall joined OCAD University on in 2016, as Dean of Design. As part of the senior management team, she plays a vital role in steering aspects of the academic and administrative agendas within the Faculty of Design, as well as related research, outreach, fundraising and operational activities. As the university has initiated the challenge of decolonizing its institution, Dori advocates and communicates how Respectful Design serves the appropriate design ethos for this process.

Photo credit: Martin Iskander

Rinaldo Walcott is Professor of Black Diaspora Cultural Studies in the Women and Gender Studies Institute; and a member of the Graduate Program at the Institute of Cinema Studies at the University of Toronto. From 2002-2007 Rinaldo held the Canada Research Chair of Social Justice and Cultural Studies at OISE.

Rinaldo is the author of Black Like Who: Writing Black Canada (Insomniac Press, 1997 with a second revised edition in 2003); he is also the editor of Rude: Contemporary Black Canadian Cultural Criticism (Insomniac, 2000); Queer Returns: Essays on Multiculturalism, Diaspora and Black Studies (Insomniac, 2016). With Idil Abdillahi, he co-authored BlackLife: Post-BLM and the Struggle for Freedom (ARP Books, 2019). As well Rinaldo is the Co-editor with Roy Moodley of Counselling Across and Beyond Cultures: Exploring the Work of Clemment Vontress in Clinical Practice (University of Toronto Press, 2010). 

Rinaldo’s teaching and research is in the area of Black diaspora cultural studies and postcolonial studies with an emphasis on questions of sexuality, gender, nation, citizenship and multiculturalism. As an interdisciplinary Black Studies scholar Rinaldo has published in a wide range of venues. His articles have appeared in journals and books, as well as popular venues like newspapers, magazines and online venues, as well as other forms of media. His most recent books the Long Emancipation: Moving Toward Black Freedom from Duke University Press, 2021; and On Property (Biblioasis, 2021 which was shortlisted for the Toronto Book Award). He was born in Barbados.