Indigenous Community Planning

The Indigenous Community Planning project in DUSP is a multi-disciplinary research and teaching effort that seeks to center Indigeneity within the field of urban planning. Students and faculty within the department engage with Indigenous communities, scholars, leaders, and activists to explore together how to address questions of sovereignty, identity, land-use planning, climate adaptation, natural resource development, and historical land-taking. The research, curriculum development, and practice activities are undertaken in partnership with indigenous communities in the United States and Canada, and seek to highlight lessons and practices from indigenous planning that can be applied more generally.

The project has strengthened connections with local Indigenous communities in Massachusetts, the MIT SOLVE Indigenous Fellows program, and Indigenous student groups at MIT and Harvard.  

The 11.171/11.172 Indigenous Environmental Planning MIT course , lead by Professor Janelle Knox-Hayes, is an ongoing, adaptive effort to realize the pedagogical goals of the Indigenous Community Planning Project. The course examines how Indigenous peoples’ relationships to their homelands and local environments have been adversely affected by climate change and the failures of governmental planning. Participants - faculty, student, and community guests seek to address current environmental challenges and use participatory action research methods to help formulate potential solutions to these challenges.