The Housing Justice Oral History Project (Canada) is part of the Housing Justice Archive, an educational resource concerned with centering the voices of the housing justice movement in Canada. With accounts from activists, outreach workers, street nurses, unhoused citizens, artists, writers, and researchers, the project aims to deepen public understanding of the housing crisis in Canada.

How did we get here? What organizing efforts and individuals have led the advocacy for unhoused and precariously housed Canadians? Why do things seem to be getting worse? What are the relationships between housing, health, food security, colonization, racism, and contemporary forms of capitalism?

The oral history interviews collected here are done in collaboration with several organizations, most based in Toronto and Vancouver, active over the last 40 years. Some are no longer active, with others are part of more recent struggles for housing justice. What do these activist histories have to teach those involved today in tenant organizing, policy change, shaping media narratives, writing books, making art, or building community?

Organizations that have supported the development of this project include the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP), the Toronto Disaster Relief Committee (TDRC), Street Health Toronto, the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users (VANDU), 230 Fightback, Sanctuary Toronto, the Toronto Underhoused and Homeless Union (TUHU), and many more.

This project is led by timothy martin, a Postdoctoral Fellow at Simon Fraser University, under the incredible supervision of Ann Chinnery in the Faculty of Education.

Cover photo: courtesy of the City of Toronto Archives (Nancy Baker, c. 2005).