Climate Fellowship

The Inspiring Communities Fellowship Program, launched in September 2022, fosters research and experimentation to develop positive social change through a systems approach. HCi3 funding will support two new Climate Fellows to the program, one senior and one junior fellow. One fellow will develop an event and content related to a shared vision and recommendations for integrating 2SLGBTQIA+ rights within climate justice, while the second will exploring connecting the community to different land uses, integrating and connecting with Indigenous communities, and training youth on woodlot stewardship.

Grant award: $5,000

Lily Barraclough (she/they), a climate fellow with Inspiring Communities, is exploring the unique ways in which members of the 2SLGBTQIA+ community are affected by the climate crisis, their unique relationship with the environment, and why this is important when considering climate action.

Barraclough recently completed their master’s degree at Dalhousie University on climate grief in youth climate activists, and noticed that many of the participants in their research were members of the 2SLGBTQIA+ community. “That’s definitely an under-explored connection,” said Barraclough. “There seems to be a higher proportion of youth, especially youth climate activists, in the climate and environmental spheres, who are queer.”

Through the climate fellowship with Inspiring Communities, funded through HCi3, Barraclough has been able to build on this area of her work through writing and hosting conversations. The fellowship was guided by the question, “why do so many youth climate activists also belong to the queer community?” Barraclough shared their own experience in personal blog, “Queering Climate Justice in Mi’kmaki,” where she reflected on her childhood being raised by a non-nuclear, queer family, and the ways they were shaped by their upbringing. Barraclough states: “I don’t think I truly understood the impact of my queer upbringing and identity until I was active in the climate justice movement.”  Barraclough’s mothers instilled in them a passion for environmentalism from a young age, being “some of the first people in [their] neighbourhood to install solar panels,” among other practices that were less common in the early 2000’s. They also felt a deep connection to nature: “For us, and many queer folks,” wrote Barraclough, “time in nature and on the land can be some of the only times when we can be ourselves without judgement from others and feel like we belong.”

These ideas carried forward into an online panel that Barraclough hosted featuring three local queer climate champions. The panelists explored their own relationships with the environmental movement and nature, while imagining a future that has both addressed the climate crisis and created a safer, more inclusive world for all. The future of climate justice cannot move forward if those who are championing it cannot be their complete selves. One of the participants put it succinctly, stating that “bringing our whole selves to our work should be natural.” The panelists advocated for the importance of taking care of oneself and one’s community as a radical act of climate justice.

As a result of this project, Barraclough had the opportunity to participate in a North America-wide roundtable led by the Commission for Environmental Cooperation on the 2SLGBTQIA+ dimensions of climate change as a Canadian representative. There, she met representatives from across the continent, learn about the work being done in other jurisdictions, and is now collaborating on a white paper with recommendations to the Canadian, American, and Mexican federal governments on how to support their 2SLGBTQIA+ communities in the climate crisis. “It was interesting participating in that roundtable with people from the US and Mexico because, especially in the US, there’s a lot happening already; a few organizations are solely focused on the intersection of queer rights and experiences and climate change,” said Barraclough.  

Despite how much they’ve learned so far, Barraclough recognizes that this is not the end of this work. “I feel that this is the beginning, not the end, of this discussion in Atlantic Canada, and I hope that my work as a fellow has planted the seed for the impacts of queer individuals and communities to be accounted for in climate change mitigation and adaptation planning.” In her final blog, Barraclough provided guiding questions and concrete actions to help those in decision-making roles to ensure they are considering the well-being of their queer communities. Some of these guiding questions included, ‘Are nature and green spaces safe and accessible in your communities? How can you make them safer and more accessible?’, and ‘What will your role in the revolution be?’, followed by concrete actions ranging from ‘Normalize sharing pronouns – don’t force people to share their pronouns, but set an example by sharing your own,’ to ‘Slow down and ask the difficult questions, even when it is challenging.’

Lily and their partner Caden at the Powershift, 2019. Photo by Louis Sobol.

Grant Highlights