Ableism: A system of social power that both creates the social category of disability and discriminates against disabled people. Ableism can’t be separated out from other forms of oppression.

Capitalism: An economic and cultural system in which a small number of individuals and/or corporations own and control the land, natural resources, and means of production and use them to gain profit and power. Under capitalism, poverty and wealth are tied together, meaning that some people are rich because others are poor.

Cisheteropatriarchy: A system of social power in which gender is assumed to be binary, masculinity is valued over femininity, and heterosexuality is perceived as the “normal” or “natural” state.

Classism: Discrimination based on someone’s access to wealth and money; specifically, the oppression of poor and/or working-class people under capitalism.

Colonialism: The process of a nation or people attempting to extend their power by establishing control over another territory and/or its peoples. Canada is an example of settler-colonialism, which involves large-scale immigration from the dominating nation(s) to occupy the land and displace or eradicate the peoples of the colonized one.

Community-guided participatory action research: Community-guided research is a strategy for reducing the harms of academic research by ensuring participant communities have control over how their data is collected and analyzed. Participatory action research is a form of community-guided research where the findings are used to make much-needed change led by the communities being studies.

Consensus: Agreement by all. Consensus-based decision making tries to ensure that all people involved in a decision accept that decision. If anyone vetoes a decision, it does not move forward.

Criminalization: The social, cultural, and legal process through which behaviors and acts are deemed “crimes” and individuals are transformed into “criminals.”

Disability justice: A framework, vision, and organizing strategy led by Black, Indigenous, and other racialized disabled people, that seeks to address all interlocking causes of ableism. As disability justice performance collective Sins Invalid (2020) writes, “there has always been resistance to all forms of oppression, as we know in our bones that there have also always been disabled people visioning a world where we flourish, a world that values and celebrates us in all our beauty” (para. 18).

Dish with One Spoon: A treaty between the Anishinaabe Three Fires Confederacy (Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi Nations) and the Haudenosaunee Confederacy that guides and governs how people and communities must relate to each other and the land in the Great Lakes region and along what is now called the St. Lawrence River. In a settler terms, this treaty stresses the importance of collective care and interdependence, and directs people to take only what they need and ensure there is always enough to go around. This treaty can only by understood by reading, listening to, and learning from Haudenosaunee and Anishinaabe thinkers.

Lived/living expertise: Knowledge and awareness that comes from personal experience of navigating systems of social power and/or accessing (or being acted on by) social services.

“Low barrier” social service agency: A social service site that offers services that are relatively easy to access. Generally, this refers to drop-ins, food banks, extreme weather shelters, and other community programs. Importantly, low barrier does not mean no barrier: the policies and schedules of these services do not always fit the needs of their communities.

Peer worker: Any social service position reserved for people who share lived/living experiences with the communities they serve, including those that go by other names. “Peer” is a loaded term – for some people, it is meaningful and empowering, while for others it is inaccurate and/or insulting.

Radical practice: Work that tries to deal with the root causes of social problems and provides strategies that are either in direct opposition to or working outside of these root causes.

Systems of domination: Broad, overarching oppressive social and cultural ideologies that shape social institutions and relationships between individuals. Examples include colonialism, white supremacy, capitalism, cisheteropatriarchy, and ableism.

Treaty: A binding agreement between nations and communities that sets rules and guidelines for interaction. As Leanne Betasamosake Simpson (2008) writes, “it has long been known that Indigenous nations had their own processes for making and maintaining peaceful diplomatic relationships…grounded in the worldviews, language, knowledge system and political cultures of the nations involved” (p. 29).

Treaty 13: The legal agreement between the Mississaugas of the Credit River First Nation and the settler-colonial Canadian government that acknowledges Mississauga rights to the land that is now called Toronto. Negotiations for Treaty 13 began in the 1780s and were only resolved in 2010. In the interim, the British Crown and, later, the Canadian government violated the sovereignty and self-determination of the Mississaugas, and broke the terms of their own agreements.

Two Row Wampum: A treaty between the Haudenosaunee Confederacy and Dutch colonizers made in 1613 which directs colonizers, settlers, and all non-Indigenous peoples who want to live on Haudenosaunee territory to respect Indigenous self-determination, and practice non-interference with Indigenous governance and lifeways. Like the Dish with One Spoon, this treaty can only be really understood by learning from Haudenosaunee thinkers.

White supremacy: A social, economic, cultural, and political system that empowers white people to benefit from the marginalization, exploitation, suffering, and even death of Black people, Indigenous people, and other racialized people. White supremacy was central to the colonial settlement of nation-states such as Canada and continues to shape daily life in Canada in an active way.