We are constantly asked about our identities: Our gender, sexuality, abilities, disabilities; our ethnic, religious, cultural backgrounds; our style, economic status, trauma and sociological ideologies. Often, our identities are systematically categorized into neat little societal constructs, which many of us are frequently struggling to fit within. These identity checkboxes can be helpful. For example, self-identifying […]
Ki Rolle
Posted inNews + Opinion
A Nova Scotia teen is suing the federal government in the name of the environment
Last month, 15 kids and teenagers filed a lawsuit against the federal government for putting their lives at risk through dangerous climate change. One of them was 15-year- old Ira Reinhart-Smith from Caledonia—almost two hours outside of Halifax, on the way to Kejimkujik National Park. “This is the biggest threat that humanity has ever faced,” says […]
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How food insecure are Nova Scotia’s university students?
In an effort to listen to young voices when making policies, the United Nations is assembling the first global youth-led council to collaboratively strengthen resilience, food security and nutrition. Twenty-two year old Cassie Hayward from Dartmouth is on the youth council’s working committee and is helping to shape the council’s operational framework. This October, she […]
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Building BLxCKHOUSE in North Preston
L aMeia Reddick is a unicorn. The graceful 26-year old is part urbanist, part-community activist, part-changemaker, facilitator, organizer and soulful artist who channels an Erykah Badu sensitivity about her shit. As the founder of KINnected Leadership consulting firm she connects the Halifax Regional Municipality with startups to improve government, establish new private-public partnerships and translate […]
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Armaan Dhillon is dancing for diversity
Last year during a cultural festival at Dalhousie University, six university students took the stage in bright colourful outfits called Vardiyaan for their first performance. The routine brought together various folk dances from across the Punjab region of India and Pakistan. Now, with Armaan Dhillon at the helm, they form the six-person Bhangra group Noor […]
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Tyson Tolliver is digitizing the cultural markers of African Nova Scotian identity
For Tyson Tolliver, a community advocate and entrepreneur, East Preston is the place of his childhood home on Lower Partridge Road, a few houses away from his maternal grandmother “Big Mama,” matriarch of the large Colley family, and East Preston United Baptist Church where he spent more than two decades of Sundays playing the drums […]
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Meditations on music, religion and neuroscience
“I’ve always been interested in many different things and I choose to do them all, unapologetically,” explains Sidath “Sid” Paramee Rankaduwa. At just 22, Rankaduwa is an alumnus of Dalhousie University with a rather unusual combined Bachelor degree in both music and neuroscience. Through his craft, he’s exploring society’s intersectional interplay between the brain, culture, […]
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Alex “Cunny” Ross finds fame through family
In the Spring of 2015, a shy 18-year-old named Alex “Cunny” Ross laid down 10 of his songs over beats produced by future Halifax councillor Lindell Smith during a session at his neighbourhood studio. The “Young and Coming Up” mixtape—featuring his Centreline Studio pals such as BenG, Neptune and Honey—was burned onto 50 compact discs. […]