MIHE Seminar Series: “Troubled Waters: The Mental Health Impacts of Environmental Racism”

The McMaster Institute for Health Equity (MIHE) seminar series presents timely, health-equity focused research on a range of topics that is relevant to researchers, students, staff and community members across many backgrounds.

Seminar Title: “Troubled Waters: The Mental Health Impacts of Environmental Racism”
Presented by Dr. Ingrid Waldron, HOPE Chair in Peace and Health in the Global Peace and Social Justice Program in the Faculty of Humanities at McMaster University.

Register here

Dr. Ingrid Waldron is the HOPE Chair in Peace and Health in the Global Peace and Social Justice Program in the Faculty of Humanities at McMaster University.

Her research interests focus on the health and mental health impacts of structural and ecological violence in Black, Indigenous, and immigrant communities. She is interested in the relationship between social, economic political, and environmental inequities and health disparities and outcomes in these communities. Over the last 10 years, her research, teaching, community leadership, and advocacy work have focused on environmental racism, climate change inequities, mental illness, dementia, and COVID-19 in Black, Indigenous, and immigrant communities.

Dr. Waldron is the author of There’s Something in the Water: Environmental Racism in Indigenous and Black Communities (Fernwood Publishing), which was turned into a 2020 Netflix documentary of the same name and was co-produced by Waldron, actor Elliot Page, Ian Daniel, and Julia Sanderson, and directed by Page and Daniel.

In her presentation Troubled Waters: The Mental Health Impacts of Environmental Racism, Dr. Ingrid Waldron traces the legacy of environmental racism in Indigenous and Black communities in Canada. Using case studies on environmental racism in Nova Scotia, Ontario, and British Columbia, she explores the specific ways in which environmentally hazardous industry and projects have impacted the psychological well-being and mental health of impacted communities. Dr. Waldron also provides an overview of how she has been addressing environmental racism through collaborative, community-based, multi-method, multi-sectoral, and interdisciplinary approaches over the last 10 years. Her presentation concludes with a discussion on some of the “wins” Indigenous and Black communities impacted by environmental racism have experienced over the last several years.

For any inquiries please contact Lindsay Godard, mihe@mcmaster.ca , McMaster Institute for Health Equity