Introduction

Equity, diversity, inclusion, and decolonization (EDID) has become a very popular topic in recent years in Canada. Activism for EDID efforts was adopted by members of many historically marginalized groups that led public and private organizations in Canada to become more critical of practices of organizations from both sectors. A major condition to achieve accomplishments in the area of EDID was to understand the complexity of the Canadian context. There are two special attributes for the Canadian context. Firstly, it is important to fully understand Canada’s colonial history and legacy of colonialism. Secondly, Canada’s colonial legacy led to the development of two major different cultures: Anglophone and Francophone. Francophone culture is well presented in the province of Québec. Québec has not only adopted French as its official language but has its own distinct culture and methods when integrating newcomers. The rest of Canada (that speaks English primarily with few bilingual exceptions) have a completely different culture.

Canada is a country of immigration. The number of immigrants is growing and the number of Canadians who were born outside of Canada is rapidly growing. As of the first quarter of 2024, Canada continues to see significant growth in its immigrant population. Nearly 25% of Canada’s population is made up of immigrants, the largest percentage in over 150 years. Specifically, in the first quarter of 2024, Canada welcomed approximately 121,758 immigrants (Statistics Canada, 2016)​​​. Canada’s colonial legacy and the diverse composition of its population created a complex reality for EDID. Resultantly, we decided to develop a resource titled Exploring Equity and Inclusion in Canadian and Québecois Contexts for students in the field of humanities and social sciences.

This open-source resource is mainly designed for communication students who are studying organizational communication and primarily focused on the Canadian context. It fills an important need as most of the available textbooks are mainly American-focused textbooks and as a result, do not properly represent the complexities of the Canadian context. This pressbook is divided into four chapters. The first one provides different definitions and explanations for EDID. The second chapter focuses on the existing legal frameworks that are meant to legally organize EDID in both Canada and Québec. The third chapter focuses on the importance of the culture of EDID as legal frameworks alone will not achieve effective EDID. Chapter 3 also provides readers with some practical recommendations for best practices that organizations can use to achieve EDID for hiring practices. The last chapter focuses on the ramifications on mental health when EDID is not achieved.

Every chapter is composed of four components: a short text, a video,  a five-question, multiple-choice quiz, and reflective questions. The short video is an interview with an expert. The video aims to provide students with practical advice from an EDID expert. We do highly encourage students to answer the reflective questions in groups instead of doing it individually as that will help students to better understand different perspectives regarding EDID.

This book has received funding from the University of Ottawa Open educational resources managed by the ‎Morisset Library. I want to thank librarians Mélanie Brunet and Catherine Lachaîne for all their generous support and help during the process of producing this book. I also want to sincerely thank Professor Dina Salha in the Department of Communication for all invaluable mentorship and guidance during the process of writing this book. I also want to thank Oumaima Sedrati, Tiana Rangoussis, and Yeroseo Aris Kusiele Somda, the research assistants who did an amazing job in collecting and analyzing a lot of the material in this resource.  I also want to give special thanks to Tiana Rangoussis for writing the last chapter on EDID and mental health and give Yéroséo Aris Kusiélé Somda for co-authoring the rest of the chapters with me. I am grateful to Youssef Hamed for editing all the videos embedded in this resource. I also want to acknowledge the generosity and support of the experts who agreed to be filmed and share their expertise with us.

I fully understand that achieving an ideal EDID in Canada will take a long time and that combating intersectional systems of oppression is a challenging process. However, I am hopeful that this resource might assist in the development of a more just society.

Radamis Zaky, Ph.D.