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The Allusionist

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A PODCAST ABOUT LANGUAGE
BY HELEN ZALTZMAN

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The Allusionist

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Allusionist 171. Supplantation

February 24, 2023 The Allusionist

MP3 • APPLE PODCASTS • RSS • STITCHER • GOOGLE • TRANSCRIPT

Last episode, I mentioned that in London, Ontario, in 2019 a 9-year-old named Lyla Wheeler had launched a petition to rename her street, currently called Plantation Road. This episode, Lyla, now aged nearly thirteen, and her mom Kristin Daley recount the reasons why Lyla campaigned for this name change, how the neighbours reacted, what happened when the wider world heard about it, and why the street's name is still Plantation Road.

I hope you will not be deterred from campaigning for different, better words.

This is an instalment of the Telling Other Stories series, about renaming.

Content note: the episode contains references to enslavement of Black people and a brief description of the Canadian residential school system.

EXTRA MATERIALS:

  • One of the best books I’ve read in recent years is The Address Book by Deirdre Mask. It’s about the history of addresses, and is absolutely fascinating.

  • Lyla’s petition, currently closed because it’s going through council proceedings.

  • About Josiah Henson…

  • …and the renaming of the museum that now bears his name.

  • The renaming of Old North school.

  • Toronto Metropolitan University talks about their name change.

  • Toronto’s very long Dundas St will be getting renamed; the report is due sometime this year.

Support the show at theallusionist.org/donate and as well as keeping this independent podcast going, you also get behind-the-scenes glimpses about every episode, fortnightly livestreams, and the Allusioverse Discord community. Over the next few weeks, we're watching Great Pottery Throwdown together.

YOUR RANDOMLY SELECTED WORD FROM THE DICTIONARY:
zonda, noun: a hot dusty north wind in Argentina.

CREDITS:

  • Lyla Wheeler and her mom Kristin Daley live in London, Ontario on what is currently called Plantation Road but perhaps won’t always be.

  • This episode was produced by me, Helen Zaltzman. The original Allusionist music is by Martin Austwick. Download his songs at palebirdmusic.com and listen to his podcasts Song By Song and Neutrino Watch.

  • Thanks to Dan Engler for coming up with the title of this episode.

  • Find the Allusionist at youtube.com/allusionistshow, twitter.com/allusionistshow, facebook.com/allusionistshow, twitter.com/helenzaltzman and instagram.com/allusionistshow.

Back in two weeks with a new episode - HZ.

Our ad partner is Multitude. If you want me to talk compellingly about your product, sponsor an episode: contact Multitude at multitude.productions/ads. This episode is sponsored by:

• Bombas, whose mission is to make the comfiest clothes ever, and match every item sold with an equal item donated. Go to bombas.com/allusionist to get 20% off your first purchase.
• Squarespace, your one-stop shop for building and running a sleek website. Go to squarespace.com/allusionist for a free 2-week trial, and get 10 percent off your first purchase of a website or domain with the code allusionist. 
• NordVPN is offering exclusivelusionist big discounts: grab the deal on this trusty VPN at nordvpn.com/allusionist, and try it risk-free now with a 30-day money-back guarantee.

In Telling Other Stories, audio Tags words, language, linguistics, society & culture, history, telling other stories, renaming, problematic, racism, anti-Black racism, Canada, Canadian History, London, Ontario, eponyms, Ryerson, Egerton Ryerson, schools, campaigns, petition, American history, Black history, slavery, enslaved African people, Transatlantic slave trade, slave owners, white supremacy, Josiah Henson, plantation, plantations, roads, streets, street names, towns, Toronto, Toronto Metropolitan University, Dundas Street, Indigenous Canadians, residential schools, Jamaica, local government, council, policy, addresses, zonda
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The Allusionist by Helen Zaltzman is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.