DxLA Resources Page

The below resource library is a collection of resources developed by others and compiled by DxLA to assist individuals and firms in improving their diversity, equity, and inclusion. This library is a ‘living document’. If you have any resource suggestions, please send them to DxLA@asla-sierra.org.

 
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Where do I start?

WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN DIVERSITY, INCLUSION, AND EQUITY?

This article discusses the difference between diversity, equity, and inclusion, and related thought exercises.
What's the Difference?

ASLA Resources

ASLA National has developed its own resources including articles, webinars, guides, and statements which you can see below.
ASLA DEI Resources & ASLA DEI Webinars

Landscape Architecture Foundation DEI Resources

The Landscape Architecture Foundation (LAF) developed an ongoing set of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion resources available at the link below. This includes relevant podcasts and education outreach programs, amongst other interesting topics.
LAF Resources

Design as Activism

This website presents the outcome of a 2019 Landscape Architecture Foundation Fellowship for Innovation and Leadership, titled Educating Design Activists in Landscape Architecture. Through a written framework and an online resource guide, this website serves as a reference for those interested in transforming landscape architecture education and practice to address the critical challenges of our time, including equity, justice, and resilience.
Design as Activism

Human Centered Design’s DEI Principles

Human Centered Design, also known as Inclusive Design or Universal Design, expands opportunity and enhances the experience of space for people of all ages, abilities, and cultures through excellence in design. The Principles establish a valuable language for explaining the characteristics of Universal Design.
Human Centered Design

design with disabled people now.

This is a living resource for landscape architects, designers, & planners to practice a more inclusive design process & create a more accessible public realm. Includes guidance on how to include disabled people in the design process, how to conduct an accessibility audit, case studies, and more.
design with disabled people now.

A DEI Report from The National Recreation and Park Association (NRPA)

This document provides an important assessment of park and recreation programs at a national level. They also have a Historical Perspective on Equity in Parks and Recreation, Available Here.

NRPA provides and participates in a number of resources and programs focused on equity. A complete list of their resources is Available Here.
NRPA DEI Report

Empathy and DEI

This article discusses the role of empathy in DEI implementation.
Empathy and DEI

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How do I talk about it?

Grammar and Bias-Free Language for Racial & Ethnic Identities

The APA Style Guide provides guidelines around language use including capitalization, grammar, and politically correct language for different racial and ethnic groups. It also breaks down context, the why and how, and gives examples of what is and is not politically correct.
APA Style Bias-Free Language

Accessibility and Disability

AHEAD is an organization for higher ed administrators, faculty, and leaders who work with and advocate for persons with disabilities and accessibility issues and they have published a style-guide for language about person-first vs. identity-first language and how to write about disability.
AHEAD Style Guide

Homelessness

This is an article that discusses what language is best to use when referring to people who are experiencing homeless.
Discussing the Homeless Population

Preferred Pronouns

This article discusses what preferred pronouns are and why they matter. Preferred pronouns can be included in a variety of manners. One peer explains, “The majority of the people in my office decided to include our pronouns in our email signatures and in our introductions during presentations. This has been really effective for gender inclusivity at our institution and avoids mis-gendering people.”
Pronoun Guide

A People’s Glossary of Environmental Justice and Planning Terms

The California Environmental Justice Alliance is a coalition of grassroots environmental justice organizations and they developed A People’s Glossary of Environmental Justice and Planning Terms, a community-friendly glossary of environmental justice and planning terms which supports their Environmental and Housing Justice Platform.
A People’s Glossary

How to Talk about Privilege

This article discusses how to discuss the topic of identity privilege for a more productive conversation.
Discussing Privilege

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What are other people doing?

ASLA National’s Racial Equity Plan of Action

ASLA National developed a five point plan to reject bigotry and racism in all its forms, and anti-Black racism in particular, as wrong and fundamentally inconsistent with our mission and values.
ASLA Racial Equity Plan of Action

nATIONAL rECREATION AND pARK aSSOCIATION eQUITY aCTION pLAN

The National Recreation and Park Association has an Equity Action Plan which provides a framework for how they are strengthening their organizational culture and practices centered around equity and our core values of trust, continuous learning, diversity , and inclusion.
NRPA Equity Action Plan

Association of Environmental Professionals

The Association of Environmental Professionals (AEP) has its own Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Initiative which you can learn about below.
CA AEP DEI

Mithun

Mithun’s experience with the International Living Future Institute’s JUST program and the firm’s motivation to pursue a JUST Label.
Mithun Website

Diversity and Inclusion at Saskai

The Sasaki Foundation fosters equity and inclusivity by engaging diverse groups and individuals in the design of the environment. They sponsor research and programs that empower communities and strengthen education in design. Review the Saskai DEI Plan

California's 2021–2025 Statewide Comprehensive Outdoor Recreation Plan (SCORP)

A Five-Year Plan for Increasing Park Access, Community-Based Planning, and Health Partnerships Through Grants
Parks for All Californians

Tuskegee University eXtension DEI

Tuskegee University's eXtension DEI program's website gives you quick access to information, experts, training, and resources that can help you develop or conceptualize a DEI program. It also has its own resource library.
Tuskegee University eXtension

 
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Groups to Check Out

Black Landscape Architects Network

The mission of the Black Landscape Architects Network (BlackLAN) is to increase the visibility, support the interests, and foster the impact of Black practitioners in landscape architecture. BlackLAN is dedicated to the success in the profession of persons who self-identify as Black and claim African ancestry.
Black Landscape Architects Network

National Association of Minority Landscape Architects

The National Association of Minority Landscape Architects (NAMLA) aims to increase minority representation at all levels of landscape architecture practice and academia by providing educational and career development assistance to minorities while confronting the structural racism that has disproportionately kept people of color from having decision-making roles on how our landscapes are programmed, designed, and taught.
National Association of Minority Landscape Architects

The Thrivance Group

The Thrivance Group works to bring culturally restorative concepts into the lived experiences of our clients and community partners.  The Thrivance Group is located in Oakland, CA.
The Thrivance Group

The VELA Project

The VELA (Visualizing Equity in Landscape Architecture) Project is a women-led research collaborative obsessed with data and making it accessible through powerful graphics and stories. The VELA project emerged out of aligned research agendas that aimed to reveal various gender narratives in the practice of landscape architecture. 
The Vela Project

Tierra Madre Hive

The Tierra Madre Hive is a collaborative resource for female landscape business owners in the SF Bay Area.
Tierra Madre Hive

For the Bookshelf

Social Urbanism: Reframing Spatial Design – Discourses from Latin America

By María Bellalta - A book about the social justice oriented form of urbanism, architecture, and public space design emanating from Medellín and Columbia. Link

Reconstructions: Architecture and Blackness in America

Collected By MoMA - This book is an urgent call for architects to accept the challenge of reconceiving and reconstructing our built environment rather than continue giving shape to buildings, infrastructure, and urban plans that have, for generations, embodied and sustained anti-Black racism in the United States. It is a range of essays by curators and scholars and a presentation of the MoMA’s exhibition of the same name. Link

Black Landscape Matter

Edited By Water Hood and Grace Mitchell Tada - A group of notable landscape architecture and planning professionals and scholars to probe how race, memory, and meaning intersect in the American landscape. Link

Building Access: Universal Design and the Politics of Disability

By Aimi Hamraie - Building Access reveals Universal Design’s complex origins in disabled peoples’ knowledge and expertise about built environments. Using feminist, crip, and intersectional lenses, the book recuperates Universal Design’s “epistemic activism,” or interventions into dominant fields of knowledge, models of disability, and ways of thinking about race and gender, which mainstream narratives of Universal Design have forgotten. Link

Nature Swagger: Stories and Visions of Black Joy in the Outdoors

By Rue Mapp - This book celebrates Black joy in nature. Filled with breathtaking photography, inspiring stories, profiles, and spotlights from Outdoor Afro group members, prominent Black leaders in outdoor spaces, and other organizations, this book inspires Black communities to reclaim their place in the natural world. Link

Women in Landscape Architecture: Amplifying Our Voices

By Gail Greet Hannah - Link

 
 

View the Parenting x LA panel discussion from August 26th, 2021. Presented by ASLA Sierra Chapter.

View the Allyship in the Workplace discussion from April 21st, 2022. Presented by ASLA Sierra Chapter.

View the Environmental Justice through Community Outreach discussion from October 20th, 2022. Presented by Sierra Chapter DxLA.


Disclaimer: Resources provided above do not necessarily represent the opinions of ASLA Sierra Chapter.