90 THRESHOLDS 48 KIN lan, 2011). On the history of the South Indian Lake community, see the official website of the Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation (NCN): NCN, The History of Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation, accessed November 2, 2019, https://www.ncncree.com/ about-ncn/our-history/. 4 This article will later refer to Blanche Lemco simply as Lemco. Even if she was known after her marriage as Blanche Lemco Van Ginkel, this is done to avoid confusion with her husband Daniel van Ginkel, here reported as Van Ginkel. Known for her perceptive approach to urban planning and design, Blanche Lemco (b. 1923, London) was a pio- neering woman in architecture and urban design. With her husband, Dutch and Canadian architect, urban planner, and educator Daniel van Ginkel (b. 1920, Amsterdam; d. 2009 Toronto), Lemco worked on several projects for the Canadian North. Together they studied the economy and development in the Yukon Ter- ritory (1966–67), the relocation of the Indigenous commu- nity of South Indian Lake in Manitoba (1966–68), and the impact of the proposed Mackenzie Valley pipeline on Indigenous communities in the Northwest Territories (1976). For the Van Ginkels’ work see, for example, Margaret Emily Hodges, “Blanche Lemco van Ginkel and H.P. Daniel van Ginkel: Urban Planning” (PhD diss., McGill University, 2004); Inderbir Singh Riar, “Expo 67, or the Architecture of Late Mo- dernity” (PhD diss., Columbia University, 2014). 5 The report was published as: Van Ginkel Associates, with Hedlin, Menzies and Associates Ltd., Transition in THE RELOCATION OF THE INDIGENOUS COMMUNITY OF SOUTH INDIAN LAKE (1966–68): FOR AN ALTERNATIVE AND SHARED INHABITATION OF MODERN ARCHITECTURAL HISTORY Elisa Dainese In March 1966, then-Deputy Minister of Mines and Natural Resources of the Province of Manitoba, Stuart Anderson, informally approached the University of Manitoba and a group of its researcher- academics to study the effects of the diversion of the Churchill River on human and natural resources. 1 The proposal of the Nelson River Hydroelectric Project included a series of dams and hydroelectric power plants and the transformation of one of Canada’s largest freshwater lakes, Lake Winnipeg, into a hydroelectric reservoir. 2 The project also required the relocation of several Indigenous communities, including the group of South Indian Lake, 480 peoples strong and, at that time, the second largest community of the Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation, with about a quarter of its total population. 3 The engineering project’s dams would flood traditional land and Indigenous houses, disrupt fishing activities, and interfere with trap lines (Fig. 1). Life as the community had known it since its first arrival to the area in 1875 would be completely disrupted. From 1966 to 1968, Blanche Lemco van Ginkel and Daniel van Ginkel, distinguished urban planners and architects, former members of the Interna- tional Congresses of Modern Architecture (CIAM), and part of the Team Ten group of architects who challenged CIAM’s doctrinaire approach to urban design, agreed to participate in research funded by the Manitoba Development Authority. 4 With other researcher-academics at the University of Manitoba, the Van Ginkels embarked on a study that resulted in a feasibility report and a timeline for relocating the Indigenous community of South Indian Lake to higher ground. 5 Called by the Manitoba government to design a new settlement for the northern community of South Indian Lake, the Van Ginkels faced a problem of considerable complexity. They had to balance their responsibility to a governmental client—which often favored assimilationist practices based on Euro-Canadian cultural norms—with their desire to enlarge their perspective and planning protocols to the Indigenous communities of the 1 The research in this essay was carried out under a fellowship at the Canadian Centre for Architecture (CCA Visiting Scholar Program, 2018), which I thankfully acknowledge. I also express my gratitude to Dalhousie Uni- versity for its support of the study under the 2018 SSHRC Explore Grant Program. Finally, I would like to thank the anonymous reviewers of Thresholds for their attentive comments and the editors of this issue for their thorough observations and productive critique. H. E. Duckworth, and University of Manitoba, Reconnaissance Study of the Effect on Human and Natural Resources of the Churchill River Diversion Plans. Terms of reference of the study (University of Manitoba, Jan 4th, 1967), South Indian Lake, Manitoba (1966-68), Van Ginkel Associates Fonds, AP027.S1.D33, CCA Archives, Montreal. 2 On the history of River Di- version see Leonard Bateman, “A History of Electric Power Development in Manitoba,” IEEE Canadian Review (Winter 2005): 22-25; see also Churchill River Diversion, accessed November 3, 2019, https:// www.hydro.mb.ca/corporate/ facilities/water_levels/chur- chill_river_diversion/. 3 The word “Indigenous” is used in this article to define the peoples who have been living in what is now Canada for millennia before the arrival of European explorers and colonists. More on this terminology can be found, for example, in Charles Leslie Glenn, American Indian/First Nations Schooling: From the Colonial Period to the Present (New York: Palgrave Macmil- https://doi.org/10.1162/thld_a_00713 © 2020 Elisa Dainese