Ta7talíya Michelle Nahanee is a Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish) anti-colonial designer, writer, and educator who grew up in Eslhá7an, Mission IR#1, Squamish Nation. She is currently based in Shxwhá:y Village, Skway IR#5, in Stó:lō Territory.

Ta7talíya creates what she calls Matriarchal Media—board games, workbooks, playbooks, and educational media designed as public learning tools. Matriarchal Media is “critical theory that cares”: the making is the knowing, the object is the argument, and the care embedded in the design is the intervention. Her work is grounded in pattern realization—an Indigenous epistemological practice learned through her grandmother’s basket-weaving intelligence and applied to seeing colonial architectures and the conditions required for real release.

For more than 20 years, she has designed and facilitated interventions across governments, universities, NGOs, and corporations—work that has influenced opinions, changed behaviours, and mobilized action. She is completing a PhD in Curriculum & Pedagogy at the University of British Columbia (UBC), supported by a Canada Graduate Scholarships—Doctoral (CGS D) award. She holds an MA in Communication from Simon Fraser University, received the 2019 City of Vancouver Award of Excellence in Diversity & Inclusion, and is the author of Decolonize First and The Colonizer Playbook.

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