The Canadian Studies Program is pleased to announce Allison Evans as the recipient of an Edward E. Hildebrand Graduate Research Fellowship for Summer 2024.
Allison is a PhD student in the Department of City & Regional Planning and a previous Hildebrand Fellowship recipient. Her current research focuses on the recent proliferation of tent encampments in semi-rural areas of Ontario. Most tent encampment research is conducted in major urban areas, with many studies emanating from cities on the US West Coast. Allison’s research aims to shed light on the emergent housing struggles in smaller towns and cities.
Allison’s fellowship will fund her travel to Ontario to conduct preliminary fieldwork for her dissertation. She will explore the mechanisms contributing to encampment formation in in-between places, and highlight new modes of governance emerging in response. Allison aims to contribute to recent debates in urban and rural theory, and to bridge the divide between urban and rural homelessness research.
Allison holds a BES and MES in planning from York University in Toronto, where she researched various housing-related topics, including two peer-reviewed articles about the political economy of student housing and state ambiguities around tent encampments in Toronto.