Paige Taylor White

In East Vancouver’s Britannia Community Centre the All My Relations women’s basketball players have learned to practice how they want to play, saying “in our lives we are the change we want to see in our communities.” team comes together on court. The AMR team has players ranging from as young as 16 years old to in their forties. These women come from different nations, backgrounds, and lived experiences, all to support one another as Indigenous women finding a community on the basketball court. As mothers, post-secondary students, and through many challenges, AMR players have built a community together where basketball is just the surface level.

Although they play in a regular season league in the urban hub of Vancouver, AMR’s season revolves around the one of a kind All Native Tournament in Northern British Columbia. Basketball is just the surface at the ANBT, which is known for the opening ceremonies and is equally a cultural gathering. Different Nations from all over the province come together to compete and rotate hosting the opening ceremonies. The AMR women’s team competes as one of the few club teams that has players from different nations, representing urban Indignity while bringing different cultures together. When AMR shows up every February, they compete together against other nation teams, many of whom are family members, friends, and who are playing on teams from AMR player’s home communities.

These photos follow the AMR team as they trained leading up to, and then competed in the 2024 All Native Tournament in February.

Paige (she/her) is a documentary photographer based on the traditional, ancestral, unceded territories of the x m k y” m (Musqueam), Skwxwú7mesh (Squamish), and s l”ilw ta (Tsleil-Waututh) nations in “Vancouver”. Paige worked as a photographer for Canada’s largest daily newspaper, the Toronto Star before moving to Vancouver to begin freelancing and pursuing her own project based work.