Introduction: Narratives and Temporalities of Infrastructure in Canada

Approaches to InfrastructureI nfrastructures lie at the core of numerous social transformations, sociopolitical and economic developments, and creative processes of innovation.They have become significant indicators of an ongoing transition towards preferable futures, symbols of economic growth, technological advancement, and modernization.As Harvey and Knox (2012, 523) argue, infrastructures embody "promises of emancipatory modernity"-such as speed, connectivity, and economic prosperity; they "enchant" the hopes and dreams associated with development.Infrastructures contribute to imaginaries of improved futures, which remain elusive, flawed, and difficult to define (Abram and Weszkalnys 2013).Operating "on the level of fantasy and desire" (Larkin 2013, 333), infrastructures "draw together political and economic forces in complicated ways and often with unexpected effects," implicating "broader dynamics of social change" (Harvey, Jensen, and Morita 2017, 2).Although infrastructures are inherently future-oriented-serving as vehicles of domination and transformation-they are designed and assembled in ways that sustain contemporary settler states and societies.This process is shaped by power relations, sociopolitical change, and the material organization of everyday life in space and time (Spice 2018).Pasternak and colleagues (2023) demonstrate how infrastructure functions as a tool of settler colonialism.Infrastructures-such as roads, pipelines, and energy grids-not only facilitate economic development but also serve as mechanisms for asserting jurisdiction and reinforcing colonial control over Indigenous lands.