Joni Mitchell

Musician — Both Sides Now, Big Yellow Taxi, Carey

Born

1943

Birthplace

FORT MACLEOD, ALBERTA

Citizenships

Canadianness Score

🍁🍁🍁🍁🍁

5.0/ 5

Weighted across 2 scored criteria

Designation

Bleeds Maple Syrup 🍁

Born, raised, and still says “out for a rip” unironically.

Scorecard

Path A — born on Canadian soil

I. Origin

Born on Canadian soil

FORT MACLEOD, ALBERTA

Canadian parentage

Both parents Canadian

Citizenship on record

Automatic by birth

II. Residency

Formative years spent in Canada

Raised — Alberta

Lived in Canada by choice

Residency on record as an adult

Worked or filmed in Canada

Credits filed north of the 49th

III. Cultural evidence — not scored

Section III is recorded for the file only. Birth on Canadian soil already settles the matter.

Publicly claims to be Canadian

Says so, out loud

Canada claims them back

Claimed, enthusiastically

Fun fact

She survived polio as a child in Saskatchewan, which weakened her left hand and forced her to develop her distinctive open guitar tunings.

The verdict

Born in Alberta, raised in Saskatchewan, and honed her craft in Toronto's Yorkville coffee houses before conquering the world. She's painted the Canadian landscape into folk music history and never stopped reminding everyone where those prairie roots came from.

Adjudicated by

The Standings Committee

Status

Final — appealable