This paper comes out of 2009 workshop at the Northern Governance Policy Research Conference called Research the Indigenous Way. It addresses the 22 participants’ sharing circle input on how “alternative” Indigenous research can support Indigenous governance. Specifically, this refers to an Indigenous research paradigm that does not subscribe to or perpetuate “colonial concepts of governance.” (102)

The authors point to the Mackenzie Valley pipeline challenge as a beginning of Indigenous research in the north. They go on to outline the somewhat exploitative and extractive relationship between Indigenous peoples in the north and southern Canadian scholars. While “Indigenous research” is filled with diversity, it shares a common emphasis on relationships “to the environment, the land, and the ancestors” (106). Additionally, participants talked about the role of traditional knowledge, stories and their lessons for environment and governance, suggesting “the stories in themselves are governance… it is not necessary to distil these into abstract policy governance” (112). A young participant acknowledges the difficulty of being an Indigenous researcher and learning from elders if they cannot speak their language (114). Some other defining characteristics of Indigenous research in this paper include reaching out to one’s heritage, working with an eye to continuity over time, and its need to be recognized as a credible foundation for Indigenous self-determination. (118) Furthermore, in an ideal context, Indigenous researchers will have support from non-Indigenous researchers as resource people, rather than vice versa.

Abstract:

This paper is based on experiences, views, and stories shared by the 22 participants who spoke at the Research the Indigenous Way workshop at the Northern Governance Policy Research Conference in November 2009. The paper does not address all the issues raised, but rather focuses specifically on how the workshop sheds new light on the nature of alternative Indigenous research that would support Indigenous governance. The sharing circle format of the workshop is considered as a model reflecting the research paradigm being talked about. This paradigm requires a critique of past northern “Indigenous” research that perpetuates colonial concepts of governance. Key messages from the groundbreaking work of the Traditional Knowledge Practitioners Group in 2008–2009 are combined with narratives from the workshop to provide a picture of current thinking about Indigenous research in the North, and practical considerations in applying this paradigm. Indigenous people have always been engaged in research processes as part of their ethical “responsibility to keep the land alive.”

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Pimatisiwin: A Journal of Aboriginal and Indigenous Community Health has made this article available online here. 

The full text is also available on ResearchGate.

McGregor, Deborah, Water Bayha, and Deborah Simmons. “‘Our Responsibility to Keep the Land Alive’: Voices of Northern Indigenous Researchers.” Pimatisiwin: A Journal of Aboriginal and Indigenous Community Health 8, no. 1 (2010): 101-123.