Foreword
Let us be clear from the outset that with traditional knowledge “the knowing is in the doing.” This is the essential character of aboriginal traditional knowledge. A reference guide on the conduct of research into traditional knowledge is at the same time a guide on the conduct of research into traditional land and resource use by aboriginal people.
Understood in this way, traditional knowledge studies in the Inuvialuit Settlement Region are not new. Indeed, this research could be viewed in modern terms as supporting the 1977 Inuvialuit land claim proposal – Inuvialuit Nunangat - that ultimately evolved into the 1984 Inuvialuit Final Agreement. For many years since, traditional knowledge studies have been conducted for a variety of purposes by governments, aboriginal authorities, wildlife management organizations and by industry and academic institutions. These studies are driven by legal requirements and policy and planning objectives to give full consideration and weight to Inuvialuit knowledge in wildlife conservation management, harvest management, environmental impact assessment, and land and resource management decisions.
In some cases, they have been informed by a growing literature on how to conduct traditional knowledge studies. Terry Tobias’s Living Proof: The Essential Data-Collection Guide for Indigenous Use-And- Occupancy Map Surveys is clearly a seminal work in this regard.
and evaluating requirements for traditional knowledge across northern Canada, and, the second, general guidelines for the use of traditional knowledge in environmental impact assessment and application in the Inuvialuit Settlement Region.
This report is different and much needed. As a reference document, it provides detailed technical guidance and, importantly, supporting rationale for best practices that should be fully considered by anyone contemplating, undertaking and applying traditional knowledge research on the Yukon North Slope. Its intended audience is traditional knowledge researchers and those organizations – government agencies, co-management bodies, environmental assessment boards, aboriginal authorities and industry – that require and work with traditional knowledge.
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Peter Armitage and Stephen Kilburn are practicing social scientists – a somewhat neglected group of scientists – in the area of traditional knowledge research in Canada. They are researchers who care passionately about the quality of the methods they and others employ in the documentation and study of indigenous traditional knowledge.
The Wildlife Management Advisory Council (North Slope) had the good fortune to work with Peter and Stephen in the preparation of a major report documenting Inuvialuit traditional knowledge about nanuq - polar bears. It was published earlier this year. Over the course of this project, the Council learned a great deal about what makes for sound design, conduct and documentation in traditional knowledge research. At the conclusion of the project, the Council asked Peter and Stephen to provide their views on these matters. This report is the result of that request.
There is much in this report to think about, especially since it also benefits from the contributions of other social scientists working in the area of applied traditional knowledge research.
This report is timely. As traditional knowledge research has become more broadly accepted and conducted, the quality of the research has often been wanting. For holders of traditional knowledge who have participated in good faith in these projects, flawed and unsound methods amount to a breach of trust. They can also be expensive mistakes, especially when their findings are easily challenged and dismissed.
Traditional knowledge research is coming under greater scrutiny by traditional knowledge holders and by any institution or group that seriously evaluates and tests the body of information and evidence that it works with. When the findings of biological, ecological and climate change research, for example, don’t agree with those of traditional knowledge research, it is reasonable to expect that the transparency, rigor and integrity of the research methods are an area of immediate interest and concern. Traditional knowledge research, like other fields of research, should not enjoy a “free ride” when it comes to soundness of its methods and practices.
This reference guide to the conduct of traditional knowledge research addresses this challenge. For those who are seriously committed to evolving best practices in traditional knowledge research, it is essential reading.
Lindsay Staples
Chair Wildlife Management Advisory Council (North Slope)
http://www.wmacns.ca/pdfs/401_ConductOfTraditionalKnowledge_Sept14_fnl_WEB.pdf
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