This week in review … South Africa to launch national TK recording system

South Africa to Launch National Traditional Knowledge Recording System
IP Watch, 10 May 2013

GENEVA, SWITZERLAND: On 24 May, South Africa will be launching its National Recordal System aiming to catalogue its indigenous knowledge. The National Recordal System is an initiative of the South African Department of Science and Technology, with the ultimate goal of creating opportunities “for benefits to flow back to the communities.” The NRS includes the establishment of indigenous knowledge networks, provincial Indigenous Knowledge Systems Documentation Centers and an Information Communication Technology knowledge platform. It will be interactive, and benefit-sharing agreement forms will be accessible online. Read the article … Further information on the NRS …

 

This week in review … New technology maps Inuit knowledge

New technology maps Inuit knowledge
Nunatsiaq online, 20 March 2013

OTTAWA, CANADA: About 25 kilometres southeast of Arctic Bay, on the northern shore of Adams Sound, there is a place called Qajuutinnguaq. It means “Hill shaped like a chisel.” You wouldn’t find it on most official maps because official maps of Nunavut contain huge swaths of unnamed land. And most of the place names that do exist were given by colonial explorers to honour foreign kings and dignitaries. But a geographer from Carleton University in Ottawa is trying to decolonize those maps by helping Inuit officially name the places around their community with traditional, Inuktitut names using free software that he invented. Read the article …

 

This week in review … Participatory research programme in the Philippines documents traditional medicinal knowledge

Technology in the service of cultural diversity
The Philippine Star, 14 February 2013

MANILA, PHILIPPINES: This article reports on an initiative to document the healing traditions of indigenous and local communities in the Philippines, undertaken the Philippine Council for Health Research and Development, the Philippine Institute of Traditional and Alternative Health Care, and the National Institute of Health of the University of the Philippines Manila. Documentation of the healing traditions has been done or is ongoing among many indigenous groups in the Cordillera, Sierra Madre, Palawan, Mindoro, Zamboanga and southeastern Mindanao. The output of the documentation is stored in a traditional knowledge digital library, developed and maintained by UP Manila, together with the two collaborating institutions. The digital library thus is a repository of the various cultural traditions of Philippine indigenous and local communities, that reflect the practices, knowledge, beliefs, and philosophy of what may be called “Philippine medicine.” In the acknowledgement of the communities’ rights to their knowledge, this national research program aims to carry out a community-based participatory approach, wherein the communities are actively and effectively involved in the documentation and protection of their cultural heritage in health. Their part is integral in defining the cultural appropriateness of the research: from assessing the project objectives, data-gathering methods and instruments, to deciding what information may be inputted in the digital library and what will be kept confidential. Read the article …

 

Resource: Article on the production of an indigenous knowledge web GIS

Producing an Indigenous Knowledge Web GIS for Arctic Alaska Communities: Challenges, Successes, and Lessons Learned
Wendy R. Eisner et al, Transactions in GIS vol. 16, issue 1, February 2012, doi: 10.1111/j.1467-9671.2011.01291.x

A traditional knowledge “Iñupiaq Web GIS”, based on a five-year study and containing observations and environmental knowledge of Iñupiat communities indigenous to Arctic Alaska, was incorporated into a Web-based platform. The website, “Arctic Cultural Cartography,” was created to be an open portal through which the password-protected “Iñupiaq Web GIS” could be accessed. This article discusses the process of developing the web GIS including the incorporation of user-friendly features such as links to interactive maps, video clips of interviews, discussion boards, and the integration of popular web interfaces such as Facebook. The authors also discuss short- and long-term goals for the further development of the GIS, its potential as a sustainable, participatory online database for sharing pertinent ecological knowledge, and challenges in achieving optimal community involvement given constraints imposed by remote locations with limited bandwidth. Read the abstract … Visit the website “Arctic Cultural Cartography” …

 

Resource: Article on digital storytelling

Storytelling in a digital age: digital storytelling as an emerging narrative method for preserving and promoting indigenous oral wisdom
Ashlee Cunsolo Willox et al, Qualitative Research, 22 October 2012, doi: 10.1177/1468794112446105

This article outlines the methodological process of a transdisciplinary team of indigenous and non-indigenous individuals, who came together in early 2009 to develop a digital narrative method to engage a remote community in northern Labrador in a research project examining the linkages between climate change and physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual health and well-being. Aiming to find a method that was locally appropriate and resonant with the narrative wisdom of the community, yet cognizant of the limitations of interview-based narrative research, the team sought to discover an indigenous method that united the digital media with storytelling. Using a case study that illustrates the usage of digital storytelling within an indigenous community, this article shares how digital storytelling can stand as a community-driven methodological strategy that addresses, and moves beyond, the limitations of narrative research and the issues of colonization of research and the Western analytic project. In so doing, this emerging method can preserve and promote indigenous oral wisdom, while engaging community members, developing capacities, and celebrating stories and experiences. Read the abstract …

 

Resource: Manual on participatory 3-D modeling for adaptation in India

Participatory 3-D Modeling for Climate Change Adaptation in India: Experience, Guiding Principles, Future Opportunities
Virginia Batts, with Sushil Bajpai and Rajesh Rajak
Watershed Organization Trust, June 2012

Although participatory mapping for development is not a new concept, the application of geographic information technologies at the grassroots level, especially for indigenous peoples, has only emerged in the last two decades. Participatory Three-Dimensional Modeling, a participatory Geographic Information System, is a method that attempts to convey indigenous experience and spatial knowledge in a digital form that is communicable to researchers and policymakers, theoretically empowering indigenous communities with a voice in the legislative planning and management of natural resources. Through the construction and demarcation of a geo-referenced, scaled relief model, indigenous communities can extract and display indigenous knowledge in a way that is meaningful not only for policymakers and academics but also to the communities themselves. This draft manual provides guidelines for the implementation of Participatory 3D Modeling, as well as a basic, step-by-step guide. Download the manual [pdf] …

 

Meeting review: TK at Slow Food’s Terra Madre

Salone del Gusto and Terra Madre
25-29 October 2012 (Turin, Italy)

A conference on “Traditional Knowledge: An Inheritance to Treasure”, held during the Slow Food’s annual conference, highlighted the new “Granaries of Memory” project, an initiative of the University of Gastronomic Sciences in Pollenzo, Italy. The Granaries of Memory is an online archive of interviews with farmers, cooks, partisans and cultural figures. “We are moving towards uncertain times, times of change,” said José Esquinas-Alcazar, director of the CEHAP (Cátedra de Estudios sobre Hambre y Pobreza) at the University of Cordoba. “For future generations it is important to maintain biodiversity at all levels. And it is precisely the complementarity between new technologies and traditional knowledge that can help us to safeguard the ethnodiversity of languages, customs and traditions.” Another conference on “Indigenous Peoples and Local Food Sovereignty – A struggle for self-determined development”, gathered representatives of indigenous peoples from North America, Argentina, Malaysia, East Africa, Russia and the Pacific. Read a press release of 26 October … Read a press release of 27 October …

 

This week in review … East African pastoralists record their climate reality

Watch: East African pastoralists record their climate reality
CGIAR Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security research program (CCAFS), 18 October 2012

LISBON, PORTUGAL: Pastoralists in East Africa have been using video to share their stories and experiences about coping with seasonal and annual climatic variability as part of the project Pastoralist Transformations to Resilient Futures: Understanding Climate from the Ground Up, facilitated by researchers and film makers from the Colorado State University. Over the course of three weeks, the filmmakers learned how to shoot, conduct interviews, create sequences, storyboard and do some basic editing. They then used their new skills to create short videos about climatic changes and other aspects of their lives they wished to share. The production of a collaborative film (15 minutes), documenting the project is underway. Provisionally entitled “The Land has Changed”: East African Pastoralist Perspectives on Climate Change, it will incorporate footage by the Maasai filmmakers, Nicolas Tapia and Lindsay Simpson, and will illustrate the points of views held by a diversity of stakeholders in the debate around climate change and other transformations in the East African dry lands. Read the post …