Submitted by Kevin Hudson, P.Eng.
Indigenous people are the descendants of the first people to inhabit a given region, in contrast to groups that have settled or occupied the area more recently.
Indigenous people possess local traditional knowledge that can help document the effects of a changing climate and perhaps, offer solutions on how to better protect it. In Canada these are our First Nations peoples, who have called this place home for millennia. They can offer a wealth of traditional ecological knowledge of Canada through oral histories, observation of hunting and fishing patterns and other wisdom that has been passed down to younger generations for thousands of years.
Canada is committed to collaborating with Indigenous governments, leaders and communities to more broadly and respectfully incorporate traditional knowledge into decision making, including in environmental assessments, resource management and advancing our understanding of climate change and how best to manage its effects. Natural Resources Canada is awarding contracts to study traditional and cultural knowledge on climate and environmental change in the Northwest Territories. It’s a way to collaborate our Western scientific reconstruction of past climate with the oral histories that are provided by First Nations groups. If both knowledge systems are reporting the same thing at the same time, that increases confidence that these are accurate reconstructions.1
The Western scientific method is to search out information about a problem (such as climate change), propose a hypothesis, predict the results and then carry out controlled experiments to determine if the hypothesis accurately predicted the results. By contrast, the fundamental attributes of Indigenous Ways of Knowing are place-based (supports relationships with and responsibilities to the land), holistic (interrelationships with the whole of nature), relational (everything has equal status), mysterious (versus knowable), based on cyclical time (versus rectilinear) and spiritual (respect for the spiritual relationships that exist between all things). Both knowledge systems deserve recognition, respect and understanding.2
Non-Indigenous students planning a science-related career will benefit from learning some Indigenous knowledge. Their perspective on nature and their creative problem-solving capabilities will be enhanced. They may become more well-rounded and reflective scientists, engineers, resource managers and health professionals in the future. Multiple ways of understanding the environment encourages two-way learners to create knowledge hybridized from Indigenous and Western scientific knowledge systems and to take sustainable action.2
The “seventh generation” principle respected by First Nations groups teaches that in every decision one must consider how it will affect their descendants for seven generations into the future. Threatened with a changing climate, all sources of knowledge must work together as we face the reality of our global and ecological interdependence, for seven generations to come.
References:
1. Canada Seeks Traditional Aboriginal Knowledge on Climate Change, TheStar.com, March 12, 2016.
2. Bridging Cultures, Indigenous and Scientific Ways of Knowing Nature, Glen Aikenhead, Herman Michell, 2011, Pearson Canada Inc