INDIGENOUS ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES

INDIGENOUS ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES Trent University Dr. Roronhiake:wen Dan Longboat Professor Founder & Director IES Program http://www.trentu.ca/ies/

Gratitude • Professional experiences: degrees, teaching, research • Personal experiences: culture, language, ceremonies • Trent University • Grateful to my mother & my teachers

Personal Transformation Importance of relationships • Humans are the youngest • Stories of how much the youngest are loved • Without us the world carries on

Family & relations as the basis for the connection with all beings around us

Original Instructions for Each 1.Relationships : Have great love & care for one another : Includes all beings 2.Acknowledge responsibilities : harmony & respectful coexistence 3.Participate in reciprocity : Aware of relationships all the time : Gratitude & appreciation

Working With Students partner

Brigitte animal friend

Piggy Mom & Dad

Geoffrey

For example, Love Respect

Your Turn • •

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Somewhere on a blank piece of paper, write your own name. Now make a web showing the beings (human and non-human) with whom you have connections. For each connection, state the relationship. Look at all of your relationships & make a list of the feeling words that go with them. Share your web with your group and make a list of your common words.

Working With Students • • • • • • •

admiration anger challenge comfort gratitude love pride

• • • • • •

respect security strength support trust understanding

How to show reciprocity in your relationships?

Giving Thanks A Native American Good Morning Message by Chief Jake Swamp Illustrated by Erwin Printup, Jr. Lee & Low Books, New York, 1995 Tom Porter—Thanksgiving Address http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFa7V4VKGm8

Embedded relationship words…

Building Relationships Ohén:ton Karihwatéhkwen “Words That Come Before All Else” • as a basis for relationship building • as a model for environmental studies • as a theory for applied research

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Your Turn On a piece of paper, identify the land/place/geography that has shaped you most. Please describe some of the key features of it. Try to go back to an early memory you have of interacting with your environment. Sketch a picture that evokes your early memory. Describe this land/place/geography & yourself using relationship words. How can you show reciprocity?

Student

Personal Transformation • Invited to a new way of thinking • Changes relationships every day • Students at Trent experience this transformation • Engages heads, hearts and hands to accept responsibilities Now let’s look at professional transformation!

Professional Transformation “We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.” - Albert Einstein • Limits of 2-d thinking = digital & dominator

Professional Transformation Curriculum content is our reality as teachers. The messages that we send as we present the content can be informed by new thinking. Importance of differentiated instruction. Provide opportunity for relationship building (learning from).

From Data to Wisdom Data

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outside

Information

outside

Knowledge

inside

Wisdom

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inside

Indigenous Knowledge inside self, community & Creation learning from

Indigenous Wisdom inside self, community & Creation, learning from

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Professional Transformation Messages for students? • Information: can Google, read or hear • Information: learning about • Knowledge: takes time & experience • Knowledge: resides inside beings • Knowledge: learning from • Wisdom: grows over a life time • Wisdom: is applied knowledge Indigenous knowledges provide principles & processes for how to do this.

Only the Strong Will Survive? Darwin’s “survival of the fittest” was misinterpreted. He actually said that those with the “most adaptive” skills have the best chance of survival. (Hina Pendle) In order to ensure human survival, we need to teach resilience.

Today’s Lesson Old Thinking + Old Technology = Environmental Degradation Old Thinking + New Technology = Exponential Environmental Degradation New Thinking (Ancient) + New Technology = Environmental Restoration New Thinking + Appropriate Technology = Exponential Environmental Restoration

New Thinking—Zoom In Each individual has responsibilities: • to develop the necessary skills to sustain themselves • to develop their own individual gifts • to contribute both to the group

New Thinking—Zoom In Can focus on: • Skills for self-sufficiency : food, water, air : action, rest, repair : ‘accommodations’ for geography

• Developing metaphoric mind Indigenous knowledges provide principles & processes for how to do this.

New Thinking—Zoom Out For example, can remind students to: • Focus on quality of not quantity in life • Think as one million not one single • Think to the past as well as the future • Think in terms of complexity and complicating skill sets Indigenous knowledges provide principles & processes for how to do this.

Old Thinking—Inside Box

express

receive

me

New Thinking—Into A Circle

express

receive

me

New Thinking—Outside Box Differentiated Sources & Methods FAMILIAR

Author  writes  Book  read  Me Teacher  talks  Lecture  listen  Me COULD INCLUDE

Dancer  expresses  Dance  learn  Me Uncle  shows  Demo  watch  Me Bird  shows  Lesson  watch  Me Land  ?  Dream  dream  Me

New Thinking—Into Circle Sources: • Empirical Broadened to include: • Brought forward e.g. through teachings • Revealed e.g. through dreams • Creation & Cosmos Indigenous knowledges provide principles & processes for how to do this.

New Thinking—Behind Curtain Science & the Wizard of Oz • Demystify: Tell stories about the messy & controversial history & philosophy • Make the cultural bias explicit • Include assumptions • Be aware of consequences (broader scale) • Science & math as processes that include e.g. dreams (Kekulé, Loewi, Ramanujan)

Transformative Education New Thinking in Relationship Between Curriculum and Students • Zoom In or Out • Outside the Box & Into the Circle • Behind the Curtain Can focus on any of these (or others that you find) to create transformative learning! Indigenous knowledges provide principles & processes for how to do this.

Treaties • Peace • Friendship • Respect

• RIVER OF LIFE

Indigenous Environmental Studies • Innovative and multidisciplinary program at Trent University • Brings together principles of Indigenous knowledge & western science • Integrating these approaches provides students with the necessary knowledge, skills and critical thinking abilities to begin to address the complex environmental problems facing both Indigenous and nonIndigenous communities around the world today • Recognizes both the strengths & limitations of any single perspective • Seeks to develop complex thinking to address environmental, health, socio-cultural and sustainability issues

Environmental Sciences / Studies

Indigenous Environmental Studies

Indigenous Studies

Indigenous Environmental Studies • Environmental Sciences/Studies • Indigenous Studies • IES focuses on understanding relationship between culture & environment • Each geography & its original culture are unique, for example, Haudenosaunee Creation Story  Clans  Ceremonies  Great Law of Peace  Teachings of Handsome Lake  Longhouse

Indigenous Environmental Studies Behaviours

Behaviours Attitudes Beliefs

Attitudes Values Beliefs Culture Environment

Values

Culture Environment

Bachelor of Arts or Bachelor of Science in Indigenous Environmental Studies • 4 Year Honours Degree • 3 Year General Degree

Diploma or Specialization in Indigenous Environmental Studies

Indigenous Peoples’ Health & Environment: The relationship between local environments & community well-being

Indigenous Foods & Medicines: Growing, gathering & utilization

Natural Resource and Ecological Management and Restoration: Community development & environmental remediation

INDIGENOUS ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES

Environmental and Community Planning: For cultural and ecological sustainability

International Indigenous Environmental Networks: Innovative Indigenous solutions through knowledge exchange and mobilization

INDIGENOUS ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES

INDIGENOUS ENVIRONMENTAL STUDIES Trent University Dr. Roronhiake:wen Dan Longboat Dr. Chris Furgal Dr. Eric Sager Dr. Leanne Simpson Brigitte Evering, PhD Student http://www.trentu.ca/ies/