The overall purpose of this project is to engage with communities in the braiding of Indigenous Science and Western Science approaches to i) understand places and spaces; and ii) monitor environmental and ecological changes on seasonal to century timescales can be accomplished.
This work will be primarily conducted early career researchers (undergraduates, interns, graduate students, and PostDocs) supervised by Drs. Myrle Ballard (Earth, Energy and Environment), Allyson Menzies (Biological Science) and Kerry Black (Civil Engineering).
Dr. Ballard’s work will focus through the lens of the original, indigenous names of places and spaces and their connection to water. This work will be conducted along the Lake Winnipeg Watershed, including S’katchewan (Saskatchewan), Obuskudayang (Lake St. Martin First Nation, referring to ‘Land of the Prairies’) and S’katchewanung (Dauphin River) watersheds in Manitoba and will build out to additional watersheds as appropriate relationships are developed. In addition to viewing the watershed through its original place names, the work will collate western science information (e.g., water quality, river flow, lake levels, open water season, etc.). Dr. Ballard’s work will also consider the history of the watershed and its community, and its water influenced socioeconomic aspects. Dr. Ballard’s work is innovative as she has developed a three-eyed seeing framework which includes the lenses of Indigenous Science, Western Science, and our relations.
Dr. Menzies work will focus on Indigenous and Metis community-based monitoring of culturally significant species (e.g., moose in the prairie landscape, geese in the James Bay region). She will start working with communities which she has an existing relationship (e.g., Misipawistak Cree Nation, Opaskwayak Cree Nation, and Wuskwi Sipihk First Nation) seeks to develop community-based wildlife monitoring programs that prioritize community knowledge and values along with Western Science approaches to provide tangible examples of braiding knowledges in a good way.
Dr. Black will seek to initiate a regional lake health assessment protocol and process that is based on Indigenous Knowledges and Indigenous lake usages, with an end-goal of modernizing the ‘Atlas of Alberta Lakes’ in digital format so that it is braiding perspectives and knowledge systems, improve lake health and knowledge mobilization, and support management and decision-making processes. This work will begin with the Blackfoot Confederacy and then extend into other communities.
This work is important because it will prioritize and celebrate community knowledge and values while weaving Indigenous ways of knowing in practice with western science in a novel approach to ecological and environmental monitoring. The body of work will foster innovation in environmental monitoring while fostering the exchange of wise practices between Western knowledge and Indigenous Knowledge. In addition to providing scientific insight, this project will uplift and empower Indigenous and Metis communities for active involvement in decisions about lands and waters.
Dr. Myrle Ballard
Associate Professor, Department of Earth, Energy and Environment, University of Calgary
Tier II Canada Research Chair in Weaving Indigenous Science and Sustainability Science
Dr. Allyson Menzies
Assistant Professor, Department of Biological Sciences, University of Calgary
The primary objective of this project is to engage communities in the braiding of Indigenous Science and Western Science to enhance environmental monitoring practices. This initiative seeks to:
This project aims to celebrate and uplift Indigenous knowledge while fostering reciprocal, equitable, and sustainable environmental monitoring partnerships between Indigenous communities and researchers.
Immediate
Connects place-based, Indigenous-led research to provincial and federal science priorities (e.g., provincial environmental monitoring and evaluation approaches, federal species at risk management).
Facilitates knowledge actively and tangibly braiding by integrating Indigenous Science and Western Science into monitoring programs to demonstrate their synergy and combined effects.
Prioritizes Indigenous leadership and mentorship, advancing both the institution’s Indigenous engagement goals and the interests of Indigenous communities, while also supporting equity, diversity, inclusion, and opportunities in research
This project supports the spirit of the TRC Calls to Action (e.g., with some interpretation and broadening into natural sciences which are not overtly included); i) ending the back-log of Post-Secondary opportunities for Indigenous and Metis students (Education, 11); ii) establish [research programs] with funding to advance … reconciliation (Education for Reconciliation, 65); establish a strategy for ‘Indigenous and non-Indigenous [scientists] to undertake collaborative projects’ (Commemoration, 93) . Although environmental health is not overtly listed, it is fundamental to health. Finally, the TRC universally implies Canada should endorse and comply with the UNDRIP (see the next point).
This project supports UNDRIP principles (e.g., Indigenous Peoples’ rights to i) participate in decision-making matters… in accordance with their own procedures’ (Article 18), ii) determine and develop priorities and strategies for exercising their right to [land use] (Article 23), and iii) ‘maintain, control and protect their …. manifestations of their sciences, technologies, and cultures (Article 31).
In particular, this project supports the ‘Ten calls to action to natural scientists working in Canada’ towards reconciliation (Wong et al., 2020. FACETS 5: 769–783), particularly including the following:
Intermediate
Ultimate
Strengthens Indigenous and local knowledge contributions to public policy and decision-making.
Promotes reciprocity between Indigenous knowledge and federal science priorities.
Advances Canada’s reconciliation commitments through Indigenous-led research.
Expands Canada’s knowledge economy by integrating diverse knowledge systems.
