Alec Schemmel , Fox News; Biden Interior Dept puts together handbook to apply 'indigenous knowledge' into agency practices
[Kip Currier: This Fox News article on Indigenous Knowledge (IK) -- also called Traditional Knowledge (TK) -- traffics in "scare/sneer quotes" and is framed from the get-go by its author as a cautionary example of the suggested excesses and dangers of inclusion. This other-ing strategy is a frequent Fox News tactic. In this instance, that tactic seeks to undermine the legitimacy of IK by inferring that the very idea that Native Peoples might be able to contribute to the practice of science is radically unconventional.
The overall aim of the piece has one goal: to marginalize and discredit the inclusion of Native American perspectives in U.S. Interior Department decisions that impact issues like mining, timbering, and drilling on public lands and/or near national parks and wildlife areas.
The Biden administration's Department of the Interior, through the groundbreaking leadership of Deb Haaland -- the first Native American head of the department in its 175-year history -- has, for the first time, instituted policy that includes the knowledge and expertise of Indigenous Peoples. The inclusion of Native persons at decision-making tables that impact their sovereign lands is anathema to the incoming pro-drilling Trump administration because of fears that those perspectives may impede their unchecked economic agenda. As the AP reported on November 22, 2024, in nominating a pro-fossil fuel governor Doug Burghum to replace Haaland as Interior's head:
Donald Trump assigned Doug Burgum a singular mission in nominating the governor of oil-rich North Dakota to lead an agency that oversees a half-billion acres of federal land and vast areas offshore: “Drill baby drill.”
https://apnews.com/article/interior-burgum-public-lands-oil-gas-trump-97f7bc583f0a0de0fb16ea6f89bfbaf1
To better understand IK and TK, let's look at a few definitions from reputable sources. The World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), an agency of the United Nations headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, describes TK as:
knowledge, know-how, skills and practices that are developed, sustained and passed on from generation to generation within a community, often forming part of its cultural or spiritual identity.
While there is not yet an accepted definition of TK at the international level, it can be said that:
TK in a general sense embraces the content of knowledge itself as well as traditional cultural expressions, including distinctive signs and symbols associated with TK.
TK in the narrow sense refers to knowledge as such, in particular the knowledge resulting from intellectual activity in a traditional context, and includes know-how, practices, skills, and innovations.Traditional knowledge can be found in a wide variety of contexts, including: agricultural, scientific, technical, ecological and medicinal knowledge as well as biodiversity-related knowledge.
https://www.wipo.int/tk/en/tk/
The U.S. National Park Service (NPS) provides this explanation of IK (accessed on 11/26/24):
Indigenous Knowledge is a body of observations, oral and written knowledge, innovations, practices, and beliefs developed by Tribes and Indigenous Peoples through interaction and experience with the environment.11 It is applied to phenomena across biological, physical, social, cultural, and spiritual systems.12 Indigenous Knowledge can be developed over millennia, continues to develop, and includes understanding based on evidence acquired through direct contact with the environment and long-term experiences, as well as extensive observations, lessons, and skills passed from generation to generation.
https://www.nps.gov/subjects/tek/description.htm
UNESCO, a UN agency based in Paris, France, defines TK as:
Knowledge, innovations and practices of indigenous and local communities around the world. Developed from experience gained over the centuries and adapted to the local culture and environment, traditional knowledge is transmitted orally from generation to generation. It tends to be collectively owned and takes the form of stories, songs, folklore, proverbs, cultural values, beliefs, rituals, community laws, local language and agricultural practices, including the development of plant species and animal breeds. Traditional knowledge is mainly of a practical nature, particularly in such fields as agriculture, fisheries, health, horticulture, forestry and environmental management in general.
Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity (SCBD), Article 8(j): Traditional knowledge and the convention on biological diversity, 2007.
https://uis.unesco.org/en/glossary-term/traditional-knowledge#
Now, having looked at those descriptions of IK/TK, notice what the reporter does in their second paragraph, copied here:
The notion of "indigenous knowledge" puts forward that Native groups possess an understanding about the natural world that others do not, due to their ethnic background.
Observe the quotes around the phrase "indigenous knowledge", as if to call that designation into question. Note, too, the intentional selection of the word "notion", i.e. a belief about something.
The construction "Native groups possess an understanding about the natural world that others do not" neglects to acknowledge that Native Peoples have demonstrated that they do have oral and written traditions going back for generations that can offer unique insights and useful observations about this world. As just one example, a March 2024 Guardian article reported on how observations made by First Nations peoples in British Columbia, Canada enabled the discovery of a "coral reef that scientists say ‘shouldn’t exist’:
For generations, members of the Kitasoo Xai’xais and Heiltsuk First Nations, two communities off the Central Coast region of British Columbia, had noticed large groups of rockfish congregating in a fjord system.
In 2021, researchers and the First Nations, in collaboration with the Canadian government, deployed a remote-controlled submersible to probe the depths of the Finlayson Channel, about 300 miles north-west of Vancouver.
On the last of nearly 20 dives, the team made a startling discovery – one that has only recently been made public.
“When we started to see the living corals, everyone was in doubt,” says Cherisse Du Preez, head of the deep-sea ecology program at Fisheries and Oceans Canada. “Then, when we saw the expansive fields of coral in front of us, everybody just let loose. There were a lot of pure human emotions.
The magnitude of this discovery in Canada is unprecedented:
The following year, the team mapped Lophelia Reef, or q̓áuc̓ÃwÃsuxv, as it has been named by the Kitasoo Xai’xais and Heiltsuk First Nations. It is the country’s only known living coral reef.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/mar/15/canada-moves-to-protect-coral-reef-that-scientists-say-shouldnt-exist
However, the extraordinary find of Canada's "only known living coral reef" should not be seen as an isolated one-off; rather, it is another exemplar of ways that IK can work in complementary fashion with Western research to yield advancements in knowledge. As the 2024 coral reef discovery article explains:
The discovery marks the latest in a string of instances in which Indigenous knowledge has directed researchers to areas of scientific or historic importance. More than a decade ago, Inuk oral historian Louie Kamookak compared Inuit stories with explorers’ logbooks and journals to help locate Sir John Franklin’s lost ships, HMS Erebus and HMS Terror. In 2014, divers located the wreck of the Erebus in a spot Kamookak suggested they search, and using his directions found the Terror two years later.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/mar/15/canada-moves-to-protect-coral-reef-that-scientists-say-shouldnt-exist
Furthermore, the Fox News reporter's phrase "due to their ethnic background", arguably, seeks to portray IK/TK as an example of "woke-ness". It's an effort by the reporter to trigger listeners/viewers to dismiss the value of knowledge that derives from Native Peoples. The writer's chosen language strives to depict Native Americans as exceptional from other peoples; this too is another well-used Fox News play: pitting groups against each other to foster divisiveness and distrust.
The bottom line of my critique of this reporter's take on IK/TK is that no one credibly is suggesting that IK/TK must or should supplant Western-based science. Rather, IK/TK is knowledge that can complement other types of science. Indeed, the abstract of this 11/22/24 peer-reviewed article "Rethinking natural hazards research and engagement to include co-creation with Indigenous communities" underscores the value of what the researchers refer to as "bi-lateral knowledge exchange":
Indigenous peoples are widely affected by natural hazards and their history and knowledge can directly inform on past events and mitigation strategies. Here we show how effective co-creation of resources and bi-lateral knowledge exchange between natural hazard researchers and local Indigenous communities provides an effective, equitable, and sustainable way to conduct research.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s44304-024-00034-7
The phrase "bi-lateral knowledge exchange" sheds light on one more of Fox News' game tactics: rather than "and" Fox wants its viewers to see everything as an "either/or" end game. In other words, not Western science and Indigenous Knowledge. But rather either Western science or Indigenous Knowledge. Co-existence is possible, and exchanges of knowledge can even be advantageous.]
[Excerpt from Fox News article]
"Officials at the Department of the Interior are pushing to finalize a new "implementation handbook" to guide agency decision makers on how to "apply indigenous knowledge" in their day-to-day work.
The notion of "indigenous knowledge" puts forward that Native groups possess an understanding about the natural world that others do not, due to their ethnic background.
The aim of the new chapter in the agency-wide manual is to "equitably promote the inclusion of indigenous knowledge," but this new supplemental handbook lays out methods for "applying" indigenous knowledge into departmental practices, such as scientific research, environmental compliance work, community resiliency and more...
The nearly 150-page handbook includes a litany of other "approaches" to applying indigenous knowledge into the agency's practices, including how to create "an ethical space to receive indigenous knowledge" and information about how to shield "sensitive" indigenous knowledge from public disclosure laws."
