Western science's failure to recognize traditional environmental knowledge (TEK) was first made obvious to Martha Johnson more than ten years ago when she was working as a high school teacher in Povungnituk, an Inuit community in northern Quebec.

She remembered realizing that "as a non-Aboriginal trying to teach science from a Western perspective, it wasn't working. So I asked myself, "How do the Inuit perceive the environment?"

Johnson began experimenting in learning techniques to find ways of tapping the knowledge passed down among the Inuit. In one exercise, she gave students a diagram of the Arctic food chain and asked them to make the links. One practically illiterate boy made the connections without any problems.

Later, Johnson pursued a Master's degree in Environmental Studies and Anthropology at the University of Toronto. Her major paper examined Inuit folk ornithology, comparing Inuit classification of birds to Western groupings.

Johnson's grassroots experience with Aboriginal communities and her formal studies helped her recognize the holistic nature of TEK. "It combines biology, linguistics, social sciences, and other disciplines and connects them in an interdisciplinary way to examine how people perceive their world, live within it and use its resources" she comments.

Johnson spoke about traditional environmental knowledge, the reasons behind its growing recognition, and current research in this field during an interview in Ottawa early this year. She is now Research Director of the Dene Cultural Institute in Canada's Northwest Territories. The Institute works with Dene communities to preserve and promote this Canadian aboriginal group's culture, through research and education.

Much of the Institute's work has focused on TEK through research and the publication of a book entitled Lore: Capturing Traditional Environmental Knowledge, edited by Johnson. The book was based on papers produced from a 1990 workshop on TEK, organized by the Dene Cultural Institute. IDRC funded the workshop as a cultural exchange between researchers in developing countries and those working in Canadian aboriginal communities.

Community-based projects on TEK in the Amazon Rainforest, the African Sahel, the South Pacific and Southeast Asia were represented at the workshop. The Institute also invited aboriginal community members and researchers from northern Canada's Belcher Islands.

Workshop participants discussed the problems of gathering TEK and integrating it with Western Science to improve natural resource management. They also experienced Dene culture through food, music and dance. The participants' papers, outlining their project's research methodology, were incorporated in Lore.

ASSIMILATION OF KNOWLEDGE

According to Johnson, Western scientists have until recently ignored TEK because they assume much of its validity has been lost owing to Western assimilation of indigenous peoples and their knowledge systems. A separate factor is that, unlike Western science, TEK is not easily quantifiable.

In the past, Western scientists have interpreted the traditional emphasis on spiritual explanations as superstition. They also dismissed any emotional or subjective aspects of traditional knowledge in favour of the Western preoccupation with objectivity and the separation of self from the object of study. Johnson says TEK challenges Western science's foundation in the Judeo-Christian belief in humanity's dominance over nature.

Johnson attributes the changing attitude of Western scientists towards TEK to heightened political consciousness among indigenous peoples and their struggles for self-determination, more documentation of TEK, and a growing international environmental movement searching for new alternatives to natural resource management.

"Western society is searching for the spiritual element of life that it has been lacking for so long," she commented, refering to "Deep Ecology" as one movement that examines the spiritual interconnection between humanity and nature.

Johnson and other advocates of TEK are anxious that the shift in Western attitudes not lead to the cultural appropriation of indigenous knowledge systems in ways that do not benefit indigenous peoples. "It disturbs me when people are not given credit for what they've created or aren't able to enjoy the benefits of their work." For Johnson, traditional communities could be given credit for the concept of sustainable development, a concept they have long understood and which is now trumpeted throughout the West. "Indigenous peoples have lived within the means of their communities, its land and its resources. They have conserved natural resources while thinking of other communities and future generations."

Johnson says there is a willingness in aboriginal communities in northern Canada to preserve existing sustainable systems and to consider increasing the application of TEK. This belief is based on her involvement in a pilot research project undertaken by the Dene Cultural Institute in 1989 and completed in 1992. The goal was to develop a research methodology to discover from community members what TEK is still in use by the Dene, along with evidence of how this knowledge continues to govern their land and resource use. This information was to be used for environmental management and education. Fort Good Hope, on the Deh Cho (Mackenzie) River in the Northwest Territories, and the neighbouring community of Colville Lake were the pilot project sites. Data collection relied on interviews, translated into the Dene language of North Slavey, and participant observation. Researchers recorded community knowledge on animal ecology, local ecosystems, and traditional rules of land and resource management.

TRADITIONAL RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

The research indicated that a traditional Dene system of resource management still exists among the elders and to a lesser extent, among younger Dene. Although the younger generations use more modern technology, Johnson says the research showed that they still rely on their environmental knowledge to hunt and survive on the land. This reality points to the continued relevance of traditional environmental knowledge, Johnson says, noting that many Dene will have to live off the land because their communities lack wage labour. Most Dene want to remain in their communities, she says.

Johnson says a drawback of this type of research is its failure to involve younger Dene. Because they often lack fluency in the Dene languages, they are excluded from being project researchers. "There has to be a means of encouraging young people not only to learn about traditional environmental knowledge but to apply it to their everyday living. Traditional environmental knowledge will have no future unless major steps are taken to stop the movement of youth away from aboriginal culture."

A further drawback was poor communication within the two Dene communities, which produced low community support for the project. Johnson says part of the reason was that the Dene Cultural Institute rather than the community itself made key project decisions.

But the Institute is building on the experience of the pilot project. It has initiated other research projects on traditional medicine and justice in co-operation with the Arctic Institute of North America, based in Calgary, Alberta.

On top of safeguarding TEK within aboriginal communities, Johnson also calls for integrating it more broadly with Western science. Global ecological interdependence makes this marriage a necessity, Johnson says. TEK could provide insights into natural resource management in under-studied areas such as wetlands, high altitude zones, coastal regions, drylands, and circumpolar regions. It could also promote conservation education and offer holistic environmental assessments for development planning.

In Johnson's view, local indigenous researchers and professional researchers trained formally in Western methodology can collaborate to great effect. She points to the way aboriginal researchers made the pilot project more responsive to Dene culture by signalling the concept of "management" as unacceptable because it implies human control of nature. The Dene believe that, without human interference, nature takes care of itself. Dene opposition to putting radio collars on caribou is an example of this belief, says Johnson.

Aboriginal researchers also opposed asking community members for specific numbers of animals killed in hunts. They said that many Dene would not provide accurate numbers for fear of government reprisals or of being seen to brag about hunting accomplishments, an unacceptable practice in their culture.

For their part, the professional researchers, including Johnson, possessed complementary research skills and continually asked for explanations about things the indigenous researchers considered obvious. Aboriginal researchers suggested omitting certain questions from the interview guides because they assumed the answers were common knowledge. Yet for the outsider or younger Dene, these answers are often important for understanding TEK and its application. "Researchers must focus on the strengths of both traditional environmental knowledge and Western science," says Johnson.

WHO DECIDES?

Will traditional environmental knowledge lose much of its content and significance if it is integrated with Western science? "Key to the integration process is letting aboriginal people make choices about resource management and knowledge systems," Johnson answers. "This will ultimately give control back to these people and ensure that traditional environmental knowledge systems survive as systems which meet their needs. The real issue is who is making the decisions rather than what knowledge base they are adhering to."

Johnson says it is difficult to evaluate the success of integration with Western science because of the strikingly different ecological, economic and political contexts of the world's indigenous peoples. At one end of the spectrum is the widespread killing of Brazilian aboriginal people and simultaneous destruction of their indigenous knowledge. At the opposite end are the indigenous people of the South Pacific's Solomon Islands who both govern themselves and enjoy the authority to utilize traditional systems.

Yet overall, Johnson says she is optimistic about the future of TEK. Aboriginal self-government has the potential to ensure the survival of such knowledge among aboriginal communities in Canada if it is made a priority of self- determination. There are increasing partnerships between indigenous peoples, governments, and development and research organizations that strengthen indigenous knowledge, Johnson noted.

Most uplifting to Johnson is the growing recognition that TEK connects Canadian aboriginal communities and other indigenous people in the South. "Traditional environmental knowledge and its research have emphasized the commonality of problems, concerns and solutions that are to be found among the world's indigenous peoples." For Martha Johnson and other advocates of TEK, the hope remains that this knowledge will help preserve the identity of indigenous communities and contribute to resolving their common problems of poverty, assimilation and cultural misunderstanding.

- Deborah Carter in Ottawa

FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT:

Dene Cultural Institute
Box 570
Hay River, NWT
Canada X0E 0R0
Fax: (403) 874-3867

OR:

Martha Johnson
35 Morrison Drive
Yellowknife, NWT
Canada X1A 1Z3
Tel: (403) 873-6617

IDRC Reports is published weekly on-line by the International Development Research Centre.
Its aim is to keep an international readership informed about the work IDRC supports in developing countries as well as other development issues of interest.

Back to IDRC Homepage

Back to IDRC Reports Page