… for the knowledge and practices of indigenous people to have standing in court they must be turned into “TEK” by a credentialed representative.

This point can be extended to the application of TEK more generally – TEK studies fuel the consulting industry in places like British Columbia in large part because the government and industry want (require) the outside expert to offer information related to land use and the environment in a non-native idiom. To do so, the outside expert is often expected to ‘translate’ native ways of seeing the world into maps, reports, and databases.

This discussion encourages further critique of the uneven power relations between aboriginal peoples and governments/industry. It raises question about the direction in which information, codified as TEK, flows. As Paul Nadasdy says in his book about the Kluane of the Yukon: “[indigenous knowledge studies focus] on the incorporation of First Nations cultural elements into existing Euro-Canadian institutional contexts without ever questioning the appropriateness of such a project” (Nadasdy 2003:10). To that I’d add: ‘without questioning the possibility of such a project.’

While I feel that discussions of TEK might start conversations, I am concerned about finding ways other than the translation of knowledge to incorporate indigenous views of the world into industrial development, biological studies, land claims agreements, and other cross-cultural projects. In my own work, I aim for this by attending to the speech acts and events associated with discussion about the environment – and that probably falls short when the audience is uninformed or unreceptive to narrative data. Are there other ways to promote the dialogue without favoring one side and its goals so heavily?

(And this is my last post … thanks again to everyone at SM for the opportunity to write here over the past couple of weeks. I have an increased amount of respect for all of you and the astonishing rate of high quality and thought-provoking posts you publish.)

Bibliography

Nadasdy, Paul. 2003. Hunters and Bureaucrats: Power, Knowledge, and Aboriginal-State Relations in the Southwest Yukon . Vancouver: UBC Press.

Also

Cruikshank, Julie. 1998. The Social Life of Stories: Narrative and Knowledge in the Yukon Territory. Lincoln, NB: University of Nebraska Press.

Critiques of the TEK concept and its applications are not new. TEK studies can remove ‘data’ about the environment from the contexts in which it is used. TEK is noted to be a bureaucratic buzzword, particularly in places where consultation with aboriginal communities is desired or required; when such situations arise, documenting TEK is sometimes seen as the best way to engage an aboriginal community in conversations about local lands and resources. And, some have looked at the label, questioning what is meant by ‘traditional,’ ecological,’ and knowledge, particularly from the point of view of the community of people identified as users of TEK (see, for example, Nadasdy 2003; Cruikshank 1998).

With questions like these in mind, I was pleased to find Julie Cruikshank’s new book called Do Glacier’s Listen: Local Knowledge, Colonial Encounters, and Social Imagination (2005). I respect Cruikshank’s experience with Yukon aboriginal people and her sensitive understandings of the place of TEK in relation to oral history. In the book, Cruikshank looks at glaciation in the area where British Columbia, the Yukon, and Alaska come together geographically. She uses evidence from oral history, traveler’s journals, geological investigations, and bureaucratic reports to develop a picture of the perspectives different cultures bring to climate change in the Western Subarctic. The subjectivities inherent in creating cultural and natural histories are explored and, in doing so, questions are raised about the production of TEK in colonial contexts and in contemporary bureaucratic processes.

Regarding TEK, Cruikshank writes:

In much of the resource management literature, there seems to be a growing consensus that indigenous knowledge exists as a kind of distinct epistemology that can be systematized and incorporated into Western management regimes … Recurring questions concern how knowledge gets identified and authorized in different contexts, and who gets to control it.

…

In [spaces like parks in the Southern Yukon], science and oral history are both kinds of local knowledge that share a common history. That history includes authoritative gains for one kind of formulation – science – at the expense of another (Cruikshank 2005:256-257).

I am wondering, then, about the place of TEK-research within native communities themselves, particularly as one tool in a set of options native people have for talking and interacting with non-native people. TEK studies allow discussion of traditional culture in the idiom of science, or modernization, or bureaucracy, or whatever. They allow affiliation with these processes and they allow for participation in certain kinds of discussions about lands and resources.

Likewise, participation in TEK projects permits distance from ‘traditional culture’ to be created. Communities and individuals may choose to speak ‘in TEK’ in venues where talking about local culture might be taboo, might not be possible, or might be stigmatized. TEK allows one the possibility of speaking authoritatively without sounding ‘traditional.’ Despite the perils of the term, the perils of reducing local knowledge to decontextualized facts, what are the strategically significant reasons for aboriginal groups to engage in TEK-related research?

Bibliography

Berkes, Fikret. 1999. Sacred Ecology: Traditional Ecological Knowledge and Resource Management. Philadelphia: Taylor and Francis.

Cruikshank, Julie. 1998. The Social Life of Stories: Narrative and Knowledge in the Yukon Territory. Lincoln, NB: University of Nebraska Press.

Cruikshank, Julie. 2005. Do Glaciers Listen? Local Knowledge, Colonial Encounters, and Social Imagination. Vancouver: UBC Press.

Nadasdy, Paul. 2003. Hunters and Bureaucrats: Power, Knowledge, and Aboriginal-State Relations in the Southwest Yukon . Vancouver: UBC Press.

The question of a distinctively national anthropology in Canada can be addressed on a number of levels. Institutional links to sociology are common. A large amount of research has been conducted by scholars trained elsewhere. Anthropological support for aboriginal rights goes back to the early 1900s. These characteristics are not unique to Canada but they are emphasized here.

Given the size of the country and the number of ‘cultural areas’ within it, it also seems wise to consider Canadian anthropology in light of regions like the west, Ontario, the Maritimes, the eastern Subarctic, or the Arctic. Nancy’s comments about Franophone and Anglophone anthropology in Canada are mindful of this regionalism. Coming to Shore, a recent book of collected essays on Northwest Coast (NWC) anthropology in honour of Lévi-Strauss, exemplifies the value of such an approach. In their introduction, Mauzé, Harkin, and Kan review the academic traditions that inform NWC scholarship (2004). They argue that it is impossible to separate Canadian and American traditions of anthropology and that successful cross-pollination of ideas has occurred. In the same volume, Darnell demonstrates the relationship between Lévi-Strauss’s structuralism and Boasian anthropology – and by doing so, draws European scholarly traditions into the mix with Canadian and American traditions. Does this, then, leave us still with the notion that Canadian anthropology is a blending of traditions? Probably … and maybe that is what is truly distinctive about a Canadian anthropology.

I still find myself uncertain about how to position myself. I know something of the pedigree of my teachers and about the traditions of research in the western Subarctic where I do my fieldwork. My methods highlight textual analysis and I rely on the sociology of people like Goffman. Without an extensive publication record to cite as evidence, is that what a hiring committee wants to hear?

This post has gotten away from an effort to offer inclusive discussions of anthropology, of interest to the wider and multi-national audience of Savage Minds … I appreciate Jesse’s efforts to extend the discussion too. Let’s continue pondering these topics in the comments here.

In my next post, however, I’ll turn away from my own identity troubles to questions related to Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) in aboriginal communities.

Bibliography

Mauze, Marie, Michael Harkin, and Sergei Kan. 2004. Coming To Shore: Northwest Coast Ethnology, Traditions, and Visions. Lincoln, NB: University of Nebraska Press.

McLaughlin, Neil. 2005. Canada’s Impossible Science: Historical and Institutional Origins of the Coming Crisis in Anglo-Canadian Sociology. Canadian Journal of Sociology. 30(1):1-40.

During a recent interview, I was asked where I thought the anthropology that I do fits within “Canadian anthropology.” It was a provocative question and one I was unprepared to receive. At times in my graduate student career, I have fancied myself familiar with the history of anthropology in Canada, but I have never spent time positioning myself in the traditions of academic anthropology in Canada. I have never felt ‘far enough along’ to do so.

In a short series of posts, I want to attempt an answer to this question and graciously accept reaction in hopes of fairing better the next time such a question is posed. But guessing that most of you do not want my biography to be the centre of this guest spot, I will try to organize my thoughts on this question around the idea of encouraging you to position yourself in your own national tradition (if one or many exist). And, perhaps more generally, I’d like to throw around interesting interview questions job seekers should be prepared to answer.

The question of whether or not there is a Canadian anthropology, distinct theoretically or methodologically, from American cultural anthropology or British social anthropology has been debated earnestly (in Canada anyway) since the 1970s. American Louise Sweet initiated some of the soul searching when she proposed that there was no Canadian anthropology and that Canadian social science research was simply anti-American and elitist (Sweet 1976:844); Sweet was working at a Canadian university at the time.

The debate, as it continues, includes questions like ‘is there an autonomous tradition’ of anthropology in Canada (Darnell 1998)? Questions are asked about the origins of the scholars themselves: what kind of anthropology are Canadians doing?; are the anthropologists of Canada scholars born and trained elsewhere (Darnell 1998; McFeat 1980). Are we talking about an anthropology of Canada or a Canadian anthropology? Is a Canadian anthropologist necessarily American or British in outlook … or is there a blending of American (Boasian) and British social traditions?

(My question, in broader terms is this: if you work in Papua New Guinea, how do you position yourself intellectually between the extensive traditions of anthropology in PNG and the anthropological traditions of your institution and your country?)

The Canadian debate has me asking, at times, if this is simply another reflection of the insecurity Canadians feel when faced with questions about our identity. As a younger, smaller, colonized(?) player in the intellectual world, perhaps Canadian anthropologists simply struggle to be seen against more established traditions. I don’t truly believe that, of course, preferring instead that anthropology in Canada combines, as Darnell and Ames suggest, “features of disciplinary organization and [a] historical context that are unique” (Darnell 1998:155). Still, I wonder if we make too much of trying to be different from Americans.

Anthropology in Canada is distinctive in notable ways. There is a long tradition of applied anthropology, for example, dating back certainly to Boas and James Teit. Canadian anthropology departments have a history of hiring faculty from many different parts of the world – which goes some way to explaining the mixture of academic traditions that are apparent in the research and instruction. Darnell suggests that institutionally, Canadian anthropology differentiated itself from American counterparts by emphasizing undergraduate teaching over professionalism (Darnell 1998:158); exams at the University of Toronto included questions on ethnology in 1855 (Levin et al 1984). I expect readers will weigh in with other examples.

All of this still leaves me wondering about my own place in a Canadian anthropology, noting particularly that while my Master’s level training and my fieldwork occurred in Canada, my doctoral training continues at an American university. I will follow up with that up in a subsequent post.

Until then, let me pose to you: what is the importance of ‘knowing your intellectual place’? For the Americans in the audience, is the question more about understanding the anthropological traditions in the places that you work rather than questioning your place in an Americanist tradition? If so, how do you situate yourself in those histories?

Bibliography

Darnell, Regna. 1998. Toward a History of Canadian Departments of Anthropology: Retrospect, Prospect, and Common Cause. Anthropologica. 40(1):153-168.

Levin, Michael, Gail Avrith, and Wanda Barrett. 1984. An Historical Sketch Showing the Contribution of Sir Daniel Wilson and Many Others to the Teaching of Anthropology at the University of Toronto. Toronto: Department of Anthropology, University of Toronto.

McFeat, Tom. 1980. Three Hundred Years of Anthropology in Canada. Occasional Papers in Anthropology, Saint Mary’s University. 7

Sweet, Louise. 1976. What is Canadian Anthropology? American Anthropologist. 78(4):844-850.

Also:

Barker, John. 2000. Reply to Darnell’s ‘Toward a History of Canadian Departments of Anthropology.’ Anthropologica. 42(1):95-97.