By Samantha Lawler (University of Regina)
(Cassiopeia Spring 2024)
On February 13, the CASCA Indigenous Engagement Committee held its first workshop. The topic was “How to invite a local Indigenous knowledge-keeper to your astronomy class”. We discussed what documents were available for helping employees to fruitfully engage with local Indigenous groups, and compiled a list of these. A couple of institutions did not have a document at all, and several have really fantastic, comprehensive documents. A list of links to documents appears at the end of this article.
Many resources were highlighted during the workshop, but the committee wanted to specifically share a very complete document provided by the Calgary Board of Education that can be found here. This document is a complete elder protocol developed in partnership with many community members, the Native Counseling Services of Alberta and the Human Rights Education and Multiculturalism Fund.
The main take-aways from the workshop are summarized in the bullet points below:
- Seek the help of a Cultural Mediator provided (or not) by your institution.
- Be aware of the burden of requests Indigenous people sometimes receive.
- Clearly communicate the “shared purpose” of a meeting with the elder/knowledge-keeper.
- Build a relationship before your event/activity.
- Story telling takes time, it has a purpose to help you, and it is up to you to extract the tools you need from that story. Structured agendas may not be useful in some settings and Elders especially tend to not like time constraints.
- Elders have to be accompanied with respect over their whole visit to your institution.
- Gifts and honoraria must be given with care and respect.
- Ask what is the best way to reach out, it might not be emails.
- Prepare your participants in advance. Develop and use a code of conduct.
The IEC thanks all the participants for an excellent discussion, and we plan for future workshops with the CASCA community.
List of Indigenous engagement documents from individual institutions:
- RMC has no established Indigenous engagement protocol. The institutional approach appears to be entirely ad hoc, and (wait for it) the institution refuses to accept advice from its single Indigenous expert about engaging intentionally or appropriately.
- Okanagan College: Indigenization Protocols and Guidelines
- UdeM (this is a broader document, but Objective 7 talks about partnerships with Indigenous communities): Place aux Premiers Peuples Plan d’action 2020-2023
- Western University: Guidelines for Working with Indigenous Community Members. Also (fairly extensive) guidebook for working with Indigenous students: Guide for Working with Indigenous Students, Smudging Brochure: Procedure for Burning Traditional Medicines
- UBC Okanagan: About Indigenous Engagement (although details on how to actually engage Indigenous speakers / elders in class is not explicitly there that I can find: this is more broadly about Indigenous relations on campus). UBC (both campuses) Indigenous finance guidelines covers how and how much to handle gifts and honorariums, protocol for cash versus check, etc: Indigenous Finance Guidelines
- A UBC Indigenous Strategic Plan: UBC Strategic Plan 2020. There is a presentation of goals (such as increasing the role of indigenous knowledge in research) and steps toward them (eg. ‘Provide equitable and timely financial compensation to Indigenous people who support the Indigenization of curriculum’) here
- McMaster University: McMaster Indigenous Strategic Directions
- Queen’s University: general information about elders at Queen’s: Elders, Knowledge Keepers and Cultural Advisors, contacting elders: Protocols for Indigenous Guests, and guidelines for inviting elders: Elder Honorarium Guidelines
- Yukon University: About Us: Indigenous
- UVic: IACE Elders Guidelines for Protocol
- University of Hawaii (more precisely Center for Maunakea Stewardship, part of UH): Basic Protocol at Hawaiian Sacred Places
- SMU: not finding anything
- UofT: This link says it links to the protocol, but it doesn’t actually do that: Elder Protocol
- UofT Scarborough: Elders
- NRC Herzberg: couldn’t find anything
- University of Regina: Respectful Engagement with Elders
- University of Manitoba: Culture and Protocols
- University of Alberta: Indigenous Honorarium Guidelines
- University of Calgary: Cultural Protocol Guidelines
- University of Lethbridge: Blackfoot and First Nations Metis and Inuit Protocol Handbook
- University of Saskatchewan: (documents exist but require a login ID and password for the university)
- Thompson Rivers University: Office of Indigenous Education