Water stewardship collaboration offers template for environmental researchers in Indian country This participatory research study aimed to advance a water stewardship framework that integrates indigenous knowledge and Western science while providing a model for outsiders conducting research in Indian country. The co-authors—one a white environmental scientist and the other an Ojibwe tribal member and local expert—conducted a cross-cultural, intergenerational approach to identify traditional ecological knowledge relevant to the Bad River watershed in northern Wisconsin (USA). This collaboration sought to create locally useful knowledge, offer an integrated framework of water stewardship in and beyond indigenous communities, and indigenize the study of water in academia.
The study design was a case study of indigenous water stewardship in the Bad River watershed informed by participatory, community-based, and de-colonizing methods. The community-based research had four main phases: (1) visiting, listening, and orientation; (2) implementation and stewardship fieldwork; (3) project launch and community follow-up; and analysis and co-authorship. This process included interviews with adults on the Bad River reservation, Talking Circles with indigenous youth, and indigenous communications practices, including ceremonial uses of tobacco and intergenerational collaborations. The co-authors analyzed qualitative data collaboratively and wrote in two voices, often with Anishinaabe traditional knowledge first and mainstream academic conventions in a supporting role.
The researchers identified 24 codes related to water, culture, and Western science-traditional ecological knowledge and 7 themes based on the interviews, talking circles, and field notes. The first theme was cultural vulnerabilities, especially how environmental degradation and centuries of forced assimilation either erased or damaged traditional ecological knowledge. In spite of generational gaps in traditional water knowledge and practices, the Objibwe overcame these vulnerabilities by returning to generational teachings and mixing them with modern knowledge. Themes 3,4, and 5 looked at tangible and intangible dimensions of Ojibwe’s traditional water stewardship, which involves reciprocal relationships between humans and water as well as ceremonies and intergenerational water-based stewardship. The final two themes established how the Ojibwe’s traditional ecological knowledge centered people’s primordial connections with water and viewed water as a person (not a thing or resource). The community was most responsive to collaborations which began on indigenous terms and recognized indigenous knowledge as “knowledge”—not “beliefs” or “worldviews.”
This collaborative research yielded traditional ecological knowledge while identifying points where tribes could leverage Western science techniques and data in certain situations to integrate indigenous knowledge and scientific knowledge successfully. The authors also argue that scientists should consider cultural values in water quality metrics and integrate indigenous knowledge into Western water stewardship theories and practices. Finally, the authors characterize this study as a template for successful collaborations between indigenous communities and university researchers.
The Bottom Line