Ethics and Pragmatism in Indigenous Research

Webcast Recordings Public Event Workshop Schedule

The UBC Centennial Emerging Research Workshop on Ethics and Pragmatism in Indigenous Research will be held on February 22-24, 2016.

This workshop is intended to bring together a critical mass of UBC researchers, together with key community leaders in the field, to engage in cross-disciplinary dialogue on emerging opportunities to build meaningful relationships between indigenous communities and research institutions.

Key to this workshop is moving beyond the theoretical frameworks, to develop and understand pragmatic approaches to these research partnerships.

Public Event

Confronting the Fractures: A World Water Day Screening + UBC Researcher Panel Discussion of Fractured Land

As part of the Centennial Emerging Research Workshops on Indigenous Studies and Water, UBC is co-presenting a World Water Day (March 22) screening of the celebrated documentary Fractured Land. Presented in partnership with Vancity Theatre, the screening will be followed by a panel discussion with leading UBC researchers, moderated by Mark Forsythe, author and former host of CBC Radio’s Almanac .

WORKSHOP SCHEDULE

Click to view the full Workshop schedule on February 22 - 24, 2016

There will be four themes discussed over the course of the three days: Health, Curatorial and Artistic Practices, Natural Resources, and a capstone session on Ethics and Pragmatism. Each theme will feature presentations by key speakers and a case study discussion demonstrating important lessons learned in indigenous community-based research. Panel discussions will build on the ideas and initiatives of each workshop topic.

Opening-day events take place at the Ideas Lounge, Peter Wall Institute and the Belkin Art Gallery. All workshop sessions take place in the Jack Poole Hall in UBC's Robert H. Lee Alumni Centre.

Click on the speaker names in the schedule for more information about their research and work.

February 22, 2016: Opening Reception

Welcome Reception and Curator's Tour

5:00 pm - 6:00 pm | Belkin Art Gallery Curator's Tour

Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery
1825 Main Mall, Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z2

The evening will begin with a Curator's tour of the Lalakenis / All Directions: A Journey of Truth and Unity exhibit at the Belkin Art Gallery.

6:00 pm - 7:00 pm | Welcome Reception

Sage East Dining Room
University Centre
6331 Crescent Road, Vancouver

Hosted by Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies

February 23, 2016: Workshop Day One

Jack Poole Hall, The Robert H. Lee Alumni Centre
6163 University Boulevard, Vancouver BC, V6T 1Z1

8:30 - 9:00 am | Coffee and Registration

9:00 am - 12:00 pm | Session One: The Cedar Project

The Cedar Project Partnership is a community-based research project driven by Indigenous leadership, community partners and the Centre for Health Evaluation and Outcome Sciences at UBC. The Cedar Project explores the relationship between colonisation, residential schools, and intergenerational trauma and vulnerability to HIV and hepatitis C infection among young Aboriginal people in BC. This session will be an in-depth examination of the Cedar Project Partnership by researchers and community members on its reduction in self-harm in Aboriginal communities.

Session Speakers:

Keynote Speaker #1: Nadine Caron, Anishnawbe, University of British Columbia
Introduction to Cedar: Patricia Spittal, SPPH Professor, University of British Columbia and Vicky Thomas, Wuikinuxv Nation
Keynote Speaker #2: Kukpi7 Wayne Christian, Te Splats’in Secwepemc
Discussant: Mary Teegee, Takla Lake First Nation

Closing Summary by Vicky Thomas.

12:00 pm - 1:00 pm | Lunch

1:00 pm - 4:00 pm | Session Two: Curation after Truth and Reconciliation

In 2013 the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery presented "Witnesses: Art and Canada’s Indian Residential Schools," an exhibition that set out to educate the public about Indian Residential Schools; it illustrated how this issue has become embedded in Canadian art history and cannot be erased from a broader public consciousness. The exhibition saw record numbers of visitors to the Gallery and involved unprecedented levels of collaboration and programming, coinciding with the Vancouver meeting of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the University's mobilization around this event.

The proposed workshop will reflect on this experience through presentations by curators, academics, artists and community leaders involved in the process. Following the very public airing of difficult truths and trauma of residential school survivors, the workshop will ask what, if any, role does artistic practice play in addressing the collective wounds created by residential schools and the broader history of settler colonialism? More specifically, it will take Witnesses as a case study to explore the efficacy of the curatorial process and framing, the art works selected, the ways in which the community (survivors, students and others) were engaged, and how the exhibition continues to circulate more than two years after its closing.

Session Speakers:

Shelly Rosenblum, Curator of Academic Programs, Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, UBC
Tarah Hogue, Curatorial Resident, grunt Gallery
Dana Claxton, Associate Professor, Department of Art History, Visual Art and Theory, UBC
Geoffrey Carr, Assistant Professor, Visual Arts, University of the Fraser Valley
Lisa Jackson, Filmmaker
Angela White, Workshop Coordinator, Indian Residential School Survivors Society

February 24, 2016: Workshop Day Two

Jack Poole Hall, The Robert H. Lee Alumni Centre
6163 University Boulevard, Vancouver BC, V6T 1Z1

8:30 am - 9:00 am | Coffee and Registration

9:00 Am - 12:00 pm | Session Three: Natural Resources

Aboriginal communities are engaged in transformation. Are you? Some communities have spearheaded initiatives that have lifted their members out of gross poverty. Some communities feel that universities have been extractive, inept, time-wasting and unable to produce useful outputs; they are not enthusiastic about further contact with universities. In other countries, the universities and Aboriginal communities have more productive engagement. What changes are needed in UBC?

9:00 AM - 10:30 AM | Keynote Lectures

Session Speakers:

Fikret Berkes, University of Manitoba
Garry Merkel, Tahtlan Nation Development Corporation

10:30 AM - 12:00 PM | Panel Discussion

Discussants:

John Bass, Associate Professor, School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture, UBC
Madjid Mohseni, Professor, Department of Chemical & Biological Engineering, UBC
Gary Bull, Professor, Department of Forest Resources Management, UBC

12:00 pm - 1:00 pm | Lunch

1:00 pm - 4:00 pm | Capstone Session: Ethics and Pragmatism

Elaborate protocols now apply to university research in and for Aboriginal communities to counter the previous extractive practices. These protocols sometimes slow the preparation and publication of results from research projects. In general communities decry the lack of University support for the implementation of research findings and question the asymmetry in benefit sharing. Social studies researchers may be thus at a disadvantage when compared with their computer modelling and laboratory-based colleagues who encounter no such impediments. What changes can be considered?

This session will also include a student research exposition by students who have demonstrated exemplary engagement with indigenous communities in their research.

Session Presenters:

UBC First Nation and Indigenous Studies Program:
Daniel Justice, Chair and Professor
Danette Jubinville, Alumni, First Nations and Indigenous Studies Program
Lydia Ruenzel, Alumni, First Nations and Indigenous Studies Program

Closing remarks from Helen Burt, Associate Vice President Research & International

This workshop is being developed in partnership with

Contact

For more information regarding the workshop, please contact the workshop coordinator:

Zachary Zabawa

z.zabawa175@gmail.com

As UBC celebrates its 100th year, we invite you to join us in acknowledging that this workshop will take place on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territory of the Musqueam people. We thank the Musqueam Nation for its hospitality and support of our work.