Maada’oonidiwag gete-dibaajimowen (“sharing old stories”): reflections on a place-based reparatory research partnership in Nbisiing Anishinaabeg Territory

Abstract

In this paper, we reflect on an emerging community-based partnership rooted in place-based reparative research. Braiding knowledges (Atalay, 2012) from Nbisiing Anishinaabeg communities, northern Ontario universities, and multi-scalar museums, the partnership focuses on repatriation, reparative environmental histories, and action-based research in the context of settler colonialism and climate change. We reflect on ongoing projects that attempt to put Anishinaabe gikendaasowin (knowledge) into action alongside historical geographical research. We discuss how the partnership resonates with community geography values of relationship, collaboration, equity, and reciprocity, and urge non-Indigenous geographers to acknowledge how Indigenous knowledges and approaches have shaped these ideas long before geography became a discipline. We contend that historical geographers have a deeper role to play in community geography scholarship, citing examples of two projects related to (1) repatriation of Anishinaabeg cultural heritage and (2) storymapping through historical Geographic Information Systems (HGIS). However, we argue, geographers must continue to acknowledge their own positionality in a discipline that was built through settler colonial violence and knowledge production. Finally, we reflect on the role of academic institutions in facilitating First Nation-university-museum partnerships through access to funding, space, and databases, while addressing the challenges of relying on institutional support for reparatory and decolonizing projects.

Will the real people's geography please stand up? Community, public, and participatory geographies in conversation

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Operationalising Indigenous data sovereignty in environmental research and governance

“…Indigenous engagement of GIS around the world is increasing, with communities and people using geospatial systems to record, store and manage their cultural knowledges and values (Potter et al, 2016), produce meaningful narratives about their relationships to landscapes (Jernigan and Roach, 2021), and assert their rights and interests over their territories, lands and waters (Hemsworth et al, 2021). The process of collecting digital spatial information to include in GIS can provide Indigenous peoples a space to share knowledge between generations while slowing the rates at which these knowledges are being lost.…”