PARENT SESSION
Oral Session 17: Traditional Ecological Knowledge.
Presiding: E Sulzman
Monday, August 2, 8:00 AM to 11:30 AM, Meeting Room F 151.
Ancient knowledge, new questions: Strategies for bringing traditional ecological knowledge into the mainstream ecology classroom.
Kimmerer, Robin1, 1 SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry, Syracuse, NY, USA
ABSTRACT- Most college ecology courses begin their history of the discipline with 19th century Europe, neglecting the highly sophisticated precedents in indigenous knowledge systems. Traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) is increasingly sought by scientists as a potential source of ideas for emerging models of ecosystem management, conservation biology, agroecology and ecological restoration. Thus, college Biology graduates have a high probability of encountering issues involving indigenous cultures and TEK, and yet concepts of TEK are rarely introduced in science education. We argue that Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) has a legitimate role in the education of the next generation of ecologists and natural resource managers and offers a thought provoking alternative to the dominant western worldview. The scope of traditional ecological knowledge has many parallels with the content of a typical college ecology course, making such courses an excellent forum for introducing TEK. This presentation reports the development of educational materials designed to facilitate incorporation of TEK into an undergraduate ecology course. The materials, based on core ecological concepts, present a critical evaluation of two approaches, the familiar scientific approach paired with the perspectives of traditional knowledge. The cross-cultural comparison strengthens student understanding of both the concept and each of the cultural contexts in which it is embedded. Examination of TEK explicitly brings multicultural perspectives into the core of the science curriculum where they have traditionally been absent.
Key words: traditional ecological knowledge, ecology education