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Review of the book "Research is Ceremony" by Shawn Wilson for TEL 713
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Review of the book "Research is Ceremony" by Shawn Wilson for TEL 713
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The speaker introduces a podcast called People of the Four Directions and reviews a book called Research as Ceremony by Sean Wilson. The book explores Indigenous research methods and the author's personal journey as an academic researcher. The speaker highlights the relational style of the book and its focus on finding one's voice and worldview within the academic setting. They also mention the author's discussion of ontology, epistemology, methodology, and axiology in Indigenous research. The book includes subheadings that represent people the author met at Indigenous research conferences. The speaker shares a story from the book about Coyote's experience with education and how it relates to Indigenous research. They emphasize the importance of connecting to oneself and looking in all directions. The speaker also shares a personal story about their grandfather and the connection they feel through language and spirit. They conclude by expressing their appreciation for the book's academ Welcome to the People of the Four Directions podcast-o-matic, where communities of hope, communities of power, find their voice in setting the world as they see it. I'm Michael Littlecrow, and I'm here today to review a seminal book on Indigenous research methods called Research as Ceremony. Author is Sean Wilson, who's a fellow countryman of mine from up in Canada, from the Cree Nation. And what is amazing about this book is I bought it about a year ago, never got around to reading it. It sounded good when I read the description, but then it was just sitting there waiting for me when the right time came in my own research cycle. The book is written in a very relational style. In fact, much of the book is written as a letter to Sean Wilson's three sons, describing to them his journey of becoming an academic researcher, but the struggles he had in finding his voice, finding his way to show his worldview within the academic setting. Which is interesting, because both his parents were academics as well, so it's kind of like an intergenerational journey. He talks about his parents, who were both professors, both had earned their doctorate degrees, and he talks about himself working on his doctoral program, his research. And he's writing to the next generation, his children, in a way that they could understand. And throughout the text, Sean, as I'll call him, because by the time I got through this book, I felt I had made a friend. I made a relative, actually. And all the thoughts I had had about what Indigenous research was or is or should be was really brought out by this, I guess I'll call him an uncle. I'm not quite sure his age, he might be about the same age as me, but certainly he has gone ahead on the journey of doing Indigenous research. He has paved a path for me, a circular path, as he brings out what we choose to study. So often in research, we have all these big words that we use, like ontology, epistemology, methodology, and axiology, and he ties them together that they're all in a circle, and one leads into the other. You can't really have a discussion about ontology unless you think about epistemology. So ontology is how you see the world, as I believe he has said it. Epistemology is how we know when we know something. Methodology is our way of going about it, and the axiology is how we get there. But what was really, I don't know, I can't give too much away about this text, except that the subheadings are names of people he shared this journey with, as far as going to various Indigenous research conferences, and how they met up in groups and they had discussions, and they went places, and one's from Australia, one's from Canada, and what are the elements of an Indigenous research epistemology? I guess it says it best when he kind of gives a story about the research process from his perspective, and maybe I could just read that one for you. So here it is. It's a story he gives, well, let me just read the story for you. On page 17, if you happen to pick up the book, Coyote was once again fed up with running around all day in the hot sun for a few scrawny gophers and rabbits, dirt up his nose, dirt in his eyes, and what for? Barely a mouthful. Coyote had tried getting food at the supermarket one time, like the human people do, but got the, well, something kicked out of him for that. So once again, he went to his brother, Raven, to ask him for advice. Coyote said, Raven, there's got to be an easier way to get fed. I tried the supermarket, got beaten up. Tried to get money from welfare, but came up against the devil's spawn in a Kmart dress. Nothing's worked so far. You got any other ideas? Well, Raven said thoughtfully, the white humans seem pretty well fed, and they say that the key to success is a good education. Maybe you could go to school. Hmm, Coyote mused. Maybe I'll try it. Couldn't hurt. Well, Coyote went off to the city to the university, because that's where Raven said adults go to school. In a few days, Coyote was back. Well, brother, Raven inquired, did you get your education? Not exactly, Coyote replied. Education is as hard to get as a welfare check. To get an education like the teachers at the university takes at least 10 years. It's the coyote's entire lifetime. And in the end, you don't get paid much anyways. When I got to the university, they asked me what program I was in. I didn't know, so they sent me to this guy who told me about the programs. Kind of like the idea of biology. If I learned more about gophers, maybe they'd be easier to catch. Like the idea of engineering, maybe I could invent a great rabbit trap. But in the end, I settled on the Native Studies. Now that's something I can understand. I've known these guys for thousands of years, even been one when it suited me. So I went to my Introduction to Native Studies course, and can you believe it? The teacher was a white guy. Now how much sense does that make? I saw the Native people around town. Any one of them has got to know more about Native people than some white guy. When I asked this guy what Indian told him the stuff he was saying, he said none. He read it in a book. Then I asked who the Indian was who wrote the book, and he said it wasn't an Indian. It was a white guy. Then I asked him what Indian the guy who wrote the book learned from, and the teacher got mad and told me to sit down. The next day I went to my Indians of North America class. I was really looking forward to meeting all those Indians, and you know what? There was another white guy standing up there and not an Indian in sight. I asked the teacher, are we going to visit all the Indians? He said no. So I asked him, how are we going to learn about Indians then? He said, just like the other guy from a book written by a white guy. So I asked him if I could talk to this guy who wrote the book, and the teacher said no, he's dead. By then I was getting pretty confused about the education stuff, but I went to my next class, Indian Religions, and guess what? When I went in, there wasn't another white guy standing up in the front of the room. There was a white woman. I sat down and asked her, are we going to the sweat lodge? No. Sundance? No. Ya-whippy? No. So now are we going to learn? She said, oh wait, I know, from a book written by a dead white guy. I'm starting to get the hang of this education business. So then I go to my Research Methods class, thinking I've got it figured out. In this class, the teacher, you got it, another white guy, said that our research must be ethical, that we must follow the guidelines set out in the University for Research on Human Subjects. The rules are there, my teacher said, to protect the Indians from unscrupulous researchers. Who made these rules, I asked? You guessed it, a bunch of white guys. They decided we need protecting, and that they were the ones to decide how best to protect us from them. So I told my teacher that I wanted to interview my father. The teacher said, you've got to ask the Ethics Review Committee for permission. What? I've got to ask a bunch of white guys for permission to talk to my own dad? That can't be right. I was confused all over again. So I sat down and thought about all this for a long time. Finally, I figured it out. If white guys teach all the courses about Indians, and they teach in the way white people think, then to find Indians teaching the way Indians think, all I had to do was give up Native Studies and join the White Studies program. Interesting, anyway. That's sort of the thing I ran into myself in trying to do Indigenous research. I think the rules and the IRBs are there to protect, supposedly, what harm has been done to Native communities, but now they're protecting Natives from ourselves. Just a little story about how this connects this book about Indigenous research methods can help connect you to yourself, whether you see yourself as Indigenous or not. My definition of Indigenous is anyone who is willing to look inside themselves and look four directions. We all have color. We're red, yellow, black, white, red. A lot of different colors. It doesn't matter what color we are. We're all humans, and we're all related in that sense. My father was from the Saxon people. They had a struggle through the colonialism of the Roman Empire coming through to them. When I was reading this, I was thinking of my grandfather, who was Cree, Chippewa Cree, but Cree was his first language. When he was getting in the hospital one time, Grandma was there with him. He was sleeping, but he was speaking. I wasn't there, but Grandma and a few of the others were. She told us because she could understand his language. She's Chippewa, of course, not Cree, but she picked that up from him. Anyway, he was sleeping, but he was having a dream where he was talking to his father in Cree. It's just the way we believe things happen. He wanted to go. He had been sick. He had been in pain, but in his conversation, she could tell that what he was saying is he wanted to go. He wanted to go join the long-ago people. His father was saying, son, it's not time. You have your family. You need to go back a few more years, and then you can come join us. I think of that, the relatedness of language, of how the old people did it. In doing our research, doing my research, there's this connection we have through spirit. I don't mean religion. I mean through spirit. It's something that's real to us, to me, as a Bluetooth from my phone to this speaker over here. No wires, no connection, but it speaks to it. I think that's what I got out of this research is ceremonies. It's got spirit. It's got relatedness. It's something that was very interesting to read. It's got academic definitions in there. It was also very enlightening to read. I'm going to leave it at that as far as my book review. It's my first podcast. I hope you all enjoyed it. Anyone who took the time to listen to it. We'll sign off with the Peoples of the Four Directions podcast-o-matic. Thanks.
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