CIR Digital Garden
The Collaborative Indigenous Research Digital Garden (CIRDG) brings together two methodological streams: Indigenous methodologies and participatory methodologies.
The CIR Digital Garden functions like a virtual community archive, showcasing examples of participatory Indigenous research which novice and experienced researchers alike will be able to access and learn from. It is our hope that these examples could help scholars situate their work within this field. Researchers will also be able to contribute their own projects for inclusion in the virtual archive, growing it over time.
The aim of the CIR Digital Garden is to promote and expand the field of Collaborative Indigenous Research. The project aims to highlight the methods, ethics, theories of change, and forms of knowledge mobilization present in Collaborative Indigenous Research methodologies. Recognizing the deeply relational approaches to Indigenous research, we hope that projects included here emphasize ways that researchers and collaborators work together to show what sets participatory Indigenous research apart from other Indigenous research methodologies. The turn towards collaborative and participatory research methodologies uplifted through these projects rejects exploitative, extractive and damage-centered research that is all too pervasive in research that interacts with Indigenous communities.
The virtual archive being developed aims to be representative of the interdisciplinary and international scope of Indigenous participatory research and seeks to include research in multiple languages, and across multiple disciplines. So far, the project includes research in both English and Spanish as that reflects the language capabilities of the Tkaronto CIRCLE Lab team currently.
About the Research
Under the research tab, you will find profiles highlighting collaborative Indigenous research projects. Each profile includes a short abstract of the project as well as demographic information about the project such as locations, authors, years and related disciplines. Beyond this basic information, each profile also contains notes about the methodological and ethical frameworks of the project, the theory of change, the kinds of evidence and knowledge mobilization, as well as significant quotes.
The work of creating the metadata for the initial profiles included on this site was undertaken by graduate students, the name of the student who worked on each profile is also included, acknowledging the subjectivity of this descriptive and interpretive work.
Our intention in developing this site is to view it as never complete, as there will always be more contributions to be made. Please visit our contribution page if you would like to submit a research project to be included. Currently, we are especially hoping to grow the Digital Garden in the areas of Queer Life & Wellbeing as well as the Abolition of Policing & Prisons. We also want to expand the geographical scope of the projects as the bulk of the projects are currently from the Americas, Australia and Aotearoa (New Zealand).
How to Contribute
We are imagining the Digital Garden as a website that can be added to continuously to highlight academic and community scholarship that builds upon Collaborative Indigenous Research. We invite you to add to the collection of profiles to further contribute to understandings, writings and theories concerning Collaborative Indigenous Research.
In this turn towards collaborative and participatory research methodologies, we are interested in featuring projects in the archive which are relational, strength-based and focus on the desire-based theories of change– the kinds of projects that reject exploitative, extractive and damage-centered research that is all too pervasive in research that interacts with Indigenous communities.
Click here to download a version of the submission form where you can prepare your research profile in advance before copying it to our “Contribute” page.