Metoyer, C.A.; Doyle, A.M.: Introduction to a speicial issue on "Indigenous Knowledge Organization" (2015)
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- Date
- 26. 8.2015 19:22:31
- Footnote
- "How we long to find the right words to introduce you and stir your enthusiasm for this special issue of Cataloging & Classification Quarterly--Indigenous Knowledge Organization. In these articles, we will share with you the inherent beauty in how and why Indigenous people express and fulfill their desire to learn, preserve, organize, and share knowledge. This knowledge is embedded in stories that find expression and location in libraries, archives, and museums. If we explore the situation today, we find that there have been tremendous advancements in knowledge and an unforeseeable proliferation of information. No one can grasp or master it all. This explosion often leads to a sense of fragmentation. On a fundamental level, as human beings, we yearn to understand all this. Where does the knowledge come from? Is there an inherent order to it? How do all the pieces of knowledge fit together? And what is their purpose? We propose that these are questions of philosophy, which Indigenous people have addressed. The articles in this issue range from explicit discussions of Indigenous philosophies to application of such in library, archives, and museums settings. The narratives are compelling. They are first and foremost Indigenous stories fundamentally grounded in a sense of "place" that is endemic to, and inseparable from, indigeneity. If "place" is the luminous web that holds everything "in place," it is good to introduce you to the three places that frame this issue: New Zealand, Canada, and the United States. We begin our journey in New Zealand. In "Ka Po, Ka Ao, Ka Awatea: The Interface between Epistemology and Maori Subject Headings," Lilley analyzes Maori subject headings (Nga Upoko Tukutuku) in the context of Maori philosophy. He argues that the underlying knowledge framework is based on a hierarchy of relationships that emanates from the natural order and that is critical to the understanding of Maori epistemology.
A group of Indigenous seniors, living in Toronto, considered how a collection of handcrafted objects could be used to evoke memory and foster meaning-making in a community setting. In "To Every Artifact Its Voice: Creating Surrogates for Hand-Crafted Indigenous Objects" Howarth and Knight examine the possibilities that stem from traditional approaches to representing and organizing artifacts. Within Canada, the interest in Indigenous knowledge organization is evident in libraries, archives, as well as other types of community institutional settings. A particularly powerful challenge is faced by the National Research Centre through its mandate to apply metadata resulting from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. A description of the National Research Centre's "living archives" is presented by Lougheed, Moran, and Callison. Their article, "Reconciliation through Description: Using Metadata to Realize the Vision of the National Research Centre for Truth and Reconciliation," emphasizes the importance of including Indigenous people in organizing knowledge in a "living archive." And finally from Canada, the Nunavut Libraries Online consortium and Translation Bureau in Nunavut have partnered to address the challenge of organizing multilingual collections. There are three official languages in Nunavut: Inuit (Inuktitut/Inuinnaqtun), English, and French. In her discussion of Nunavut libraries, Rigby examines the shared cataloging practices that have resulted in a common vocabulary for creating bibliographic records.
Let's journey to Great Turtle Island, for some of us, the real first name of the United States. Developing a controlled vocabulary by selecting terms and relationships that reflect Native American philosophies is the challenge that precipitated the Mashantucket Pequot Thesaurus of American Indian Terminology Project. Littletree and Metoyer examine the theoretical framework, methodology, and conceptual foundations of the Thesaurus in "Knowledge Organization from an Indigenous Perspective: The Mashantucket Pequot Thesaurus of American Indian Terminology Project." Using story as epistemology and pedagogy, the article reveals the movement of the Thesaurus from its conception to its application in the Mashantucket Pequot Museum and Research Center. Turner's study, "Decolonizing Ethnographic Documentation: A Critical History of the Early Museum Catalogs at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History," maps the history of cataloging at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History. The article uncovers the Eurocentric norms and assumptions of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries that resulted in the lack of Indigenous knowledge in the museum records. As a means of addressing many of the Eurocentric biases, referenced by Turner, and Littletree and Metoyer, Duarte and Belarde-Lewis ("Imagining: Creating Spaces for Indigenous Ontologies") propose imagining as a viable alternative to misrepresentation and misinformation. They contend that imagining, as a decolonizing methodology, may assist theorists and practitioners in their efforts to accurately catalog and classify Indigenous materials in libraries, archives, and museums. These authors argue that an Indigenous community-based approach to knowledge organization may nullify inaccuracies created by misnaming and other mainstream standardization practices.
- Source
- Cataloging and classification quarterly. 53(2015) no.5/6, S.475-478
