Outcome 6: Researching Together: Rethinking the Relationship between Academia and Koorie Communities considers the lessons learned from this project for researchers and communities working together.
Outcome 7: Education and Training for Professional Practice and Scholarship applies the principles and outcomes of this research to recordkeeping education and research training.
Participant 23, Stage 1
"When I was telling people about this interview, that was the same feeling. "Just be careful what you say"."
Many of the outcomes presented in this report are located at the point of engagement of Indigenous and Western knowledge systems. At several points the researchers point to the need for paradigm shifts - for socio-legal systems, institutions and information professionals to rethink their foundations, to learn to recognise the ways in which these foundations are based on, and hence preference, Western understandings of evidence and memory to the exclusion of Indigenous ones, and in turn, to take on board the reality that these dominant paradigms have contributed to the marginalisation and colonisation of Indigenous Australians.
The research team was aware at the outset, at least to some extent, of an inherent tension in the research we were about to undertake: that it is based in one of the cornerstones of the Western knowledge system - academia. As the research has proceeded, however, we have learned much about the inadequacies of our engagement with Koorie communities and have recognised the need for a transformation of academic research so that its methods and outcomes value and embody an Indigenous worldview.
Participant 4, Stage 1
"Interviewer: Can you tell me a bit about what kinds of stories might be entrusted to different groups?
Without stepping on the toes I guess it is difficult. See I am a male talking to two females and it is difficult to be specific about the male specific stories."
In general terms, protocols for academic research involving people seek to ensure that research reflects the values of:
As the project was being developed standard academic research ethics approaches were applied to the research design. A procedure was established for gaining informed consent of participants and data was managed to ensure anonymity and confidentiality. Transcripts of interviews were returned to participants for checking and the right of participants to withdraw at any time was reiterated. Aware that Koorie communities have been much interviewed and studied by researchers sometimes with no apparent return to the community, the research team developed an information dissemination strategy which included sending periodical progress reports to participants. The project originated from within a longstanding relationship between the two major research partners, the Koorie Heritage Trust and Public Record Office Victoria, and their joint expression of the need to better deal with Koorie oral memory became the premise of the project. Hence the project appeared to satisfy a requirement to be of benefit to Koorie people.
Beyond the direct need to satisfy formal research ethics requirements the team was aware that, given the nature of our topic - trusted archival systems and services for Koorie people - we needed from the outset to apply the very notions we were investigating. As a project team involving both Indigenous and non-Indigenous researchers, we recognised the need to build relationships of trust with the Indigenous communities of Victoria and particularly with those members who would become a part of the research community for this project. One way of doing this was to establish a project Advisory Group involving Koorie community representatives and recordkeeping professionals to periodically review the project’s progress and provide feedback to the research team.
Another way of building relationships was to engage an Elder, Diane Singh, as a research fellow. Initially the focus of Ms Singh’s role was community liaison; identifying and contacting potential participants, administering the informed consent process and being responsible for follow-up contact via community newsletters.
Participant 11, Stage 1
"We're the most studied people in the world. They've studied us for years and there was no consulting about it when they took our land. There was no consulting when they dug up our remains and took to the museums to study. There was nothing."
Participant 53, Stage 1
"Interviewer: So the recording might put [the storyteller] off.
Yes, and the pain of actually talking about that. They'd have to be completely comfortable with talking about it. So maybe sitting in a one-to-one situation, with someone like you, or like the fact that Di's in the room with us and she's an Indigenous person, making sure there is that Indigenous presence there and make someone feel comfortable with telling a story…"
Participant 3, Stage 1
"I’m of the belief that people have done things and used it and abused it and worked it to death over the times. They’ve used us as guinea pigs. A lot of people have done research and papers and things like that. Coming from a mission I’ve been through it all. People have done papers and you never get feedback or access to it. I think it’s important to give feedback."
The project thus began with a sincere intention to work collaboratively and respectfully with Koorie communities and to learn from, not just about, those communities. Without dismissing the points at which the research team has given effect to these intentions, we believe there are lessons to be learned from this particular instance of academic research based in an Indigenous community.
As often occurs with multidisciplinary applied research, an Advisory Group was formed at the commencement of the project. Membership reflected the various interests and expertises relevant to the project and included Koorie community representatives, recordkeepers and librarians representing key institutions and information technologists. A priority was to ensure that the Group could have input into the project without imposing too much work on busy people, hence meetings were infrequent. From the point of view of some members of the Advisory Group, meetings were too infrequent and did not provide sufficient opportunity to give meaningful feedback. Although all members of the group were very interested in the research and committed to the project’s objectives, it became evident that an alternative, or perhaps additional forum was needed for a community-based research project such as this one. In particular, the Advisory Group did not adequately represent the participants in the research - the interviewees. In discussion with Koorie Elders on the Advisory Group the research team came to the view that a reference group, comprised of all participants in the research, was a more appropriate forum for providing feedback, seeking advice and validation of the research.
Participant 43, Stage 1
"It's no use having a story, for me, and then keeping it to yourself. But then that is so sacred it is only said within and to certain people within the family confines. So if someone from the university was to ask me, I'd say no. It is very, very selective who it be told to because you want that treasured. I still have a thing of seeing how historical data is questioned, how it is presented and interpreted, and then somehow the meaning goes out of that. So if I was to tell someone I would perhaps, not play it dumb, but I don't go beyond to let people know because that is very private."
Direct involvement of community representatives as research partners rather than research subjects, is relatively new in university research communities. Current research governance and protocols in universities, which include the processes for ensuring that the responsibilities of institutions and researcher are monitored, are based on ownership models that do not adequately recognise legal or moral rights of community partners. Joint control and ownership of research agenda, data and products are complex areas that require negotiations between many competing interests. (Iacovino, forthcoming).
Protocols for researching in Australian Indigenous communities have been developing within academia for several decades. These have attempted to apply the underlying values of ethical research to academic engagement with Indigenous people. However, as the above quote highlights, there is a limit to how far protocols steeped in Western academic tradition can go towards supporting community-based research. In the course of this project the research team has become increasingly aware of the ways in which, despite other intentions, the members of Koorie communities who contributed to the project have been positioned as subjects, not participants. Positioning academic and community participants in research as equal partners challenges many of the tenets of academic research institutions, protocols and methodologies. Some of the implications are:
Despite the tensions and struggles expressed above, there are reasons to be optimistic about the future of academia supported community-based research. Our expression of the inadequacies of current practices is far from unique, and the need for new approaches to researching with communities of various types is beginning to influence some university processes around the globe. Our experience of working and learning together enables us to envisage a transformation of parts of academia to make a participatory model of community-based research a reality. We are also confident that as the benefits to all parties of such a transformation are realised, new approaches will gradually become embedded within academic principles and processes.
Participant 26, Stage 1
"Interviewer: Did you seek help from the librarian?
No. When you're looking at something you can't take up their time. There is not always someone there available that can show you how to work things. You pay your money to use the machine and then you're sort of left to your own devices. If you don't even know what you're looking for or how to go about looking for what you're looking for…"
Participant 58, Stage 1
"I know through meeting a lot of people from the stolen generation, and actually seeing them get access to their records, it's quite daunting. Files and files of stuff. I've sat there when people have ten A4 folders about them. You don't even know that much about yourself let alone somebody else to write that much."
Participant 18, Stage 1
"It would be nice to meet up with someone who could tell us exactly what's there and show us where to go, then be taken to the place each individual person which area they want to go into. I think it would be very important to have somebody with you and also have that little bit of privacy so that you could go through things yourself. I think it would be really important to have support there but also to have that amount of privacy if you wanted to go through your records, you could go through it, but at the end of you've got somebody there because it could turn out a bit traumatic and just need a bit of back up a bit of support."
Participant 35, Stage 1
"Interviewer: She talked to a lot of people?
She did, not just family. She never talked cultural stuff at all. Her boys played footy so she was involved with the footy, but she always kept that to herself. She was never in anybody's face or anything like that. She was great, that's why I was devastated when I couldn't find her birth certificate. When she passed away, as a grandchild we thought we would see how old Nan really really was.
Interviewer: And there wasn't a birth certificate?
No, and when you find the mission records that they're registered just like cattle records. That's a little bit devastating, because she was a person."
Participant 56, Stage 1
"Interviewer: So you would prefer Indigenous staff to manage the collection?
Yes I would, because there is always training out there. If this person wasn't as good as that person, train them up. Make them as good as that person. It's not their fault that that person has had the training and they haven't. I'm sure the capacity is there for that person to be trained."
The Trust and Technology research project has not directly investigated the question of whether the educational experiences currently available to Australian recordkeepers adequately support them in working with Indigenous communities. There is, however, an obvious direct link between the ability and readiness of practitioners to give effect to the directions proposed in this report and the foundational professional education and ongoing development undertaken by recordkeepers. Similarly there is a clear relationship between the readiness of researchers and research students to adopt more participatory research models, as proposed in the previous section of this report, and the formal and informal research training provided to them, and the expectations set for them, by academia.
Three broad observations relevant to professional education arise from Trust and Technology.
First, recordkeepers need an education which enables them to, and expects them to, recognise their own cultural perspectives and how these come into play in their work. Understanding that they are working within and applying a particular ontology is an essential first step towards recognising and embracing multiple ontologies. Recordkeepers need to be able to recognise the contexts in which the dominant conceptualisations and theory of their work have been developed, and the values on which these are based. Definitions - record, creator, evidence, ownership, authenticity - reflect a particular knowledge framework. Recordkeepers need to be able to identify the points at which this knowledge framework agrees with, excludes and conflicts with the ways of knowing and keeping of those with different cultural perspectives.
Recordkeepers also need exposure to the experiences of Indigenous Australians who have interacted with the dominant knowledge framework represented by mainstream archival institutions. These experiences should profoundly shape the perceptions and attitudes which recordkeepers have about the job they do. Koorie participants in this project have powerfully told of their experiences of using archival records and services, and many more recordkeeping professionals need to hear these stories directly. Some understandings which emerge from Trust and Technology are:
Initiatives to increase the participation of Indigenous Australians in archival education need to continue and be extended (assuming that that education is pluralistic and culturally aware and does not simply impose current paradigms on students). In particular, efforts to develop and sustain community-based Indigenous archives programs need Indigenous recordkeeping professionals who are able to work across the usual boundaries of institutional archives and who can continue to reshape the services and systems within these community-based programs and in other settings.
Addressing the implications of this research will require educators themselves to grapple with a new paradigm within their own domain. Some key issues to be explored are:
Leading employers and professional associations as well as recordkeeping educators need to be involved in addressing these issues. A set of principles derived from this report should inform course recognition/accreditation and the expectations set by employers and professional associations for ongoing professional development.
Many archival educators are already addressing the need to overhaul recordkeeping education to enable it to be more culturally diverse. Pluralizing the Archival Paradigm through Education, a collaboration involving researchers from the University of California Los Angeles, Monash University and Renmin University (Beijing), is an example of a current project examining the need for recordkeeping education that is inclusive of local and Indigenous knowledge and practices and is culturally sensitive and responsive. Inherent in this research is the understanding that integrating Indigenous knowledge and practices into the global paradigm within which archival theory and practice is situated will make that paradigm more inclusive and less in danger of being a neo-colonial force. This research project provides scope for the paradigmatic shifts which the Trust and Technology project proposes to be investigated further, particularly with regard to their implications for recordkeeping education.
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