The Role of the Body in Indigenous and Decolonizing Research Methodologies

Session Submission Type: Working Group Roundtable

Abstract

This working group roundtable session will examine the role of embodiment in decolonizing and Indigenous methodologies. Through exploring our embodied research practice in Indigenous communities, we will interrogate the themes related to embodiment that are emerging in research with decolonizing and Indigenous methodologies using the following questions:

What is the place of embodiment (Mind/Body) in decolonizing and Indigenous methodologies?

Sub questions:
How are issues of colonization present in our bodies?
What does it mean to decolonize the body?
What is the role of the body in Indigenous methodologies and epistemologies?
What are the felt/bodied/embodied ways of knowing, ways of being, and practices that have emerged in research with Indigenous methodologies?
How do we unlearn, relearn or transform ways of being in our felt senses?
What is the role of the arts and cultural expression in this process?

Sub Unit

• SIG-Indigenous Peoples of the Americas

Chair

• Warren S. Linds, Concordia University

Papers

• The body speaks: Theatre as an embodied decolonizing methodology - Warren S. Linds, Concordia University; Linda M. Goulet, First Nations University of Canada; Heather Ritenburg, University of Regina; Jo-Ann Episkenew, Indigenous People's Health Research Centre; Karen Schmidt, File Hills Qu'Appelle Tribal Council

• Mana Whenua: Belonging - Meri A. M. A. Marshall, Victoria University of Wellington

• Spaces of Knowing: Bodies, Tribal Knowledges, and Indigenous Methodologies - Margaret Elizabeth Kovach, University of Saskatchewan

• Embodying All Our Relations - Denise Nadeau, Concordia University; Alannah YoungLeon, University of British Columbia