Time, Space, and Place in Narrative Inquiry: Learning From Indigenous Perspectives

• In Event: 41.067 - Indigenous Philosophies and Narrative Inquiry: Deepening the Connections

Abstract

Attentiveness to relational ethics in narrative inquiry has been shaped by Dewey's(1938) work, Bergum and Dossetor(2005) and the work of Noddings(1986) and Coles(1989).
Our particular attention to relational ethics in narrative inquiry has also brought us to indigenous scholars including; Baptiste(1995), Basso(1996) Ermine(1995), Archibald(2008), Cajete(1994) and King(2005) whose writing helped us understand the interwovenness of responsibilities, vulnerabilities, mutuality, respect and reciprocity. The work of these scholars particularly shaped understandings of the meanings around relational interconnections.
We were also drawn to deeper understandings of relational ethics by living alongside(Clandinin & Caine, 2008) three Indigenous Elders, Isabelle Kootenay, Francis Whiskeyjack, and Mary Cardinal Collins in a narrative inquiry with youth and families. Over the course of three years we engaged in a narrative inquiry with aboriginal youth attending a junior high school in a large urban Canadian centre. It is through the early processes of beginning to imagine the possibilities within this study that we would further our understanding of relational ethics alongside Elders and knowledge keepers. We soon found the ways in which we would come to understand relationship and ethics through the Elders we spent time with was markedly different than the concepts in scholarly articles and the literature.
We learned and continue to learn about what it might mean to move slow in relationship over time and about the importance of place and identity, as we consider the multiplicity within lives and the geographical contexts that shapes an inquiry...that shapes an emerging and evolving relationship. We were attentive to what it might mean to engage in relationships alongside Elders and knowledge keepers within Treaty 6 territory and within a particular area in Alberta, Canada that is layered in history and layered in story with protocols and rhythms that guide us gently along the way.
We would learn small details to consider through the experiences that involved conversations over cups of tea or the invitation to share a meal, at other times the gentleness of the drum and the sweet smell of sage and introspective time allowed us to become more thoughtful, wakeful to what might be possible over time. These are the experiences and teachings that shape us, sustain us and stay with us in the present.
Many years later long after the initial study the conversations alongside these particular Elders and knowledge keepers are ongoing and continue to evolve as we take serious the relational ethics of narrative inquiry and the commitment to staying with relationships over the long haul...over time and place and through the experiences quite literally learning to trust in a process of living alongside one another in a reciprocal relationship.

Authors

• Vera F. Caine, University of Alberta

• Sean Michael Lessard, University of Alberta

• D. Jean Clandinin, University of Alberta