Ethno-ornithology

Birds, Indigenous Peoples, Culture and Society

Sonia C. Tidemann, Andrew Gosler, Sonia C. Tidemann, Andrew Gosler, Sonia Tidemann

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN: 9781844077830
• eBook ISBN: 9781136543838
• Topic: Biological Sciences
• Subtopic: Ecology
• Index: Biological Sciences

Indigenous knowledge that embraces ornithology takes in whole social dimensions that are inter-linked with environmental ethos, conservation and management for sustainability. In contrast, western approaches have tended to reduce knowledge to elemental and material references. This book looks at the significance of indigenous knowledge of birds and their cultural significance, and how these can assist in framing research methods of western scientists working in related areas.
As well as its knowledge base, this book provides practical advice for professionals in conservation and anthropology by demonstrating the relationship between mutual respect, local participation and the building of partnerships for the resolution of joint problems. It identifies techniques that can be transferred to different regions, environments and collections, as well as practices suitable for investigation, adaptation and improvement of knowledge exchange and collection in ornithology.
The authors take anthropologists and biologists who have been trained in, and largely continue to practise from, a western reductionist approach, along another path - one that presents ornithological knowledge from alternative perspectives, which can enrich the more common approaches to ecological and other studies as well as plans of management for conservation.

Part I

Introduction

1

Indigenous Knowledges, Birds that Have ‘Spoken’ and Science

Sonia Tidemann, Sharon Chirgwin and J. Ross Sinclair

Knowledges and ethno-ornithology

The accumulated knowledge of indigenous peoples has enabled them to survive and flourish in some of the most difficult environments of the world, and to develop rich and diverse cultures that describe quite different relationships with their surroundings from those of most Western cultures. In order to understand and appreciate indigenous perspectives on creatures such as birds, it is necessary first to review how indigenous peoples view the world, and how their knowledge is produced, owned and recorded (Medin and Atran, 1999).

Indigenous peoples have been accumulating knowledge for many generations about their interactions with the physical and spiritual world through processes of conceiving, considering and experimenting (Arbon, 2008; Trafzer et al, 2008). Typically, the knowledge that results from these processes is unique to the particular indigenous group and the specific geographical location. Accordingly, there is no one homogeneous body of indigenous knowledge; neither are there globally recognizable methods of categorizing, as there are for the Western disciplines. It is therefore not surprising that some researchers describe what is known by indigenous peoples as local knowledges (Briggs et al, 2006).

What indigenous peoples know about the world, and the place of people in it, forms a broad understanding of existence that is intertwined with spirituality, language and the environment. Indigenous knowledge is therefore variously described by Western scholars as holistic (Christie, 2006), utilitarian and grounded (Briggs et al, 2006), but by indigenous peoples themselves as ‘a living, breathing concept’ (Whap, 2001) that is relational, pluralistic and infinite (Malloch, 1989; Little Bear, 2000; Shiva, 2000). Irrespective of how it is described, the central tenet of indigenous knowledge is connectivity, where all elements may be infused with spirit and where human life is not superior to other elements (Johnson, 1992). The place of spirituality in ‘other knowledges’ may be hard for the Western mind to grasp; but it is a dominant feature of many indigenous cultures. From the indigenous perspective, it is the Western way that misses this: the Western culture is the only culture in the world – perhaps the only culture that the world has ever known – that argues for the non-existence of any dimension or reality which the senses cannot perceive. Accordingly, every alternative to scientific, sensorial reality is rendered as metaphor (Lehman, 2008).

Indigenous knowledge is passed to successive generations by cultural transmission (Berkes, 1999). Symbols and totems, art, song, ritual ceremonies and dance (Janke, 2005) may be used, or in a more prosaic setting a young weaver or hunter or gardener may learn by working with older people. There may be chosen ‘keepers’ who have the responsibility to both safeguard and transmit portions of the knowledge to future generations (Bell et al, 2007), or particular forms of knowledge that belong to a specific demographic within the group such as one sex or a particular family (Bourke, 1997; Whap, 2001).

Over the last three decades there has gradually been wider and better understanding and appreciation of the indigenous perspective and indigenous knowledge. This has occurred as more and more indigenous scholars have taken their place in academia and presented their ontological and epistemological stance using the medium that Western scholars understand, and as some Western scholars have developed a more nuanced approach to studying indigenous knowledge. Many indigenous scholars have argued strongly for the parallel status of their knowledge in academia (Raseroka, 2008). They argue for their form of knowledge, which represents many different ways of making sense of the world, to be extended alongside that of existing Western knowledge (Tuhiwai Smith, 1999).

There is also an argument for the improved status of the methodologies used in the collection and interpretation of knowledge. Some indigenous researchers feel that, at best, certain methodologies favoured in the collection and interpretation of indigenous knowledge have had little acceptance by Western academics as authentic research tools (Lekolo, 2007). The methodologies of narrative and storytelling are two of these, and have revealed a lot of the knowledge about birds presented in this book. Narrative has, however, gradually found a place in a plethora of Western disciplines in many diverse forms, and has been identified as a methodology that enables individuals to claim identity (Reissman, 2008). While Western minds may have issues with validation in both narration and storytelling, from the indigenous perspective it is the relationship between the researcher and the narrator who claims to have the right to narrate, the authorship of stories and the intelligibility of the work that are important considerations (Lekolo, 2007).

In applying a Western perspective to indigenous knowledge, it has been compartmentalized and disconnected from the history and culture of which it is part (Sillitoe, 1998; Ellis and West, 2004). Although the antithesis of the indigenous worldview, this process has contributed to the understanding of indigenous knowledge with terms such as ethno-ecology, ethnobotany, ethnoornithology, indigenous knowledge and traditional ecological knowledge (TEK), now commonplace and useful constructs, particularly for those brought up in the Western paradigm. These terms also provide a useful base and starting point in the dialogue between indigenous and Western bodies of knowledge.

Birds that have ‘spoken’ and science

The focus of this book is ethno-ornithology. Ethno-ornithology is a Western term, although, as a concept, it is embraced by many cultures across the world. It is more than ornithology or just ‘the study of’ birds in cultures: it is all that, but it is also more. Portrayals of birds through art, patterns of utilization, language, life from creation to death, bearers of messages and interactions in everyday life are all examples of ethno-ornithology. As a term, ethno-ornithology is useful because it refers broadly to the complex of inter-relationships between birds, humans and all other living and non-living things, whether in terrestrial or extra-terrestrial spheres or in body or in spirit.

Too often, ethno-ornithological knowledge is reported from the perspective of an outsider and therefore appears to be in some way devalued. The terms legends, fables, tales, myths and stories are frequently used for indigenous knowledge, but not always in a way that engenders respect or an understanding of the place of birds in cultures. As an example, del Hoyo et al (1992) report that Cassowaries Casuarius spp. of the island of New Guinea are of ‘great ritual and mystical significance. They appear in numerous legends and tribal tales and many strange beliefs are held about them.’

The importance of birds in non-Western cultures is all too frequently ignored in even the most comprehensive of Western texts. For example, in Australia, the Emu Dromaius novaehollandiae, a large, iconic flightless bird, can be found across about three-quarters of the continent. Despite there being dozens of published accounts of Emus from over 40 Aboriginal languages, not a single mention of Emus from an Aboriginal perspective occurs in the authoritative Handbook of the Birds of the World (edited by del Hoyo et al, 1992-2008).

This book will have succeeded if it does nothing more than raise awareness of alternative bodies of ornithological knowledge. This introductory chapter looks at indigenous knowledge and ethno-ornithological knowledge. It examines portrayals of birds from an historical perspective and uses this platform to introduce the chapters in Part II. Chapters 2 and 3 look broadly at ethno-ornithology, its relationships with conservation and its wider significance for the increasingly globalized, and globalizing, Western cultures of the world.

Historically, birds have been prominent in art, literature and sculpture, have been accredited with supernatural powers, have played a role in songs, ceremony and dance, as well as day-to-day existence, and have been linked to both death and some of life's grea...

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Figures, Tables and Plates
• Foreword by Eugene S. Hunn
• Preface
• Contributors
• Abbreviations
• Part I — Introduction
• Part II — Birds: Hunting and Products
• Part III — Birds and Knowledge
• Part IV — Birds: Story and Language
• Part V — Birds and Conservation
• Index