IIRC COLLABS

Leaders: Dr Shaun Awatere and team

As Indigenous peoples, our care of land, sea, sky and people has spanned millennia and evolved to ensure survival in a healthy biosphere. Indigenous knowledge and Indigenous-led research have a vital part to play as the world meets the challenges of climate change. What do we need to be doing now to ensure the survival of our peoples, communities, environments, lifeways and future generations?  What priorities should we be establishing to ensure that Indigenous people are empowered to determine and lead pathways towards transformative climate change adaptation and mitigation outcomes? How can Indigenous scholars and researchers best contribute to this effort? This COLLAB will engage with these questions, the goal being to identify priorities for achieving meaningful and enduring climate change outcomes for Indigenous communities and realised through scholarly activity. COLLAB discussion will focus on behaviours, institutions, rights, knowledge, resourcing, communication, and other priorities.

Leaders: Professor Papaarangi Reid and team

Mental wellbeing is of significant concern worldwide, especially for youth. The indicators of mental stress and distress are particularly concerning for Indigenous youth. Underlying factors, including poverty, bullying, family estrangement, inadequate mental health support and a sense that life is hopeless, have been noted in the literature. For Indigenous peoples, all these factors can be linked to colonisation and the underlying ideology of white supremacy and racism. Intervention strategies that promote and develop cultural strengths have shown these to be important protective factors however they are less effective in protecting against racism. Recent work with rangatahi Māori recommends interventions that are comprehensive, sustained, multidimensional, Indigenous and rangatahi-led, operating with an antiracist praxis and within a context of political will to meaningfully address the fundamental issues. In this COLLAB, we seek to create a community of practice amongst those interested in connecting over this issue.

 Leaders: Associate Professor Karyn Paringatai and team

This COLLAB will bring together researchers interested in unlocking the potential of technology that will accelerate knowledge regeneration amongst Indigenous communities. Rather than be restricted by on-trend technological innovations that have had no Indigenous input into their creation or design, we will build a programme of work that looks at how we can maximise the potential of technology on our own terms and in doing so, ensure a flourishing Indigenous future in the digital space.

 Leaders: Professor Joanna Kidman and team

What counts as truth in the digital age is increasingly driven by social media, clickbait, and online networks and platforms with little or no regulation. During the Covid pandemic, large amounts of information were available on the internet, but not all of it came from reliable sources. Simultaneously, disinformed social movements coalesced and gathered in strength and numbers as the pandemic went on and public uncertainty grew. This COLLAB centres on Indigenous narratives and understandings of these social phenomena and the recognition that Indigenous solutions, devised and tailored for Indigenous communities, are an effective means of combatting the growing tide of misinformation and disinformation online and at large in civil society. We ask how we can serve to safeguard the mauri (life force) of Indigenous communities where members are promoting or engaging with conspiracy theories? How can the richness of Indigenous ways of being, thinking and doing be mobilised to help heal the social and emotional damage and anguish caused when conspiracy theories and disinformation take hold?  This COLLAB invites people to share Indigenous solutions and to grow new ones. 

Leaders: Professor Tahu Kukutai, Associate Professor Donna Cormack and team

Indigenous peoples have fraught histories with data and statistics produced as part of the colonial project. While there are now new technologies at play, the power to decide whether and how Indigenous peoples are counted, classified, surveilled and ‘acted’ on continues to lie with governments and, increasingly the private sector. Transforming the locus of power over Indigenous data from nation states back to Indigenous peoples lies at the heart of Indigenous Data Sovereignty (IDSov). 

This COLLAB provides an opportunity for researchers, practitioners, activists and advocates interested in IDSov to come together, share, learn, inspire, and catalyse action. Universities are sites in particular need of intervention. Many have collected, acquired and extracted a significant amount of Indigenous data but lack a basic understanding about what Indigenous data they hold and to whom the data belongs, let alone have a plan to uphold their responsibilities and accountabilities. Perhaps a change is timely.