http://www.loc.gov/mods/v3 http://www.loc.gov/standards/mods/v3/mods-3-2.xsd
Using an indigenous research methodology to decolonize and define self-determination and indigenous governance
An Indigenous Research Methodology (IRM) is a relatively new methodology (appearing in the academic literature in the early 2000s in response to Linda Tuhiwai Smith's seminal 1999 text on Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Peoples) that makes use of old (as in thousands of years old) Indigenous ways of knowing and being that have contemporary relevance. An IRM is a process that acknowledges the past in order to understand the present and therefore change the future. As IRM is grounded in Indigenous worldviews and theories, it is not a subcategory of Western quantitative or qualitative methodologies. IRM is its own methodology; it relies upon Indigenous sources and ways of knowing (epistemologies) in order to achieve an understanding of any given Indigenous topic or question. As noted by Smith (1999) Indigenous Peoples are among the most researched groups of people in the world and all too often in detrimental ways, so much so that research has become a "dirty" word. This has resulted in a state of crisis and requires a complete overhaul, a revolution, in how research is to be conducted with Indigenous peoples. This calls for necessary paradigm shifts at both an individual and societal level. This case study highlights the processes and necessary paradigm shifts required to move from a modified qualitative research process to an IRM in order to identity true Indigenous governing structures and principles, and experience self-determination even while living under a colonial regime.
SAGE Research methods: diversifying and decolonizing research