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Contribution to Book
Indigenous Knowledge
Encyclopedia of Quality of Life and Well-Being Research (2014)
  • Sam Grey, University of Victoria
Abstract

Indigenous knowledge (IK) includes the expressions, practices, beliefs, understandings, insights, and experiences of Indigenous groups, generated over centuries of profound interaction with a particular territory. Its iterations and mechanisms are unique to each community, even where it shares certain features across groups by virtue of being embedded in a wider, common culture. In all locations IK is the foundation of Indigenous governance, ecological stewardship, social, ethical, linguistic, spiritual, medical, food, and economic systems, so that the continual production and reproduction of local, land-based knowledge is the basis of Indigenous identity and sense of place in the world, as well as of Indigenous groups’ very survival as distinct peoples.

Keywords
  • Traditional ecological/environmental knowledge,
  • Indigenous knowledge,
  • Indigenous knowledge systems,
  • intellectual property rights,
  • Indigenous science
Publication Date
2014
Editor
Alex C. Michalos
Publisher
Springer
Citation Information
Sam Grey. "Indigenous Knowledge" New YorkEncyclopedia of Quality of Life and Well-Being Research (2014)
Available at: http://works.bepress.com/samgrey/3/