7
Researcher or student?
S. Daniels-Mayes (2021). Researcher or student? Knowing when not to know in Community-Led Indigenous research. In V. Rawlings, J. Flexner & L. Riley (Eds.), Community-Led Research: Walking new pathways together. Sydney: Sydney University Press.
Methods of undertaking research and recruiting participants have traditionally been located within the cultural preferences and practices of the ‘Western’ world rather than the distinct cultural ways of the peoples being investigated (Bishop, 2011). Writing from a New Zealand perspective, Bishop goes on to argue (2011, p. 19):
Maori people, along with many other minoritised peoples, are concerned that educational researchers have been slow to acknowledge the importance of culture and cultural differences as key components in successful research practice and understandings. As a result, key research issues of power relations, initiation, benefits, representation, legitimisation, and accountability continue to be addressed in terms of the researchers’ own cultural agendas, concerns, and interests.
Likewise, Aboriginal peoples of Australia are concerned about how their distinct cultural ways of knowing, being and doing are to be not only recognised in research, but centrally positioned within the research process and outcomes (Rigney, 2006). Additionally, Aboriginal peoples are concerned about power relations, values, accountability, ownership, dissemination and benefits of the research (Fredericks, 2007; Gower, 2012).
By contrast to traditional methods of investigation, culturally responsive research focuses on respecting and privileging the ways of knowing, being and doing of participants in the research process (Berryman, SooHoo & Nevin, 2013). Thus, when research is approached from a culturally sensitive stance, the varied aspects of a distinct culture as well as the varied historical and contemporary experiences of a people are recognised. In this way, the shared knowledge and understandings of the phenomenon under study are privileged and the individual and collective/community knowledge is placed at the centre of the investigation (Daniels-Mayes, 2016). Likewise, Indigenous diplomatic protocols and practices are prioritised and observed (Daniels-Mayes & Sehlin MacNeil, 2019). In Karen Martin’s (2008, p. 78) distinct Aboriginal cultural Ways of Being, she explains:
Ultimately, Ways of Being hold for us processes for fulfilling relatedness with respect, responsibility and accountability. Where Ways of Knowing contextualise the Stories, Ways of Being ground these to ensure what we have learned and know is applied with respect, responsibility and accountability in a range of contexts and situations.
Furthermore, as a culturally responsive researcher, and more specifically as an Aboriginal culturally responsive researcher, there are protocols to be observed (ways of doing). For example, Moreton-Robinson (2000, p. xv) writes in her work:
The protocol for introducing one’s self to other Indigenous people is to provide information about one’s cultural location, so that connection can be made on political, cultural and social grounds and relations established.
Positioning myself in my research is therefore the observation and enactment of cultural protocols. So let me introduce myself. For ease of conversation, I identify as being an Australian Aboriginal woman as many do not know my Country of Kamilaroi. I am a lecturer, researcher, educator, and scholarly advocate primarily in the spaces of Aboriginal education and disability. Over the years I have done much listening, reading, writing, thinking, questioning and learning, of self and others, that led me to the theoretical frameworks of cultural responsiveness (see, for example, Castagno & Brayboy, 2008; Gay, 2010; Ladson-Billings, 1994) and Critical Race Theory (see, for example, Ladson-Billings & Tate, 2006; Lynn, Yosso, Solórzano & Parker, 2002). This seeking of knowing has been the inadvertent enactment of what Kress (2011) refers to as Critical Praxis Research (CPR) that requires ‘scholar–practitioners to develop critical consciousness about who they are in relation to their students and the larger society in order to then determine the best methods for conducting sophisticated research that is fair, ethical, and empowering for all stakeholders’ (Kress, 2011, p. 10). With regards to my ethnographic research, the word ‘student’ in the above quote is replaced with ‘community’. By privileging the ‘community’ within which I am working, their cultures, their knowledges, I am rejecting traditional colonising research methods and am instead being led by the needs and aspirations of the community. As with others throughout this volume, the aim is to make communities equal partners in the research process. A key question I use for focusing my CPR is: ‘Would I want to be participating in my research? Why? Why not?’ I also constantly critically reflect upon the given day’s events to identify what is working and what lessons I learnt (a point I return to later in this chapter).
This chapter uses Critical Praxis Research (Kress, 2011) to develop critical consciousness around a multi-sited school ethnography (Castagno, 2006) that had the following aim: to examine pedagogies in two mainstream secondary schools in metropolitan Adelaide that are both committed to improving academic outcomes for Aboriginal students and to reveal and develop a counterstory of Aboriginal education success. The research worked extensively with six community-nominated teachers (Foster, 1994; Ladson-Billings, 1994; McDonald, 2003) over two years of fieldwork. The participants taught across all year levels (and in South Australia that was from years 8 to 12), and subject disciplines, with teaching experience ranging from two years to over three decades. There were three male and three female teachers with one male identifying as being Aboriginal. Each school had an Aboriginal student population of at least 10 per cent (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2010), which demonstrates Aboriginal community support but also means that they belonged to a minority culture within these schools.
This chapter is organised into two main sections following this introduction. First, I examine the purpose of research in Aboriginal spaces, focusing on problematising terra nullius–styled research, benefits of research, and ways of working ethically, socially and culturally. I will then turn to Part Two: Enacting culturally responsive research, with a focus on an accessible research vernacular; participant selection; and the consideration of insider or outsider. The chapter is intended to bring to
the fore key areas which my thinking and my practice, as an Indigenous/Aboriginal/Kamilaroi woman working in Aboriginal spaces, need to contend with. The chapter problematises the question: when do I know not to know and therefore become the student and not the researcher?
Aboriginal scholars such as Martin (2003), Rigney (2006) and Gower (2012) contend that the extent of research in Australian Aboriginal lands and on Aboriginal peoples since colonisation in the late 18th century ‘is so vast it makes Aboriginal peoples one of the most researched groups of people on earth’ (Martin, 2003, p. 1). Investigations have been conducted by all manner of natural and social scientists, usually without permission, consultation or involvement of Aboriginal peoples (Bourke, 1999). Martin (2003, p. 1) writes of ‘terra nullius’ research:
In this research, we are present only as objects of curiosity and subjects of research. To be seen but not asked, heard nor respected. So the research has been undertaken in the same way Captain James Cook falsely claimed the eastern coast of the land to become known as Australia as terra nullius.
This fictional doctrine of terra nullius not only devalued, dispossessed and marginalised Aboriginal people but also set the scene for how relationships between Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal peoples within Australia were to operate (Matthews, 2012, p. 122). Moreover, Hart and Whatman (1998, p. 3) state that for over 200 years:
The premise of most [Western] research and analysis has been locked into the belief that Indigenous Australians are anachronisms and, in defiance of the laws of evolution, remain a curiosity of nature, and are ‘fair game’ for research. The overt and covert presumptions underwriting all [Western] research and analysis into Indigenous Australian cultures is the inherent view of the superiority of Non-Indigenous society’s cultures.
Consequently, much research targeting Aboriginal peoples has sought to understand Aboriginal peoples and their cultures from the foundation of non-Aboriginal perspectives, methodologies and measures (Carlson, 2013). Such an approach is embedded in the majoritarian narrative of racism which excluded Aboriginal peoples from knowledge construction as defined by Western thought (Kovach, 2009). In this traditional approach to research, the investigator’s way of knowing is privileged over the researched (Kress, 2011). Researchers, especially with their legacy of complicity with colonisation, need to engage in research that seeks to counter the colonising impact of research (Berryman, SooHoo & Nevin, 2013). This approach requires a shift in thinking and power that recognises that Aboriginal peoples should not be considered as being ‘known’, but rather recognised and respected as ‘knowers’ (Martin, 2008; Moreton-Robinson, 2011), with the investigator needing to enter the research project as a student ready and willing to learn from the knowers. Arguably, this is particularly important when undertaking research in Aboriginal contexts owing to the legacy of terra nullius–styled research where participants were considered to be subjects to be studied and no more.
When undertaking research, I am ever-mindful of Indigenous researcher Shawn Wilson (Askwayak Cree from northern Manitoba, Canada), who asserts that ‘Research is not just something that’s out there: it’s something that you’re building for yourself and for your community’ (2001, p. 179). I am also mindful of the words of Brayboy and Maughan (2009, p. 12) who state: ‘Indigenous Knowledges requires responsible behaviour, and this is often achieved by considering the ramifications of actions before they are taken’. Finally, I am conscious of the words of educator and scholar Tyson Kaawoppa Yunkaporta, Bama man of Nunga and Koori descent, who argues that ‘The protocol we follow in this work is, “If you take something, put something back”’ (Yunkaporta & Kirby, 2011, p. 205). So, as an Indigenous/Aboriginal/Kamilaroi researcher, I seek to put back more than I take when engaging in research. The primary aim of my work is for it to be of benefit to the participants and their communities, rather than being of disadvantage (AIATSIS, 2012). A culturally responsive approach seeks to counteract the devastating legacy of traditional Western research so that new knowledge and understandings can be acquired.
As my research progressed, several guiding principles emerged. First, my research needed to go beyond interpretivist ethnography that aims to simply advance knowledge with no further purpose or benefit. Second, my research demands that I am culturally, ethically and socially responsible to the participants and their communities. If I undertake my research without being relationally accountable to both the participants and to the wider community, I, like colonising researchers of the past, could do more harm. My research was not just about getting a PhD and moving on with my life, it was about doing it ‘proper ways’ (Aunty Nangala, personal communication, 23 June 2013). ‘Proper ways’ research is an Aboriginal English term that means that my research was mindful of working in ways that located the research within the cultural ways of knowing, being and doing of participants. It is an approach that privileges the valuable insider knowledge of research participants and their methodologies (Moreton-Robinson, 2011). Third, to be of benefit to participants, my investigation was formed and shaped by those consulted, a process repeated throughout the length of the project, as the communities involved led the research in a diversity of ways. Finally, my research needed to be of some tangible value to the Aboriginal community and not just using their stories for my own advancement as in terra nullius–styled research investigations.
Additionally, continual critical reflection on the research investigation played a pivotal role in the project’s success. The following questions, adapted from Wilson (2008, p. 178), were frequently referred back to in my process of Critical Praxis Research:
Having established the need for Community-Led Research, I now discuss how the research was enacted, focusing on the examples of language, participant selection, and the tensions of insider and outsider status.
Language is used to discuss, debate, exchange information and to communicate ideas. However, language is also a means for the enactment of exclusion, discrimination and prejudice, as cultural values and attitudes are reflected in the structures and meanings of the language we use (Flinders University, n.d.). Language, therefore, is not neutral or unproblematic. Wilson (2008, p. 279) writes that ‘Language mastery can be used in a bad way to make people feel small, or it can be used in a good way to explain concepts’. Similarly, Basil Johnston, an Ojibwa storyteller, writes that ‘Words are medicine that can heal or injure’ (cited in Archibald, 2008, p. 19). Language is used to convey the research purpose, it is the means by which participants share their stories, and language is used to interpret and represent the narratives shared. But what language do I use to make the research accessible, and therefore valuable, to the participants and the wider community?
As a culturally responsive researcher, my responsibility is to draw on the language strengths of participants so as not to exclude or discriminate, nor ultimately to alienate. Moreover, drawing on and respecting the cultural concepts and perspectives the language/s reflect, is privileging the voices and stories of those choosing to participate. It is not, quite simply, terra nullius–styled research. Consequently, a key task was to develop and use an accessible Aboriginal research vernacular, and infuse it into the research process. Three genres of English – Standard Australian English (SAE), Aboriginal English (AbE) and Academic English (AE) – were identified and used to facilitate the research (Daniels-Mayes, 2016). There are many possible examples to illustrate how this was achieved in my research; however, due to word limits, I will provide some select examples to illustrate the process undertaken.
In researching Aboriginal women’s perceptions and experiences of health and health services, Fredericks (2008, p. 18) writes of being ‘asked to “talk up” – throw my ideas out, let the women in the community hear what I was thinking and let them question me about what I was thinking about doing’. Similarly, in my research I would be asked to ‘come and yarn’, which included talking about me, them, the project, and life in general. Yarning is an Aboriginal cultural form of conversation ‘through which both the researcher and participant journey together, visiting places and topics of interest relevant to the research’ (Bessarab & Ng’andu, 2010, p. 39). Different rules or protocols, techniques and purposes exist for the carrying out and maintaining of the discussion, depending on the knowledge being sought. It involves deep discussion about a particular issue (Adams & Faulkhead, 2012; Bessarab & Ng’andu, 2010) and has been described as ‘a transactional activity that involves negotiation and trust’ (Imtoual, Kameniar & Bradley, 2009, p. 27). Moreover, yarning is ‘a process that requires the researcher to develop and build a relationship that is accountable to Indigenous people participating in the research’ (Bessarab & Ng’andu, 2010, p. 38).
This method of yarning was partnered with that of Indigenous Storywork developed by Jo-ann Archibald from the Sto:lo Nation of British Columbia, Canada. I was introduced to this Indigenous method while visiting Canada in 2014 and found it to have similarities to yarning described above. Archibald (2001, p. 1) explains that stories capture our attention and ask us ‘to think deeply and to reflect upon our actions and reaction’ – a process called ‘Storywork’. In Archibald’s methodological framework, the 4Rs of respect, responsibility, reverence and reciprocity relate to ways of working with people and with Indigenous knowledges; the remaining principles of holism, interrelatedness and synergy refer to how Indigenous knowledges and Indigenous stories are used in the research process (Archibald, 2008). It is a framework for understanding the characteristics of stories, which includes appreciating the process of storytelling, establishing a receptive learning context, and engaging in holistic meaning making (Archibald, 2008).
Together, the principles of these two Indigenous storying methods provided the guiding framework for undertaking the research. Skilful and respectful questioning and active listening are key tools in these storying methods. Active listening forces people to listen responsively to what is being shared. ‘It avoids misunderstandings, as people have to confirm that they do really understand what another person has said rather than assuming that they have got it’ (Daniels-Mayes, 2016, p. 80). Language barriers need to be worked through by rewording, restructuring, retelling and, at times, telling another story to clarify the point being conveyed. Such a process required me to shift between ‘Englishes’, from academic to everyday to Aboriginal English and back.
One significant way in which I traversed the three Englishes was through the use of metaphor and imagery located within the participants’ worlds. The use of metaphor in Indigenous research is prominent (see, for example, Archibald, 2008; Kovach, 2009; Martin, 2008; Wilson, 2008). Metaphor is a visual story (Martin, 2008) that compares two unlike objects, concepts or feelings, to establish mutual understanding. The visual story provided through metaphor enables ‘listeners to walk inside the story to find their own teachings’ (Kovach, 2009, p. 63). I repeatedly used metaphor in the research, particularly when working with participants to learn and build knowledge of new or complex ideas. The following story, from my research, is illustrative of this point:
Lesson learned today. I gave Uncle ‘Pedro’ the transcript of his interview today, printed out as he doesn’t like computers. An hour later I asked him what he thought. Put simply he didn’t like it.
I recall holding my breath and asking, ‘Tell me more?’ Uncle Pedro responded that reading it he ‘sounded like an idiot’. Through skilful questioning and careful listening I learned he didn’t believe he spoke ‘like that, with the “ums” and “ahs”.’ We yarned further, and I used the following metaphor to teach Uncle Pedro about raw data:
Sheelagh: OK, let’s think of raw data as a pumpkin you buy in the shops. You wouldn’t eat it off the shelf? You’d take it home; peel it; bake it; steam it; mash it; you might add some herbs and spice or just salt?
Uncle Pedro: Salt and butter?
Sheelagh: Yeah, sounds good. So, this transcript is like the raw pumpkin; doesn’t taste too good right now. But what I do now, with your help, is prepare it and spice it up. Take out the ‘ums’ and ‘ahs’. Come back to you for regular tastings until it tastes good?
Uncle Pedro: OK. But do I really sound like that?
Sheelagh: Yeah, most of us do. Let me show you the transcript of another participant, a whitefella teacher.
Uncle Pedro: (after reading through a couple of paragraphs) He’s gonna need some serious spicing up. (Field notes: 25 November 2014)
In this encounter, Uncle Pedro went from being a reluctant participant, ready to withdraw, to one willing to participate and assist in the future development of the investigation. Additionally, Uncle Pedro learned a new language, Academic English. Moreover, through this transactional activity, I became the student (re)learning the power of words to both wound and heal, to both exclude and empower. My ‘lesson learned’ was one of many enactments of Critical Praxis Research.
It is important to note that I did not just extend this courtesy to Aboriginal participants in my research, but to all participants, understanding that they knew the meanings of the stories being shared (knowers), and therefore what was to be learned from them. At times, some ‘spicing up’ was involved in the writing up of the stories to avoid participants being portrayed as, for example, ‘idiots’, as was Uncle Pedro’s initial interpretation of the raw data (Daniels-Mayes, 2016). I stress that proper ways of working through accessible language is not about compliance or manipulation. But rather it is a matter of having the consideration to attend to how access to privileged, or knowers’ knowledge, often hidden in unfamiliar language, can be achieved.
My preference was not to predetermine the characteristics of participant teachers nor to devise a checklist against which to assess. Instead, I relied on a community nomination process (Foster, 1994; Ladson-Billings, 1994; McDonald, 1993). Here the researcher relies on community members to judge people, places and things within their own setting (McDonald, 2003). Researchers such as Delpit (1995) and Foster (1994) have written of the dangers of defining successful or good teaching without accounting for the emic (or insider) perspective. The insider is the knower of whom or what is valued by the community the teachers are intended to serve and benefit. With this in mind, my research design recognised and privileged Aboriginal students, parents and community leaders as insiders, or knowers, in their own education. Additionally, my research design recognised the experience and knowledge of key school stakeholders such as the principal, fellow teachers and, significantly, staff and visitors of the Nunga Room (a culturally safe space in the school).
Over a period of several months, interviewing referred to by Burgess (1988) as ‘conversations with a purpose’, which lasted from three minutes to several hours, were used. These purposeful conversations are a ‘non-standardised interview [which] does not include identical questions for all those interviewed with the result that information cannot be summarised in a statistical form’ (Burges, 1988, p. 138). After fulfilling my relational responsibilities by providing a brief ‘who am I’ and ‘what am I doing here’, I asked my core question: ‘Who do you think is a successful teacher at this school?’ or, to put it another way, ‘Which teachers are doing good with our [Aboriginal] kids?’ (Daniels-Mayes, 2016, p. 93). These purposeful conversations were undertaken with individuals or small groups as opportunities arose. Such moments occurred, for example, at community events, while walking down a corridor, at a staff meeting, at a football match, or in the Nunga Room.
When a name was provided, I would simply nudge for more information by asking questions like: ‘How come Mr/Mrs ...?’ Or, ‘What does Mr/Mrs do to get nominated?’ Overall, nominations were based on a variety of elements including those characteristics that matched with the international and national literature reviewed: student academic performance, high attendance rates, participation in the lesson and a high willingness to get homework completed on time. Most common though were the positive stories individuals shared with me about the caring, passionate and determined nature of the teacher with regards to the student. Also disclosed to me were classroom placement requests with particular teachers by students, parents/caregivers and Aboriginal Education Team (AET) staff, based on the positive educational outcomes of Aboriginal students in their specific classrooms. In short, participants were the ‘knowers’ and I was the student learning, or as I became known, a ‘stickybeak’ (Aunty Nangala) sticking my nose into others’ business or knowledge or lived experience so as to learn.
Many reading this chapter might assume that as an Aboriginal person, I might have the insider track on undertaking Aboriginal-centred research – that being Aboriginal myself means that I have easy access to participants and their communities, know the relevant protocols and speak the same language. But such assertions assume a homogeneity that is far from the reality of the diversity and complexity that characterises Indigenous peoples’ lives around the world. There is, quite simply, no pan-Aboriginal identity in Australia. Nor do such suppositions take into consideration the influence that age, class, gender, education and ability – among a myriad of other variables – might have upon the research relationship.
Studies by researchers who had initially considered themselves to be insiders speak to this problem (see, for example, Archibald, 2008; Martin, 2008; Smith, 1999). Additionally, as Smith (1999) argues, even Western-trained Indigenous researchers who are intimately involved with community members will typically employ research techniques and methodologies that will likely marginalise the community’s contribution to the research. Overall, the research advises that being an Indigenous researcher does not automatically mean that research will be undertaken in a culturally responsive way when researching in or with their own community.
When considering who should conduct research in African-American communities, Tillman (2002, p. 4) advises that it is not simply a matter of saying that the researcher must be African-American, but ‘Rather it is important to consider whether the researcher has the cultural knowledge to accurately interpret and validate the experiences of African-Americans within the context of the phenomenon under study’. Similarly, Rigney (2006, p. 42) advises that ‘Indigenist research principles can be drawn upon by non-Indigenous researchers who uphold its principles for Indigenous self-determination’. So, instead of the focus being on insider and outsider, Narayan (1993, p. 672) proposes:
What we must focus our attention on is the quality of relations with the people we seek to represent in our texts: are they viewed as mere fodder for professionally self-serving statements about a generalised Other, or are they accepted as subjects with voices, views, and dilemmas – people to whom we are bonded through ties of reciprocity ...?
Consequently, as an Indigenous/Aboriginal/Kamilaroi researcher, I did not expect to be bestowed with automatic ‘insider’ status; quite simply, I was not. I belong to a freshwater language group, far distant from the Aboriginal Country my research was located in or, in some cases, to the Countries of my participants and their communities. Additionally, my age, gender, class, education and ability, among other things, significantly influenced my insider or outsider status. Moreover, I was ‘marked’ by the community as an outsider simply by being affiliated with a university: to whom am I accountable – the university or the community – when it comes to, for example, ethics or methodology?
I am bonded to my culture and I am therefore expected by Aboriginal communities to undertake research in ‘proper ways’ (Aunty Nangala), adhering to cultural Aboriginal ways of knowing, being and doing relevant to the community with whom I am engaging (Daniels-Mayes & Sehlin MacNeil, 2019). I am expected to work respectfully, reciprocally and relationally, observing the dynamics of kinship structures present in the participating community. This, I found, creates a community–university tension that needs constant negotiation with community, with my PhD supervisors, and with the protocols of the academy itself, a discussion of which goes beyond the scope of this chapter. Quite simply, through my research practice I seek to become an invited and accepted insider by doing research ‘proper ways’.
In this chapter I have applied the method of Critical Praxis Research (Kress, 2011) to problematise the question: when do I know not to know and therefore become the student and not the researcher? My aim has been to highlight the need for research to be led by the community in which the research is to be undertaken. It has been shown that this approach to research is oppositional to terra nullius–styled research that understands participants as objects of curiosity and subjects of research. So while all research should strive to centre the participant as ‘knower’, it is arguably more significant to do so when undertaking research in Aboriginal spaces due to the legacy of dispossessing colonisation where Aboriginal peoples were to be seen but not asked, heard, nor respected, let alone lead research.
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