1.1 TEK as a collective and place-based experience
TEK can be broadly defined as ‘the knowledge and know-how accumulated across generations, and renewed by each new generation, which guide human societies in their innumerable interactions with their surrounding environment’ (Nakashima et al., 2012, p. 8).
Central to TEK are notions of collective heritage and collective human experience with the natural world through thousands of generations. An experience that is human and shared while being simultaneously local, strongly community-based, and reflecting the knowledge, practices, worldview and beliefs of a particular bioregion and culture (Whyte, 2013).
TEK is place-based, and an expression of the knowledge and wisdom of indigenous groups that co-evolved with their ecosystem, along with a deep awareness of and respect for the uniqueness of the place they inhabited. This therefore connects with the notions of seeking out and facilitating the participation of local knowledge by indigenous peoples advocated in Unit 3.
Reflection
Reflect on what you know as a result of being part of a particular community. You might have sayings that predict the weather, like, if there are a great many berries on the hedges it will be a hard winter, or it might be related to a type of food you expect to be served at a celebration.
1. How did you get to know these ideas?
2. Do you think they have a basis in science? What makes you say that they do or do not?
3. What does this tell you about your attitude to TEK?
1 Knowledge and wisdom: learning from our ancestors’ relationship with nature