ABSTRACT

Historically, non-Indigenous researchers have contributed to colonisation by research based on Western positivistic philosophical frameworks. This approach led to disembodying knowledge from Indigenous people’s histories, worldviews, and cultural and social practices, thus perpetuating a deficit-based discourse which situates the responsibility of problems within Indigenous peoples and ignores the larger socio-economic and historical contexts in which problems are rooted. Rectifying this position requires decolonising Western positivistic research by shifting to basing research on social constructionist paradigms that lead to strength-based approaches. Based on our experiences gained exploring disaster risk reduction perspectives with two remote Indigenous communities in Australia and Pakistan, we suggest in this conceptual paper that a synergy of systems theory and symbolic interactionism offers an appropriate philosophical lens to non-Indigenous researchers for gaining a more comprehensive and deeper understanding of Indigenous holistic and relational perspectives, experiences, interpretations and actions/interaction. Research based on these philosophical worldviews promotes a strength-based approach that aligns with and empowers Indigenous ways of facilitating health and wellbeing. We offer our experiences of utilising these two frameworks and of how they could assist other non-Indigenous researchers to discover valuable insights into Indigenous perspectives and interpretations that might otherwise be ignored or neglected.

摘要

从历史上看，非土著研究人员通过基于西方实证主义哲学框架的研究为殖民化做出了贡献。这种方法导致从土著人民的历史，世界观以及文化和社会实践中剥夺知识，从而使基于赤字的话语永存，这种话语将土著人民内部问题的责任置于首位，而忽视了根源问题的更大的社会经济和历史背景。纠正这一立场需要将西方实证主义研究非殖民化，方法是转向基于社会建构主义范式的研究，这些范式导致基于力量的方法。根据我们在澳大利亚和巴基斯坦的两个偏远土著社区探索减少灾害风险观点的经验，我们在此概念文件中建议，系统理论与符号互动主义的协同作用为非土著研究人员提供了适当的哲学视角，以使其对土著整体和关系的观点，经验，解释和行动/相互作用有更全面，更深入的理解。基于这些哲学世界观的研究促进了一种基于力量的方法，该方法与土著居民促进健康和福祉的方式保持一致并赋予其力量。我们提供了利用这两个框架的经验，以及它们如何可以帮助其他非土著研究人员发现对土著观点和解释的宝贵见解，而这些观点和解释可能会被忽略或忽视。