The philosophical tradition of positivism, which rejects the metaphysical or spiritual realm as a source of knowledge, has had a significant impact on Western thought. This impact is especially evident in the natural sciences, but it also extends to the social sciences. In modern times, the Western knowledge system has dominated the course of learning.

Dominance of Western knowledge

Hassan Kaya, director of the DSI-NRF Center of Excellence in Indigenous Knowledge Systems at the University of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa, said in a recent interview with CSST that the dominance of Western knowledge is responsible for the view that there is only one social reality and one system of knowledge: that of the West.

This is exemplified in the teaching of social sciences and humanities, where the prevailing social, economic, and political theories remain deeply rooted in methods, concerns, and experiences of 19th-century Western Europe and North America. “Yet there is a growing realization that a nation’s ability to use and build on the knowledge systems inherent within its own that exist among its people is as vital to socioeconomic development as physical and financial resources,” Kaya said.

Traditional knowledge underutilized

“Our knowledge of the world comes from many sources,” George Nicholas, a professor of archaeology at Simon Fraser University in Canada, told CSST. For example, archaeologists have long depended upon ethnographic sources of information—detailed observations or information derived directly from communities studied—to help develop or test interpretations about past peoples’ lives.

In recent years, many scholars have become aware of the large body of information known as Traditional Knowledge (TK), Indigenous Knowledge (IK), or Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK), among other terms.

These knowledge systems, developed over countless generations, are based on individual and collectively learned experiences and explanations of the world, verified by elders, and are transmitted through guided experiential learning, oral traditions, and other means of record keeping, Nicholas said.

“Indigenous knowledge refers to the longstanding traditions and practices of indigenous communities and cultures. It encompasses the skills, innovations, wisdom, teachings, beliefs, languages, and insights of the people, produced and accumulated over centuries and used to maintain or improve their ways of living,” Kaya explained.

The depth of these knowledge systems, rooted in the long inhabitation of local ecosystems, offers lessons that can benefit everyone as we search for a more satisfying and sustainable way to share our planet, Kaya said.

In many communities, indigenous knowledge systems are at the heart of survival and inform decision-making about every aspect of day-to-day life. This knowledge is community-based, accessible, affordable, culturally sensitive, and hence sustainable, and may hold solutions to our most pressing global challenges. “Yet it remains an underutilized and even marginalized resource,” Kaya said.

Multiple ways of knowing

Nicholas said, “The terms ‘Western knowledge’ and ‘indigenous or traditional knowledge’ are widespread today. What is often ignored is that knowledge is knowledge regardless of whatever form it takes.” This holds true of all people’s understanding of the world around them. Sometimes it is dominated by a “scientific” perspective, other times a “religious perspective,” but both rely on observations made of the world.

Nicholas noted that TK has today become a highly valued source of information for archaeologists, ecologists, biologists, ethnologists, climatologists, and others. This information ranges from medicinal properties of plants and insights into the value of biological diversity, to caribou migration patterns and the effects of prescribed burning to manage particular resources.

Despite the wide acknowledgement of their demonstrated value, Nicholas said that many scientists continue to have had an uneasy alliance with TK and indigenous oral histories.

On the one hand, TK and other types of local knowledge are valued when they support or supplement archaeological or other scientific evidence. However, when the situation is reversed—when TK is seen to challenge scientific “truths”—then its utility is questioned or dismissed as myth, Nicholas said. Science is promoted as objective, quantifiable, and the foundation for “real” knowledge creation or evaluation while TK may be seen as anecdotal, imprecise, and unfamiliar in form.

As ways of knowing, Western knowledge and TK share several important and fundamental attributes. Both are constantly verified through repetition and verification, inference and prediction, empirical observations, and recognition of pattern events, Nicolas continued. While some actions leave no physical evidence (e.g. clam cultivation), and some experiments can’t be replicated (e.g. cold fusion), in the case of TK, the absence of “empirical evidence” can be damning in terms of wider acceptance.

Nicholas said that in contrast to Western knowledge, which tends to be text-based, reductionist, hierarchical, and dependent on categorization, indigenous science does not strive for a universal set of explanations, but is particularistic in orientation and often contextual.

One key attribute of Western science is the development and testing of hypotheses to ensure rigor and replicability in interpreting empirical observations or making predictions. Although hypothesis testing is not a feature of TK, its rigor and replicability are not absent.

“Whether or not traditional knowledge systems and scientific reasoning are mutually supportive, even contradictory lines of evidence have value,” Nicholas said. Employing TK-based observations and explanations within multiple working hypotheses ensures consideration of a variety of predictive, interpretive, or explanatory possibilities not constrained by Western expectation or logic. Furthermore, hypotheses incorporating traditional knowledge-based information can lead the way toward unanticipated insights.