Community Informing Our Research Practices
We are a firm believer of using decolonizing methods for data collection. In our approach, we attempt to build a dialogue between knowledge from the margins and the mainstream, in the absence of which knowledge and cultural identity unique to local communities will continue to be ignored. We believe that community is the best collector of their own data.
The systems that are currently working towards evaluation, data collection, technology, science, and the way that we look at research in the social sector can be more effective and efficient if they adopt the indigenous framework. We define indigenous framework for data collection as an indigenous manner of taking steps towards acquisition and dissemination of knowledge about indigenous peoples.
Our Decolonizing approach involves community helping us determine the ways we collect data and enabling the community to collect their own data. We chose people within the community that is being surveyed and we seek their help in the training of our field teams in data collection. This helps us at two levels. First, It assists our surveyors in gaining entry into the field and have a more nuanced understanding of the field setting. Second, it helps us at the epistemological level, to critically think of how the knowledge will get produced and whose knowledge will be privileged. It is important to unpack the underlying assumptions, motivations and values which inform the research practices. We as outsiders can never do justice to data collection without involving the community.
We diligently follow decolonizing methods and don’t use it merely as a euphemism. Wherever possible, we also try to recruit surveyors from the community. This also creates an income-earning opportunity for them. We fairly compensate the community members working with us
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