Traditional Ecological Knowledge

Learning from Indigenous Practices for Environmental Sustainability

Authors Simon J. Ortiz and Joan McGregor

Edited by Melissa K. Nelson and Dan Shilling

This book examines the importance of Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) and how it can provide models for a time-tested form of sustainability needed in the world today. The essays, written by a team of scholars from diverse disciplinary backgrounds, explore TEK through compelling cases of environmental sustainability from multiple tribal and geographic locations in North America and beyond. Addressing the philosophical issues concerning indigenous and ecological knowledge production and maintenance, they focus on how environmental values and ethics are applied to the uses of land. Grounded in an understanding of the profound relationship between biological and cultural diversity, this book defines, interrogates and problematizes the many definitions of traditional ecological knowledge and sustainability. It includes a holistic and broad disciplinary approach to sustainability, including language, art and ceremony as critical ways to maintain healthy human-environment relations.

Bios

Editor Dan Shilling earned a PhD in English at Arizona State University in 1987.

Contributor Joan McGregor is professor of philosophy in the School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies as well as a senior sustainability scientist for the Julie Ann Wrigley Global Institute of Sustainability.

Contributor Simon Ortiz was a Regents' Professor Emeritus of English and American Indian studies at ASU.

Cover of Traditional Ecological Knowledge edited by Nelson and Shilling with fish and animal design
Date published
Publisher
Cambridge University Press
ISBN
978-1108428569
Genres
Race and ethnicity, Nonfiction, Nature, Literature, Language, Humanities, Essays, Environment and sustainability, Arts
College or unit
The College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, Department of English, American Indian Studies Program

Get this book