Traditional Ecological Knowledge
Traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) is an academic term referring to aboriginal, indigenous, or other forms of traditional knowledges regarding local environmental resources. TEK can be defined as "a cumulative body of knowledge, practice, and belief, evolving by adaptive processes and handed down through generations by cultural transmission. the relationship of living beings (including human) with one another and with their environment." TEK is commonly used in natural resource management as a substitute for baseline environmental data to measure changes over time in remote regions that have little recorded scientific data.
The use of TEK in management and science is controversial since methods of acquiring and accumulating TEK, although often including forms of empirical research and experimentation, differ from those used to create and validate Western scientific knowledge.
There is a debate whether holders of TEK (i.e., Indigenous populations) retain an intellectual property right over traditional knowledge and whether use of this knowledge requires prior permission and license. This is especially complicated because TEK is most frequently preserved as oral tradition and as such may lack objectively confirmed documentation. Ironically, those same methods that might resolve the issue of documentation compromise the very nature of traditional knowledge.
TEK is often used to sustain local populations and maintain resources necessary for survival. However, it can be weakened or invalidated in the context of rapid climate change, environmental impact, or other situations in which significant alterations of ecosystems render TEK weak or obsolete.
TEK can also be referred to as "traditional environmental knowledge" which emphasizes the different components and interactions of the environment. More specifically it contains the knowledge of species of both animals and plants, and biophysical characteristics of the environment through space and time. However Traditional Ecological Knowledge and Traditional Environmental Knowledge can be used interchangeably due to the nature of both terms being synonymous where both emphasize the cultural relations with the environment and non-human relations with animals.
Read more about Traditional Ecological Knowledge: Faces of Traditional Ecological Knowledge, Ecosystem Management Theory, Case Study: Gwaii Haanas, Kaitiakitanga, See Also
Famous quotes containing the words traditional, ecological and/or knowledge:
“There are two kinds of fathers in traditional households: the fathers of sons and the fathers of daughters. These two kinds of fathers sometimes co-exist in one and the same man. For instance, Daughter’s Father kisses his little girl goodnight, strokes her hair, hugs her warmly, then goes into the next room where he becomes Son’s Father, who says in a hearty voice, perhaps with a light punch on the boy’s shoulder: “Goodnight, Son, see ya in the morning.””
—Letty Cottin Pogrebin (20th century)
“Could it not be that just at the moment masculinity has brought us to the brink of nuclear destruction or ecological suicide, women are beginning to rise in response to the Mother’s call to save her planet and create instead the next stage of evolution? Can our revolution mean anything else than the reversion of social and economic control to Her representatives among Womankind, and the resumption of Her worship on the face of the Earth? Do we dare demand less?”
—Jane Alpert (b. 1947)
“To read a newspaper for the first time is like coming into a film that has been on for an hour. Newspapers are like serials. To understand them you have to take knowledge to them; the knowledge that serves best is the knowledge provided by the newspaper itself.”
—V.S. (Vidiadhar Surajprasad)