When you think of an expert or specialist, you might picture a scientist with a lab coat and test tubes. Science likes to claim that its knowledge applies everywhere – like gravity or evolution – which makes scientific knowledge superior to local knowledge about one specific place. But Paige West points out that in practice scientists rely heavily on local people’s knowledge, for example the specialist knowledge that indigenous people in Papua New Guinea have about the fish, plants and ecosystems of their area. In fact, such local knowledge has proven to be crucial for successfully combating major problems like climate change.
Works mentioned
– Regis Tove Stella, Imagining the Other: The Representation of the Papua New Guinean Subject
Further reading
Two videos: Presentation of New Ireland and Deep in: Papua New Guinea
Sarah M. Munoz at The Conversation – Understanding the human side of climate change relocation
Jennifer Wilson at The Nation – The Circle: Franz Boas, Margaret Mead, Zora Neale Hurston, and the origins of American anthropology
George Nicholas at Smithsonian Magazine – When Scientists “Discover” What Indigenous People Have Known For Centuries
Julian Morgans at Vice – Poisonous Birds in Papua New Guinea and a Very Baffling Story of Evolution
Anthony Langat at BBC Future Planet – The traditions that could save a nation’s forests
Greg Dvorak at e-flux – S/pacific Islands: Some Reflections on Identity and Art in Contemporary Oceania