Integrating Indigenous women’s traditional knowledge for climate change in Canada

Abstract

Traditional Ecological Knowledge has historically been appropriated by White settler societies across the globe. It has an important role to play in environmental decision-making, particularly in climate policy. Due to past colonization and continued neo-colonial pressures, Indigenous women’s Traditional Ecological Knowledge has an even less prominent position in environmental policies. Traditional Ecological Knowledge can help build local expertise, formulate research questions, and provide insights into community adaptation and monitoring. We explore the case of Canadian environmental policy, arguing that although Canadian rhetoric seems to consider Traditional Ecological Knowledge, both women’s and otherwise, it rarely does so. When included, it is only done in a superficial manner within legal requirements. We suggest that the lack of attention paid to Indigenous women’s Traditional Ecological Knowledge in Canadian environmental decision-making (1) ignores the disproportionate impacts that Indigenous women experience because of climate change, (2) perpetuates gender blindness, and (3) does not recognize the key insights that women’s Traditional Ecological Knowledge can offer.