Transdisciplinary and Indigenous Methodologies
Social partnerships in lifelong learning require careful intercultural collaborations. We bring to our work long experience of collaborative work in diverse cultural settings, particularly in Indigenous and international contexts.
Of critical importance to our work are methodologies which take seriously, divergent knowledge practices. We are actively sought to undertake complex cross-cultural research, consultancies and evaluations which require robust and rigorous outcomes committed to the mutual benefit of all partners.
The development and articulation of our methodologies requires significant epistemological work which is a key aspect of our research. We work with Indigenous academics to articulate distinctive Indigenous methodologies, and to professionalise Indigenous researchers and consultants. We are interested in questions of evidence and accountability, ethics and agreement making. We are interested in the uses of websites and other digital technologies to preserve the complexity of the issues and practices we work within, and make our processes and outcomes accessible to the people we work with from diverse cultural and educational backgrounds.
The collaborations which our research enhances, allow us to focus on front-line policy work, and organisational culture. We work with people on the ground in urban and remote communities and across all levels of government to identify and support those local practices which are successful and productive, but often invisible from above. We work at the local level to support vibrant practices, and through those piecemeal tactics produce knowledge and policy at the same time. Devising an evidence base is knowledge work that is not separate from policy work. We call this bottom-up or generative policy work.