Wabanaki Climate Change Adaptation: Indigenous Science, Research Partnerships, and Just - A seminar with Dr. Darren Ranco

NOTE: Talk is postponed and is being rescheduled for another time.

In this talk, Dr. Darren Ranco will examine current climate change impacts to the Wabanaki Tribal Nations in what is now Maine and outline their climate adaptation priorities. Emphasis will be on how climate change adaptation research partnerships can ethically address Indigenous livelihoods such as agriculture, hunting and gathering, fishing, forestry, energy, recreation, and tourism in centering Indigenous science, and in turn how these threats are already impacting the physical, mental, and spiritual wellbeing of Wabanaki and other Indigenous people. Ranco will also present elements of a Wabanaki climate adaptation strategy developed in the last three years as part of a NE CASC-supported project. This work focused on aligning research questions, data collection methods, outputs, and research protocols with Wabanaki people, knowledge, and values to build a regional tribal network for climate change adaptation.

About the Speaker

Darren Ranco is a Professor of Anthropology and Chair of Native American Programs at the University of Maine. His research focuses on the ways in which Indigenous communities in the United States resist environmental destruction by using Indigenous diplomacies and critiques of liberalism to protect cultural resources, and how state knowledge systems, rooted in colonial contexts, continue to expose indigenous peoples to an inordinate amount of environmental risk. He teaches classes on Indigenous intellectual property rights, research ethics, environmental justice and tribal governance. A member of the Penobscot Nation, he is particularly interested in how better research relationships can be made between universities, Native and non-Native researchers, and Indigenous communities.