A growing body of empirical data suggests that there may be a true psychological distinction between academic and practical intelligence. If there is, then conventional ability tests used alone may reveal substantially less than we want to know about people's competence in everyday practical situations. Evidence to this effect is reviewed from…

This paper proposes the development of Indigenous Studies as an international field, both in the sense of advancing the discipline internationally, wherever there are Indigenous peoples, and in the sense of incorporating international perspectives into curricula. In Canada, Indigenous Studies has been and is still treated as something to be done…

Central American health beliefs and practices are largely influenced by religious and indigenous worldviews. Study assesses the use of ethnomedical approaches and the illnesses for which these approaches are used among 76 Central Americans. Results indicate the importance of understanding and integrating cultural and spiritual influences on…

Issues raised by feminist epistemic critiques of social science are used to examine local (farmer-based) knowledge of agriculture and its contribution to analyses of agricultural sustainability. Focuses on the on-farm gender division of labor as critical in constituting the family farm, and elaborates how different experiences of men and women…

As Lewis and Clark moved west across the North American continent, their contact with Native informants revealed spatial and topographic concepts at variance with their own "scientific" methods of cartography. The explorers' failure to understand and integrate Native patterns of geographical knowledge resulted in long detours where…

A critique of the current character education phenomenon notes the religious foundation of most of its proponents. Critical questions concerning the role of the Ten Commandments in character education examine whether the underlying worldview supports diversity. Ten moral recommendations from an Indigenous perspective articulate a worldview that…

Reviews four books that explain modern schooling's irrelevance for many indigenous communities and that represent indigenous knowledge practices with respect: "What Is Indigenous Knowledge? Voices from the Academy"; "Escaping Education: Living as Learning within Grassroots Cultures"; "Intercultural Education and Literacy: An Ethnographic Study of…

Created in 1552 as a gift for Spain's king, the Badianus Manuscript is a repository of Aztec traditional medicinal knowledge and contains the earliest surviving illustrations of New World plants. At the College of Santa Cruz (Mexico City) for Aztec nobility, an Aztec healer who became the college physician compiled plant descriptions and medicinal…

Australian children's literature has a history of excluding Indigenous child readers and positioning non-Indigenous readers as the subject. Rather than portray such literature, particularly before the 1950s, as simply racist or stereotypical, I argue that it is important for teachers, of all students, to help readers understand how nationalist or…

Indigenous academic researchers are involved in Indigenist, interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research, all of which present problems and opportunities for Indigenous knowledge traditions. "Transdisciplinary" research is different from "interdisciplinary" research because it moves beyond the disciplinarity of the…

The international literature suggests the use of indigenous knowledge (IK) and traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) contexts in science education to provide motivation and self-esteem for indigenous students is widespread. However, the danger of alienating culture (as knowledge) from the language in which the worldview is embedded seems to have…

The need to enhance the relevance and quality of pre- and in-service teacher education in India has long been recognised in official commentaries. Despite the structural innovation of District Institutes of Education and Training to enhance systemic responsiveness to local contexts, training messages mediated through DIETs are largely not having…

We assessed the importance of academic and practical intelligence in rural and relatively urban Yup'ik Alaskan communities with respect to Yup'ik-valued traits rated by adults or peers in the adolescents' communities. A total of 261 adolescents participated in the study; of these adolescents, 145 were females and 116 were males, and they were from…

Indigenous communities remain concerned about research into their lives, their control over and participation in the research process and the public dissemination of knowledge. The relationship between researcher and participant and the product of this relationship has been traditionally cast as a dualism with one side being the less powerful,…

While considerable attention is being paid to reforming education systems to prepare students for the challenges of globalization and a knowledge-based economy, teacher education models in the Asia Pacific remain insufficiently critiqued. There is an urgent need to rethink teacher education as, in spite of decades of investment and development,…