“The thing is, to adapt is traditional”: Environmental Change and its Effects on Traditional Ecological Knowledge in the Eastern United States

In this essay, I examine the transformation of traditional ecological knowledge, particularly that concerning plant knowledge pertaining to medicine. I argue that this transformation is a result of an environmental history influenced by the presence of a colonial population. When the Europeans began to arrive in the Eastern United States in the sixteenth century, they created a domino effect of environmental change. This change occurred because the Europeans had different cultural adaptations when interacting with the environment than the natives did; in other words, they drew from a differently developed form of ecological knowledge. When the colonists utilized this knowledge to interact with their new environment in the Eastern United States, they altered the environment in ways that contradicted how the natives interacted with the same environment. The ecological changes occurring as a result of such alterations fostered changes in native traditional knowledge, because there were now new plants, animals, and people to interact with, as well as transformations of the landscape to contend with

Cooperative Cross-Cultural Instruction: The Value of Multi-cultural Collaboration in the Coteaching of Topics of Worldview, Knowledge Traditions, and Epistemologies

For four years (2011, 2013, 2014, 2015) two faculty members of the University of Alaska Fairbanks’ Center for Cross-cultural Studies have collaborated to co-teach a course entitled Traditional Ecological Knowledge (CCS 612). This course examines the acquisition and utilization of knowledge associated with the long-term habitation of particular ecological systems and the adaptations that arise from the accumulation of such knowledge. Intimate knowledge of place—culturally, spiritually, nutritionally, and economically for viability—is traditional ecological knowledge, and this perspective is combined with the needs of an Indigenous research method to better understand and more effectively explore the proper role of traditional knowledge in academic, cross-cultural research. This presentation and paper explores the strategies tested and lessons learned from teaching students from a wide variety of academic and cultural backgrounds including the social and life sciences, and the humanities, and from Indigenous and non-Indigenous cultural origins. The instructors, too—and most importantly for this endeavor—come from an Indigenous (John) and non-Indigenous (Koskey) background, and though hailing from very different cultures and upbringings work collaboratively and with genuine mutual respect to enable an understanding of variations of traditions of knowledge and their application to academic research

Generalized modeling of empirical social-ecological systems

Modeling social-ecological systems is difficult due to the complexity of ecosystems and of individual and collective human behavior. Key components of the social-ecological system are often over-simplified or omitted. Generalized modeling is a dynamical systems approach that can overcome some of these challenges. It can rigorously analyze qualitative system dynamics such as regime shifts despite incomplete knowledge of the model's constituent processes. Here, we review generalized modeling and use a recent study on the Baltic Sea cod fishery's boom and collapse to demonstrate its application to modeling the dynamics of empirical social-ecological systems. These empirical applications demand new methods of analysis suited to larger, more complicated generalized models. Generalized modeling is a promising tool for rapidly developing mathematically rigorous, process-based understanding of a social-ecological system's dynamics despite limited knowledge of the system.Comment: This is the authors' accepted manuscript. The final version of the paper including copy-editing can be accessed at http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/nrm.12129/ful

Assessing Cultural and Ecological Variation in Ethnobiological Research: The Importance of Gender

Contending that a significant portion of current ethnobiological research continues to overlook cultural variation in traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) and practice, this paper explores the potential impacts of gender-imbalanced research on data collection, hypothesis testing, and the formulation and application of ethnobiological inventories and theories. A multidisciplinary review of over 220 studies addresses commonly held stereotypes underlying gender-imbalanced field research and demonstrates the need for more inclusive, finely-tuned studies which disaggregate indigenous knowledge and practice by gender. The paper outlines factors underlying gender-based spatial and temporal variation in ecosystem exposure and traditional ecological knowledge in rural societies worldwide, and discusses how these factors contribute to gender differences in wild food harvesting, biodiversity and agrobiodiversity maintenance, natural resource management, and the transmission and conservation of sacred and secular customs. The review concludes with suggestions for designing and implementing more inclusive research

"What are mortals that you are mindful of them?" A Reading of the Biblical Message about Human Being and Nature from the New Vision of Science and Ecology

The author integrates the new scientific view of the universe with a rereading of the Genesis creation narratives. He introduces a reading of the human being as Vicar of God in light of \"precomprehension\" offered by science and the ecological crisis. New biblical interpretation of the unique role of humanity is compelled both by increased scientific knowledge of the cosmos and also by ecological destruction. In particular, the ecological crisis has emphasized that human domination of the world may destroy it. Interpreting Genesis from a New Testament viewpoint, particularly from the writings that announce a \"new creation\" performed by Jesus Christ, may remake the original mission of Vicar of God and lead Creation, affected by sin, to the new reality that it longs for

Agroforestry systems as alternative for conserving native plant species and improving agro-ecological knowledge

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Cultural and educational background of formation of sustainable lifestyle

In the XXI century mankind has approached the global transformation of society, which resulted in creation of a qualitatively new socioeconomic system, which is the knowledge society and the informational society, the foundation of which is the "economy of knowledge." Since the main factor in the formation and development of the "economy of knowledge" is human capital, need for a permanent way of human life gains currency more and more. That is, a way of life, which will provide the usage of the human capital (knowledge and skills) to meet the diverse needs of people who are not putting the state at risk of social, economic and ecological systems of society. When you are citing the document, use the following link http://essuir.sumdu.edu.ua/handle/123456789/3174

Genomic Inference of the Metabolism and Evolution of the Archaeal Phylum Aigarchaeota

Microbes of the phylum Aigarchaeota are widely distributed in geothermal environments, but their physiological and ecological roles are poorly understood. Here we analyze six Aigarchaeota metagenomic bins from two circumneutral hot springs in Tengchong, China, to reveal that they are either strict or facultative anaerobes, and most are chemolithotrophs that can perform sulfide oxidation. Applying comparative genomics to the Thaumarchaeota and Aigarchaeota, we find that they both originated from thermal habitats, sharing 1154 genes with their common ancestor. Horizontal gene transfer played a crucial role in shaping genetic diversity of Aigarchaeota and led to functional partitioning and ecological divergence among sympatric microbes, as several key functional innovations were endowed by Bacteria, including dissimilatory sulfite reduction and possibly carbon monoxide oxidation. Our study expands our knowledge of the possible ecological roles of the Aigarchaeota and clarifies their evolutionary relationship to their sister lineage Thaumarchaeota