This keynote introduces an Indigenous paradigm of "witnessing" and "truth telling" to educators, researchers and students trained in Western methodologies. Its story-telling and videography format is intended to expose participants to researcher’s roles as witnesses and truth tellers through the example of a SSHRC funded canoe revitalization research project. This SSHRC project resulted in the first canoe carved in a West Coast First Nation in more than 30 years. The responsibilities of the university witness in research are critical, as it is in many Indigenous communities and societies where witnesses are the historians of other villages and places. The highest priority of a witness in ceremony is to maintain the absolute accuracy of all the details in the work they have observed in order to maintain this history for generations to come. Particular attention will be paid to how an Indigenous research paradigm can open up culturally- and place-specific understandings of Indigenist research more broadly.
