Canadian Studies Center, October Report, 2014
In early June the College of Arts and Sciences awarded the Center and partners (see below) $40,000 for the proposed Mellon grant project, Comparative Intellectual Traditions: Indigenous and Western Worldviews in Area Studies to engage in an important cross-campus dialogue and expand on the foundation for the Arctic academic programs.
In early June the College of Arts and Sciences awarded the Center and partners – D. Million, American Indian Studies, M. E. Garcia, Comparative History of Ideas, T. Lucero, Latin American Studies, S. Pekkanen, Jackson School, E. Steig, Atmospheric Sciences, S. Gardner, Philosophy, and J. Marlow, Law – $40,000 for the proposed Mellon grant project,Comparative Intellectual Traditions: Indigenous and Western Worldviews in Area Studies.
The project activities are designed to assist the Center and partners in ensuring that the developing Arctic academic programs are rooted in indigenous epistemologies as well as Western ways of knowing. The proposal asks the important question, how can U.S. Department of Education Title VI programs in the Jackson School effectively incorporate the Arctic as a world region in to their academic programs; and, activities and how will particular characteristics of the Arctic – specifically Arctic indigenous worldviews – challenge and broaden current understandings of the area and international studies field.
The proposal identifies three main projects including laying an intellectual foundation for the Arctic academic program (Arctic minor); holding three workshops to discuss the need for and design of a Graduate Certificate in Arctic Studies; and, continuing funding for three Arctic Research Fellowships.
The proposal builds from the 2013-14 funded project, Re-imagining Area and International Studies in the 21st Century: The Arctic as an Emerging Region, that provided eight U.W. graduate students with fellowships to write research papers. See http://www.jsis.washington.edu/arctic/grad/arctic.shtml.