Abstract
A new pedagogical methodology is proposed to reduce the social vulnerability of indigenous communities occupying areas subject to volcanic activity, as a potential interactive approach between those communities, scientists, and scientific institutions. The multidisciplinary methodology aims to increase scientist’s understanding of the relationship between native inhabitants and active volcanoes in indigenous territories, and to improve the effective dissemination of information. Also, the proposed methodology offers to the local community the scientific knowledge in an understandable and useful way, in order to maximize people’s awareness of their exposure to volcanic activity. The procedure starts with the recognition of the local ancestral comprehension of the volcano and the cultural, ecological, and economical bonds between humans and volcanic processes. Subsequently, the transmission of the indigenous knowledge to the scientific community and the appropriation of geological knowledge by the children and teachers in a specific Māori primary school in New Zealand, allowed: (1) the establishment of a common language, (2) enhanced communication and collaboration between the participants involved in understanding and living with an active volcano, and (3) increased awareness about the relationship between humans and active volcanoes. A permanent application (and site-specific adjustment) of this method, and the use of the resulting teaching tools, could reduce social vulnerability and empower indigenous communities in the development of volcanic risk mitigation strategies by revitalizing and sharing knowledge, rather than imposing one epistemological system onto the other.
Highlights
Introduction backgroundThe lack of dialogue among stakeholders undertaking volcanic risk management hinders agreement in front of decision-making processes
Rather than “imposing” western science onto indigenous communities living around active volcanoes we propose a participative dialogue in order to maximize the local awareness and build up a strategy derived from multiple disciplines for risk mitigation
We suggest that body language in combination with other forms of human expression, such as, fine arts, music and poetry, are highly effective tools to teach geological and volcanological concepts
Summary
Introduction backgroundThe lack of dialogue among stakeholders undertaking volcanic risk management hinders agreement in front of decision-making processes (cf., King et al 2007). The scarcity of programs that integrate scientific-knowledge with the local epistemology, including the environmental and cultural relationship between the community exposed to volcanic eruptions and the volcano itself, is a key factor increasing the social vulnerability (cf., Alexander 1993, Paton et al 2001, Paton et al 2008, Vervaeck 2012). In most of the indigenous communities worldwide, the territory is the centre of their identity, culture, livelihood practices, ecology, economy, and knowledge and belief systems (cf., Feiring 2013). Moving in the space while feeling the centre of gravity, experiencing what happens when changing levels. Free-dance experiencing/ performing the states of water when changing temperature. A group of children form a central cluster (Sun), by making a circle holding hands and recreating collapse, explosion, rotation, initiation of the Star. Careful creation of larger clusters (planetoids) by embracing children along selected orbits, adding more “mass to each planet”
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