Story-listening as methodology: a feminist case for unheard stories

Abstract

In light of the ongoing practice of non-Indigenous researchers conducting studies on Indigenous lands, new opportunities are needed for creative alternatives to fieldwork, along with an honest conversation about ethics, intent, and practices of place-based collaborative methods in Indigenous studies. In this paper, I explore the notion of story-listening as a creative methodological alternative to extractive methods for settler scholars in Indigenous communities. Through personal reflection, I argue that decolonizing research strategies should involve practices which minimize settler presence in, and demands on, Indigenous communities. A storied approach to research points to academic expectations of knowledge-production, which contribute to silencing Indigenous voices, while paradoxically setting Settler researchers as a privileged audience of Indigenous stories. Looking for told-but-unheard stories, I argue, is one way to find answers and guidance in research while respecting storytellers’ agency and challenging colonial origin stories. Methodological ideas for unheard stories are explored in three phases: hearing, listening, and sharing. All stages of story-listening involve care and respect for the storyteller.