Subverting the universality of metadata standards. The TK labels as a tool to promote Indigenous data sovereignty
| Pages | 731-749 |
| Date | 08 July 2019 |
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JD-08-2018-0124 |
| Published date | 08 July 2019 |
| Author | María Montenegro |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science,Records management & preservation,Document management,Classification & cataloguing,Information behaviour & retrieval,Collection building & management,Scholarly communications/publishing,Information & knowledge management,Information management & governance,Information management,Information & communications technology,Internet |
Subverting the universality of
metadata standards
The TK labels as a tool to promote Indigenous
data sovereignty
María Montenegro
University of California Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, USA
Abstract
Purpose –The purpose of this paper is to investigate the underlying meanings, effects and cultural patterns
of metadata standards, focusing on Dublin Core (DC), and explore the ways in which anticolonial metadata
tools can be applied to exercise and promote Indigenous data sovereignty.
Design/methodology/approach –Applying an ant icolonial approach, this paper examines the
assumptions underpinning the stated roles of two of DC’s metadata elements, rights and creator. Based on
that examination, the paper considers the limitations of DC for appropriately documenting Indigenous
traditional knowledge (TK). Introduction of the TK labels and their implementation are put forward as an
alternative method to such limitations in metadata standards.
Findings –The analysis of the rights and creator elements revealed that DC’s universality and supposed
neutrality threaten the rightful attribution, specificity and dynamism of TK, undermining Indigenous data
sovereignty. The paper advocates for alternative descriptive methods grounded within tribal sovereignty
values while recognizing the difficulties of dealing with issues of interoperability by means of metadata
standards given potentially innate tendencies to customization within communities.
Originality/value –This is the first paper to directly examine the implications of DC’s rights and creator
elements for documenting TK. The paper identifies ethical practices and culturally appropriate tools that
unsettle the universality claims ofmetadata standards. By introducingthe TK labels, the paper contributesto
the effortsof Indigenous communitiesto regain control and ownershipof their cultural and intellectualproperty.
Keywords Traditional knowledge, Dublin Core, Metadata standards, Indigenous communities,
Indigenous data sovereignty, TK labels, Universality
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
The Karuk Tribe, a federally recognized Native American tribe[1] located in northwestern
California, welcomes visitors to their Sípnuuk Digital Library with the following statement:
“Any materials containing Karuk traditional knowledge are the intellectual and cultural
property of the Karuk People, and we will therefore make these materials available
according to our Karuk cultural protocols regardless of their current copyright assignment
[…] The Karuk Tribe asserts primary ownership of all cultural knowledge specific to our
Tribe”(Sípnuuk Digital Library). Sípnuuk, which means storage basket in Karuk, is
dedicated to managing, sharing and enhancing understandings of Karuk history, language,
traditional knowledge (TK), natural resources and living culture, all of which activities are
conducted in accordance with Karuk cultural protocols (Tribe et al., 2017). Built using the
Mukurtu content management system (CMS), an open source platform that allows
Indigenous communities to define privacy settings and levels of access to and circulation of
their digital heritage materials according to local cultural protocols (Christen, 2011), Karuk
Journal of Documentation
Vol. 75 No. 4, 2019
pp. 731-749
© Emerald PublishingLimited
0022-0418
DOI 10.1108/JD-08-2018-0124
Received 1 August 2018
Revised 8 February 2019
Accepted 10 February 2019
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/0022-0418.htm
This paper was written in Los Angeles, CA, which is the unceded territory of the Tongva people, the
traditional land caretakers of Tovaangar (Los Angeles basin, So. Channel Islands). As a non-Native
Student pursuing a degree in a land grant institution, the author pay her respects to this land’s
ancestors, elders and their relatives/relations past, present and emerging and recognize their con-
tinuing connections to land, water and resources.
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Universality of
metadata
standards
tribal members see Sípnuuk as a part of their efforts “to revitalize Karuk culture and fully
realize tribal sovereignty”(Sípnuuk Digital Library).
Karuk efforts to manage and (re)gain legal ownership, custody and control of their
cultural information and TK can be read as an example of Indigenous data sovereignty:
“the right of a [tribal] nation to govern the collection, ownership, and application of its own
data”(US Indigenous Data Sovereignty Network). This concept strategically builds upon
that of data sovereignty, which was developed in the wider data community to prevent the
subpoenaing of digital materials held in the cloud in one country by another, holding that
digital or digitized information should be subject to the laws of the country where it is
being held or processed (per conversation with Anne, 2017). Advocates of Indigenous data
sovereignty, consequently, argue that “when data are collected from the people and
communities of an Indigenous nation, the data come under the control of that Indigenous
nation”(Kukutai and Taylor, 2016) asserting tribes’inherent right to govern their peoples,
lands and resources (Rainie, Schultz, Briggs, Riggs and Palmanteer-Holder, 2017; Rainie,
Rodriguez-Lonebear and Martinez, 2017; Kukutai and Taylor, 2016; Rodriguez-Lonebear,
2016; Snipp, 2016; Smith, 2015; Schultz and Rainie, 2014). In other words, data sovereignty
typically refers to the understanding that data is subject to the laws of the nation within
which it is stored, while Indigenous data sovereignty understands data as subject to the
laws of the nation from which is collected. Indigenous data sovereignty, thus, positions
tribal nations’data governance activities within a broader Indigenous rights framework in
accordance with international declarations and agreements to which the USA has become a
signatory, such as the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
(UNDRIP). Article 31 of UNDRIP states that:
Indigenous peoples have the right to maintain, control, protect and develop their cultural heritage,
traditional knowledge and traditional cultural expressions, as well as the manifestations of their
sciences, technologies and cultures, including human and genetic resources, seeds, medicines,
knowledge of the properties of fauna and flora, oral traditions, literatures, designs, sports and
traditional games and visual and performing arts. They also have the right to maintain, control,
protect and develop their intellectual property over such cultural heritage, traditional knowledge,
and traditional cultural expressions.
In conjunction with indigenous peoples, States shall take effective measures to recognize and
protect the exercise of these rights.
Indigenous conceptions of data sovereignty differ from the western constructions because they
include a wider assertion of sovereign nation status and rights that seek to redress and preempt
situations where these have been dismissed or disregarded. They call for Indigenous people to
be involved in decisions about every step relevant to the management of their data –from the
collection, research, circulation of and access to their data, to controlling their data’s
documentation, classification, description and interpretation. Western constructions of data
sovereignty also differ from Indigenous terms in that data sovereignty typically refers only to
government, institutional, and business-generated information, e.g. demographic,
environmental, educational and health data. Indigenous data sovereignty, on the other hand,
while also concerned with government-collected administrative data, takes into consideration
“all data about Indigenous people that is used to describe or compare Indigenous collectives”
(Kukutai and Taylor, 2016). This includes data about Indigenous communities that are captured
in or can be derived from Indigenous cultural materials collected and/or recorded through
colonial activities and other practices of “exploration,”conquest, exploitation, dispossession and
expropriation, including non-Indigenous scholarly and personal collecting activities.
Situated within a broader critical project and theoretical background relating to
documentation and radical knowledge organization practices (Littletree and Metoyer, 2015;
Drabinski, 2013; Gilliland and McKemmish, 2012; Olson, 2001), and informed by an
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