Leece Oliver LaRue
Aja Conrad
Shawn Borque
Facing countless research, project, and partnership collaboration requests, the Karuk Tribe asserts its own guide for prioritization, responsibility, and ethics for Karuk research. The Practicing Pikyav Policy for Collaborative Projects and Research Initiatives with the Karuk Tribe synthesized at the 2017 Association for Tribal Archives, Libraries, and Museums Conference within a workshop for community collections management. Formulated by two Karuk sisters working within the Karuk Tribe Department of Natural Resource’s Pikyav Field Institute, this framework details a process for centering Karuk tradition, custom, and laws for knowledge governance in collaborative research endeavors. With two updates since its inception, the Practicing Pikyav Policy continues to guide “outside” institutions and agencies on how to conduct Karuk research and project initiatives. Reflecting on seven years of Practicing Pikyav, this presentation gives a working guide for honoring Tribal conceptions of data sovereignty to intentionally encourage equitable, expansive research and project management practices. We invite Tribal leaders and aspiring collaborators to learn and discuss how to implement similar policies and strategies within their own place-based practices and research by synthesizing case studies of current relationships with University of Oregon, California Polytechnic State University: Humboldt, the Western Klamath Restoration Partnership, and Oakland Museum of California.