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Partnering Indigenous and Western knowledge systems: a case study of Maasai perspectives on problematic plants in northern Tanzania's drylands

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dc.contributor.authorMcCarty, Connor, author
dc.contributor.authorLynn, Stacy, advisor
dc.contributor.authorVogeler, Jody, committee member
dc.contributor.authorSmith, Melinda, committee member
dc.date.accessioned2024-09-09T20:51:20Z
dc.date.available2024-09-09T20:51:20Z
dc.date.issued2024
dc.description.abstractMaasai are an Indigenous group native to the East African drylands who traditionally practice pastoralism, but their livelihoods are undergoing drastic changes as they become increasingly dependent on cultivation, adapt to climate change, and endure socio-political pressures, including for wildlife conservation. We wanted to understand Maasai communities' views on this landscape-level change using their Indigenous knowledge of plants as an indicator. In the first part of this research project, we asked members of five Maasai villages located in Tanzania's Simanjiro Plains about their experiences with problematic plants to identify and rank which plant species and plant characteristics they found to be most problematic from their perspective without influence from our team's biases. In the second part of the project, we introduced a participatory science tool, CitSci, into the community to collect geospatial data on these plants to created habitat suitability models for the three most problematic plants – Oltelemet (Ipomoea hildebrandtii), Alairahirah (Crotalaria polysperma), and Gugu caroti (Parthenium hysterophorus). Using quantitative and qualitative analyses, we evaluated participatory science's challenges and benefits in the community as a source of continuous engagement, collaboration, and local utility. This speaks to our greater goal: to embed two-eyed seeing in participatory social-ecological research. By utilizing both Indigenous knowledge and scientific tools from the Western scientific world, there is potential to improve academic research and help Indigenous researchers carry out locally focused and community-led projects without the oversight, influence, or harm from external forces common with Western-focused approaches. Using this project as an exploratory case study, our conceptual framework shows great promise.
dc.format.mediumborn digital
dc.format.mediummasters theses
dc.identifierMcCarty_colostate_0053N_18596.pdf
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/10217/239197
dc.languageEnglish
dc.language.isoeng
dc.publisherColorado State University. Libraries
dc.relation.ispartof2020-
dc.rightsCopyright and other restrictions may apply. User is responsible for compliance with all applicable laws. For information about copyright law, please see https://libguides.colostate.edu/copyright.
dc.titlePartnering Indigenous and Western knowledge systems: a case study of Maasai perspectives on problematic plants in northern Tanzania's drylands
dc.typeText
dcterms.rights.dplaThis Item is protected by copyright and/or related rights (https://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/). You are free to use this Item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s).
thesis.degree.disciplineEcosystem Science and Sustainability
thesis.degree.grantorColorado State University
thesis.degree.levelMasters
thesis.degree.nameMaster of Science (M.S.)

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