Dr. Tassy Parker, Director of CNAH, is one of the co-instructors for the annual Community-Based Participatory Research (CBPR) Institute in Indigenous and Critical Methodologies. The CBPR Institute is a 1-week summer coarse offered by the UNM HSC.
About the Institute
CBPR and related-Participatory Action & Community-Engaged Research, is defined as a “collaborative approach that equitably involves all partners in research…with the aim of combining knowledge and action for social change to improve health and eliminate health disparities” (Kellogg Foundation). Not simply a set of research methods, CBPR fundamentally changes the relationship between researchers and research.
For this CBPR institute, we used a broad definition of Indigenous, as the knowledge that is an “exercise in self-determination” (Doxtator, 2004), referring to values, beliefs, traditions, and environmental relationships that are deeply embedded within the economic, political and cultural-social contexts in which they have been developed (Ball & Simpkins, 2004, Briggs, 2005). Indigenous methodologies are “those approaches to research that privilege indigenous knowledge, voices, and experiences” (Smith 2005). Critical methodologies, grounded in Paulo Freirs’s philosophy and cultural studies, are approaches to inquiry that are social-constructed, emancipatory and empowering, and see social justice for communities.
Structure of the Institute
The goal of this institute is to weave together theory and practice of CBPR with indigenous and critical methodologies through:
Articles
Presentations by community-academic partners
Discussion
Self-reflection on our own research questions
Participants will gain an appreciation of CBPR advantages and challenges as well as skills necessary for participating effectively in CBPR projects.
