Working with Indigenous people Flashcards
The role of elders:
- Custodians of knowledge to be passed down to future generations.
- Community functioning.
- Mentoring of young people.
Ways of cultural learning:
- Yarning and storytelling.
- Loss, grief and trauma.
- Activism and advocating.
- Ceremonial events or cultural business.
- The experience of growing older.
The impact of broken community governance:
- The role of Elders is a cultural obligation. If they are unable to occupy their function, it can lead to poor personal health and community wellbeing.
Three ways of speaking on Indigenous affairs:
- Speaking up for and alongside Indigenous people and their rights.
- Speaking on behalf of Indigenous people (this may be seen as paternalistic and undermine their sovereignty).
- Speaking as an Indigenous person (which leans towards cultural appropriation and may be seen as disrespectful).
Ethics and Indigenous engagement:
- Government agencies commissioning projects requiring consultation and review with Indigenous peoples.
- Community consent (provided by the respective Indigenous community).
Principles of Indigenous research (4):
- Indigenous self-determination.
- Indigenous leadership.
- Impact and value.
- Sustainability and accountability.
5 key principles of Indigenous health and medical research:
- Net benefits for Aboriginal people and communities, including ‘The research addresses and overcomes an identified issue’.
- Aboriginal community control of research, including Aboriginal community involvement, support and consent has been sought.
- Cultural sensitivity.
- Reimbursement of costs.
- Enhancing Aboriginal skills and knowledge.
First steps to developing cultural ‘competence’:
- Cultural knowledge: learning the elements of culture and their role in shaping and defining health behaviour.
- Cultural awareness: recognising and understanding the cultural implications of behaviour.
- Cultural sensitivity: the integration of cultural knowledge and awareness into individual and institutional behaviours.
Cultural competency (3):
- includes knowledge, behaviour and attitudes- not simply knowledge.
- it is a skill that needs to be expressed in behaviour as the capacity to function effectively in intercultural contexts, not imply knowledge and awareness.
- it extends beyond individual professional behaviours and includes organisations and systems- a culturally incompetent system can undermine the work of culturally competent practitioners.
Cultural competence includes:
- Knowledge (understanding of world views and history).
- Values (reflexivity).
- Skills.
Critical reflexivity and cultural competence:
- It involves developing an understanding of the nature and dynamics of power as it operates at many levels, from practitioner-client interactions to organisational and political systems.
- Includes impacts of history, racism, and privilege.
Stages of reflection (3):
- Reflection for action (before the work/planning).
- Reflection in action (in the moment/doing/analysing).
- Reflection on action (after the fact/looking back/reviewing the experience).
Cultural responsiveness:
- An ongoing process that requires awareness of the relationship between ourselves and others and the systems in which we interact.
- A long-term ongoing process and does not end in ‘competency’.
Cultural humility:
… frees workers from feeling that they have to possess expert knowledge about all cultural differences. Four essential skills:
- Active listening
- Reflecting
- Reserving judgment
- Entering the client’s world.
Strengths based approach:
- Linked to cultural humility.
- Client possesses expertise, resources and resilience in addressing their own needs.
- Client not seen as a set of problems, disorders or pathologies to be ‘treated’ or solved.
Cultural safety:
Cultural safety is defined in with reference to the experience of the Indigenous client/consumer, the care they are given, and their ability to access services and to raise concerns.
Developing a culturally safe practice:
- Build relationships of trust with Aboriginal community over time.
