Vermont Abenaki Artists Association is presenting a Two-Eyed Seeing Speaker Series.
Mi’kmaw Nation Elder Albert Marshall coined the term Two-Eyed Seeing to refer to the process of learning through sharing different cultural perspectives. Bringing Indigenous and Western ways of knowing together is beneficial for all.
Since the 1990’s indigenous research has moved away from scientific positivism toward critical theory, seeing evidence not as leading toward an underlying “truth,” but an outcome of many different truths, each depending on one’s biocultural or political perspective. However, politicized rewriting of native history has posed a distinct threat to such emerging Indigenous ways of exploring the world. In this presentation Dr. Frederick Wiseman will demonstrate the ways that Indigenous and positivist (scientific) ways of knowing can work together to preserve a legitimate American Abenaki biocultural history and worldview.
About the presenter
Frederick M. Wiseman, Ph. D. is a member of Vermont Abenaki Artists Association (VAAA) and received their first Lifetime Achievement Award in 2013. Scholar, activist, and diplomat, Wiseman is Director of the Vermont Indigenous Heritage Center at the Burlington Intervale; Abenaki Delegate to the Wobanaki Confederacy since 1990; and Seven Nations (Canada) Wampum Keeper since 2004.
