Challenging "Normal": Black & Anishinaabe Perspectives and Processes on Inclusive Conservation Ideologies

Over the years, environmental organizations have been increasingly recognizing the value of engaging underrepresented groups in conservation efforts. However, for many organizations, engaging diversity, equity, and inclusion... [ view full abstract ]

Over the years, environmental organizations have been increasingly recognizing the value of engaging underrepresented groups in conservation efforts. However, for many organizations, engaging diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) has been difficult to implement effectively. One major problem is the difficulty of reconciling the Western conservation mission of safeguarding the world’s ecosystems with the knowledge, interests, values, issues, and protocols of people who have been historically excluded from the environmental movement. In many cases, ideas and practices considered “normal” in conservation circles are predicated on white, male, Christian, middle/upper class ideologies that privilege Western knowledge, economic efficiency, and paternalistic authority. While these biases are often enacted unconsciously, they greatly impact conservationists’ interactions with Indigenous and other communities of color in ways that they often fail to apprehend. In order to engage underrepresented groups in equitable and effective partnerships, we must question “normal” ways of thinking and behaving. In this session, we challenge “normal” by centering the inner work of DEI using a hybrid of Indigenous, Black, and common Western learning methods. We will begin the session by looking at current literature on organizational diversity through the lenses of Black and Anishinaabe perspectives in order to understand how racial stereotyping and “us vs. them” behavior that can occur within conservation organizations. Afterwards, the audience will be invited to participate in a sharing circle where Anishinaabe protocol and process will be utilized to talk about how we can challenge stereotyping and other exclusionary behaviors in our work. The goal of this session is to focus on DEI as a multi-faceted process of self-reflection and discovery that helps to open up spaces of compassion for having difficult dialogues about our differences and similarities as well their implications for engaging DEI in conservation.