Place learning for sustainable futures

![CDATA[This paper will develop some ideas about place learning for sustainable futures that have evolved out of two major research projects with indigenous communities over the past 10 years. Most models of involving indigenous knowledges in 'natural resource management' co-opt indigenous knowledges into a western scientific framework. These moves then fail to make a difference to seemingly inevitable processes of environmental degradation. The experience of working with indigenous communities on place-based research offers deep insights into how we learn about place for a sustainable future. By identifying a framework of principles and processes from indigenous place relationships throughout these projects, this paper will attempt to develop a set of understandings about how non-indigenous people can learn about place for a sustainable future. It will explore four propositions for such place learning: place learning is local and embodied but simultaneously has universal application, stories are a powerful means of learning about place, deep place learning inevitably brings into sharp focus the contested nature of place knowledge and practices in the contact zone (Pratt, 1992), and this place learning is peculiarly the province of adult and community education.]]