| RESEARCH PROTOCOLS TO GUIDE SCHOLARS IN COMMUNITIES |
Introduction This project aims at enabling scholars and practitioners to carry out research together with the communities with a view to creating new body of knowledge. The idea is to locate Sites of African Indigenous Knowledge and Wisdom and explore the content and dimensions of such knowledge and wisdom with a view to making it more accessible for learning and use by them and other communities concerned and protect their heritages, while at the same time creating new avenues for them to utilise those heritages in a way that enhances their own well-being and welfare. For these reasons, the researchers and the researched communities have to establish proper modalities and relationships for interaction so they can design the research and carry it through together. This will require a high level of awareness about the rights of the communities and the individuals in those communities over their knowledge and wisdom found through the research. This should be the starting point and the point of departure in this exercise. For this reason, it has been decided to give the following guidelines in the form of protocols in order to ensure that relations between the researcher and the researched communities are on even level in order to avoid ethical and cultural pitfalls and complications. The Epistemological Dimension An episteme holds knowledge and meaning to be culturally differentiated and determined, always mediated by a specific language and situated in a specific historical setting. An episteme presupposes fundamental cultural and spiritual ontology, positing human beings, first and foremost, as cultural beings and producers of knowledge and wisdom. There is no epistemology of knowledge and wisdom, which is "value free", "neutral" and/or "objective" beyond those cultural frameworks. It is therefore vitally important that scholars/researchers seek to make clear their own cultural bearings and make these value bearings known to the other sides so they are aware of them. A purely "scientific" approach, in which the scholars see themselves as a detached individuals, carrying out "objective research" about others is bound to produce distorted results that may not reflect the reality on the ground. We must therefore establish how this dichotomy can be comprehended through a hermeneutic and phenomenological approach to research. A hermeneutic and phenomenological approach permits the removal of these barriers to communication. It permits free communication between the researcher and the researched in which both are subjects and knowing individuals, which is communicated through dialogue. In the "scientific" and "objectivist" research paradigm the "objects" (the communities) are distanced from the researcher both spatially and culturally. The purpose of data collection ("facts") by the "objective researcher" is to find out the actual condition of the "objects" that they are investigating. Their knowledge of themselves and their actual conditions is regarded as "suspect" because of their "subjectivity", "ignorance", "superstition" and possible "mistakes and errors" that informs their interpretations [Max Weber]. Until their knowledge is "validated" by "scientific methodologies", used by the scholars and subjected to their "unbiased analysis", the knowledge of the "objects" is regarded as mere a "raw data", which has to be "collected", "coded", categorised" and classified" before it is subjected to "rigorous" and "scientific" analysis. The "knowledge" produced is supposed to reflect the "truth" that the scholars have "discovered" through their "objective research". But, contrary to these "scientific" superstitions, errors and mistakes, truth is not an abstract concept, which has to be researched upon. Truth is lived experience that cannot be found through mere research, however "objective", "rigorous", and "scientific" it may be. As professor Mogobe Ramose has pointed out, truth is "simultaneously participatory and interactive". It is active continually. In that way it leads to action and reflection on the part of the creators of such knowledge. He argues further that even if "scientific methodology" was "neutral" enough, it could not produce only a knowledge-based truth for there is more to "truth" than the mere search for "knowledge". Simon Critchley agrees and notes that there exists a "gap" between knowledge and wisdom "that cannot be closed through empirical enquiry". There are also other areas of human understanding that cannot be accessed by scientific enquiry. Therefore, whereas "scientific research" may establish its own "truths" from its methodologies of "value-free" research, this approach can never fully do away with the existence of knowledge and wisdom that is produced within culturally determined communities, which reflect a peoples' understanding of themselves and the meaning they attach to their existence as human beings. Such understanding, knowledge and wisdom of each people can only be accessed by dialogue with them as well as through intersubjective communication with particular communities who are the producers of such meanings . We should therefore seek to understand, through intersubjective communication with the creators of such knowledge and wisdom, the basis of their knowledge and wisdom on their terms. This is the only way we can access such knowledge and wisdom, because it is the most democratic. An African hermeneutic and phenomenological contribution must lie in re-establishing a balance between knowledge and wisdom as well as asserting the principle of dialogue, which can only be found in the communities concerned. The Paradigmic and Methodological Hurdles Methodology in social science research including the humanities and the natural sciences in paradigm-based. This is in turn episteme-based. A paradigm, consequently, is a set of assumptions, concepts, values, and practices that constitute a way of viewing reality for the community that share them, especially in an intellectual discipline to which we may belong. It is for this reason that Thomas S. Kuhn described paradigms as "universally recognised scientific achievements that for a time provide model problems and solutions to a community of scientists and scholars, who create their paradigms through which they can find solutions to the problems defined by the paradigm. A methodology is more detailed theoretical construct that can guide a practical research. That means, any methodology has to establish the episteme and paradigm that can determine the framework within which the construction of rules and theoretical techniques for discovering meanings of a particular situation is possible. It follows that an African-based epistemology has to start with the recognition that its knowledge is valid within its own cultural contexts and that such knowledge can only be accessed and validated on the basis of its bearings. To understand these bearings one must enter into an intersubjective contact with it and this means trying to access it through its mechanisms of constructions of meaning and the techniques of "downloading" it. This entails understanding certain pedagogical tools and techniques, which are used to disclose signs and meanings. These tools and techniques can only be found within the language, signs and body language spoken by the people. On the understanding of these tools and techniques, it is possible to enter into dialogue with that culture for self-disclosure and cross-cultural validation. This is the hermeneutic and phenomenological approach. Concretely, in order for the researcher to fully participate both intellectually and emotionally in the day-to-day activities of the community, within the context of their language and culture, such a researcher must interact with the community concerned. This is an indispensable to any critical understanding of the structures and processes that the research will be trying to elucidate to form the foundation of any practice, which may derive from such knowledge. Other techniques of data collection, however sophisticated and "scientific" they may be, will merely complement this approach, and without it the data collected may bear no relation to the reality on the ground in the community concerned and no reality for knowledge of interest in social sciences. Therefore, taking the African lived historical situation as whole, we can state that the post-colonial condition in which Africans find themselves calls for emancipatory methodologies, which can enable Africans rid themselves of the remnants of colonialism and its rule of structural and other forms of violence that still engulf the continent. This step constitutes the "deconstructive challenge" for all Africans, including scholars. The challenge calls for the full exposure of the consequences of colonialism on the African people in order to develop tools, within the African hermeneutic experience, that can enable the generation of knowledge designed to describe, analyse and empower the African people "to change negative social forces into positive social forces as they impact on life chances" as part of the process of emancipation. Research Protocols In seeking to do research in African communities, we must therefore avoid doing those things that will immediately alienate the researcher from the community. This means we must take into account certain ethical dos and don'ts. This will vary from place to place and hence the first thing to do before going into a particular community is first to familiarise oneself with the community, the cultural sensitivities and short histories, which an outsider must take into account as one enters into intersubjective communication with them. As a guide, the following points should be taken into account towards developing comprehensive research protocols: Protocol 1: The researcher must first acknowledge the contextual validity of African indigenous knowledge and wisdom and respect the uniqueness of the particular community's contributions to knowledge production and what that knowledge offers to the entire community. In this connection, it is absolutely important to understand that the recognition of a peoples' culture and language by the scholar must be at the core of the relationship between the scholar and the community concerned and must be developed as the basis for the access of knowledge and understandings; Protocol 2: The scholar/researcher must avoid using concepts and theories that are alien to the situation in the community. Academic analyses based on abstract theories and concepts, common among scholars who carry out research as their main profession are counter- productive. In the real world of the African communities, people are able to constitute their first-world understanding of their social worlds through their own reflexivity and action. But these first-order understandings have no logical or necessary connection to the second-order analyses, which research and analyst's construct and which they call "scientific knowledge." Community first-order understandings may sometimes include but are by no means dominated by abstract reasoning strategies like those used by scholars and analysts use. Therefore the analyst's second-order understandings sometimes result in systematic misrepresentation of the concrete ways in which people create knowledge and engage in action within their first-order worlds. In this connection the understanding and use of a peoples' language in this discourse is of vital first-order significance. Protocol 3: In order to escape this vicious circle, scholars/researchers should make every effort to understand how people go about understanding and creating their own meanings and lifeworlds in their own cultural contexts and lived experiences. One guideline to help us to localise research in our communities is to treat research not merely as intellectual activity as understood in academia, but as a joint effort we make together with the communities to discover their lived truths. The arrogance the scholars adopt in this respect, or what Pierre Bourdieu called "illusion of the omnipotence of thought" is, in his words, a "dangerous delusion," which confuses academic analyses with social change and may lead some scholars to believe that one can change the world by merely "changing words." This falsehood also leads scholars into a further illusion of believing that by subverting terms, categories, and discourses it is possible to subvert or dent objective structures of existing structures of domination and power relations. One hallmark of such scholastic attitude is that it encourages the pursuit of academic activities as-ends-in-themselves, leading to endless research upon research rather than working with communities to explore community understanding and meaning upon which community and local actions for meaningful change can take place. Protocol 4: Scholars/Research in the community should seek to embolden the marginalised African masses. Therefore, methods of research should, aim at generating or validating existing practical and emancipatory knowledge about the forces that impact on the "life chances" of the of the masses according to their understandings. Secondly, the understanding generated from the above exercise should act as a guide to enable us to describe and analyse the empirical reality identified from the data gathered through those methods. This will assist us to gather testable hypothesis operationalising the variables obtained so that those variables can be tested empirically. In this case practical knowledge, according to Kershaw: "helps to generate new concepts, variables and ultimately Afrocentric theories which are grounded in the attitudes, behaviours, and historical relationships of the people being studied." Most importantly, this method enables us to identify from the data obtained apparent contradictions as well as convergences of the communities' first-order understandings and their "objective" reality. When a convergence occurs, validity results, but where it does not further inquiry is held until convergence is obtained or a theory found to explain the contradiction. Protocol 5: In order to move forward the resultant technical, practical and emancipatory knowledge and make it to contribute to the existing body of knowledge through its utilisation and critique, we have to be conscious of the relationships between theory and practice. Therefore, the researcher should participate in a programme of education and action with the communities by presenting and disseminating the findings to them in a culturally appropriate manner in order to enable them to identify contradictions so they can take action to rectify the situation. Actions should particularly aim at emancipating the African masses, as a step towards "humanising the whole world" because by asserting their own humanness through struggle and action they make a contribution to a better world based on Ubuntu. This implies a dialogical relationship between the researcher and the researched communities. In this way, as we observe above, the researcher participates in the discussion in the community and, where necessary, also participate in activities aimed at changing existing oppressive relationships on an equal basis. Protocol 6: In going further to utilise the results of the research, it vital that the researcher discusses with the community the use to which, he/she intends to put it. I f publication or use for productive activity is desired, intellectual rights in the form of copyrights and patent rights should be explained to them so their interests are protected and compensatory arrangements concluded. The product from the community is a joint/collective property of the researcher and the communities. This approach will dispose of the prejudice held by the dominant cultures are opposed to "development" since development and social transformation results from activities in which they are recognised and respected as subject rather than being objects of exploitation and oppression. Conclusion These protocols are intended to strengthen the role of scholars in communities as well as being anchored in the wider society. They are intended to act as guidelines, but since human relationships vary from place to place and from culture to culture, the scholar should always be creative so that he/she can work out relevant relationships with the community concerned that can enable them to work together. Prepared by: Professor Dani W. Nabudere Visiting Scholar, Collaborator: |