Recently a nice little blurb from the university was published about one of our many projects (skip below to see the article). As it becomes more popular to support humanitarianism, civil rights, reconciliation efforts, and social justice, many people are left to wonder, "What is the appropriate role of an ally?"
Conflicting messages abound. Some advice calls non-Indigenous people (or, similarly, non-Black people) to "do something", and that anything less than action is complacence to a racist system. At the same, other advice argues that White perspectives, control, leadership, and Western values have been producing and re-producing the inequitable landscape that historically recent allies are hoping to help challenge. This advice calls allies to play a more supportive, background role, at times sitting aside so that members from the marginalized groups they purportedly want to help can lead.
Through a set of three studies, we are working to identify different ways of acting in solidarity with Indigenous Peoples and recommendations for how to be a good ally. First, we identified different ways that non-Indigenous think, feel, and act in solidarity with Indigenous Peoples using a innovative method (Q-methodology). Second, we collected positive and negative ally stories from Indigenous students from their own life, and, third, we are interviewing Indigenous faculty to provide their perspective on the types of allies they need for their work. Part 2 data is currently being analyzed. Part 3 is planned to begin in the Winter semester.
Read the results of Part 1 here: