Saturday, February 18, 2012: 10:00 AM-11:30 AM
Room 215-216 (VCC West Building)
The push for progress often undermines or overlooks the resilience of everyday technologies in indigenous lives. In addition, globalization creates a homogenizing force as new communicative technologies seek to move knowledge beyond borders. Finally, increasing populations with high technological expectations put stresses on the existing abilities of power generation. Thus, how do indigenous communities retain their unique cultures? How do they respond to new technologies while preserving the knowledge of time-tested indigenous technologies? How do we meet globalization with sustainable methods? The need to maintain indigenous cultures and values in a rapidly homogenizing world; assert indigenous control over local resources, science, and technology; and finally, explore all available options for sustainability call for the need to examine indigenous architectures in both a historical and contemporary sense. Indigenous values, culture, and governance systems are reflected and enforced by architecture. Indigenous architectures use regional, sustainable, and adaptive materials. Built environments reflect and influence the values and governance goals of an indigenous community, creating a buttress against the homogenizing influence of globalization, and in addition, support sustainable globalization through indigenous technologies.
Organizer:
Omeasoo Butt, University of Saskatchewan
Speakers: