Doctoral Dissertation Improvement Grant: An Examination of the Role of Inter-generational Interactions and Learning Contexts in the Process of TEK Loss in the Sonoran Desert

在过去，关于自然世界的知识，通常被称为传统的生态知识（TEK），是通过与其他更有知识的人（如祖父母、父母或兄弟姐妹）的互动来学习的。最近的研究表明，这种互动学习经历对孩子们来说越来越不常见了。今天，更多的儿童在正式的课堂环境中获得生物和生态知识，或者依靠电视、书籍或视频进行教学。十多年前在亚利桑那州进行的一项研究表明，将Tohono Oodham的孩子与他们的祖父母进行比较，他们失去了TEK。乔治亚大学的一位文化人类学家的论文研究将检验TEK的习得需要基于社会互动的学习环境这一命题。重点将放在代际接触和指导的作用，特别是儿童与祖父母或长辈之间的社会关系。本研究将有助于对TEK的损失或转化提供理论依据。这将有助于了解和预测正在经历社会和环境变革的人口在知识获取过程中的变化。研究结果将为今后开展Tohono Oodham地区文化知识流失的纵向研究提供基线数据，并为其他地区文化知识流失的研究提供比较数据。研究成果将应用于当地学校和风琴管仙人掌国家保护区目前的生物文化教育工作。这项研究还将为Tohono Oodham的两名合作者提供人种学研究培训，并将建立一个关于索诺兰沙漠动植物的传统生态知识的电子图书馆，分发给当地的学校。

In the past, knowledge about the natural world, often referred to as traditional ecological knowledge (TEK), was learned through interaction with others who are more knowledgeable, such as grandparents, parents or siblings. Recent research suggests that such interactional learning experiences are becoming less common for children. Today, a greater number of children acquire biological and ecological knowledge in formal classroom settings, or rely on television, books, or videos for instruction. Research conducted over a decade ago in Arizona revealed that there has been a loss of TEK when comparing Tohono Oodham children to their grandparents. This dissertation research by a cultural anthropologist from the University of Georgia will test the proposition that the acquisition of TEK requires a learning context based on social interactions. The focus will be on the role of inter-generational contact and instruction, specifically the social relationships between children and a grandparent or elder. This research will contribute to theory on the loss or transformation of TEK. The will help to understand and predict changes in the process of knowledge acquisition in populations undergoing social and environmental transformations. Research results will provide baseline data for conducting future longitudinal studies on the loss of cultural knowledge among Tohono Oodham, and comparative data for research on loss of TEK in other locations. Research results will be applied to current biocultural education efforts in local schools and in the Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. The research also will provide ethnographic research training for two Tohono Oodham collaborators and will create an electronic library of traditional ecological knowledge about Sonoran Desert plants and animals to be distributed to local schools.