Indigenous Knowledge Workshop

Victoria University of Wellington and the University of New South Wales invite you to "Mapping the Changing Landscape" on Monday 12 February, 2018.

Presentations and Roundtable session will be held at Rutherford House, Mezzanine Floor, Room MZ03

Workshop programme

Indigenous knowledge has become a ‘hot topic’ in global discourses relating to intellectual property, international trade law and human rights, among other fields. Every year we are flooded by more and more literature outlining Indigenous expectations, the difficulties involved and potential solutions. But where exactly are we? What is the state of the art, and how can we escape from the status quo?

This workshop aims to map-out where we are at in terms of understanding, suggest where it is we might or need be heading, and offer some tools for the journey. The geographic focus is on Australia and New Zealand, and we are encouraging practical exchanges of ideas ‘across the ditch’.

Opening Presentations

Concerns surrounding the misappropriation and 'biopiracy' of Indigenous Knowledge (IK) associated with biological resources emerged in the early 1990s. However, different parties in the WIPO Committee on IP, Genetic Resources (GRs) and Traditional Knowledge (TK) are not convinced of the scale of the problem and there is disagreement over how to resolve the issues.

There have been ad hoc 'biopiracy' cases and concerns identified in the press relating to Australian and New Zealand GRs and IK, but no significant attempts to quantify or analyse the scale of the problem. The organisers will present the following findings obtained from global patent searches:

Māori Knowledge under the Microscope: Appropriation and Patenting of Māori Knowledge and Resources
Identifying and Preventing Biopiracy in Australia: Patent Landscapes and Legal Geographies for Plants with Indigenous Australian Uses

Afternoon Roundtable

Led by Professor Susy Frankel (Victoria University of Wellington) and Professor Kathy Bowrey (University of New South Wales).

This session provides an opportunity for discussion about the relationship between academic work and social justice with respect to Indigenous related IP issues. Matters that might be canvassed include:

Different ways of approaching what Indigenous/non-Indigenous solidarity might entail;
When inquiry becomes invasion;
Addressing personal positions without engaging in autobiographical ethnography;
Not assuming solidarity;
Understanding Indigenous politics in settler colonialism and the limitations of an IP world-view;
Reflections upon unsettling encounters and interactions between non-Indigenous participants; non-Indigenous and Indigenous; Indigenous participants;
The limits of self-reflexivity and confessing one’s positionality; and
When to shut up and when to speak up.

Download the Workshop flier

Call for papers

We welcome academics, Indigenous experts, government representatives and practitioners to attend.

If you would like to present on this topic, please email a title and short abstract to Daniel Robinson (d.robinson@unsw.edu.au) by 22 January 2018.

If you do not wish to present, your attendance and contribution to an afternoon roundtable on these issues would still be greatly valued.

Registration

Please indicate your attendance via the online registration form.

Venue

Victoria Business School, Rutherford House, Mezzanine Floor, Room 03, 23 Lambton Quay, Wellington (view a map of Pipitea campus).

Key dates

If you wish to present, please email a title and short abstract to Daniel Robinson (d.robinson@unsw.edu.au) by 22 January 2018
Last date for registration for workshop (for catering purposes): Thursday 8 February 2018

Organisers

Daniel Robinson, Associate Professor, University of New South Wales

Jessica C Lai, Senior Lecturer, Victoria University of Wellington

Together with:

Tim Stirrup, IP Adviser, Auckland UniServices

Hai-Yuean Tualima, Doctoral Candidate, University of New South Wales