July 2020

At the July meeting, we discussed chapters two and five from Kukutai and Taylor’s (2016) Indigenous Data Sovereignty. These chapters examine how indigenous peoples are inscribed, classified, and presented through a Westerncentric system of datafication. This includes concepts of how data (as a concept) is understood but also how data are collected. Walter’s chapter on indigenous representation in Australian statistics, for example, highlights how data on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders peoples focuses on only collecting negative data, positioning Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders peoples as inherently ‘problematic people’ who need to be corrected by the dominant Westerncentric system.

Abridged notes for these chapters can be found here.

Minutes from the meeting can be found here.