The dialogue between science and traditional knowledge for biodiversity conservation
Are there rational justifications for the human to be separated from their environment? The debate "Visual, Popular and Scientific Narratives: Traditional Peoples and the Challenge of Biodiversity Conservation" will be held by IEA-USP's Philosophy, History, and Sociology of Science and Technology Research Group from April 9 to 10 at the IEA- USP (read the programme below) to emphasize the need of a cooperative dialogue between scientific and traditional knowledge with focus on designing a kind of conservation of biodiversity that is sensitive to the values of social justice, popular participation and sustainability.
Special attention will be given to the imagery documentary record, seen as an inventory of social and cultural practices that contributes to human and social sciences in the mapping and interpretation of Amazonian realities.
According to the organizers of the debate, "science and the technology perspective associated with it tend to understand the Amazon as a repository of natural resources, biodiversity and genetic 'bank', which must be harnessed to meet human needs, specifically to answer the hegemonic model of progress."
However, the researchers warn that "science and technology, as drivers of rational development and of the ideals of human flourishing behind it, oppose the traditional knowledge, meaning knowledge and ways of life of people and local communities, considering that they constitute an obstacle to modernization."
Given the possible tensions arising from the meeting of these narratives, some questions arise:
- Are traditional knowledge and science competing rationalities?
- In spite of their differences, is the cooperation between these rationales a viable alternative?
- Are there rational justifications for the human to be separated from their environment and for biodiversity to be separated from human cultures?
According to organizers, cooperative dialogue between the two sides find support in the theoretical framework of the model of interaction between science and values which is developed by the research group [read the interview with Hugh Lacey on this model]: "The arguments of the model in favor of strategic pluralism point to the need of a research based on methodological complementarity and the possibility of adopting unconventional alternative practices for biodiversity conservation."
Three central issues will be addressed by the two debates of the event:
- The imagery documentary record and field survey: from image to translation of realities
- Dialogue between science and traditional knowledge: from the model of interaction to methodological pluralism
- Communication and polarization between scientific and popular narratives in biodiversity conservation
PROGRAMME
April 9 from 9.30 am to 12.30 pm
Exhibitors: Antonio Carlos Diegues (NUPAUB-USP) and Sylvia Caiuby Novaes (FFLCH-USP)
Discussant: Stelio Marras (IEB-USP)
Mediator: Ana Tereza Reis da Silva (FE-UNB and IEA-USP)
April 10 from 9.30 am to 12.30 pm
Exhibitors: Mauro William Barbosa de Almeida (IFCH-Unicamp) and Ana Tereza Reis da Silva (FE-UNB and IEA-USP)
Discussant / mediator: Stelio Marras (IEB-USP)