Bi-Directional Learning: Identifying Contaminants on the Yurok Indian Reservation

Abstract

The Yurok Tribe partnered with the University of California Davis (UC Davis) Superfund Research Program to identify and address contaminants in the Klamath watershed that may be impairing human and ecosystem health. We draw on a community-based participatory research approach that begins with community concerns, includes shared duties across the research process, and collaborative interpretation of results. A primary challenge facing University and Tribal researchers on this project is the complexity of the relationship(s) between the identity and concentrations of contaminants and the diversity of illnesses plaguing community members. The framework of bi-directional learning includes Yurok-led river sampling, Yurok traditional ecological knowledge, University lab analysis, and collaborative interpretation of results. Yurok staff and community members share their unique exposure pathways, their knowledge of the landscape, their past scientific studies, and the history of landscape management, and University researchers use both specific and broad scope chemical screening techniques to attempt to identify contaminants and their sources. Both university and tribal knowledge are crucial to understanding the relationship between human and environmental health. This paper examines University and Tribal researchers’ shared learning, progress, and challenges at the end of the second year of a five-year Superfund Research Program (SRP) grant to identify and remediate toxins in the lower Klamath River watershed. Our water quality research is framed within a larger question of how to best build university–Tribal collaboration to address contamination and associated human health impacts.

Themes Across New Directions in Community Engagement

“…Community participation was only mentioned rarely by the articles reviewed and was typically portrayed in a negative light when it was. Finally, Middleton et al [5] describe their experiences and challenges in community engagement with the Yurok Tribe in California. These authors explain that they have faced several challenges so far, including difficulties in getting non-CEC members of the SRP center to participate in engagement and knowledge exchange, difficulties in finding the best avenues for community outreach, misunderstandings about realistic outcomes of engagement efforts, and disconnects between what the community hoped to get out of the experience and what the SRP center has been able to provide.…”

“…However, the institutional commitments to community engagement do not necessarily imply that its value will be immediately understood by all parties. Middleton et al [5] explain that one of the challenges faced by their CEC, for example, was that other members of the SRP center were not always eager to participate in community engagement activities. When they set up training sessions that brought university researchers and community members together to learn about the Yurok Tribe and research conducted by the Yurok Tribe Environmental Program, attendance among researchers was low, and some that did attend “wondered how it was relevant to their lab-based research” (p. 17).…”

“…Although both the EPA and NIEHS have come a long way when it comes to appreciating the value of community involvement, CECs may still need to take steps to explain this value to members of their SRPs. For example, Middleton et al [5] found that drawing more explicit connections between engagement and research helped other members of the SRP center better understand the value of community engagement activities.…”

“…Indeed, even though this special issue of IJERPH highlights only a sample of the community engagement efforts taking place at CECs around the U.S., the task of identifying common themes across the articles was still challenging. Based on the work presented here, community engagement may include the study of the communication process in communities [38], the study of other social issues affecting a community [37], the practice of communicating with community members [4], the process of engaging with institutional stakeholders in a community [36], and reflection on the community engagement process itself [5].…”

“…4) through the process of community engagement, which the SRP defines as “bidirectional interaction and communication between community stakeholders and its Centers” [3] (p. 2). As will be discussed in greater detail later in this paper, CEC activities vary widely, ranging from relatively low-engagement activities such as outreach and consultation [4,5] to high-engagement activities such as community-based participatory research [6].…”