Relational Accountability In Data Curation and Infrastructure: Supporting Indigenous Data Needs

Research data professionals working in libraries and repositories have limited experience supporting Indigenous scholars or working with the specialized and sensitive data involved in their research. The CARE Principles for Indigenous Data Governance, now widely referenced and discussed, can serve as the normative backbone for Indigenous research data services (RDS), but guidance and resources are needed to support application of the principles in practice. The Data Services for Indigenous Scholarship and Sovereignty (DSISS) initiative is advancing practical and technical solutions for integrating CARE in RDS through a Collaborative Curation Case Study approach that centers Indigenous research methods, data sovereignty, and relational accountability. Each DSISS case documents key elements of the Indigenous-appropriate curation process as building blocks for developing CARE-based stewardship guidelines and technical implementations.

We report on a foundational curation case study based on a rich collection of Cherokee natural and cultural history data underpinning a significant recent book on Cherokee stories and teachings of the natural world. We detail the collaborative work undertaken by the curation team, including the Indigenous researcher, family of the Elder co-author, and curators from the Qualitative Data Repository (QDR), to show how the interactive process, and diversity of data sources and documentation, shaped documentation, metadata and other curation choices, to represent the relationality integral to Indigenous methods and the priorities of the specific Indigenous family and community members. As a Local Contexts Integration Partner, we also share our experience with application of engagement and disclosure notices through the Dataverse platform and discuss the potential of collections care notices and TK labels for qualitative Indigenous research data. Our aim is to engage the IASSIST community on how to further support libraries and repositories to work responsibly with Indigenous scholars and communities and to customize the collaborative curation approach to suit RDS in their institutions.