Join us on Wednesday, February 11th as the AVA Webinar Series presents Responsibilities in Environmental Research, featuring Dr. Ranjan Datta from Mount Royal University and Dr. Kevin wâsakâyâsiw Lewis.
Wednesday, February 11th, 2026
10 – 11:00am MST
This webinar explores the meanings of responsibilities in environmental research from cross-cultural and Indigenous community perspectives. Drawing on case studies from rural and northern Indigenous communities in Canada, including energy disaster and land rights struggles, the presentation examines how settler colonialism, miscommunication, and exclusion of Indigenous self-governance shape environmental research practices. Grounded in relational theoretical frameworks and participatory action research, the talk highlights storytelling, land-based learning, and deep listening as decolonizing methodologies. The webinar calls for redefining research as community capacity building, honoring non-human relations, Indigenous knowledge systems, and collective responsibilities toward land, people, and future generations.
About the Speaker
Dr. Ranjan Datta is a Canada Research Chair in Community Disaster Research and Associate Professor of Indigenous Studies at Mount Royal University, Canada. An interdisciplinary community-based scholar, his work focuses on Indigenous land-based science, anti-racist climate justice, community-led disaster research, and decolonizing methodologies. He has secured over $15 million in competitive research funding and has advised governments, UN agencies, and international research networks. Dr. Datta has published extensively across books and high-impact journals and collaborates with Indigenous, racialized, and Global South communities to advance relational, justice-oriented, and action-based research practices.
Dr. Kevin wâsakâyâsiw Lewis is a nêhiyaw (Plains Cree) instructor, land-based researcher, and writer. Dr. Lewis has worked with higher learning institutions within the Prairie Provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta in the areas of Cree Language Development and Instructional methodologies. His research interests include language and policy development, second language teaching methodologies, teacher education programming, and environmental education. For the past 15 years, Dr. Lewis has been working with community schools in promoting land and language-based education and is the founder of kâniyâsihk Culture Camps, a non-profit organization focused on holistic community well-being, and co-developer of Land-Based Cree Immersion School kâ-nêyâsihk mîkiwâhpa. Dr. Lewis is from the Ministikwan Lake Cree Nation in Treaty 6 Territory.