On April 13, 2021, NNI’s Research Specialist Andrew Martinez (O’odham, Diegueno, and Yaqui) and NNI’s Associate Director Dr. Stephanie Russo Carroll (Ahtna-Native Village of Kluti-Kaah) were invited to present at the Inter-Tribal Monitoring Data Project Annual Meeting, organized by the team at the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission. Their presentation entitled “Indigenous Data Sovereignty: An Overview and Potential Application for Data Governance for CRITFC” was developed to serve as a broad introduction to the Indigenous data sovereignty framework. Martinez covered the first part of the presentation, which focused on traditional forms of data storage that have been utilized by Indigenous communities for centuries, and highlighted the relationship between Native nation building and data rebuilding and enhancing relationships between data rights holders and stakeholders. Dr. Carroll followed up with content focused on the development and operationalizing of the CARE Principles for Indigenous Data Governance and also shared examples and initial findings from some of the ongoing projects that our Collaboratory for Indigenous Data Governance is working on.

“We are always excited to introduce new audiences to the Indigenous data sovereignty and governance work that our NNI and Collaboratory for Indigenous Data Governance team is doing.”

– Andrew Martinez

The session concluded with a lively discussion with audience members sharing their initial feedback and questions. We want to thank the team at the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission for the invitation to join the annual meeting and look forward to continued conversations with the team at CRITFC.

Photos courtesy Columbia River Inter Tribal Fish Commission