What is Social Constructivist Framework

This chapter focuses on exploring the contributions of indigenous-oriented relational thinking-and-being in terms of implications for the quality of social living and for sustaining relationships with everything in our ecological niche. It offers an account of how we can treat Indigenous Knowledge Systems (IKS) as envisaging socio-economic development differently from economic models of growth which thus far can be said to govern processes of globalization. The chapter attempts to demonstrate that resuscitating IKS is not so much a matter of researchers' documenting and respecting the content of indigenous knowledge that has been created to date. More important is to direct research with the aim of drawing out and revitalizing the styles of knowing and living that can be interpreted as characterizing indigeneity. Examples are provided of how research can be directed with this in mind.