Members of the MATC Native American Student Movement organization (NASM) recently attended a lecture entitled, “I Am The Corn” while on a field trip to the Schlitz Audobon Nature Center in Brown Deer, Wisconsin on Saturday April 9.
The lecture was given by Dr. Cheryl Metoyer, Associate Professor and Associate Dean for Research University of Washington Information School Adjunct Associate.
Metoyer is also Professor of American Indian Studies at the University of Washington.
The lecture was part of the Annual Ted Seymore 2011 Series sponsored by University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee School of Informational Studies.
Dr. Metoyer’s lecture centered on Native American knowledge systems, which reflect a world view that is cohesive, complex and highly sophisticated.
The conceptual foundations of these cultural systems enable recording, storing and classifying information in ways that reflect Native American values. It has the potential for bridging Native American knowledge systems with mainstream knowledge organization research, according to Dr. Metoyer.
Through the story of the Mashantucket Pequot Museum and Research Center, Professor Metoyer examined the challenges at the intersection of Native American knowledge systems, the historical record, and knowledge organization.
While working as Project Director at that National Indian Education Association, Dr. Metoyer assisted tribes and state agencies in planning and developing library services in urban and reservations communities.
Correctly defining Native American terminology proved to be a major hurdle for Dr. Metoyer. Sources had to be re-verified and intense meetings provided the ground zero for final decisions on cultural meanings.
The search system used for finding materials within archival files called EAD (Encoded Archival Description) used by The Library of Congress was also implemented by Dr. Metoyer for the Native American libraries project.
Dr. Metoyer assisted the Mashantucket Pequot, Cahuilla, San Manuel, Yakama, Navajo, Seneca, Mohawk and the Lakota nations in the development of their libraries, archives
and museums.
