Indigenous Ways of Knowing in Counseling - Theory, Research, and Practice

Indigenous Counseling is based in universal principals/truths that promote a way to think about how to live in the world and with one another that extends beyond the scope of Western European thought.  Individual health and wellness is intricately interwoven into the relationships that we establish on multiple levels in our lives, those that we establish with ourselves, with others, and with the external environments with which we live. From an Indigenous perspective, health and wellness in our individual lives, families, community and world, is the result of ancient knowledge that produces action in a way that is beneficial to all beings on the planet for generations to come. The current social and political record of our country now clearly reveals the result of a paradigm that has outlived its time. No longer can we ignore the core values of our fields of study; we must take a deeper look into the academic endeavors that inform the way we pass our cultures' values on to successive generations. While it has taken Western Science decades to catch up to Indigenous/Native Science, we now have ample scientific evidence to support claims of interconnectedness on multiple levels of individual and collective health. 

Dr. Lisa Grayshield is a member of the Washoe Tribe of Nevada and California. She is a Mother, a Grandmother, a tribal community member, and an associate professor of counseling psychology at New Mexico State University. She has an extensive record of scholarly activity that reflects her passion in promotion of Indigenous Ways of Knowing (IWOK) as a viable and practical theoretical construct for the research, teaching and practice in the helping professions. Dr. Grayshield, along with her students have developed IWOK coursework including, Indigenous Counseling Research Theory and Practice; Healing Trauma: Including Historical and Intergenerational Trauma, and; Indigenous Research Methods. She is currently focused on the creation of an Indigenous Healing Sanctuary where her students can learn about plants and experience ceremony.

Dr. Ramon Del Castillo is Professor and Chair of the Chicana/o Studies Department, Metropolitan State University of Denver, Denver, CO, USA.