ABSTRACT
Knowledge systems are most fundamentally cultural traditions. The habits and customs that surround learning and the accumulation of knowledge are based on philosophical traditions regarding notions of belief and truth, and are, therefore, inescapably worldview issues. In this chapter, a community-based participatory research methodology is discussed alongside a specific case study of indigenous knowledge in research for cultural revitalisation and community wellbeing with Gwich’in Alaska Natives. Indigenous knowledge systems as knowledge tradition are all-inclusive concerning the subjects of a knowledge system and serve as a way of life. Western knowledge traditions tend to be divided internally, and, academically, this division is evident in the social structure of institutions with its divisions into departments dedicated to one or more aspects of knowledge, usually within a Western cultural worldview.
