OEB Seminar Series: Leke Hutchins

Leke Hutchins 
Presidential Postdoctoral Fellow 
School of Life Sciences 
Arizona State University

Let’s Consider a World Shaped by Indigenous and Western Science

Abstract: In recent years, Indigenous science has gained considerable attention for its potential to address environmental challenges—ranging from local to global scales—including biodiversity loss, wildfire intensity, and climate change. However, Indigenous science is not a new discipline. It has emerged since time immemorial through the oral transmission of knowledge, methods, and practices across generations. This cumulative body of observations and experimentation often parallels Western science, originating in post-Renaissance Europe, while diverging in central ways. Rather than pitting these approaches against each other, we should harness the strengths of both. Doing so requires ethical guidelines and careful consideration of the entire data life cycle, from question framing to data storage. In this talk, I will present arthropod DNA metabarcoding data from a diversified agroforestry gradient in Hawaiʻi, illustrating how species richness and antagonistic interactions shift in response to local agroforestry practices and the broader landscape composition. I will then discuss my efforts to operationalize Indigenous Data Sovereignty—the right of Indigenous communities to control data relevant to them—throughout the project. Finally, I will explore new horizons for reimagining biocollections, including culturally aligned nomenclature and the #collectionsback movement.