Indigenous Practices of Integrity

Considerations for Applications in Post-Secondary Spaces

Abstract

Indigenous understandings of “integrity” are rooted in Indigenous worldviews. Therefore, they cannot be easily stitched onto the colonial frameworks from which academic integrity policies usually arise. When asked to explore academic integrity from Indigenous perspectives by our own post-secondary institution, the authors began a critical journey into understanding practices of integrity from both Indigenous and western worldviews. This paper shares our journey of inquiry, as well as the key tensions we see when these two perspectives of integrity are brought together. We share the process in which we engaged, and recommendations for others seeking to take pragmatic action to “decolonize” academic integrity policies and practices. Though we share the integrity-related insights we are taking forward in our own context, we also place emphasis on the need for post-secondary institutions to consider ways to cultivate ethical spaces in which local Indigenous wisdom can be meaningfully centered.