Ask the Horses: Considerations for Indigenous Animal Methodologies

Kelsey John

This project intends to address a gap in Indigenous methodological literature, that is, the significance of nonhuman animal agents, knowers, and participants in research. The book project confronts anthropocentric and settler colonial foundations and instead centers Indigenous human/nonhuman relations within education and research paradigms. Using Indigenous story work, the text considers concepts of relationality, anthropocentrism, and ethics in research. The author uses her own stories with her horse relations to narrate encounters and tensions with more than human knowers. The text will highlight theoretical considerations relevant for Indigenous research from the fields of equine facilitated learning, multispecies ethnography, and critical animal studies describing some possible futures of Indigenous research that consider human/nonhuman members of Native Nations.

About Kelsey John

Kelsey Dayle John (Diné) is an Assistant Professor with a joint appointment in American Indian Studies and Gender and Women’s Studies at the University of Arizona. Her work is centered on animal relationalities, particularly horse/human relationships as ways of knowing, healing, and decolonizing education. Alongside her work in Indigenous animal studies, Kelsey’s research interests also include Indigenous feminisms and decolonizing methodologies. She is a member of the Navajo Nation and finds her theoretical locations within transnational feminism, Indigenous studies, settler colonial studies, Diné Studies, and foundations of education. She has a Ph.D. from Syracuse University in Cultural Foundations of Education.