How can I visit or learn about indigenous communities respectfully?
Presented by ClearTrust Free for classrooms, newsrooms and the curious.
Go only where you are invited or where the community itself runs the visit. Ask before taking photographs, follow local rules about sacred places, pay fairly, and listen more than you speak. Never try to visit isolated or uncontacted peoples. To learn from home, start with sources produced by the people themselves.
Choose visits that the community controls and benefits from, such as tours, homestays, museums and cultural centres owned by the people. Check for permit rules. In India, for example, some tribal areas require an Inner Line Permit or a Protected Area Permit.
Ask permission before photographing people, homes or ceremonies, and accept a refusal. Some places, objects and knowledge are private. If an area is closed, as the climb at Uluru has been since 2019, respect the closure. Dress and behave as your hosts ask.
Avoid tours that treat people as a spectacle. So-called human safaris along the Andaman Trunk Road, through the Jarawa reserve, have been condemned and restricted by Indian courts. Contact with isolated peoples is dangerous to them and often illegal. If a tour promises a glimpse of people who have not agreed to be seen, do not take it.
Buy crafts directly from makers or community cooperatives, and do not buy sacred items or antiquities. To learn without travelling, read and watch work by indigenous authors, film-makers and organisations, and visit museums that work in partnership with the communities whose objects they hold.
Words used here
Sources
- Survival Internationalsurvivalinternational.org
- Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studiesaiatsis.gov.au