Collaboration Under the Five Obligations
Research Partnerships
We do not “partner” with institutions that extract knowledge and disappear. We enter relationship with researchers who will listen, learn, and return.
The Foundation’s archive is open to serious inquiry — but only under the five obligations that govern all Nipadua practice.
Who Can Apply
We Welcome
- +Universities with ethical review boards that include community representation
- +Museums that repatriate and co-curate
- +Independent researchers with demonstrated relationship to community
- +Laboratories developing sustainable technology from indigenous observation
- +Artists and designers who will translate knowledge into new form while honoring its spirit
We Do Not Welcome
- –Universities that treat indigenous knowledge as “data” to be mined
- –Museums that collect and display without consent
- –Researchers who arrive with conclusions and seek confirmation
- –Laboratories seeking to patent what belongs to the land
- –Artists who strip spiritual core for aesthetic trend
The Five Obligations of Research
Before any research begins, these obligations must be fulfilled:
Know the Name
Know the true name of the practice, the elder, the community, the land. Not the colonial name. Not the academic category. The name it answers to.
Know the Spiritual Association
Know what deity claims this knowledge, what taboo surrounds it, what season is appropriate for its study, what moon phase welcomes its transmission.
Obtain Permission
Ask the elders. Ask the custodians. Ask the community. Permission is not granted on the first visit — it is earned through relationship.
Offer Something in Return
Your offering must be proportional to what you take. Funding for the archive, labor in the community, publication that amplifies elder voice, or technology that serves the practice. The custodian determines what is appropriate.
Plan for Return
Before you begin, you must know how your research will return to the community. Will you teach? Will you build? Will you advocate? Will you deposit your findings in the archive under community control?
Forms of Partnership
Short-Term Study
- You Receive
- Access to specified archive collections, elder interview (if permitted), custodian guidance
- You Give
- Financial contribution to archive, published acknowledgment, community presentation of findings
Long-Term Residency
- You Receive
- Deep immersion in practice, participation in ritual (if initiated), co-authorship of documentation
- You Give
- Substantial funding for archive and community, apprenticeship labor, permanent deposit of research in archive
Institutional Collaboration
- You Receive
- Shared governance of research direction, joint publications, co-curated exhibitions
- You Give
- Endowment for archive maintenance, community advisory board seat, repatriation of any previously extracted materials
Technology Transfer
- You Receive
- Indigenous knowledge informing sustainable technology development
- You Give
- Community ownership of resulting patents, profit-sharing, open-source publication where appropriate
Application Process
The Question
Submit not a research proposal but a question. What do you want to learn? Why do you want to learn it? What relationship do you already have with the practice or community?
The Arrival
If your question is accepted, you arrive. You sit. You wait. You listen. You bring an offering. You prove you are not an extractor.
The Negotiation
The council of custodians meets. They ask the elders. They ask the land. They decide if you are ready.
The Agreement
If permission is granted, a formal agreement is signed — not by you alone, but by you, the elder, the custodian, and the community representative.
The Return
Your research is not complete until you have returned what you promised. The archive reviews. The community witnesses. The year is not closed until the cycle is complete.
We do not partner with extractors. We enter relationship with listeners.
Research is not discovery. Research is remembering.