About

The Summer internship for INdigenous peoples in Genomics Canada (SING Canada) is an initiative associated with the Indigenous Science, Technology, and Society Research and Training Program (Indigenous STS) at the University of Alberta, Faculty of Native Studies. Building on the success of SING US and SING AotearoaSING Canada is an annual one-week intensive workshop designed to build Indigenous capacity and scientific literacy by training undergraduate and graduate students, postdoctoral, and community fellows in the basic of genomics, bioinformatics, and Indigenous and decolonial bioethics. This all expenses paid residential program invites Indigenous participants to engage in hands-on classroom, lab, and field training in genomic sciences and Indigenous knowledge. The curriculum includes an introduction to leading advances in and Indigenous approaches to genomics and its ethical, environmental, economic, legal, and social (GE3LS) implications. Participants gain an awareness of the uses, misuses, opportunities, and limitations of genomics as a tool for Indigenous peoples’ governance. SING Canada is distinguished by its dedication to critical Indigenous theory and an emphasis on discussing the local contexts (i.e. political, legal, biological, and Indigenous) where the workshops take place, including the human and other-than-human relations that have implications variously for human and non-human health, environments, and societies. This is not your average summer science training program!

For more information and to apply for the internship, please visit our dedicated website at sing-canada.ca

SING CANADA 2023

#LandBack: Indigenous Peoples, Soil Science, and Disruptive Sequencing Technologies

Building on the success of SING Canada’s 2022 workshop, #LandBack: Indigenous Peoples, Soil Science, and Disruptive Sequencing Technologies, the 2023 workshop will focus on urban Indigenous presence and geopolitics. A multi-disciplinary team of faculty members from Canada and the US will lead participants in a multi-locale comparative soil microbiome analysis with the goal of integrating Oxford Nanopore MinION sequencing technologies. Given that cities are Indigenous spaces, the workshop will highlight the need and opportunity to support Indigenous training in genomics from within the city of Amiskwaciwâskahikan (ᐊᒥᐢᑲᐧᒋᐋᐧᐢᑲᐦᐃᑲᐣ ).

The goals of the workshop will be to introduce participants to mobile sequencing technologies and their role in metagenomic soil science while joining a broader movement to assert urban spaces as being Indigenous. Participants will learn the techniques of identifying soil microorganisms from their DNA, assessing their relative abundance, and comparing metagenomic composition across different collection sites: Edmonton’s River Valley and the University of Alberta Farm. Additionally, participants will be introduced to the emergent critical Indigenous studies methodology: Indigenous science, technology, and society (Indigenous STS).

We will consider soil composition in a framework that understands human and land-based relations as being shaped by colonial power/resistance dynamics. Participants will also consider the ways that mobile technologies might expand Indigenous governance in their territories through the use of genomic technosciences. We will assess their potential to unsettle and thus productively transform the conventional genome “lab” by shifting the spatial and disciplinary contours of scientific knowledge production while asserting urban spaces as our own. We also seek to add to existing land-based learning initiatives to include urban spaces by: 1) operating beyond the physical, disciplinary, and methodological bounds of the university lab; and 2) orienting transformative pathways among STEM fields in ways distinct from increasing calls for equity, diversity, and inclusion (EDI) to, instead, centre Indigenous land, life, and relations (in a word, governance).

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SING’ing Indigenous Technoscience: An Encounter with the Summer internship for INdigenous peoples in Genomics Canada

Sponsors

Our SING Canada regular sponsors include the University of Alberta Faculty of Native Studies, Genome CanadaSilent Genomes and LifeLabs.