SESSION KEYWORDS: Community Collaboration, Data Ownership, Management and Governance, Anti-Racism and Anti-Oppression in Research Ethics Research Integrity and Misconduct

SESSION ABSTRACT

In ethical consideration of the CAREB-ACER 2024 conference call to disrupt legacy power dynamics, a shift is needed in thinking and practice around the habitual use of Crown photography of indigenous children to research difficult history (Canada’s residential school system). Informed by my current graduate thesis research on the social semiotic analysis of the use of Crown photography, historical images of children have become synonymous with maltreatment while images of those people responsible for the difficult history remain hidden and rarely utilized. Following the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Calls to Action around education and archival access to documentation, provincial and federal archives increasingly facilitate public online access to Crown photography. Some photos are as recent as circa 1960’s where the children may still be alive today and in their late 70’s or 80’s and who hold no agency over the use of their images (see https://www.flickr.com/photos/alberta_archives/albums/72157649831501971/). Crown photography was done by representatives of the Crown for the purposes of showcasing assimilation. The photos were shared amongst residential school staff, federal and provincial agents, and media before passing into archival holdings where copyright remains in perpetuity with the Crown. In the case of a research analysis of images available to the public on the internet, ethics approval or community engagement are currently not needed which calls for ethical consideration of the impact that this could have on the well-being of those now grown children. In line with this year’s conference theme around the future of research ethics and navigating the changing landscape, this presentation proposes a broader scope of research ethics within the TCPS 2 policy that could include the use of Crown photography and an ethics analytical tool that promotes reflexivity on behalf of researchers, ethics’ committees, post-secondary institutions, and the community at large while facilitating accountability between those in control of the images and the children and their communities that present in the images. A presentation on current research and educational practices using Crown photography informs community collaboration, anti-racism and anti-oppression, research integrity and building capacity: inappropriate photo credit conventions, absence of indigenous community engagement and guidance, missing context, monolithic thinking, Crown copyright infringement, fair use/dealings, child advocacy and current ethical child protection initiatives. While Canadian copyright guidelines serve to protect the copyright holders of images – in this case the Crown – there are no ethical guidelines involving the use, dissemination, or protection of images of children. While some researchers call for the return of these images to the source communities or visual repatriation and an enhanced critical mindset in choosing images (Giancarlo et al., 2021; Miller & Hunt, 2022), future reconciliation must also realize a call for the ethical use of these images as once they are digitized and out in the world wide web, it is impossible to pull them back. REFERENCES Giancarlo, A., Forsyth, J., Hiwi, B., & McKee, T. (2021). Methodology and indigenous memory: using photographs to anchor critical reflections on Indian residential school experiences. Visual Studies 36(4-5), 406-420. https://doi.org/10.1080/1472586X.2021.1878929 Miller, K., & Hunt, C. (2022). A picture is worth a thousand words: Visual microaggressions in teacher education. The Urban Review. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11256-022-00636-3