The Right to Traditional Knowledge and Language
摘要
This chapter conceptually explores the “right to knowledge” as a human rights issue with foundational importance for personal autonomy, collective participation, and conflict resolution. Comparing formal state-based legal rights and informal, community-driven conflict resolution practices, it also discusses passive and active roadblocks to people’s practice of a right to knowledge and the necessity for culturally relevant, locally defined, and contextually appropriate knowledge dissemination. It especially highlights indigenous justice and knowledge systems and the role of language in maintaining cultural identity, particularly in the face of globalization and hegemonic erasure. Centrally, it describes how digital communities of practice, such as those facilitated by ICT platforms, like the SAWBO app, can enable local communities to access, adapt, and contribute to global knowledge bases, fostering a more democratized and inclusive approach to knowledge sharing. By examining these dynamics, this chapter underscores the critical need to respect linguistic and cultural diversity in the pursuit of the SDGs, affirming that the right to knowledge is inseparable from the right to language and the recognition of diverse worldviews.