Dr. Olivia Matshabane is a fellow of the African Postdoctoral Training Initiative (APTI) and a Neuroethics Researcher in the Department of Psychiatry, at Stellenbosch University, South Africa. She recently co-authored an insightful article titled Two-eyed Seeing and other Indigenous perspectives for neuroscience, which underscores the value of including Indigenous Knowledge in neuroscience research. The article was co-led by Dr. Judy Illes and Dr. Melissa Perreault, alongside a team of international experts.
According to the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, Indigenous people are defined as “holders of unique languages, knowledge systems and beliefs and possess invaluable knowledge of practices for the sustainable management of natural resources. They have a special relation to and use of their traditional land. Their ancestral land has a fundamental importance for their collective physical and cultural survival as peoples. Indigenous peoples hold their own diverse concepts of development, based on their traditional values, visions, needs and priorities.”
The article emphasizes that the integration of Indigenous perspectives and knowledge with biomedical approaches in neurosciences can significantly broaden the understanding of the human brain and mind. According to Dr. Matshabane and her co-authors it is crucial for neuroscientists to open up to different ‘thoughts, world views, methods of inquiry and means of communicating knowledge’, as this can contribute to fostering intellectual and epistemic humility. This is particularly relevant in culturally rich contexts, such as Africa, where neuroscientists should strive towards cultural humility.
A previous Nature Human Behaviour article – led by Dr. Matshabane alongside colleagues from South Africa, Ghana and the United States – on African neuroethics and cultural diversity builds on the National Institutes of Health definition and defines cultural humility as ‘a continuous lifelong process of self-reflection and self-critique, that involves an individual acquiring knowledge of other cultures and becoming more aware of one’s own hermeneutical situatedness’. In the recent Nature article, Dr. Matshabane and her co-authors explain that it is through this intentional process that one can – over-time – earn true allyship while building mutually beneficial partnerships with Indigenous communities. They also highlight the need for meaningful neuroscience communication, that informs community and public engagement, in ways that are bi and multidirectional. 
This perspective resonates with Dr. Matshabane’s and her team (the Africa Neuroethics Research Group’s) research in neuroscience and neuroethics in Africa, which incorporates culturally informed methodologies – such as Imbizo (which is a traditional gathering in the AmaZulu and AmaXhosa cultures of South Africa) – to understand brain and mental health as well as neuroethics in Africa. She says, “as Africans, our Indigenous Knowledge Systems have guided our ancestors for centuries, and they hold immense value for all that we do – including for the ways in which we understand and treat brain and mental health conditions in Africa. With that, we should think carefully about how we can ethically and respectfully embed Indigenous perspectives in the foundational education on neuroscience and neuroethics research in Africa. Many African and international scholars have eloquently articulated this through their scholarship – much of which we cite in our paper”. She quotes Dr. Botlhale Tema, who says “Africa’s power lies latent in its Indigenous Knowledge Systems”. In this light, accessing our powerful Indigenous knowledge as a resource in neuroscience, may be the key towards finding ‘African solutions for African problems’ in brain science.  
All the authors of the article Two-eyed Seeing and other Indigenous perspectives for neuroscience are members of the Cross cultural Working Group of the International Brain Initiative and this paper is a product of the working group. 
About Dr Olivia Matshabane
Dr. Matshabane is a Neuroethics Researcher in the Department of Psychiatry at Stellenbosch University. She also serves as the South African representative in UNESCO’s Ad hoc Expert Group (AHEG) mandated to draft the Recommendation on Ethics of Neurotechnology and on the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Neurotechnology. Dr. Matshabane is a fellow of the African Postdoctoral Training Initiative (APTI).
APTI is a postdoctoral training fellowship programme implemented by the African Academy of Sciences (AAS) in partnership with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF) and the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH).