Disrupting Informed Consent: Refusal and Cultural Sovereignty in Indigenous Knowledge Practices

Informed consent is an ethical and legal principle in research determined at the national level, resulting in differentiated levels of compliance across countries. Therefore, what are the implications for Indigenous communities, where collective consent and relational ethics matter most (Smith, 2012)? This poster explores refusal as a generative Indigenous methodological and ethical stance to develop a library and information science (LIS) framework for honoring refusal as a sovereign act of care and knowledge protection. Through an examination of two cases: Amos Bad Heart Bull's ledger drawings and the film depiction of the isiXhosa initiation ceremony of Ulwaluko , we argue that refusal is an active form of cultural governance that determines what knowledge may be shared, by whom, and under what conditions (Simpson, 2007). Drawing on the work of Simpson (2007), Smith (2012), Tuck & Yang (2014), Gasa (2007), Hlabangane (2021), Cifor et al. (2019), and Zong & Matias (2024), this poster interrogates authorship vs. cultural ownership, positionality, the role of land and culture as ceremonial actor, and other aspects of cultural sovereignty. It invites the audience to disrupt their notion of informed consent and to engage in a critical conversation of refusal in LIS research.