Skip to main content

Exploring Indigenous Knowledge Through Virtual Reality: A Co-Design Approach with the Penan Community of Long Lamai

  • Conference paper
  • First Online:
Human-Computer Interaction – INTERACT 2023 (INTERACT 2023)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNCS,volume 14144))

Included in the following conference series:

  • 766 Accesses

Abstract

This study aims to explore the design process of a virtual reality (VR) application to preserve indigenous knowledge (IK). Leveraging the community’s preference for visual means of communication, a VR application was designed. The process involved working with the local Penan community in the forests of Borneo to co-design a VR application for a traditional hunting game called Nelikit and the mythological origin story associated with the game. Our methodology ensures that the application accurately represents the traditional game by community-led ownership of the design process and the final result. The findings of this study confirms that the use of VR can be an effective tool for cultural preservation and education, and that collaboration with the local indigenous community and designers is essential in the design process. Future research will further investigate the development, deployment and testing of the VR application.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 79.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 99.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. 1.

    Inga’ means game in the Penan Language.

References

  1. Arendttorp, E.M.N.: Grab it, while you can: a VR gesture evaluation of a co-designed traditional narrative by indigenous people (2023)

    Google Scholar 

  2. LaPensée, E.: Video games encourage Indigenous cultural expression. www.theconversation.com/video-games-encourage-indigenous-cultural-expression-74138

  3. Mills, K.A., Doyle, K.: Visual arts: a multimodal language for Indigenous education. Lang. Educ. 33(6), 521–543 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1080/09500782.2019.1635618. ISSN 0950–0782, 1747–7581. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09500782.2019.1635618

  4. Ramirez, Carlos R.: Ethnobotany and the Loss of Traditional Knowledge in the 21st Century. Ethnobot. Res. Appl. 5, 245–247 (2007). ISSN 1547–3465. www.ethnobotanyjournal.org/index.php/era/article/view/134

  5. Reitsma, L., Light, A., Zaman, T., Rodgers, P.: A Respectful Design Framework. Incorporating indigenous knowledge in the design process. Des. J. 22(sup1), 1555–1570 (2019). ISSN 1460–6925, 1756–3062. https://doi.org/10.1080/14606925.2019.1594991. URL www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14606925.2019.1594991

  6. Rodil, K., Maasz, D., Winschiers-Theophilus, H.: Moving Virtual reality out of its comfort zone and into the African Kalahari desert field: experiences from technological co-exploration with an indigenous san community in Namibia. In: 26th ACM Symposium on Virtual Reality Software and Technology, pages 1–10, Virtual Event Canada, November 2020. ACM (2020). ISBN 978-1-4503-7619-8. https://doi.org/10.1145/3385956.3418955. URL www.dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3385956.3418955

  7. Thomas, V., Eggins, J., Papoutsaki, E.: Relational accountability in indigenizing visual research for participatory communication. SAGE Open 6(1), 2158244015626493 (2016). ISSN 2158–2440. https://doi.org/10.1177/2158244015626493. URL https://doi.org/10.1177/2158244015626493. Publisher: SAGE Publications

  8. Wallis, K., Ross, M.: Fourth VR: indigenous virtual reality practice. Convergence: Int. J. Res. New Media Technol. 27(2), 313–329 (2021). ISSN 1354–8565, 1748–7382. https://doi.org/10.1177/1354856520943083. URL www.journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1354856520943083

  9. Winschiers-Theophilus, H., Zaman, T., Stanley, C.: A classification of cultural engagements in community technology design: introducing a transcultural approach. AI Soc. 34(3), 419–435 (2019). ISSN 0951–5666, 1435–5655. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00146-017-0739-y. URL www.link.springer.com/10.1007/s00146-017-0739-y

  10. Zaman, T., Winschiers-Theophilus, H.: Penan’s Oroo’ short message signs (PO-SMS): co-design of a digital jungle sign language application. In: Abascal, J., Barbosa, S., Fetter, M., Gross, T., Palanque, P., Winckler, M. (eds.) INTERACT 2015. LNCS, vol. 9297, pp. 489–504. Springer, Cham (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-22668-2_38 IIBN: 978-3-319-22667-5

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  11. Zaman, T., Yeo, A.W., Jengan, G.: Designing digital solutions for preserving penan sign language: a reflective study. Adv. Hum.-Comput. Interact. 2016, 1–9 (2016). ISSN 1687–5893, 1687–5907, https://doi.org/10.1155/2016/4174795. URL www.hindawi.com/journals/ahci/2016/4174795/

  12. Zaman, T., Winschiers-Theophilus, H., Yeo, A.W., Ting, L.C., Jengan, G.: Reviving an indigenous rainforest sign language: digital Oroo’ adventure game. In: Proceedings of the Seventh International Conference on Information and Communication Technologies and Development, pp. 1–4, Singapore Singapore, May 2015. ACM (2015). ISBN 978-1-4503-3163-0. https://doi.org/10.1145/2737856.2737885. URL www.dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/2737856.2737885

  13. Zaman,T., Winschiers-Theophilus, H., George, F., Wee, A.Y., Falak, H., Goagoses, N.: Using sketches to communicate interaction protocols of an indigenous community. In: Proceedings of the 14th Participatory Design Conference: Short Papers, Interactive Exhibitions, Workshops - Volume 2, pp. 13–16, Aarhus Denmark, August 2016. ACM (2016). ISBN 978-1-4503-4136-3. https://doi.org/10.1145/2948076.2948088. URL www.dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/2948076.2948088

Download references

Acknowledgement

We thank the community of Long Lamai for their engagement, UTS for local research funding (2/2020/03 Crowdsourcing for Cultural Resource Mapping).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Bram Kreuger .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2023 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this paper

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this paper

Kreuger, B., Zaman, T. (2023). Exploring Indigenous Knowledge Through Virtual Reality: A Co-Design Approach with the Penan Community of Long Lamai. In: Abdelnour Nocera, J., Kristín Lárusdóttir, M., Petrie, H., Piccinno, A., Winckler, M. (eds) Human-Computer Interaction – INTERACT 2023. INTERACT 2023. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 14144. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-42286-7_24

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-42286-7_24

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-031-42285-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-031-42286-7

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics