Communities appear to be struggling with climate change. The views they hold have to change swiftly and, as a result, a researcher's understanding of a community's view becomes even more challenging. Countless times I have witnessed how a community's view defers and alters under circumstances I could have never predicted beforehand or, many times, not even slightly understood. At that moment, I wish to have the unique but unattainable ability to see through the eyes of a community to discover its thoughts and choices when it is combatting the changing climate. The closest I came to looking through the eyes of communities is with a practical framework I have gradually developed over a period of more than ten years. I was privileged to test this framework with the help of numerous colleagues in several indigenous (and other) communities spread over countries in South America. The new framework is presented in this chapter.

Construction of a Community View

Indigenous communities are entrenched societies made up of several functioning members who live collectively in a certain place. They are often called “natives” because they belong to a location close to or in nature, usually a great distance away from mainstream society. Every so often researchers even say indigenous peoples have their “own” society based on rules and norms that are politically and socially different from modern society. Any kind of economic involvement with modern society seems necessary to contribute to the community's basic need for clothes, personal hygiene and essential food items. Some indigenous groups may have more involvement in mainstream society than others, and many social science researchers refer to this difference as their level of acculturation. This term refers to the process of losing one's culture to new influences from the market economy in the Western world.

Living in serenity with the forest for generations to come is one essential goal of these extraordinary peoples. It is apparent that most indigenous groups generate a vigorous and robust view of their life based on the aspects they select as important in life based on previous experience (Docherty 2001).