Indigenous cultures (using country and regional domains)

  • Article

Indigenous people are people who have lived in a region since long before modern boundaries were created. We all live on lands that Indigenous people inhabited for hundreds or thousands of years. There are Indigenous people in almost every region in the world. It's important to learn about their diverse history and culture.

Learning outcomes:

  • Use country and regional domains to compare and contrast geographically specific information
  • Explore and discuss various perspectives from multiple sources

Questions to think about:

  • How do Indigenous people vary across the United States and in other locations? How is their history and culture similar?
  • What shared challenges do Indigenous communities around the world face?
  • What kinds of initiatives are Indigenous peoples leading today? How does this vary by location?

Try it

  1. Open Search Coach.
  2. Type [indigenous people history culture] in the search bar and run your search.
    What results do you get? Are they mostly general articles about Indigenous people? Are some focused on specific locations? Which ones?
  3. Now try to search for resources from specific locations. Select Domain and find the Country and Regional Domains category. Select More to find and select a country or region of your choice. For locations not on this list, select Find more country and regional domains to find the appropriate code then type it in the search box. For example, you add [site:pe] to your search for Peru.
  4. Using this filter helps find articles from a specific location. They could still talk about Indigenous people generally, or may be more specific to the country or region you selected. Did you find information about the people indigenous to the location you chose?
  5. Although the results come from the same country or region, they may offer differing perspectives. Explore a few sources. What do they have in common, and how are they different?
  6. Run your search using a different country or regional filter. What do the Indigenous communities have in common, and how do they differ?

Bonus exercise: Lateral reading is the practice of looking at multiple sources that cover the same topic to verify accuracy and understand different perspectives. Let's explore some of the historical figures and events from your results.

  1. While reading one of your sources, select an important name or event.
  2. In a new tab, search for this topic. Explore a few of the new resources. Is the information consistent? What might inform different perspectives here?

Think about it

  • Why is it sometimes important to specify a country or region in your search?
  • Can you think of another example of when you may want to specify the location when searching for information online?

Teacher resources