85 - Co-learners on whiteness, evaluation and our relationship to land

Eval2022 featured a ground-breaking think tank session called “White Evaluators and Relationship to Land: An Entry Point for Discussing ‘Something Different.’” Many participants wanted to continue the discussion, so we met approximately once every two months for 1.5 years, pausing in Spring 2024. We learned a lot from these collective reflections, and we know our inquiry was just a starting point. At Eval2024, we recognize an opportunity to get re-grounded and re-oriented to this conversation, to honor the roots and lineages that have informed this initial start to our work. Together, we aim to generate a deeper, collective, shared understanding of the role that context, land and place has in our relationships to ourselves (including our racial identities and cultural worldviews), our communities, and our evaluation practice. To extend beyond the “white caucus” format that held us in Eval2022, we invite a conversation among all our colleagues to discuss the complex nexus between our dominant culture, orientation to land and place, and what this learning contributes to the field of evaluation. Potential topics include: How does our relationship to land and place inform and create a critical lens through which to explore our approach to evaluation? What lived experiences do each of us bring to this conversation? What is it about the culture of whiteness that needs to be transformed, redefined, and unlearned in relation to land and our sense of place? How can this conversation help us move the evaluation field forward together in humanity, care, social justice, with a decolonizing heart and commitment to equity? Join us as we unsettle ourselves into the questions, unlikely to arrive at answers but committed to learning together in a good way.