Cultural Continuation via Data Visualization - Centering the Indigenous Experience in Climate Science

Department of Computer Science & Engineering (CS&E) PhD candidate Sean Dorr is helping foster relationships between Indigenous communities and climate scientists by using data visualization tools that connect Indigenous communities to their lands, waters, and skies. Under the guidance of his advisor, Professor Daniel Keefe, Dorr creates tangible mixed-reality data experiences that blend western scientific data with Indigenous forms of knowledge sharing to transform how we think about community data science and climate research. To support this transition, Dorr is introducing Natively Intuitive Software and Hardware (NISH) Data Storytelling Systems, which bring Indigenous values and STEAM-focused language revitalization approaches into ecological data-intensive contexts to advance collaboration across disciplines and cultures. 

“Climate-focused organizations have scientists that are trained in this work statistically, but it can exclude information from Native communities who have a deep history and relationship with the land,” Dorr said. “It would be a missed opportunity if these two communities were not able to fully participate in these types of conversations. These mixed reality environments can serve as a mediator between these groups and empower community participation in scientific discussion. We start from a place that is more natural to the Indigenous orientation as opposed to a technological determinist approach.” 

Dorr serves as a designer, technologist, and project architect for a variety of projects that facilitate cultural continuation for Indigenous communities. He is currently translating lessons learned from working with a community of Micronesians from Chuuk State, who now reside in Minnesota, into building data experiences for Dakota and Ojibwe communities. 

“Typically when you are working with elders from these communities, as soon as you bring up a computer screen, they start shutting down,” Dorr said. “In an immersive experience, they can transport mentally to a specific place and come into relationship with that location and time period. When we look at the affordances that come from immersive data visualization, it is a great fit for this work because previously collecting data from nature required a person to be out and about in the actual spaces.”

Dorr notes that this observation was especially pronounced when he and the IV/LAB team partnered with the Bell Planetarium to connect Micronesian community members to the stars and swells of their home waters in Chuuk Lagoon. Using stars and land references, a full-scale Micronesian outrigger canoe tangible user interface was used to navigate around the lagoon and share stories. These types of interactive, immersive experiences help facilitate intergenerational culture sharing by establishing a sense of presence with their home lands, waters, and skies. 

For the Dakota project, Dorr is collecting pre-settlement star and tree data from the Bdote, which is the confluence of the Mississippi and Minnesota Rivers in the area now known as Fort Snelling. This data is then projected at the Como Planetarium, where community members can sit in a virtual dugout canoe and listen to star stories from Dakota elder and ethnoastronomer Jim Rock as they explore the skies and waters.

In the Ojibwe context, Dorr is working with manoomin (wild rice) data to be experienced through a NISH system. He is mapping all data interactions to how one would naturally interact with manoomin, such as rice-knocking, parching, winnowing, and jigging. NISH systems are used to render data experiences and are inspired by the large-scale, 4-sided augmented virtual reality environment found in the newly relocated Interactive Visualization Lab (IV/LAB) space on the third floor of Shepherd Labs.

“One of the things that is unmistakable about the new Shepherd Labs space is the reaction of the Native guests that I bring into the space. It brings a better energy and excitement, and gives them a better sense of what human-centered computing actually looks like in practice. It helps pull us as computer scientists outside of the black box and allows us to establish better relationships.” 

Ultimately, Dorr hopes this type of work can help give more Indigenous communities a seat at the table when it comes to climate and ecological research. His philosophy centers the Native experience and flips the current order for conducting scientific research. 

“When you are only looking at data and place as a latitude and longitude, you are missing the bigger picture. There are humans, plants, and animals in that space that care for the land and have a better understanding of what things look like on the ground. These Native communities can absolutely help scientific research, and scientific research should also be open to seeking out questions and projects that are helpful to these Native communities. We are trying to flip this dynamic through immersion and data visualization.”

In the future, Dorr hopes to further this work by exploring ways to make interactive data experiences more portable and accessible. He works with a number of interdisciplinary partners, including the Institute on the Environment (IonE), Midwest Climate Adaptation Science Center (MWCASC), Department of American and Indigenous Studies, Arts + Technology + Science Collaborative Research Studio (ArTeS), and the Como and Bell Planetarium. In summer 2025, his work received a $100K grant from IonE, a program which supports dozens of high-impact projects that combine the expertise of UMN faculty, researchers, staff, and community partners.