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New language in the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) is prompting museums to pull some Native items from public display. The rule went into effect in January that requires museums to consult with tribes more comprehensively when it comes to Native artifacts. That’s because, even though they may not be the human remains or sacred items that NAGPRA historically referenced, many items held by museums, universities, and other institutions could have been looted from Native sites or otherwise taken under suspicious circumstances.
GUESTS
Shannon O’Loughlin, (Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma), chief executive and attorney with the Association on American Indian Affairs
William Hughes, president of the Authentic Tribal Art Dealers Association (ATADA)
Dr. Meranda Roberts (Citizen of the Yerington Paiute Tribe and Chicana), guest curator and visiting art history professor at the Benton Museum of Art at Pomona College
Kate Compton-Gore, NAGPRA specialist for the Museum of Northern Arizona
Break 1 Music: Healing Song (song) Red Hawk Medicine Drum (artist) New Beginnings (album)
Break 2 Music: North of Superior (song) Nadjiwan (artist) The Great Sea (album)
This is ridiculous actually – do thieves write down where THEY STOLE their loot? Of course not… museums and looters don’t have accurate information – they never needed it. Look at THE MET collection in NY and mislabeled stolen artifacts. Tribal mounds and massacre sites were looted – like early 1900s in Wisconsin for example. You can find their reports at the Wisc, Historical Museum website. Some of these looters made careers, titles, and big dollars off their stolen loot. They called themselves “anthropologists.”
Now these museums are caught with STOLEN bones and funerary items? They are caught.
They have made millions!
I say GIVE IT ALL BACK. Pay it all back.
The museums and private collections have saved these objects. Your ignorant surface opinion will actually rob the youth of witnessing these rich histories and traditions.