People coming home

One of our claims for human remains is going to the next level. It looks like the museum will indeed honor our claim and we can start notifying other tribes. Once that is done, the federal register notice is next. Hopefully I will be out to visit this museum sometime this spring, maybe May.  Many emails and phone calls have paid off. Consultation is so vital, I can’t imagine sending in a claim and not discussing the claim with the museum after they have received and reviewed it.

A good part of the day was spent drafting more chapters for our repatriation manual. The chapter I worked on today was repatriation of human remains. This is such an emotionally charged subject, both to tribes and museums. When we at LTBB write a claim, the human remains are always treated differently, with a sense of urgency. Some of these remains have sat on museums shelves for over 100yrs, some close to 150yrs at the older museums. Time for these ancestors to go back, regardless of their tribe or origin. I am crossing my fingers the new regulations for CUI will be published this year. Until then, it’s business as usual, reviewing inventories, writing claims and working on dispositions.

Inventories and summaries

For our repatriation manual, I wrote about inventories today. Inventories/summaries are very important to the repatriation process, so important, the topic of inventories receives its own chapter. Without an accurate inventory, a tribe will never know what a museum has in its collections. Without knowing this basic information, a claim may never be submitted. It’s very simple and basic, but over looked many times. We have had multiple requests to museums about inventories, because they were just not sending them. Inventories are the foundation of any claim, as well as summaries. We realize not all the possible information may be available for a specific item, but we appreciate any and all information the museum has. At least with an inventory, we can identify an object and though consultation, possibly have the item returned.

This is just one of the many steps in a repatriation. It’s much more then a tribe simply requesting an item. I have had some good discussions recently, with a museum we currently have a claim to, on many NAGPRA topics, one of which is actual claims. There is no right or wrong way to write a claim, but more information on some areas makes the process go more quickly. It’s  arriving at a middle ground with the museum, providing enough information, while at the same time, not giving too much.

Repatriation Claims

There are so many claims I want to write, I don’t know where to start. It’s time to write a claim for items, but it’s hard deciding which one first. A book I have waited for just arrived and it tells of a specific area that is a burial ground for our tribe. This is one of the only sources I know of that mentions this area in such a way. A certain museum has, what I believe, grave items from this place. Having some documentation saying this area was in fact Indian burial grounds makes the claim much more solid, since the items were not found with any remains. A UFO claim. Unassociated Funerary Objects.

The other claim is for sacred objects. I have a list of all the museums and what they have. I list which museums have the highest chance of immediate success and then which museums need more information for their claims. The UFO was such a museum, then my book arrived, making it possible to write a stronger claim. All claims are cross referenced with other claims, so many items are similar and from the same area. We have had prior UFO claims go through successfully, as well as sacred object claims. The only claim we have yet to write is a lineal descendant claim. Maybe this year.

Notice day

Today we had two federal register notices published. One was for a repatriation to our tribe and the other for a disposition of all the tribes in Michigan. Having notices published is one of the most gratifying aspects of my job, it’s one of the final steps in the repatriation process and we can officially start counting down the days until we can pick up these remains. One of the museums is out in Nebraska, a possible grant may be utilized to make that trip. I drove out there last year to pick up remains and it’s a haul. It’s weird, Anishnaabe remains ending up in Nebraska of all places. It goes to show, you never know where remains/items will end up, you have to read inventories very closely.

Both of these museums were wonderful to work with. The staff at these museums were with us every step of the way, making sure this got done in a timely manner and in a respectful way. In actuality, the majority of museums I have worked with have been positive experiences. It’s when you get a hard line museum denying your claim, the negativity tends to overshadow the positive. This will make the 12th successful repatriation claim in 3ys, along with 11 dispositions in that time. That’s a lot of museums working with not only LTBB Odawa, but all the tribes in Michigan as well. I am very lucky to be here, now, working with so many people who want to make repatriation happen. It makes my job easier.

Plugging Away

Back in the office after a few days on the road. After driving 700 miles in the last three days, I am happy to be back in my office. Part of the work is physically being present at certain meetings, teleconferences don’t cut it sometimes. I went from meeting with university staff one day, then all the tribal NAGPRA reps from Michigan the next. The university meeting was pretty basic. I presented the process for a disposition, that such a process has taken place for years and many museums and agencies across the country have been party to this process. Now the university knows this, all we can do is wait to see where they go with their CUI collection.

Today was another phone day, keeping the repatriations we have out on track, as well as the one disposition for this spring review committee meeting. One museum I have worked with in Michigan has really been immersed in NAGPRA the last few months. The new director of the anthropology department at this museum, since September, has worked with a repatriation claim for our tribe, affiliated remains to a different tribe in Michigan and has begun the preliminary work for a disposition of their CUI. By this time next year, all of their remains will be properly taken care of. It makes such a huge difference when working with motivated individuals. Many times it’s only one or two people in a department (same as tribes) but when attitude is right and the energy high, so much can happen.