Property
Above: Woman Weaving Rush Mat. Frances Densmore, Chippewa Customs, 1929 (Newberry Library, Ayer 301 .A5 v. 86, pl. 1). View catalog record
In June 1971 Clyde Bellecourte led a group of American Indian Movement members to the site of an archaeological excavation in Minnesota. To the consternation of the students digging there, they confiscated the artifacts and filled in the trenches. This event helped trigger national attention to a long history of excavation of Indian burials that began as soon as Europeans came to North America. The stuggle over who should control Native remains and objects became part of the sovereignty movement in the 1970s and resulted in the passage of the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) in 1990. This section discusses Native ideas about the meaning of ownership and property; explains what led up to NAGPRA and how it is being implemented; and highlights some of the efforts of scholars to understand why this conflict about Native cultural property occurred and why the implementation of NAGPRA is so complicated.
How do Native ideas about property differ from those of non-Natives?
Like majority Americans, Indian communities recognize group and individually-owned tangible and intangible property, but traditionally Indian people had use-rights rather than ownership of natural resources; women had more property rights than non-Native women in early America; and Native Americans have been less interested in accumulating property than in sharing with others. Go to "Ownership" for more detail
What are the legal responsibilities of museums that have collections of Native remains or objects?
Since 1990, museums must notify tribes that have cultural affiliation with remains or objects and return (repatriate) the remains and certain objects upon request. Go to "NAGPRA" for more detail
Why have scholars concluded that the remains of Indian peoples were not treated with the same respect as remains of non-Indians?
The bones of Indians were treated as spoils of war and exhibited in ways that reassured Americans that they were destined to “civilize” America. Go to "How We Know" for more detail
