School administrators at the University of California, Berkeley are working to repatriate thousands of human remains and artifacts that the school took from Native American tribes and housed in its anthropology museum.
The effort is one of several at U.S. institutions of higher education to repatriate thousands of Native American artifacts and human remains that have been housed in the anthropology collections, in accordance with the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act of 1990. The act requires all government agencies and institutions that receive federal funding to return Native American “cultural items” to their respective tribes.
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PROFESSOR BRANDED AS RACIST SUES UNIVERSITY FOR BLOCKING ACCESS TO HUMAN REMAINS
UC Berkeley bioarchaeologist Sabrina Agarwal said the university has “had a very difficult relationship with Native people in the U.S. because institutions and museums took their ancestors and belongings without their consent for more than 100 years,” according to CNN.
“This is part of restorative justice across the country. If we want to rebuild those relationships, repatriation is the first step. There can’t be healing or rebuilding trust without repatriation,” said Agarwal, who is also the chairwoman of UC Berkeley’s NAGPRA committee.
A portion of the UC Berkeley collection, currently housed at the Hearst Museum of Anthropology, belongs to the Wiyot Tribe, whose ancestral lands included the modern-day Humboldt Bay area in northern California. The Hearst Museum is closed to the public while staff “prioritize repatriation.”
“It wasn’t right for past generations to dig up [the Wiyot Tribe] remains and take them to Berkeley or anywhere else. But people can learn from their mistakes and the new generation has been able to finally see why this was wrong,” Wiyot Tribe Chairman Ted Hernandez told CNN. “Those people who think this is not a big deal or doesn’t matter: Imagine someone goes to your cemetery, digs up your ancestors, packs them in boxes and puts them on a shelf. Our ancestors should not be in boxes or on shelves, they should be home with their families.”
Hernandez told the news outlet that UC Berkeley has returned over 20 different artifacts and remains to the Wiyot Tribe that were once held in its collection.
“When we bought our ancestors back, we held a ceremony for them, and that’s an important part of our healing process. As Wiyoti people, we are known as the world-people, which is bringing balance into the world,” the tribe chairman said.
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The practice of repatriation is not without its critics. Earlier this year, Elizabeth Weiss, a professor at San Jose State University, sued her employer after the institution blocked her from accessing the university’s anthropological collection, which includes the human remains of Native Americans. Weiss, an outspoken critic of repatriation efforts, had been accused of racism by her colleagues for her writings on the issue.
