To Curate or Not to Curate: Surprises, Remorse, and Archaeological Grey Area

Part of: Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)

This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "To Curate or Not to Curate: Surprises, Remorse, and Archaeological Grey Area," at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

While solid accessioning policies guide institutions, museum practitioners continue to be surprised and sometimes perplexed by how to handle questionable incoming archaeological items. In this session, a variety of federal agency and non-federal museum professionals explore the grey area of collecting and curating archaeological material, primarily from the Southwestern United States. Topics range from what is collected from archaeological sites, what is left behind, and how collecting decisions are made; what and how materials are returned to museums from illegal surface collecting and digging; and how incoming archaeological material is assessed at the institutional level utilizing ethical, legal, practical, and cultural considerations.