Many Voices in the Repository: Community-Based Collections Work

Part of: Society for American Archaeology 90th Annual Meeting, Denver, CO (2025)

This collection contains the abstracts of the papers presented in the session entitled "Many Voices in the Repository: Community-Based Collections Work" at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

As archaeology evolves into a more open and community-focused field, one area with significant potential to bridge gaps between professionals and the broader public is collections-based work. Many problems faced in collections management have been part of larger conversations for decades, including how to partner with communities, how best to revitalize the potential of “orphaned” and legacy collections, how to meet the needs of a diverse array of stakeholders, and how to ethically protect and provide access to material culture. Moreover, with increased recognition that responsible archaeology must prioritize a long-term plan for collections and data generated by fieldwork, archaeologists and their community partners are developing creative approaches that both improve long-term care and lower barriers to accessing archaeological work and its products. This session addresses many of these issues with concrete examples of how those working in repositories, agencies, academic, CRM, and avocational settings continue to work toward the preservation of our past for future generations. The goal of this session is to bring together those interested in community and collections relationships to discuss successes and failures in a collaborative setting to build a more inclusive future in our field.

Other Keywords
North America • Cultural Resources and Heritage Management • Conservation and Curation • Public and Community Archaeology

Resources Inside This Collection (Viewing 1-9 of 9)

  • Documents (9)
Documents
  • Archaeological Collections as Education for Multiple Audiences: The Moore-Hancock Farmstead (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Katelyn Kitch.

    This is an abstract from the "Many Voices in the Repository: Community-Based Collections Work" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. <html> The Moore-Hancock Farmstead, a historic-age mid-19<sup>th</sup> century log cabin structure and associated buildings located in central Austin, Texas, has been the subject of archaeological investigations since the early 1990s. Though the collections produced by this work sat on repository shelves for decades, they...

  • Cui Bono: Working towards more reciprocal community and volunteer relationships in archeological collections work (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Jamie Ross.

    This is an abstract from the "Many Voices in the Repository: Community-Based Collections Work" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. In 2022, staff in the Texas Historical Commission Historic Sites division received funding through an Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) Save America’s Treasures grant to develop a Community Curation program. This program is intended to enable the rehabilitation of legacy archeological collections through the...

  • Emergency Life Support for Vulnerable Collections: A Collections Management Case Study on the Anderson Collection (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only AnnaLevi Chavis.

    This is an abstract from the "Many Voices in the Repository: Community-Based Collections Work" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. This presentation discusses a detailed case study on the Anderson Collection, a large collection of Indigenous artifacts gathered by an amateur archaeologist. This collection, now under the care of the Tennessee Division of Archaeology (TDOA), offers a unique lens to explore issues of collections management, emergency...

  • From Repatriation to Collaboration for South Carolina State Collections: The Keowee-Toxaway Reservoir Project (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Nina Schreiner.

    This is an abstract from the "Many Voices in the Repository: Community-Based Collections Work" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Stewarding state-controlled archaeological collections is challenging when state budget allocations determine the degree to which best practices may be realized in the repository. When daily routines are constrained by under-resourcing, engaging community stakeholders may seem out of reach; but regardless of capacity,...

  • Indigenous Data Sovereignty at the Paint Rock Archaeological Project (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Lauren Bussiere.

    This is an abstract from the "Many Voices in the Repository: Community-Based Collections Work" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The Paint Rock Archaeological Project is an ongoing community-based investigation led by members of the Comanche Nation, the Lipan Apache Band of Texas, and Coahuiltecan tribes. Working with archaeologists from the University of Texas' Texas Archeological Research Laboratory, researchers from Abilene Christian Univeristy,...

  • Last Tango in Paris: Partnership, Citizen Science, and the 1971–1972 Texas Archaeological Society Field School Collections from Paris, Texas (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Matthew Boulanger.

    This is an abstract from the "Many Voices in the Repository: Community-Based Collections Work" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. The 1971–1972 Texas Archaeological Society field schools, cohosted by Southern Methodist University, resulted in the identification of 230+ archaeological sites in Central Texas and partial excavation of several of these sites. Few of these sites were registered with the State of Texas. Poor curatorial practices—including...

  • No Context: Can We Achieve Meaningful Research with Unprovenienced Legacy Collections? (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Bryon Schroeder.

    This is an abstract from the "Many Voices in the Repository: Community-Based Collections Work" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. Engaged amateurs, or Responsive and Responsible Stewards (RRS), are the drivers behind some of the discipline's most influential field efforts and consequential material collections. There are numerous examples of RRS collaboration with the professional community, and we often use their involvement as a valuable source of...

  • Safeguarding a Long Legacy: Preserving Jay C. Blaine’s Collections (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Dawn Crawford.

    This is an abstract from the "Many Voices in the Repository: Community-Based Collections Work" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. During his lifetime, Jay C. Blaine was a prolific avocational archaeologist, whose expertise professional and avocational archaeologists relied upon. Upon his passing at 99, Jay’s friends faced finding new homes for his collections. S. Alan Skinner, owner of AR Consultants, Inc., took on the responsibility of preserving...

  • Sharing the shelves and opening the doors: making collections useful to communities (2025)
    DOCUMENT Citation Only Mark Warner.

    This is an abstract from the "Many Voices in the Repository: Community-Based Collections Work" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology. For the past decade, historical archaeologists at the University of Idaho have been aggressively committed to make archaeology available to communities. On one front, this has meant conducting numerous excavations that were explicitly open to the public for participation. Teh second front has been collections focused. The...