The Challenges of Dealing with Multiple Sets of Human Remains in the Cultural Resource Management Setting where Tribal Resources are Limited

Summary

Over the past few years, I have had the opportunity to excavate a couple of large sites in California, working on behalf of a developer to keep their project in compliance with their permit. In conjunction, I also worked with the local tribe to resolve their burial issues with each excavation. During these two excavations, I have had to opportunity to observe the challenges that the tribe encountered when dealing with fast-paced cultural resource management (CRM) projects where burial retrieval and a shortage of resources was the norm. For many years, archaeologists have viewed CRM as just dealing with the material culture of the past; however, we also consult and work with the living culture. This paper will address the endemic problem in CRM of stems from a lack of planning, preparation, resources, and training and how it affects the burial excavations that we and tribes encounter in the CRM setting. It will also look for solutions to remedy a long-broken system that continues to ignore existing laws set in place to protect resources, as well as the relationships between the Native American community, agencies, researchers, and applicants.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 82nd Annual Meeting, Vancouver, BC (2017)   •
• Curating the Past: The Practice and Ethics of Skeletal Conservation

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 16610