Who Tells Your Story? Utilizing Legacy Collections to Serve a Living Culture

Summary

This is an abstract from the ""Re-excavating" Legacy Collections" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Unlike most archaeological collections, those held and curated by the Seminole Tribe of Florida (STOF) represent a living culture, and tribal understanding of those archaeological collections is a fluid, dynamic entity. The unique relationship between the Tribal Historic Preservation Office (THPO) and STOF requires an adherence to and respect of cultural traditions and viewpoints. As the key stakeholder, the Tribe’s needs are the most fundamental aspect when sharing the Seminole story and voice. Reexamining legacy collections within the framework of serving the tribe works to not only shed light on history, but also to further our understanding of how to mitigate current preservation issues. Within the last ten years, the tribe has aimed its focus towards understanding and managing the damage created by climate change. For the THPO, this means reorienting our research and analytical focus to look forward, asking how we can utilize legacy collections to shape a knowledge base for the future. We seek to explore how revisiting legacy collections within our own holdings works to serve the best interests of the tribe, as well as give service to the past in order to challenge our own perception of archaeology in reference to a living culture.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• "Re-excavating" Legacy Collections   •
• Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 23719