Curating Donations: Ethical Curation of Pesky Collections

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Archaeological objects are frequently donated by private citizens to professional organizations. These include the legacy collections of professional or avocational archaeologists, many of which date to the period when the profession of archaeology was being formalized, and objects found in the attic of a grandparent’s house. These collections range from well-documented to completely unprovenanced. Archaeological repositories can provide a permanent home for these materials, but curators must strive to develop robust protocols for cataloging and caring for donated collections if they are to be better off than they were in private hands. This presentation will look at how the Illinois State Archaeological Survey (ISAS) cares for donations to ensure the accessibility of these collections for consultation, research, and outreach. This presentation will cover how donations are housed across a variety of Midwest archaeological repositories for comparison before discussing the ethical care of donations in ISAS’s repository specifically. Topics raised will include establishing donation protocols that fit your institution's resources, how to handle legacy donations, and increasing the value of donations through data sharing.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• SAA 2024: Individual Abstracts   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 39294.0