Leaving the Legacy Behind: Lab Perspectives and Efforts on Curation Backlogs

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Recent Archaeological Work by Chronicle Heritage Staff" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Data recovery projects in CRM, which typically involve excavation and collection of artifacts and material culture, are inherently destructive processes. The deleterious impact of such projects is amplified when collected objects and archival material are not properly prepped for curation and adequately housed at a repository. Artifacts left on shelves in basements, paperwork improperly stored in boxes, and other neglectful acts that lead to “legacy projects” cause loss of data and are disrespectful to the Indigenous communities from which collections are recovered. Such actions can also lead to storage constraints and budgeting issues. CRM staff, therefore, must be trained to be cognizant of all the steps required to care for material culture and data generated by data recovery projects so that the knowledge attained from compliance projects is preserved and tribal descendants are respected.

Chronicle Heritage’s Phoenix office has enlisted full-time laboratory staff to help facilitate proper and respectful stewardship and curation of collections. This poster summarizes the efforts Chronicle Heritage’s Phoenix laboratory staff have taken to help ameliorate issues associated with the back end of data recovery and provides tips for CRM practitioners to implement similar steps.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 90th Annual Meeting, Denver, CO (2025)   •
• Recent Archaeological Work by Chronicle Heritage Staff

Keywords

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 52217