“Who Speaks for the Ancestors”: Repatriation and Indian Identity A Panel Discussion

Sunday, August 21, 2011 – 2:00 pm

“Who Speaks for the Ancestors”: Repatriation and Indian Identity. FREE with museum Admission. In the MIAC theater, seating is limited, first come first serve.

A Panel Discussion on the current status of the repatriation of tribal ancestors and their associated funerary objects from museums to culturally affiliated tribes. Since the enactment of the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA) in 1990 museums that have received federal funding are required by law to consult with federally recognized tribes concerning human remains, funerary objects and objects of cultural patrimony in their collections. Panelists will discuss the creation of NAGPRA and what the implications are for tribal sovereignty and cultural identity over the past twenty years. There will also be a discussion of the new ruling regarding the status of Culturally Identifiable Individuals currently in museum collections.

Panelists include Native scholars Suzan Shown Harjo (Cheyenne & Houlgee Muscogee), James Riding In (Pawnee) and Poeh Museum Director Vernon Lujan (Taos Pueblo).

Dr. Suzan Shown Harjo is a poet, writer, lecturer, curator and policy advocate, who has helped Native Peoples recover more than one million acres of land, including many sacred places. She has developed key laws in four decades to promote and protect Native nations, sovereignty, children, arts, cultures and languages, including the American Indian Religious Freedom Act, National Museum of the American Indian Act, Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act and Executive Order on Indian Sacred Sites.

Recipient of the 2011 IAIA Honorary Doctorate of Humanities degree, she is the first woman to receive the honor from the Institute of American Indian Arts, which conferred the tribute only twice before. She was awarded unprecedented back-to-back residency fellowships by the School for Advanced Research as the 2004 Dobkin Artist Fellow for Poetry and as a Summer Scholar. She chaired SAR Seminars on Native Identity and on Native Women’s Cultural Matters, and a 2006 Seminar on U.S. Civilization and Native Identity Policies at the UPenn Museum.

President of The Morning Star Institute, Dr. Harjo also directs the national Native rights organization founded in 1984 for Native Peoples’ traditional and cultural advocacy, arts promotion and research. A leader in cultural rights protection and stereotype busting, and she is one of seven Native people who filed the 1992 landmark case, Harjo et al v. Pro Football, Inc., against the disparaging name of the Washington football team. Dr. Harjo is Guest Curator and General Editor for the National Museum of the American Indian’s upcoming exhibit and book, Treaties: Great Nations In Their Own Words. An NMAI Founding Trustee (1990-1996), she began work with a coalition in 1967 that led to the NMAI and to federal repatriation laws reforming museum policies dealing with Native Peoples. She is also a founding member of the Working Group for the Disposition of Culturally Unidentified Human Remains.

Dr. James Riding In is an activist Pawnee scholar who received an AA degree from Haskell Indian Junior College (now Haskell Indian Nations University), a baccalaureate in history from Fort Lewis College, and a master’s in American Indian studies and a doctorate in U.S. history from UCLA.  In addition to being the editor of Wicazo Sa Review: A Journal of Native American Studies, he is an associate professor and a founder of the American Indian Studies Program at Arizona State University, where he teaches courses dealing with issues ranging from sovereignty and the U.S. courts to struggles over repatriation and sacred sites.

His research interests transcend traditional academic disciplines and bridge matters of decolonizing methodologies and paradigms, Indigenous histories, cultures, resistance, critical race theory, human rights, religious freedom, sacred sites protection, and repatriation.  His scholarly works have been published in numerous academic journals and books.  He is the co-editor of Native Historians Write Back: Decolonizing American Indian History, which is scheduled for publication in October 2011. 

He is a past president of the American Indian Studies Association and a featured writer of the National Museum of the American Indian’s writers series. 

Dr. Riding In is also the 2011 recipient of the “Cal Seciwa Outstanding ASU Faculty Award” for his commitment to leadership development and community building.

Working on behalf of Indian nations and peoples, he has participated in grassroots initiatives that have successfully challenged oppressive and unethical curatorial practices of museums.  Dr. Riding In played a key role in historic agreements on behalf of the Pawnee Nation with the Smithsonian Institution, University of Nebraska, and the Colorado Historical Society that led to the repatriation and reburial of hundreds of ancestral human remains and funerary objects.  He is also a founding member of the Working Group for the Disposition of the Culturally Unidentified Human Remains.  In 2008, he was the principal investigator and co-author of a study that examines problems of federal agency implementation of the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act.

Having served as chair of the Board of Trustees of the Pawnee Nation College since its inception in 2005, Dr. Riding In is helping to shape the mission, curriculum, and future of this new tribal college.

  Mr. Vernon G. Lujan is an enrolled member of the Pueblo of Taos, speaks Tiwa fluently and is an articulate voice for current and historical Pueblo viewpoints. Vernon received his Master of Public Administration from the University of New Mexico and attended Arizona State University and the University of New Mexico, the latter where he received his Bachelor of University Studies degree in Southwest Studies.

Mr. Lujan has worked for the Pueblo of Pojoaque since 1995 as Director of the Poeh Arts Program and Poeh Cultural Center and Museum with his most recent appointment as Tribal Historic Preservation Officer. He formerly worked for numerous museums including the Institute of American Indian Arts, Museums of New Mexico, Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian, Harwood Museum of the University of New Mexico and the Smithsonian Institution.

Mr. Lujan is an adjunct faculty member the University of New Mexico in the Native American Studies and Fine Arts Departments. He is a writer and contributing author and editor for numerous publications such as the Taos County Historical Society; Eight Northern Indian Pueblos Annual Visitor’s Guide; Santa Fe New Mexican; and various archaeological reports for both the New Mexico Office of Archaeological Studies and Historical Research Associates. He continues to be a scholar and tour guide for the Crow Canyon Archaeological Center.