In
1990, the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act — or
NAGPRA — required institutions to return human remains and burial
objects
EAST LANSING, Mich. (News 10) - The clock is ticking for universities and museums to return thousands of Native American remains and artifacts from their collections.
In 1990, the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act — or NAGPRA — required institutions to return human remains and burial objects to their tribes of origin.
NAGPRA was updated in 2024 and now requires institutions to finish returning Native American artifacts by 2029.
“There were many years when there was a provision in the law about being culturally unidentifiable. And so, this was a substantial barrier for tribes to achieve repatriation,” said Matthew Bussler. “The January 2024 new NAGPRA rule that came out removed that provision, and so that has made this a lot more achievable for tribes to have that work accomplished.”
While Michigan has made progress, thousands of ancestral remains and artifacts in the state still haven’t been returned.
ProPublica shared the following data from its Reparation Database Report:
In Michigan, of the more than 3,200 reported ancestral remains taken from Michigan:
- 2,638 Native American remains were made available for return
- At least 609 Native Americans were not made available for return
The University of Michigan Museum of Anthropology, with the 25th largest collection of unrepatriated Native American remains in the U.S., says it has made 54% of the more than 1,600 remains taken from the state available for return:
- 904 remains available for return
- 773 remains not made available for return
The University of Michigan has made 2,478 associated funerary objects available for return out of more than 11,200.
Michigan State University has made 100% of the 544 Native American remains and 84,900 funerary objects available for return to tribes.
“We have a really good unit on campus... that our doing the best with the resources they have to make sure that they get those ceremonial items, those cultural items, and those ancestral remains back to our tribes,” said Dr. Kevin Leonard, the Interim Director of the Native American Institute at Michigan State University. “I would like to say we are ahead of the curve, but there’s still work that we have to do.”
Dr. Leonard describes seeing Native American ancestral artifacts in museums like going to a cemetery, digging up a grave, and taking whatever you want from inside.
“They’ve basically grave robbed,” Leonard said. “You’ve disturbed their resting sites and taken things that aren’t yours. Those are our ceremonial and our funeral objects, and they need to be in our communities, and those remains of our ancestors need to be returned so they can be laid to rest and aren’t in a box or a display case in a museum.”
Dr. Leonard encourages people to speak with the native community more often. He said, “you don’t have to dig our grave sites” to know the history.
If institutions fail to comply or meet the NAGPRA 2029 deadline, they could face financial penalties.
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