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American Indian Programs

Major program areas include: the Arizona State Museum's Southwest Native Nations Advisory Board, American Indian Internship Program, special projects, and coordination of ethnographic repatriations. The American Indian Programs office was created in the fall of 1998. The first full time staff devoted to developing programs for, and maintaining relationships with, American Indian tribes in the southwest, is the Assistant Curator for Native American Relations, Alyce Sadongei (Kiowa/Tohono O'odham).

ASM Southwest Native Nations Advisory Board

The Southwest Native Nations Advisory Board was initially organized to inform the development of the Paths of Life exhibition. This exhibition was one of the first in the country to involve American Indian consultants. The group has been maintained to provide guidance and feedback primarily on repatriation issues. In 1999, the group was restructured to include up to two representatives from each of the federally recognized tribes in Arizona. The Board now provides guidelines on issues of cultural sensitivity, program development and evaluation while serving as a resource for information to ASM and to other members of the Southwest Native Nations Advisory Board. Board chair is Joseph T. Joaquin from the Tohono O’odham Nation and the vice-chair is Barnaby V. Lewis from the Gila River Indian Community.

Board Members
Tribal Leadership in Arizona

Internship Program

The American Indian Internship Program has been offered since 1993. Since 1999, the internship program has enjoyed indirect support from the Ft. McDowell Yavapai Nation enabling U of A students to receive periodic stipends while conducting internships at ASM. In 2001, the Norton Allen American Indian Internship Endowment was established. The program will provide stipends for internships targeting Tohono O'odham students.

Special Projects

National Leadership Grant
The Arizona State Museum and the Arizona State Library were awarded a $248,819 National Leadership Grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services in the category of Library-Museum Collaboration. The two-year grant will be managed out of the American Indian Programs office at ASM.
More about the National Leadership Grant

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Repatriation Grants

The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act -25 U.S.C. 3001 (NAGPRA), created by an Act of Congress in 1990, requires that all museums who receive federal funding repatriate human remains, sacred objects and objects of cultural patrimony to tribes with whom they are culturally affiliated.

As part of the NAGPRA legislation, Congress authorized funding to provide grants to tribes and museums. In 1999, the Arizona State Museum received its first NAGPRA competitive grant. Since then, the Arizona State Museum has been awarded a total of four grants. Projects resulting from these grants include:

Contaminated Cultural Materials in Museum Collections Workshop,
March 2000
This workshop, the first of its kind, served to share information and create awareness on the types and levels of chemical contamination found on tribal cultural materials in museum collections. The workshop has been used as a model for other workshops and symposia on this issue. Alyce Sadongei and Nancy Odegaard, conservator at ASM, are recognized as national leaders in the field regarding this issue. They are continuing to provide guidance and leadership to the professional museum and preservation communities as they are invited to speak about the workshop at numerous meetings and conferences.

Gila River Indian Community Collaborative Documentation Project
This grant enabled the Arizona State Museum to hire two consultants from the Gila River Indian Community to collaborate with staff on the identification, inventory and documentation of the Snaketown collection. The Snaketown collections are the result of excavations conducted in the 1930's by the Gila Pueblo Foundation and in the 1950's by the Arizona State Museum.

Repatriation to Gila River Indian Community
In compliance with NAGPRA, this grant provided funds to repatriate human remains and funerary objects held by ASM to the Gila River Indian Community, including a portion of the Snaketown collection.

Pottery Consultation
This project created an opportunity for tribes from the southwest region to share their expertise with ASM staff regarding the appropriate cultural methods for handling and storing cultural items in the ceramic collection.

XRF Workshop
ASM held a one day workshop to share research and disseminate information on detecting pesticide residues using the portable x-ray fluorescence spectrometer. This technology, used primarily by enviornmental researchersto study soil samples, has been adapted by a team of researchers at ASM to detect quantitative and qualitative surface amounts of toxic heavy metals on objects subject to repatriation.

For other ASM repatriation-related activities please see Cultural Resource Services

Contact

For more information about American Indian Programs at ASM please contact:
Alyce Sadongei
Assistant Curator for Native American Relations
Arizona State Museum
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721-0026
520-621-4500