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the repatriation, but does send out periodic communications to culturally affiliated Tribes to
remind them of the remains’ and objects’ status and express its willingness to move forward,
when appropriate. Currently, 45% of the culturally affiliated human remains are still in the
Museum’s care, awaiting physical transfer upon 62 affiliated Tribes’ request.
The CPR Office’s NAGPRA consultation is one of the nation’s busiest. In addition to frequent
phone and email correspondence, since 2016, it has invited 83 tribes to consult, yielding 27
separate NAGPRA consultation meetings with 18 separate Tribes. These meetings occurred at all
stages of the NAGPRA process: when Tribes were considering future claims, when a claim was
under consideration by University authorities, or after a Campus determination has been made.
In this period, the Museum has also welcomed members from 42 Tribes for 69 separate visits
related to ceremonial needs, education, language revitalization, and other descendant
community-led research. Both the NAGPRA-related and other meetings range from one to
three days in length, are most often friendly, and are always respectful; the Museum invites
visiting groups to make use of an adjacent dedicated, secluded, outdoor location where they can
attend to ceremonial needs, if they wish.
The University benefits from the CPR Division’s nationally recognized expertise. The Division’s
Head, Jordan Jacobs, has served on the Repatriation Committee of the Society for American
Archaeology, was the American Alliance of Museum’s 2014 nominee to the National Park
Service’s NAGPRA Review Committee, lectures regularly at Boalt Law School and other graduate
and undergraduate courses—at UC Berkeley and elsewhere–in the disciplines of law,
anthropology, and art history, and regularly advises NAGPRA programs at other institutions.
CPR’s positive impact on the Berkeley Campus’ NAGPRA program was recognized with a
Chancellor’s Outstanding Service Award in 2017.
RESEARCH USE OF INVENTORY-REPORTED HUMAN REMAINS
The Hearst Museum adheres strictly to UCOP Policy regarding research use of NAGPRA
inventory reported human remains. Accordingly, all study of human remains that have been
culturally affiliated under NAGPRA is prohibited—unless the interested researcher obtains the
permission of the affiliated Tribe or Tribes—so that any research must be limited to those
human remains determined to be culturally unidentifiable. Additionally, the Hearst Museum
only grants research access to collections when proposals conform to the standards of the
relevant scholarly disciplines. Researchers submit a detailed proposal and letters of
recommendation certifying their professional training. The Museum’s Faculty Curators, Staff,
and Director review and discuss these documents. In some instances, external specialists are
asked to weigh in on the appropriateness of the project. The Museum’s Director takes all
opinions into consideration when granting approval to conduct research. Requests for
destructive analysis are subjected to a similar rigorous review process, following established
best museum and research practices.
Since 2016, twelve research requests have been granted that involve access to the culturally
unidentifiable human skeletal remains in the care of the Hearst Museum. These studies have
been conducted by researchers in biology, anthropology, and related fields, from UC Berkeley,
other UC campuses, and other national and international universities and museums. Five
requests have been denied in the same period. One of the approved requests in this period
involved destructive analysis—the sectioning of teeth for microscopic analysis—though