Teaching
Archaeology
-
Unit 3
Museums
Museums are dynamic spaces undergoing major shifts in policy and ethics, since, historically, they have been sites of contention for many reasons. In this unit, students will gain insight into changes in museum policies on housing controversial art and culturally significant items.
Sapiens articles
The Many Hands Shirt: Reuniting a Family and an Heirloom
Sometimes objects in museum collections lead to a lot of conflict. In the best cases, though, they give rise to mutual respect and gratitude.
Confronting the Colonial Legacies of Museum Collections
The Humboldt Forum, a new exhibition venue in Berlin, has raised questions about museum restitution and the importance of researching objects' provenance.
Keywords
View All in Culture
![Four silhouetted people stand on a shoreline watching a vivid pink sun set over a calm, expansive ocean under a hazy, pastel sky.]()
![Parts of a wall clock lie on a table disassembled.]()
![Part of a face is reflected in a handheld compact mirror as a person applies mascara.]()
![Four person-shaped wooden figurines stand on wood surface that has been painted bright blue. On the right, three cluster together representing parents and a child. On the left, one with a child-shaped cut out stands alone.]()
![A bamboo ladder leads to the upper portion of a building with a thatched roof.]()
![Beside a rocky coast, a seal pops its head above the waves.]()
Best of SAPIENS 2025
In SAPIENS’ final year of publishing new stories, the magazine honors 10 standout contributions that carried anthropology into the hearts and minds of readers worldwide.
Listening Against the Threshold of Pain
SAPIENS’ 2025 poet-in-residence situates her listening in Kashmir and Germany during and after her fieldwork, contextualizing her contributions to SAPIENS this year.
In Malaysia, Muslim Trans Women Find Their Own Paths
An anthropologist traces how transgender women navigate state-sponsored religious programs aimed at “rehabilitating” LGBTQ+ Muslims.
In Japan, the Philosophical Stance Against Having Children
An anthropologist delves beyond simplistic portrayals of the anti-natalist movement to understand what motivates its adherents.
Padi Nyawa Urang
A poet and aspiring anthropologist in Indonesia reflects on the values reflected in rice cultivation in a traditional village in Lebak, Banten, Indonesia.
Connections and Conflicts With Seals in a Scottish Archipelago
An environmental anthropologist investigates deep-time, mythical, and contemporary relations between seals and Orkney Islanders.
View All in Heritage
![A bamboo ladder leads to the upper portion of a building with a thatched roof.]()
![The National Park Service Insignia—a pine tree, snow-capped mountain, and buffalo within a brown arrowhead shape—adorns the shoulder of a gray sweatshirt.]()
![Beside a large rock, a team digs at an archaeological site scattered with blue and green buckets and sandbags. Some team members wear red hats.]()
![A person wearing black-framed glasses and a white shirt with a green, blue, black, and gold flag emblem on it points up at a rock surface that has faint bronze-colored drawings on it.]()
![A mosque, shrine, and houses lie in ruins after having been burned.]()
![A well-lit large room features glass-fronted cabinets on the right in a row and glass-covered display cases in rows on the left. An archway leads toward a black-and-white photo of dwellings.]()
Padi Nyawa Urang
A poet and aspiring anthropologist in Indonesia reflects on the values reflected in rice cultivation in a traditional village in Lebak, Banten, Indonesia.
The Cost of Cutting Anthropology Out of U.S. National Parks
A former National Park Service anthropologist reflects on the vital role of cultural anthropology to the agency’s mission—and what might be lost if the Trump administration’s cuts to federal funding and staffing continue.
In Human Origins Research, Communities Are the Missing Link
A paleoanthropologist reflects on relationships between researchers and communities living around sites relevant to human evolution.
Reclaiming Tanzania’s Deep Past—Together
A U.S. archaeologist reflects on the power of community-driven research in Tanzania to include local voices and reshape how the story of human origins is told.
Listening to Murmurs
Through her field recordings, SAPIENS poet-in-residence for 2025 listens to murmurings of clay, debris, and time in Kashmir’s Tsaar.
An [un]Heroic Journey
A Tanzanian poet unseats the illusionist tale of the mission museum of the Archabbey of St. Ottilien in Germany.
View All in Indigenous
![Parts of a wall clock lie on a table disassembled.]()
![A horse and another animal graze alongside a dirt road rising across the right side of a photo. The shines on a hazy scene above a village.]()
![A group of people in elaborate bright-colored ceremonial clothing and headdresses stands in the middle of a tree-lined street in daylight.]()
![Kashmiri men separate chestnuts from mud while in boats floating serenely across a silvery lake. Trees are reflected on the water's surface.]()
![The National Park Service Insignia—a pine tree, snow-capped mountain, and buffalo within a brown arrowhead shape—adorns the shoulder of a gray sweatshirt.]()
![A mosque, shrine, and houses lie in ruins after having been burned.]()
Listening Against the Threshold of Pain
SAPIENS’ 2025 poet-in-residence situates her listening in Kashmir and Germany during and after her fieldwork, contextualizing her contributions to SAPIENS this year.
Sounding the Border
An anthropologist-poet listens to echoes of laughter and other sounds of crossings in Kashmir.
The Sacred Heartbeat at Houston Pride
An anthropologist participates in the Houston Pride Parade, offering dance, music, and prayer with others to counter intensifying oppression faced by queer and Latine communities.
Dreamscapes of Refusal: A Chorus
SAPIENS poet-in-residence for 2025 listens to a chorus of dreams in her field recordings from Kashmir.
The Cost of Cutting Anthropology Out of U.S. National Parks
A former National Park Service anthropologist reflects on the vital role of cultural anthropology to the agency’s mission—and what might be lost if the Trump administration’s cuts to federal funding and staffing continue.
Listening to Murmurs
Through her field recordings, SAPIENS poet-in-residence for 2025 listens to murmurings of clay, debris, and time in Kashmir’s Tsaar.
View All in Memory
![Beside a rocky coast, a seal pops its head above the waves.]()
![A woman with dark hair wearing a brown shirt wraps her arm around another woman with dark hair wearing a black coat as they look at a large memorial display of victims’ portraits. A black banner with white Korean letters appears above the display.]()
![Kashmiri men separate chestnuts from mud while in boats floating serenely across a silvery lake. Trees are reflected on the water's surface.]()
![A mosque, shrine, and houses lie in ruins after having been burned.]()
![Standing at a lookout spot adjacent to a stone wall, a small group holding a blue umbrella looks across a large body of water at the opposite shore.]()
![As the setting sun reflects on wet sand, a silhouetted figure runs on a beach surrounded by palm trees.]()
Connections and Conflicts With Seals in a Scottish Archipelago
An environmental anthropologist investigates deep-time, mythical, and contemporary relations between seals and Orkney Islanders.
The Politics of Mourning After Itaewon
After the deadly 2022 Itaewon crowd crush, South Korea faced a failure of prevention—and mourning. A group of anthropologists explores how grief was managed, marginalized, and ultimately erased, raising questions about who we remember and why.
Dreamscapes of Refusal: A Chorus
SAPIENS poet-in-residence for 2025 listens to a chorus of dreams in her field recordings from Kashmir.
Listening to Murmurs
Through her field recordings, SAPIENS poet-in-residence for 2025 listens to murmurings of clay, debris, and time in Kashmir’s Tsaar.
Why Do Swallows Fly to the Korean DMZ?
An anthropologist discovers diasporic flights—including her own—that begin at and return to the waters of the demilitarized zone between North and South Korea.
A Poetics of Liberation: An Imagined Archive
A Tanzanian historian and poet conjures alternative engagements with Black African women who were marginalized by violent colonial histories and imprisoned in the archives. As the 2024 poet-in-resident at the magazine, she imaginatively reaches for new possibilities.
View All in Museums
![A well-lit large room features glass-fronted cabinets on the right in a row and glass-covered display cases in rows on the left. An archway leads toward a black-and-white photo of dwellings.]()
![A beige cylindrical object with lines and marks carved on its surface rests on a soft green surface.]()
![In a room with a chalkboard and bright-red walls, a woman stands next to a person wearing a white-colored device that covers the eyes and is strapped onto the head. A third person in a pastel green shirt looks on.]()
![As the setting sun reflects on wet sand, a silhouetted figure runs on a beach surrounded by palm trees.]()
![A woman in a blue sweater, tan dress, and tall brown boots pushes a dolly loaded with a great ape skeleton through a white room full of taxidermic animals.]()
![Beneath a blue sky with a few wispy white clouds, the glassy, rippling deep-blue surface of the ocean stretches to the horizon.]()
An [un]Heroic Journey
A Tanzanian poet unseats the illusionist tale of the mission museum of the Archabbey of St. Ottilien in Germany.
When Wartime Plunder Comes to Campus
An archaeologist considers whether students should learn from antiquities looted from Iraq.
How Virtual Reality Is Restoring Liberia’s Culture
Traveling Treasures is a new project led by a team of anthropologists that puts Liberians directly in touch with their dispersed cultural heritage through immersive technologies designed to bridge continents and histories.
A Poetics of Liberation: An Imagined Archive
A Tanzanian historian and poet conjures alternative engagements with Black African women who were marginalized by violent colonial histories and imprisoned in the archives. As the 2024 poet-in-resident at the magazine, she imaginatively reaches for new possibilities.
Envisioning a More Empathetic Treatment of Great Ape Remains
Many museums are reckoning with the colonial legacies of the human remains and cultural objects in their collections. Now anthropologists are advocating to pay similar respects to primates.
Home-Carrying—A Repatriation Trip to Vanuatu 100 Years in the Making
An anthropologist and poet reflects on a journey of return that tells a larger story about human connection, acts of Indigenous solidarity, and the potential for repair within anthropology.
Professor Talking Points
- Museums are important spaces for learning and appreciating material culture over the course of humanity’s existence.
- Many museums have come under scrutiny for the ways in which they acquire and retain items that may have been obtained through theft or by means now deemed unethical.
- Curators, Indigenous communities, and nations as a whole are defining the meaning of cultural property and patrimony, debating repatriation, and contemplating how to appropriately portray clothing, art, sacred objects, etc., in museums.
Academic Articles
-
Lowry, G.D. 1998. “Cultural Property: A Museum Director’s Perspective.” International Journal of Cultural Property 7 (2): 438–445.
-
White, Shelby. 1998. “A Collector’s Odyssey.” International Journal of Cultural Property 7 (1): 170–176.
Student Discussion Questions
- What is cultural property, and why is it a salient topic in museum studies?
- What is the significance of repatriation for the communities and nations who demand it? Why do some museums oppose it?
- What ethical decisions should curators consider when deciding whether or not to display sacred items? Use examples from the readings.
- What does the 2017 SAPIENS article by columnist Steve Nash tell us about the kinds of relationships that are possible between marginalized communities and museums?
Activities
- Have students watch the TED-Ed presentation by J.V. Maranto “Why Do We Have Museums?” Then have them write a one-page perspective essay on whether they believe museums bring value to society and, if in the affirmative, what they feel that value is.
- Visit a local museum and write a paper critically analyzing the museum’s exhibits.
Additional Resources
-
Article: New Yorker’s “Den of Antiquity: The Met Defends Its Treasures”
-
Article: The Guardian’s “Should Museums Return Their Colonial Artefacts?”
-
Article: The New York Review of Books’ “Whose Culture Is It?”
-
Code: American Alliance of Museums’ Code of Ethics for Museums
-
TED Talk: Neil MacGregor’s “2,600 Years of History in One Object”
Unit By
Eshe Lewis (2020)
Teaching
Archaeology
-
Unit 4
Archaeology and Colonialism
