US museums hold the remains of thousands of Black people - 1 views
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Among the human remains in Harvard University’s museum collections are those of 15 people who were probably enslaved African American people.
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This dehumanizing history of collecting African American bodies as scientific specimens is not a problem just at Harvard.
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However, scholars and activists across the U.S. are now seeking to recognize and redress the deep history of violence against Black bodies. Museums and society are finally confronting how the desires of science have at times eclipsed the demands of human rights.
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By one estimate, the Smithsonian Institution, Cleveland Museum of Natural History and Howard University hold the remains of some 2,000 African Americans among them. The total only increases when considering museums with remains from other populations across the African diaspora.
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His collection eventually ended up at the University of Pennsylvania. Only last year did the university officially announce the collection had been removed from a shelved display within an archaeology classroom.
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systematic collection of African American remains, as well as those of people from other marginalized communities, began with the work of Samuel George Morton.
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Institutions long embraced such collections primarily for the pseudoscientific work of justifying racial hierarchies.
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The U.S. Senate passed the African American Burial Grounds Network Act in December 2020. This bill would establish a voluntary network to identify and protect often at-risk African American cemeteries.
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This work is necessary because many of the remains of Black people, like those of Native Americans, were taken without the consent of family, used in ways that contravened spiritual traditions, and treated with less respect than most others in society.
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Even more importantly, the absence of a coordinated, national effort will mean the delay of justice for thousands of African American ancestors whose bodies have been, and continue to be, desecrated