American Archaeology and the Revised NAGPRA, Supercharged	by Gary S. Foster
Central States Archaeological Societies 2025 January Journal	Eastern Illinois University

On January 12, 2024, a revised federal statute quietly went into effect with immediate seismic impact on the practice of archaeology, a sea change for the profession. The Department of the Interior authorized a revision of NAGPRA (Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, 1990) and for the past three years (2021 – 2023), those revisions were made. The National Park Service (NPS) conducted a public comment period (January, 2023) and archaeologists, museum curators, and administrators spoke to the difficulties the revisions would pose on the practice of archaeology and the threats presented to the science and production of knowledge.

The intent of the revisions was to eliminate impediments to the repatriation of human remains and funerary materials with sacred meanings to their descendant communities. NAGPRA, as originally crafted, was deemed insufficient, inefficient, and ineffective in its intent, with the claim that it was embedded with “loopholes” that delayed and stalled repatriation. For example,since 1995, museums and institutions reported holding nearly 210,000 human remains, but since the passage of NAGPRA (1990), fewer than half have been repatriated and more are recovered daily. In addition, museums, institutions, universities, and federal agencies hold hundreds of thousands of funerary objects, many with claimed sacred significance (federal data bases, NPS 2022).

NAGPRA revisions and their implications on the profession and practice of archaeology are as follows: ....

This excerpt from "American Archaeology and the Revised NAGPRA, Supercharged" published in the 2025 Central States Archaeological Societies 2025 January Journal Read this and mores in the Central States Archaeological 2025 January Journal which can be purchased on-line after March 2026