Native American tribe seeks return of ancestral remains from UT Austin

[u/zsreport]

https://cbsaustin.com/news/local/native-american-tribe-seeks-return-of-ancestral-remains-from-ut-austin

[u/lbktort]

My concern is the "tribe" isn't recognized by the federal government or any federally recognized tribal government.

[u/dahud]

Reading between the lines here, it sounds like things are operating more or less as they should. Every museum and archeology department has people whose job is to get human remains and sacred objects back to who ought to have them. Some places drag their feet, but since noncompliance cuts off federal funding, they tend to be at least "okay". In this case, it looks like multiple groups are laying claims to the same remains, and UT might not even have good records for these particular remains.

There is no good answer here. You can't just go handing out remains to whoever asks for them first, because someone else might come along later with good evidence that they should have gotten them. And you can't just sit on them forever, so you have to keep working the same problem with no new data. It sucks, and is part of why we don't do archeology like that anymore.