Native consultants

If anyone out there has had the good fortune to work with native
consultants on issues of collections care, could you share some of the
insights and advice provided on specific types of artifacts? Some of the
larger museums (eg. the Field Museum) have begun bringing in tribal
consultants to review their collections and provide recommendations, but
I fear the information gained will not be published or otherwise
disseminated. I know that each collection will be different, but perhaps
there are protocols of a general nature that would be of use to many of
us. For example, some of the Wisconsin tribes, at least, prefer that
pipes be stored and exhibited with the bowls and stems separated, as the
pipes become spiritually active when joined. Rather than every museum
with any ethnographic material trying to contact all of the relevant
groups, we could pool the information any of us have been able to
obtain. Advice with "citations" would be particularly helpful (I'm not
actually sure where I picked up the information about pipes). For those
of us responsible for general anthropology collections, the task of
providing appropriate care for the artifacts of all of the groups
represented is truly awesome. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Jane Ketcham
Keeper & Conservator
Logan Museum of Anthropology

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                  Conservation DistList Instance 6:23
                 Distributed: Sunday, October 18, 1992
                        Message Id: cdl-6-23-003
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