The American Museum of Natural History in New York City is closing two of its major exhibits featuring Native American artifacts, The New York Times reports, as museums across the country respond to new federal regulations that require museums to obtain consent from tribes before displaying or performing research on cultural items.
Sean Decatur, the museum’s president, said in a letter to museum staff: “The halls we are closing are artifacts of an era when museums such as ours did not respect the values, perspectives and indeed shared humanity of Indigenous peoples. Actions that may feel sudden to some may seem long overdue to others.”
Faculty experts at the George Washington University are available to offer insight and analysis on the new policy and changes underway at U.S. museums. If you would like to speak with an expert, please contact GW Media Relations Specialists Tayah Frye at [email protected] and Cate Douglass at [email protected].
David Silverman, professor of history, specializes in Native American, Colonial American, and American racial history. His most recent book is This Land is Their Land: The Wampanoag Indians, Plymouth Colony, and the Troubled History of Thanksgiving. He is also the author of Thundersticks: Firearms and the Violent Transformation of Native America, Red Brethren: The Brothertown and Stockbridge Indians and the Problem of Race in Early America, and Faith and Boundaries: Colonists, Christianity, and Community among the Wampanoag Indians of Martha’s Vineyard, 1600-1871. His essays have won major awards from the Omohundro Institute of Early American History and Culture and the New York Association of History.
Schillica Howard is an Assistant Professor of Museum Studies for Corcoran School of the Arts & Design at the George Washington University, bringing a fresh perspective and passion for collections management to the field. Before joining the faculty at GW, Howard worked primarily with African American collections, museums, and cultural institutions as a curator, collections manager, and registrar focusing on preserving marginalized narratives.
Suse Anderson is an Assistant Professor of Museum Studies for Corcoran School of the Arts & Design at the George Washington University, and host of Museopunks – the podcast for the progressive museum. For more than a decade, her work focused on the intersection of museums and technology, culminating in the 2020 publication of The Digital Future of Museums: Conversations and Provocations, co-authored with Dr. Keir Winesmith. More recently, Anderson has become concerned with investigating contemporary ethical dilemmas confronting the field, and is currently on the Board of ICOM's IC-Ethics Committee.
Laura Schiavo is the Deputy Director of Museum Studies for Corcoran School of the Arts & Design at the George Washington University. Before joining the Museum Studies faculty in 2009, Professor Schiavo, Ph.D. worked in museums in the DC area, including the City Museum, Jewish Historical Society of Greater Washington, and the National Building Museum, where she curated Designing Tomorrow: America’s World’s Fairs of the 1930s. Her current research looks at the contemporary work of US museums in the field of civic engagement and the historic roots of that commitment, with an article forthcoming in a volume on the radical roots of public history. She has been published in the areas of visual culture, museums and diversity, and museums and identity, as well as contributing book and exhibition reviews to national publications. Professor Schiavo is currently working on an initiative to address the vital issue of the role of Museum Studies programs in the lack of racial, ethnic, and socio-economic diversity in the museum profession.
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