Zui: Repatriation and hidden health hazards

In the 1800s, many museums treated cultural items with heavy metals such as arsenic and mercury. By the 1940s, organic pesticides like DDT were widely used in collections.

This Zoom hui with Dr. Holly Cusack-McVeigh will briefly explore that history, share how Tribal Nations and national working groups across the United States are responding to chemical contamination in repatriated items, and highlight current resources and approaches relevant to museum practice today. Dr. Cusack-McVeigh is an Associate Professor of Anthropology and Museum Studies in the School of Liberal Arts at Indiana University Indianapolis (IUI). She holds appointments as a Public Scholar of Collections and Community Curation and as an Associate Professor of Native American and Indigenous studies.

Dr. Cusack-McVeigh has worked in the cultural heritage and preservation fields for decades in partnership with tribal communities, government agencies, and museums to address complex issues grounded in social justice, human rights and health equity around the world.

Her repatriation work with and for Native American and Indigenous communities, includes ongoing collaborations with Alaska Native communities, Native North American tribes throughout the continental United States, as well as Indigenous communities in Canada, Colombia, Haiti, New Zealand, Peru, and South Africa.