World History in Today's World: Kennewick Man in Court

This activity corresponds to the "World History in Today's World: Kennewick Man in Court" feature in your textbook. Once you have answered the Comprehension questions, submit your answers and move on to the subsequent questions included in the Analysis and Outside Sources sections. Each section is designed to build upon the one before it, taking you progressively deeper into the subject you are studying. After you have answered all of the questions, you will have the option of emailing your responses to your instructor.

Introduction

The troubled history of relations between Native Americans, Europeans, and European Americans presents special challenges to contemporary researchers studying prehistoric North America. Discoveries of early American humans necessarily raise controversial questions of who may legitimately claim the remains and what are the proper uses of them. These questions become even more urgent when, as in the case of the Kennewick Man, the remains challenge what scientists thought they knew about the origin and identity of the earliest Americans. The resources below will help you to explore, in greater depth, some of the issues raised by the on-going controversy surrounding the KennewickMan.

Comprehension

1. What law did Congress pass in 1990 concerning Native American remains, and what is the law's basic provision?

2. On what basis did the Umatilla people claim the Kennewick Man's remains?

3. What was the argument of the scientists who sued the federal government for the return of the Kennewick Man's remains?

Analysis

1. In general, the discovery of prehistoric human remains in Europe has not generated the kind of controversy it has in North America. How would you account for this difference?

2. In 2002, a federal magistrate ruled the Kennewick Man "could not be 'related to any identifiable group or culture, and the culture to which he belonged may have died out thousands of years ago'." Do you think that this judgment fully settles the issue of who may legitimately claim the Kennewick Man? Why or why not?

3. Do you think that very old remains, such as those of the Kennewick Man, should be covered by NAGPRA? Why or why not?

Outside Sources

1. Visit the National Park Service Archeology Program at What role did the NPS play in the effort to resolve the question of who could claim the Kennewick Man? What misunderstandings did the NPS try to correct?

2. Go back to the NPS Archeology Program site and review the remarks on the news coverage of the controversy. Now go to read the articles in the "Recasting the Past" series. Based on what you know, do you think that this series reported the initial stages of controversy accurately? If not, what inaccuracies does the series contain?

3. Visit a site maintained by the Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture in Seattle, WA. Scroll down to the section entitled "The Controversy." Click on the links and read the material those pages contain. What, according to the museum, are the controversial issues surrounding the Kennewick Man, and how does the museum present them? Does the museum take a particular side?

4. Go back to Click on the News Stories link on the left of the page and read the article dates December 2006 and the two dated 2007. What are the most recent developments in the controversy?