Sunday, December 30, 2007

Indigenous People, Cultural Heritage, and Rights: Archaeology in Mexico

Indigenous peoples face a multitude of obstacles around the world - one of which is their rights concerning cultural heritage. In the US, there are numerous laws relating to the collection, excavation, and recovery of cultural heritage and archaeological artifacts (i.e., NAGPRA). Over the years, indigenous peoples of North America - Native Americans, First Nation peoples, and Native Alaskan and Hawaiian peoples - have gained access and rights concerning their cultural heritage. This is not the case in other countries.

In Mexico, the rights of indigenous peoples are not nearly as great, and they have little or no say over their cultural heritage. Mexican law is largely derived from Roman law, as reinterpreted by Spanish medieval law. In accordance with this, ownership of land is very different than in the US or other countries. The owner of the plot of land only owns the surface itself; whatever is under the surface is the property of the State. As such, almost all aspects of cultural heritage - palaeontological, archaeological, and historical patrimony - is owned by the federal government. The primary law in Mexico dictating this is the Federal Law on the Archaeological, Artistic, and Historic Monuments and Zones, which was implemented in 1972.

The Mexican federal arm that is responsible for managing the 34,789 known sites - and hypothesized 100,000+ sites - is the National Institute for Anthropology and History (INAH). Composed of four patrimonial councils - paleontology, archaeology, conservation, and historical monuments - the INAH oversees all archaeological and cultural heritage management in Mexico. The specific rules applied to archaeological research projects in Mexico are contained in the Disposiciones Reglamentarias para la Investigacion Arqueologica en Mexico (A copy can be obtained free of charge from the Consejo de Arqueologia, Moneda 16, Col. Centro, 06060 Mexico, D.F. Mexico (consejo.arqueologia@inah.gob.mx).

As a result of this system of cultural heritage management, indigenous peoples of Mexico have little or no say in the management of their own history. Because archaeological artifacts and other cultural patrimony - even human remains - are the property of the State, the indigenous peoples of Mexico are being denied a role in their past, present, and future. Even though they are the acknowledge living descendants of the magnificent temples, buildings, sites, and cultural patrimony of Mexico, today's indigenous peoples - Maya, Nahuatl, Zapotec, Mixtec, Otomi, etc. - are not able to participate in the management of their own heritage.

Another component is that exacerbating this picture is that most archaeological projects carried out in Mexico today do not involve the local communities and indigenous groups who may have a connection to the site being excavated. As Nelly M. Robles Garcia noted in the SAA Archaeological Record (Vol. 7, #5, 2007), "However, the current tendency of projects submitted to the Council of Archaeology, whether by Mexicans or foreigners, is to virtually ignore that social context, treating sites as if they exist in a vacuum abstracted from any social reality. Only a few archaeologists live by choice in the communities where the archaeological sites are located. The majority of us prefer to spend the nights in more urban environments, where better services are available. With this preference for comfort we lose opportunities for a basic understanding of the peoples and cultures around us, and deny ourselves the chance to participate in richer anthropological experiences" (p. 30).

The indigenous peoples of the US have fought for many years to gain just basic rights when it comes to participating in the collection, management, and decipherment of their own cultural patrimony. This same fight now needs to be carried out in other countries. The indigenous peoples of the world should have a direct role in the management of each countries heritage - without them there would be little heritage to manage. Archaeologists, politicians, and others need to recognize this and include the local indigenous peoples in decisions regarding management of cultural heritage. If we do, not only will our understanding of the archaeological material be enriched, but so will the country's cultural heritage.

Related Indigenous People's Issues by Keywords



Use the Search Function at the Top to Find More Articles, Fellowships, Conferences, Indigenous Issues, Book Reviews, and Resources

No comments:

Post a Comment

Contribute to Indigenous People's Issues Today

Do you have a resource on indigenous peoples that you would like to share? Indigenous People's Issues is always looking for great new information, news, articles, book reviews, movies, stories, or resources.

Please send it along and we will do a feature. Email it to the Editor, Peter N. Jones: pnj "at" bauuinstitute.com.

Indigenous Peoples Issues and Resources

Privacy Policy for Indigenous Peoples Issues Today (http://indigenousissuestoday.blogspot.com)

The privacy of our visitors to Indigenous Peoples Issues Today is important to us.

At Indigenous Peoples Issues Today, we recognize that privacy of your personal information is important. Here is information on what types of personal information we receive and collect when you use visit Indigenous Peoples Issues Today, and how we safeguard your information. We never sell your personal information to third parties.

Log Files

As with most other websites, we collect and use the data contained in log files. The information in the log files include your IP (internet protocol) address, your ISP (internet service provider, such as AOL or Shaw Cable), the browser you used to visit our site (such as Internet Explorer or Firefox), the time you visited our site and which pages you visited throughout our site.

Cookies and Web Beacons

We do use cookies to store information, such as your personal preferences when you visit our site. This could include only showing you a pop-up once in your visit, or the ability to login to some of our features, such as forums.

We also use third party advertisements on Indigenous Peoples Issues Today to support our site. Some of these advertisers may use technology such as cookies and web beacons when they advertise on our site, which will also send these advertisers (such as Google through the Google AdSense program) information including your IP address, your ISP, the browser you used to visit our site, and in some cases, whether you have Flash installed. This is generally used for geotargeting purposes (showing New York real estate ads to someone in New York, for example) or showing certain ads based on specific sites visited (such as showing cooking ads to someone who frequents cooking sites). Google, as a third party vendor, uses cookies to serve ads on this site. Google's use of the DART cookie enables it to serve ads to users based on their visit to sites on the Internet. Users may opt out of the use of the DART cookie by visiting the Google ad and content network privacy policy.

You can chose to disable or selectively turn off our cookies or third-party cookies in your browser settings, or by managing preferences in programs such as Norton Internet Security. However, this can affect how you are able to interact with our site as well as other websites. This could include the inability to login to services or programs, such as logging into forums or accounts.

Thank you for understanding and supporting Indigenous Peoples Issues Today. We understand that some viewers may be concerned that ads are sometimes served for companies that negatively depict indigenous peoples and their cultures. We understand this concern. However, there are many legitimate companies that utilize Google Adwords and other programs to attract visitors. Currently, we have no way of deciphering between the two - we leave it up to the viewer to decide whether the companies serving ads are honest or not.