Laura Petznick asked: I wonder if your collection policies acknowledge > the issue of "ultimate ownership". Surely there is a common term for > accessioned objects that were acquired legally by museums but perhaps not > morally? For example, how would your museum react to claims that an item > in your collection rightfully belongs to (or should be possessed by) > someone else? > I am not sure that any of us have a word for it, but I believe that in the U.S. the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act (NAGPRA), for all its flaws, has set up a fairly good mechanism for dealing with precisely this issue. I also believe that it has forced museums to face the fact that legal possession is not the be-all and the end-all. It establishes the principle that there are some things that it is not moral for us to possess. NAGPRA forces museums to examine their collections, and their records, to discover how the Native American artifacts in their collections came to them, and to try to decide (with consultations with tribes) which artifacts it is not proper for them to hold. Artifacts are repatriated to tribes and individuals on a case-by-case basis, depending upon the claim, the documentation the museum holds, and the nature of the artifact. I believe that art museums are now going through a similar process with art that is believed to have been confiscated from Jewish families by the Nazis. So, if we accept the fact that there are artifacts that it is not moral for us to hold, and we are willing to study our documentation and work with a claimant on possible repatriation, there is no reason that I can see that this could not work in other instances. All that is required is for people of good faith to perform their duties, both to their institutions and society. Claudia Nicholson ========================================================= Important Subscriber Information: The Museum-L FAQ file is located at http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "help" (without the quotes). If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes).