One of the individuals in support of properly handling the bones of the Native Americans said, in context of the bones being studied and overall loss of the Native American identity in America, that it will be placed in pages of people’s history. This too me was the most powerful quote within the movie. This quote alone suggests the loss of the Native Americans history, for their history is in the history books of others, the others that likely mistreated the Native Americans and will re-write their history in support of their sense of patriotism.
This quote also points out that the use of science has been used to de-humanize these people and has succeeded in categorizing them as subjects to be studied.
The movie Bones of Contention presented complex feelings and issues for me. On one hand I believe it should be obvious what not to do with the bones of deceased Native Americans, but then on another hand, after hearing the arguments for studying I felt I may actually be able to be swayed in support of both arguments; however, I did not feel the arguments in support of studying the bones were very strong or presented as effectively as they could be.
Due to the not-so convincing arguments in support of studying the bones, I continue to believe that the idea of automatically wanting to study the bones is implicitly racist.
Why were the bones of the white individuals instantly looked over and put in a proper burial location? Is it because the bones of the Native Americans are so obviously “othered”, abnormal, less human…?
An interesting point brought up in the movie was that in America there is not just archeaology, but instead, colonial archealogy. This points out the importance of colonialism in the history of this country. The colonization that took place de-humanized these people decades ago, but to this day these people are seen as archealogical artifacts and still less human, although this may never be admitted.
With it being colonial archeaology the fact that the bones of whites were not of importance in regards to studying supports the idea that the Native Americans “otherness” was what led to them being subjects of study. Because if the claim is that they are being studied because they were alive in a different period, then why wouldn’t all bones of that period be studied? The colonial mindset that exsisted then is still present amongst some of the researchers today.
Something I was curious about was how the bones of the Native Americans was determined to have defects, was this in comparison to the bones of whites? If so, this is another representation of how white is the standard and all else is “othered”.
I believe, as much as the remains being researched may provide helpful information, due to this country’s history of “othering” certain races and then using this as a method of control, power and cruelty, one can not help but wonder the true intent of these researchers. Furthermore, the normalcy of quickly wanting to study the remains of these people is disturbing. To me it suggests that the ideas that existed amongst those colonists that mistreated these people in the past, is still prevalent, even if not outwardly stated.
