The Native Right

When does ones ancestry become less of that one person and more of an united ancestry? In the movie watched on September 21st, the question was posed to all Americans and not just the tribes that can date their ancestry to pre-Columbus. The ethical stance of the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act is brought into question when challenged with the collective rights of the American people to have prehistoric clues saved for study. Our film lasting just over an hour examines what may be lost to the NAGPRA if prohibited.
Our film starts unassumingly enough with an archaeologist discovering what would be the find of his life on a beach, bones from a male about 45 years of age with a stone aged weapon lodged in his hip. After more analysis by both the archaeologist and a forensic investigator the modern man found on the beach proves to be nearly 9000 years old. The remains of this man tell a major story of brutal existence. NAGPRA hears about the find and invokes their right to the bones, demanding the bones be returned for proper reburial, causing the archaeologist to file a law suit to prevent the return of said bones.
Upon further examination of the bones it is believe he had a more Caucasoid facial structure than that of the Native structure giving clues to mans existence in the Americas before the Clovis migration. This pre-dating Native existence and falsifying the NAGPRA’s claim to the bones. The beach bones where not the only ones providing evidence of pre-Clovis inhabitants, there was also a man found in a bear cave being called Spirit Cave Man with facial similarities to that of the beach man and dating to the same period. Sharon Long reconstructed his face and hypothesized the two bones of being more like the Japanese Inuit than the Native Americans. Which brings us back to the question at hand, just because these bones pre-date Columbus, does that mean the Native Americans can invoke NAGPRA when there is clear evidence of the bones pre-dating their known entry into the Americas? The question is being examined in the trail of the beach bones and hopefully justice will be served to the greater good of knowledge.