Rebecca Tsosie

An article by Professor Rebecca Tsosie, “Native Nations and Museums: Developing an Institutional Framework for Cultural Sovereignty,” has been published in the Native American Law Symposium edition of the Tulsa Law Review.

Tsosie observes that, although issues of tribal political sovereignty have preoccupied most legal scholars focused on tribes, cultural sovereignty has received less attention. Cultural sovereignty can be forged from within a tribe, and it evolves from each tribe’s unique sense of history, identity and place, according to Tsosie. Because cultural sovereignty can be advanced through repatriation of ancestral remains and cultural artifacts, museums often are the place for dialogue about cultural sovereignty, and therefore, museums can play an important role in reconciliation.

To read the article, click here.

Tsosie, a Willard H. Pedrick Distinguished Research Scholar and Executive Director of the College’s Indian Legal Program, teaches in the areas of Indian law, Property, Bioethics, and Critical Race Theory, as well as seminars in International Indigenous Rights and in the College’s Tribal Policy, Law, and Government Master of Laws program. She is a Faculty Fellow in the Center for Law and Global Affairs, and an Affiliate Professor in the American Indian Studies Program at ASU. Tsosie has written and published widely on doctrinal and theoretical issues related to tribal sovereignty, environmental policy and cultural rights, and is the author of many prominent articles dealing with cultural resources and cultural pluralism.