This research has also identified points of contention between tribal members and the NPS. Some consultants express resentment over past archeological excavations and prohibitions on hunting within or near park boundaries. There is concern about interpretive media that they feel misrepresents tribal activities or beliefs, and some perceive the establishment of these parks as an uncompensated ‘taking’ of treaty land. Many see paying entrance fees to access traditional sacred sites as an unacceptable limitation on their religious freedom; more than one tribal consultant has asked, “what if we started charging you money to go to church?” A few of these issues may be easily resolved through government-to government memoranda of understanding, for example, while others may prove relatively insurmountable. At the very least, these concerns are now clearly identified for present and future NPS managers.
As traditional knowledge reflects culturally rooted understandings of the world, so too do peoples’ expectations about how such information is to be used. Once a sacred site is identified, for example, how shold it be managed? Often there are no simple or singular answers. Likewise, a collection of ethnographic facts does not point, unambiguously, to a representation of traditional use that would be appropriate for park interpretative media. Visitors to NPS units certainly should receive accurate information about past and present Native American uses of parks—but without violating tribes’ notions about privacy and proprietary knowledge (Rundstrom and Deur 1999). With this in mind, interviews also involve asking tribal consultants how (or if) traditional knowledge might be presented to general audiences.
The questions identified through this study will ultimately be as important as the answers it provides, as the questions shall inform future dialogue and subsequent research. This study has already created a dialogue, improving relations between the NPS and the Klamath Tribes. This may help insure that meaningful tribal consultation becomes an integral part of interpretation and planning at both parks. As one tribal consultant, hearing of the study’s goals, exclaimed, its about time!”
Douglas Deur is a researcher with advanced degrees in anthropology and geography. He is chair of the Association of American Geographers’ American Indian Specialty Group.
Steve Mark is the park historian at Crater Lake National Park.
This article originally appeared in Cultural Resource Management, Vol. 23 No. 3, 2000.
References
Robert H. Keller and Michael F. Turek, American Indians and National Parks. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1998.
Robert Rundstrom and Douglas Deur, “Reciprocal appropriation: Toward an ethics of cross-cultural research,” in James D. Proctor and David M. Smith (eds.), Geography and Ethics: Journeys in a moral terrain (New York: Routledge, 1999), pp. 237-250.
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