Expert: John Shea - 5/5/2010

Question
Im writing a paper for my working in America/hummanities class at kirkwood college in cedar rapids, Iowa. The job im writing my paper on is anthropology, particularly a physical anthropoligist. i'm supposed to find situations in which one would need to be careful about laws or restrictions concerning the job. I was wondering if you had any ideas. One thing that came to mind for me, besides the obvious sexual harassment and the like, would be the laws and regulations concerning entering foreign countries on digs and the processes by which the artifacts recovered would be under regulations or secured by governments and laws pertaining to that sort of situation. What rules there are when digging up the ancient hominid bones or ancient civilizations artifacts. Thank you very much and i look forward to your response.

Answer
Jerry,
The laws vary from country to country, but there are some common themes.
Permits to survey and excavate are issued by a governmental agency only to qualified scientists.
The fossils are the property of the country and stored there (sometimes exported on loan for study or exhibition).
Special permissions are needed to excavate recent human remains, i.e., ones with identifiable next-of-kin.
Sale of fossils is illegal.
What I suggest you do is to pick a couple of countries, and look up their "antiquities" laws.
Kenya, Tanzania, Ethiopia, and South Africa are places where a lot of fossil hunting goes on.
For countries where physical anthorpologists have to deal with restrictions on research on recent human remains, your best bet is to look up Australia
and United States.  The most relevant law and focus for much debate is NAGPRA.
If you are looking for a focused study on these issues in the USA, look up references to Kennewick Man.
For an indigenous scholar's take on some of these issues, look up the writings of Vine Deloria.
Good luck with your research.
You might also try asking a few other experts.  I am an archaeologist, and though I occasionally find humans fossils, they are not things I have to deal with very often.

Cheers,
John Shea