Data Back: Indigenous Material Culture, Philanthropy, and Indigenous Data Sovereignty

In June 2021, the Nez Perce Tribe celebrated the twenty-fifth anniversary of the return of the Wetxuuwi’itin’ (which, in the Nimíipuu or Nez Perce language, means “returned home after a period of captivity”) Collection. Previously referred to as the Spalding-Allen Collection, the return of the Wetxuuwi’itin’ Collection was a significant step in the reclamation of Nimíipuu culture, history, and more importantly, Nimíipuu data. The history surrounding the return of the Wetxuuwi’itin’ Collection surfaces many challenges that Native nations face when their material culture is collected by elite philanthropists. For example, it demonstrates how colonial institutions (such as universities and museums) keep these materials despite Native nations calling for the ethical return of Indigenous cultural property. Moreover, the history of the return of the Wetxuuwi’itin’ Collection also highlights the limits of NAGPRA—a law intended to guide repatriation for institutions that receive federal funds but has been implemented extremely slowly and inconsistently as it leaves full discretion to the benevolence of philanthropists and those who hold private collections. Finally, the history of the return of the Wetxuuwi’itin’ Collection brings to light several questions about philanthropy and capitalist market forces under conditions of aggressive colonialism.

The Nez Perce Tribe, or Nimíipuu, are a federally recognized Native nation with headquarters in north-central Idaho. The Nimíipuu have ancestral ties to lands and waters throughout the Pacific Northwest including in places today known as Idaho, Washington, Oregon, Montana, and Wyoming.³ In the 1800s, as new American settlers began encroaching on their lands, a slew of wars began over Nez Perce Territory. The Nez Perce entered treaties with the federal government (1855, 1865, and 1877), and each reduced the size of Nez Perce homelands. The 1855 treaty was broken due to settlers’ westward expansion and the discovery of gold in 1860.

Henry Spalding, a fur trader and Presbyterian missionary, was among the early “explorers” of the west, embodying the idea of American manifest destiny. Spalding, with his wife Eliza, settled among the Nez Perce, opening a mission in 1836 (roughly thirty-one years after the Lewis and Clark colonial excursion into Nez Perce Territory). Spalding was one of many settlers sent to the Pacific Northwest to “instruct the natives in our more holy religion and in civilization.”⁴ Spalding’s goals were to “enlighten” Native people about the glories of Christianity and civilization. He was also part of a growing class of individuals who viewed Native American cultural items as valuable remnants of a vanishing people, although he had little understanding of Indigenous peoples or their material culture. Like other Christian missionaries who sought to assimilate Native Americans, Spalding forbade the wearing of traditional clothing as well as traditional practices such as the making of horse regalia. Between 1841 and 1846, Spalding acquired Nimíipuu clothing, horse gear, and other material culture, not through purchase or trade, but rather, he used his position as a missionary to take them.⁵ Many of these items were likely seized by Spalding and his missionary accomplices. Spalding, like other settlers, viewed these cultural items as commodities that could be used in transactional relations with other settlers. As a struggling missionary, Spalding shipped Native cultural material across many miles in exchange for “donations” of money, commodities, and other goods needed to sustain missionary operations in the costly Pacific Northwest.⁶

In a letter dated April 27, 1846, Henry Spalding wrote to his friend Dr. Dudley Allen, a physician in Ohio, that “after many promises & a long delay I have started the boxes containing a small collection of articles of Indian manufacture with some specimens of stone &c, all designed for yourself.”⁷ As historian Trevor James Bond notes, Spalding had shipped two barrels of “Indian curiosities” that included Nez Perce clothing, baskets, and horse regalia to Allen.⁸ This exchange of Native goods was not merely coincidental. Allen wrote to Spalding in 1847, “I want more. They are all worth the having! I will try and pay for them all in due course of time. If you see proper you will oblige me by any different curiosities, that you can send me.”⁹

In some correspondence, Spalding listed prices for Nimíipuu material culture that he sent to Allen—not prices he paid but prices of assumed monetary value in hopes of receiving equal worth in “donated” barreled commodities from Allen and his religious congregation. Spalding did not want cash in return for Nimíipuu material culture but wanted goods, such as clothing, cloth, and tools. Spalding referred to these items as donations in Allen and Spalding’s communications, but this wasn’t accurately altruistic giving of goods or gifts. Spalding’s donations were not philanthropic; rather they were transactional and used as a means of soliciting support from Allen. Allen also had a desire for more “Indian curiosities,” and Spalding was a willing supplier. Spalding acquired Nimíipuu material culture while actively working as a missionary whose goal was to extinguish Nimíipuu culture, identity, and practices. This was not done through simple religious proselytization. There are documented accounts of Allen abusing Nez Perce people, including holding public whippings for engaging in acts that were deemed offensive to Christian ways of life and/or furthered Nimíipuu cultural beliefs and practices (such as wearing Nimíipuu clothing).

As Bond reminds us, the acquisition of Nimíipuu material culture by Spalding and Allen cannot be separated from the larger American colonial project taking place in the 1800s and broader attempts at cultural genocide targeting Nimíipuu and other Native people across the ever-expanding United States. The acquisition of Nimíipuu cultural items is intrinsically linked to the Euro-American quest for resources and land as well as efforts to extinguish Native identities, cultures, and lifeways. This history surrounding the acquisition of Nimíipuu material culture by Allen and Spalding raises important questions about the ownership of Nimíipuu material culture, philanthropy (including giving donations and gifts), and the ethical return of Indigenous material culture acquired under colonial rule.

The collection of Nimíipuu cultural items continued to endure a long journey. In 1893, upon Allen’s death, his son donated the Nimíipuu cultural items acquired from Spalding—items that were long displayed in Allen’s home—to Oberlin College, and these materials became known as the Spalding-Allen Collection. Oberlin College then loaned most of the collection to the Ohio Historical Society (OHS) in 1942, where it laid in archival storage until the 1970s.

Meanwhile, in the 1960s, Native American activism took hold across the country and groups such as the American Indian Movement emerged to challenge federal urban relocation policies and their effects on Native peoples, as well as expose violations of treaty rights, corruption in tribal governments, and more.¹⁰ At the same time, questions about the ethics surrounding museum collections began to emerge globally. The American Indian Movement took issue with archaeological excavations that could threaten or disrupt sacred sites, helping fuel the passage of the Archaeological Resources Protection Act of 1979, which mandated Tribal notification and consultation requirements for site excavations that could result in harm or destruction of religious or cultural sites.¹¹ In the 1980s, many Native nations and organizations—including the Pueblo of Zuni, the Native American Rights Fund, and the Three Affiliated Tribes (Mandan, Hidatsa, and Arikara Nations) among others—began taking action to reclaim material culture collected by colonial institutions.¹² This active pursuit of the ethical return of Indigenous material culture continues today by many Native nations across the country.

In this context of Native political resurgence, representatives of the Nez Perce National Historic Park (NEPE) began to ask questions about the Spalding-Allen Collection. Established by Congress in 1965, the NEPE includes thirty-eight sites significant to Nimíipuu history and culture in Washington, Oregon, Montana, and Idaho. A museum was opened in 1983 at the park headquarters in Spalding, Idaho. Interest grew in the Spalding-Allen collection at Oberlin and among the NEPE. According to most sources, the collection was officially rediscovered in 1976 when Bill Holm, the former director of the Burke Museum of Natural History and Culture, visited and documented the collection at the OHS, as he was interested in possibly exhibiting items from it. During his visit, Holm witnessed the lack of care OHS took of the collection but still concluded the objects were of great value.¹³

As NEPE began to establish the story of the Nimíipuu, the park’s superintendent, Jack Williams, began to search for the collection and contacted Oberlin College. By this point, the collection was on perpetual loan to OHS, but in the wake of Native activism and support, a collections technician sought to restore it and reached out to a University of Idaho archaeologist, Roderick Sprague. Sprague had worked closely with the Nez Perce and had almost certainly notified NEPE officials. These interactions led to additional visits to OHS and more discussions about a potential loan to NEPE, yet all parties were unable to agree on loan terms for almost a decade.

At last, by 1980, after negotiations between OHS, the Nez Perce, and NEPE, the OHS agreed to loan most of the Spalding-Allen collection to NEPE for renewable one-year loans. Unfortunately, in 1993, after a decade of the collection being on loan, OHS recalled the collection despite the efforts of both the Nez Perce and NEPE to keep the collection with the tribe.¹⁴ During negotiations, the Nez Perce learned that the collection would be sold at an appraised value of $608,100. Although not happy about the idea of purchasing their own items, the Nez Perce wanted to keep their material culture and so had no choice but to proceed to raise the required funds under a six-month deadline.

On June 26, 1996, with philanthropic support from thousands of individual donors, the Nez Perce Tribe purchased the collection of Nimíipuu items which were on loan to the National Park Service. Although many donors across the state and nation supported the campaign to return the collection, the result is not a feel-good or triumphant story of a diverse set of peoples coming together for a good cause. Rather, it illustrates important lessons about Indigenous material culture and philanthropic institutions. First, this case demonstrates that reckoning with the mishandling of Indigenous material culture has not been prioritized within colonial institutions. Further, it reveals that the philanthropic history of donating Indigenous items is too often told from a colonial perspective and ignores the tribal sovereignty of Native nations.

This is just one case of a Native nation forced to raise funds to purchase its own collection. Nearly twenty-five years later, the money raised for this purchase would be returned to the Nez Perce. But still, it was the Nimíipuu who “brought home the oldest, largest, and most well-preserved artifact collection of the Plateau people.”¹⁵

The return of these items was a hard-fought battle for the Nez Perce. This experience and the actual cultural property remain integral to tribal culture and data governance. Nez Perce Tribal Executive Committee Chairman Shannon Wheeler shared sentiments about the meaning of this collection, noting:

The Nez Perce Tribe renaming the Spalding-Allen Collection as Wetxuuwíitin Collection is also a reclaiming of Indigenous data that was stolen and remained captive for so many years. According to Nez Perce Cultural Resources Specialist Josiah Pinkham, these items were transgenerational.¹⁷ He means this in two ways: the items were passed on from generation to generation to be shared with future relatives; they were also often made by more than one person who might exchange stories, teachings, and other knowledge during the creative process. Thus, these cultural items are not stagnant remnants of a past people; rather, they are the embodiment of relational ties and cultural knowledge between those who made them and the Nimíipuu today.

These items are living pieces that carry ancestral knowledge from Nimíipuu ancestors for their relatives today. The items in the Wetxuuwíitin Collection are familial and were most likely not given with the intent to be collected and stored by non-Nimíipuu. The items are much more than material culture and much more than a commodity to be used for the exchange of resources by colonial actors. Indigenous material culture is in fact Indigenous data. The Wetxuuwíitin Collection is living Indigenous data that holds specific teachings and stories about families and relatives, including important cultural knowledge systems, and that must be protected and cared for by its rightful owners. The collection is comprised of traditional knowledge about the materials, tools, processes, and uses that Nimíipuu ancestors embedded into these items. Native nations have sole authority to govern this data. The Wetxuuwíitin Collection is only now with its rightful owners, the Nez Perce Tribe, which is governing its data in accordance with its needs.

As noted above, the institution formerly known as the Ohio Historical Society, now the Ohio History Connection (OHC), eventually reimbursed the Nez Perce Tribe for the purchase of Nimíipuu items. The return of the original purchase amount of $608,100 from OHC to the Nez Perce came in September 2021, twenty-five years after the Tribe was forced to pay this amount to acquire their material culture and data in 1996. Under a new name and new leadership, the OHC joined the Nez Perce Tribe to celebrate the twenty-fifth anniversary of the return of the formerly named Spalding-Allen Collection. According to a recent article, Burt Logan, executive director and CEO of OHC, said, “As delighted as I was to learn about the renaming of the Wetxuuwíitin Collection, the invitation was also a painful reminder of the shameful mistreatment and marginalization of American Indians since the arrival of Europeans on the North American continent.”¹⁸ This change of heart by the OHC occurred for many reasons that are mostly unknown. Perhaps it was new leadership, a new board, or societal pressure in the wake of the country’s racial reckoning. Currently, the OHC includes a Native American on the board of trustees, and in 2020 it hired a Director of American Indian Relations.¹⁹

Colonial institutions have an ethical responsibility to work directly with Native nations to ensure historical wrongs do not continue. The Wetxuuwíitin Collection is a horrific case that exemplifies how colonialism has contributed to the collection of Indigenous material culture as well as the role that philanthropy often plays. Native communities and Native nations must continue to assert their tribal sovereignty to recover their living data. It is therefore insufficient to continue ignoring how colonialism continues to impact Indigenous material culture today and necessary to examine how philanthropy has also harmed Indigenous Peoples.

The collection of Indigenous material culture and philanthropy are both linked to systems of colonialism. The collection of Nez Perce material culture by missionary colonists was part of a larger genocidal process aimed at assimilating Native people in the US with the goal of acquiring Native lands and resources. The collection of Nez Perce material culture in history was not value free and involved inherent power inequities with documented histories of abuse against Native people by Spalding.

Thus, the colonial backdrop in the acquisition of the Wetxuuwíitin Collection raises several important questions about the ownership of Native cultural property and material culture under historical conditions of colonialism and ongoing settler colonialism. Who has the right to give and receive Native cultural property and material culture? What are the ethical boundaries around the possession of Native cultural property when the acquisition of Native material culture is tied to a violent history of attempted genocide and blatant attempts to extinguish Indigenous identities, worldviews, and cultural practices? Is the ethical collection of Indigenous material culture possible under conditions of colonialism where documented power asymmetries and physical abuse are the norms in guiding relationships? These are important and difficult questions that must be raised and integrated when it comes to all Indigenous material culture possessed by colonial institutions today.

Discussions about the history of Native American material culture have largely operated at the intersection of art history, archaeology, and anthropology—all problematic disciplines for the study of the First Nations of North America and beyond.²⁰ Art historians Melanie Anne Herzog and Sarah Anne Stolte note that the art history of Native North America is typically assumed to have started in the second half of the nineteenth century, when explorers, anthropologists, and other early collectors eagerly amassed Native American material culture because it offered evidence of a dying Native past. Native American material culture was housed and exhibited in early colonial institutions such as the Smithsonian, American Museum of Natural History, and other museums, where Native American cultural property was viewed through an anthropological lens and where Native objects, cultures, and traditions were static vestiges of the past and near extinction.²¹ Museums that housed and displayed Native American material culture were institutions that openly celebrated American manifest destiny and Western imperialism over the “primitive” and “savage” original inhabitants of the land.

Still today, despite years of Native activism for the return of their material culture and federal law outlining conditions for the return of Native material culture, colonial institutions are celebrated for “allowing” Native people to “visit” their cultural property (typically called a “partnership” with Native people or communities by colonial institutions). Indigenous Peoples must sometimes travel hundreds of miles to “visit” their cultural property, often funding these visits themselves. Some museums do engage in authentic partnerships with Native people and have agreements in place that acknowledge that the colonial institution is a trusted caretaker of Indigenous cultural property—but this is not the norm.

The hoarding of Indigenous material culture is not unique to the US—Indigenous Peoples in Canada have demanded the return of their headdresses, carvings, masks, animal skills, and more that have been housed in the collections of the Catholic Church.²² Most of these materials were also acquired during early periods of colonization when the Church was actively engaged in efforts to exterminate Indigenous identities. The Catholic Church has stated these items were gifts to the Church to document the Church’s “global reach.”²³ But Indigenous Peoples in Canada connect the collection to histories of genocide and colonialism and demand the return of Native cultural property be included in part of the country’s ongoing efforts of reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples.²⁴

Like the Wetxuuwíitin Collection, materials held by the Catholic Church and others are part of the colonial legacy, and stories about the acquisition of Indigenous cultural property are typically shrouded in the language of a gift, trade, exchange, or commerce. These colonial histories about Indigenous material culture, as told through the lens of the colonizer, imply an equal and amicable exchange. But these stories need further interrogation and a deeper contextualization. Collection origin stories should be anchored to an explicit backdrop of colonialism, centering Native people and communities, not colonial actors.

Questions must be raised about the acquisition of Indigenous material cultural by colonial institutions today, especially when these materials were acquired during campaigns of colonization and genocide. The acquiring of Indigenous goods—be it from gifting or purchase—is not free of extreme power inequalities, and must be understood in historical context. Archival journals of early traders, “explorers,” and missionaries must be integrated, and Indigenous histories, stories, and context must be prioritized within the telling of these histories.

In Western history, philanthropy is typically defined as the love of human beings, taken from the Greek words philo and anthropos. But Indigenous Peoples across the Americas (and in other parts of the globe) have always had their own conceptualization of what is today known as philanthropy. In many Native American cultures, philanthropy and the notion of giving and receiving is cyclical, understood as a reciprocal relationship and considered an honor. This idea of philanthropy as a circle of giving and care reflects beliefs of interconnectedness and strengthens new and existing relationships. This circle of giving is “a bonding experience; giving bonds one to the group and within the group because the individual provides gifts that allow the group to prosper, and the group provides gifts that allow the individual to prosper.”²⁵

Indigenous conceptualizations of philanthropy involve values of reciprocal responsibility and care for the self that is fundamentally linked to care for the community. As Mindy Berry and Rebecca Adamson note, this idea of philanthropy is not just about generosity but rather about deconstructing hierarchies and balancing wealth. “The Indigenous view of philanthropy is a tool to restore order within a tribal nation, with other tribal nations, and to maintain a harmonious and peaceful relationship with nature. Through collective sharing, each individual has a responsibility to—and part ownership of—the group.”²⁶ In sum, Indigenous giving and philanthropy are rooted in mutual responsibility and restoring or maintaining balance.

In many ways, this Indigenous definition of philanthropy conflicts with and contradicts colonial norms and paternalistic practices associated with philanthropy today and in history. Certainly, throughout history there was an exchange of goods and gifts between Indigenous peoples and settlers. But for colonial institutions to ethically house Indigenous material culture today, they must set aside their preconceived notions of Western history and philanthropy, which include settler-centered stories of Indigenous material culture, and ask: were Native cultural items acquired and exchanged in a way that valued reciprocity, responsibility, and care for the self and community (Indigenous notions of philanthropy and exchange)? This question must also be answered by Indigenous communities themselves, not colonial institutions. Moreover, in seeking answers to these questions, colonial institutions must honor and center the traditions, customs, histories, and values of Indigenous Peoples in unpacking the history of Indigenous material culture that is housed in colonial institutions today.

In this vein, historian Amy Lonetree argues that museums should “assist [Indigenous] communities in their efforts to address the legacies of historical unresolved grief by speaking the hard truth of colonialism and thereby creating spaces for healing and understanding.”²⁷ In her analysis of different types of museums, she demonstrates how colonial museums tend to prioritize the voices, perspectives, and worldviews of collectors, photographers, traders, historians, anthropologists, and government officials. Although some museums seek to reposition themselves to develop more collaborative relationships with Native communities, pathways toward trust and cooperation are long, slow, and require intentional action as well as an increased understanding of the needs, values, and perspectives of Native people themselves. This call to reexamine and to tell more accurate truths of the acquisition of Indigenous material culture by and held within colonial institutions today is fundamentally about centering Indigenous peoples’ views of philanthropy and exchange.

In 2024, new rules governing NAGPRA, originally passed in 1990, may help in facilitating more Indigenous centered truth-telling and quicken the repatriation of Indigenous cultural property, including Native American human remains, funerary objects, sacred objects, and objects of cultural patrimony. In short, NAGPRA requires that federal agencies and institutions that receive federal funding must repatriate or transfer Native American remains and other cultural property by consulting with lineal descendants, a Native nation, or Native Hawaiian Organizations; identify and report all items housed in inventories with summaries of holdings; and give notice of transfer or repatriation. Originally, NAGPRA mandated a five-year timeline for the identification and reporting of Native American cultural material, but implementation and enforcement of NAGPRA is ongoing today.²⁸ According to the Department of Interior, effective January 2024, new rules include the following changes: a commitment to strengthening the role of Indigenous knowledge by directing institutions to defer to the Indigenous knowledge of tribes and Native Hawaiian organizations (NHOs) in the repatriation process; a requirement that institutions obtain free, prior, and informed consent when it comes to researching or exhibiting Native American cultural items or human remains; and a five-year deadline for museums and federal agencies to update their inventories.²⁹ In response, some leading museums from across the country, including the American Museum of Natural History in Manhattan, the Field Museum in Chicago, and the Cleveland Museum of Art, to name a few, closed and/or concealed some public Native American exhibitions to evaluate and take necessary action to comply with regulations under the new NAGPRA rules. It is unclear how these rules that refer to honoring and deferring to Indigenous knowledge are operationalized in consultation with Indigenous communities, but we hope this leads to centering and uplifting Indigenous histories, values, and customs in evaluating how colonial institutions have acquired Indigenous material culture.

Still, colonial philanthropy today may not be equipped for returning Indigenous material culture. Western philanthropy remains a construct that continues to center whiteness and reinforce settler colonialism.³⁰ In 2020, following the unjust murder of George Floyd and the rise of Black Lives Matter protests across the country, there seemed to be an overwhelming philanthropic increase in commitment to social and racial justice issues. However, research has shown little change in funding practices and suggests public commitments were performative and superficial since they failed to translate into significant shifts in funding for social equity or social justice for Black, Brown, and Indigenous people.³¹ Philanthropy has long neglected Native communities, and today less than half of one percent of philanthropic dollars goes to support Native American organizations and causes—an even smaller percentage goes to support Native American communities and organizations themselves.³²

With philanthropy neglecting to fund Native causes and communities, some advocate for the “decolonizing of philanthropy,” in which money can be used as medicine to repair past harms.³³ Calls for the decolonization of philanthropy sharply diverge from the way Indigenous scholars have defined decolonization, which is the repatriation of Indigenous land and life.³⁴ Colonial philanthropy today must be reimagined and decenter whiteness, colonialism, and the erasure and invisibility of Indigenous people and communities. By doing this, philanthropy can play a pivotal role in shaping agendas for different sectors, including the museums where Indigenous material culture is housed. But if the status quo of philanthropy continues, the philanthropic sector will continue to perpetuate the colonization of Indigenous material culture.³⁵

This section has called for understanding the acquisition and ethical return of Indigenous material culture, involving the gifting or exchange of goods, to take place from an Indigenous perspective. Moreover, we have touched on how the current system of formalized philanthropy must be reshaped to better support Native communities and their demands, including the return of Indigenous material culture. Still, for philanthropy to improve their practices requires shifting how they conceive material culture.

In this final section, we connect the colonial history of Indigenous material culture to the IDSov and governance movements. First, we discuss how Indigenous material culture is Indigenous data, be it Indigenous materials in collections, archives, or in other forms. Colonial institutions may view Indigenous material culture as vestiges of the past, but these materials are Indigenous data. Native people have always had distinct ways of transmitting their own knowledge, information, and stories. Indigenous data contain and transmit specific forms of knowledge about a specific time, place, and social context about relationships to the land, waters, and people—the natural and physical worlds that link the past, present, and future of Indigenous Peoples. Given that Indigenous material culture is Indigenous data, we must give and bring these data back to Indigenous Peoples and communities, ultimately bringing these data back into relationship with Native people, their families, and communities.³⁶ In a recent TedX talk at the University of Arizona, Indigenous scholar Stephanie Carroll discussed the fluidity of Indigenous data and its ability to connect knowledge to Indigenous people, asserting that it is both living and breathing. Recognizing the role of Indigenous data in our collective past, present, and future necessitates the urgent need to bring data back to its rightful Indigenous caretakers and stewards.³⁷

Carroll helps us realize that Indigenous Peoples’ conceptions of Indigenous data are expansive with fluid boundaries of data, information, wisdom, and knowledges, particularly in juxtaposition to colonial contexts that focus on digital characters, quantities, and symbols as data distinct from other forms.³⁸ Indigenous data can be digital or emerge as tangible or intangible information, knowledges, languages, cultures, resources, materials, specimens, and objects.³⁹ Indigenous people have always created, stewarded, and collected data.⁴⁰ And Indigenous practices and teaching have always gathered for the benefit of future generations. For example, Indigenous data include oral stories, stories, winter counts, calendar sticks, totem poles, and other instruments that stored information for the benefit of the entire community.⁴¹

This more fluid definition of Indigenous data applies to material culture and further builds upon recent scholarly assertions toward a more expansive view of material culture. Recent discussions diverge from the traditional definition of material culture. Established in 1996, the Journal of Material Culture “explores the relationship between artefacts and social relations” and seeks to acknowledge and examine the linkage between the construction of social identities and the production and use of culture. Yet it seemingly remains focused on conceiving “artefacts” as historical, largely assuming they relate to a People of the past who have most likely vanished. For this reason, Ngandali and Craig, among others, suggest moving beyond that definition by including Indigenous ontologies in both museum and archaeological research. For example, in their own work, they use the term “belongings,” instead of artifacts or objects, as an “ontological shift in the perception of cultural heritage.”⁴² This shift allows for the more present term of belongings to hold life and meaning in contemporary terms.

Viewed in this context, Indigenous material culture is indeed Indigenous data, cultural property embedded with knowledge about Indigenous culture, resources, life sources, and teachings that connect generations of relatives. The history of the Wetxuuwíitin Collection demonstrates how Indigenous Peoples seek to care and protect their data. Caring for Indigenous data includes the ways in which Nimíipuu protected their data by choosing not to trade regalia and instead sought to trade beadwork, buckskins, and elk hides.⁴³ This practice protected their family items, to be shared with future generations. Spalding’s exploitation of that data for financial and circumstantial benefit demonstrates his inability to recognize what Pinkham stated as the “transgenerational” aspect of Nimíipuu data.

The history of the Wetxuuwíitin Collection is also one of harm to Native nations. There is a historical pattern of theft of Indigenous data globally, and therefore Indigenous Peoples must reclaim their data through IDSov. IDSov and Indigenous data governance movements are global efforts to reclaim control of Indigenous data and set clear practices for handling and governing Indigenous data.⁴⁴ IDSov offers important guiding principles for working with Native nations regarding Indigenous data or material culture. IDSov is the right of Indigenous Peoples and nations to govern the collection, ownership, and application of their own data.⁴⁵ IDSov derives from the inherent rights of Indigenous Peoples and nations to govern their peoples, land, and resources. Moreover, IDSov encapsulates Indigenous values, worldviews, and knowledge systems to ensure that research and data serve to strengthen Indigenous communities, a sharp contrast to the colonial data practices that have inflicted harm on Indigenous peoples, their knowledge systems, and ways of life.

IDSov seeks to reconcile the data that was stolen and exploited and bring that data back to its original and rightful caretakers. CARE principles can serve as a guide for both non-Indigenous and Indigenous people. CARE principles advocate for Collective Benefit, Authority to Control, Responsibility, and Ethics. The collective benefit includes the right of Indigenous Peoples to develop, benefit from, and access research and data. Authority to control includes the right of Indigenous Peoples to govern data. Responsibility calls on researchers and colonial institutions to use data to build the local capacity of Indigenous communities. Finally, ethics is the principle that Indigenous values and ethics be reflected in research so they can benefit from such research.⁴⁶ CARE principles assert greater control over the use of Indigenous data and knowledge and promote the vital role of data in advancing Indigenous development and self-determination. They also “empower Indigenous Peoples by shifting the focus from regulated consultation to value-based relationships that position data approaches within Indigenous cultures and knowledge systems to the benefit of Indigenous Peoples.”⁴⁷

With this definition in mind, it is easy to understand why we consider Indigenous material culture as Indigenous data. While others call for a more inclusive and expansive view of Indigenous material culture, we highlight how IDSov and governance can proactively work to reconcile the disparate relationships between cultural items and Indigenous peoples within colonial institutions. IDSov recognizes our relationships, connecting past to present, and in that sense, Indigenous data are living.

In the context of the Nimíipuu Collection, the Nez Perce sought to bring their living relatives home to rest just as IDSov seeks to bring Indigenous data back. By shifting how one conceives of material culture to a more present process, it is evident how and why Indigenous communities take action to bring data back. Moreover, now that the collection is home with the Nez Perce, they preserve their data with the help of the Washington State University (WSU) Plateau Peoples’ Portal, an archiving system and agreement that supports tribal authority to govern their data in accordance with tribal preferences. IDSov advocates envision the creation of Indigenous and tribally specific data repositories so that Indigenous Peoples can store, house, and fully control their historical, current, and future data. These repositories would operate based on Indigenous knowledge systems and worldviews that seek to advance the lifeways of Indigenous Peoples and nations. Partnerships or tribally led repositories are necessary infrastructures for Indigenous data governance that offer many benefits.

Indigenous scholar Sonya Atalay finds that this process of reclaiming has several outcomes for Indigenous communities and colonial institutions:

As the Nez Perce have secured their data, partnered with the Plateau Peoples’ Portal and the Nez Perce National Park, they have begun to govern that data. The Nimíipuu have translated their Indigenous data from the physical world to the digital world, to be shared for future use. And though they partner with a colonial institution, they guide this relationship on their terms. The digital collection includes a tribal specific coding of items in the digital archives and the development of tribal governance permission and use. Digital tags describe the roles and responsibilities of the Nimíipuu and have been developed with WSU Archives.

Now that the Wetxuuwíitin Collection is home, these Indigenous data are finally being cared for as living relatives and creating lasting and appropriate relationships. The buying back of this collection shows how tribes refuse to be disconnected from their data and will embark on challenging efforts to successfully buy back their data. Users of the Wetxuuwíitin Collection data must abide by the tribe’s sharing agreement. By asserting governance of their data, the Nimíipuu are representing themselves through their data, showing how it continues to live and breathe.

This article has pulled together the intersections of Native American material culture, Indigenous Data Sovereignty, and philanthropy. Elite and individual philanthropy have an important role to play in assisting and partnering with Native nations to acquire their cultural property from colonial institutions. To assist philanthropy in this work, we have discussed how IDSov and CARE principles can help guide their efforts and advance Native American interests while supporting tribal data governance, particularly as it relates to material culture. IDSov offers several resources and practices led by Indigenous Peoples (see CARE Principles) to govern Native data including cultural property.

Disentangling the colonial ties of material culture is not the sole responsibility of Indigenous Peoples. Museums must improve their efforts to partner with Native nations in the return of cultural property. Although many museums have yet to embark on repatriation, there is a growing effort and call for the voluntary repatriation of Indigenous data back to Native nations. Elite and individual philanthropy must also prioritize Native people and their demands. Philanthropic groups, as agenda setters for community organizations, can do the heavy lifting and start by reframing material culture as Indigenous data and understanding that it must be governed by Indigenous Peoples. The Nez Perce Tribe’s partnership with WSU shows that data governance is not always achievable alone. Colonial institutions must acknowledge Indigenous data and give data back. To do so, material culture must be conceived as Indigenous data and governed by and for the benefit of Indigenous Peoples.