It is Good that You are Listening: The Dynamics of Native American Cultural Resource Management

Cultural preservation laws are concerned with the protection of the archaeological record for humanistic and scientific purposes. However, as Native American leaders, scholars, cultural resource managers, and archaeologists become increasingly engaged in cultural preservation issues and assume the legal responsibilities of cultural resource management (CRM), they soon realize that federal and state cultural preservation laws do more to promote the norms and values of the dominant society than it does of indigenous culture. As a consequence, the Native community finds itself immersed in a form of community-centered advocacy that not only seeks to educate federal agencies with whom they work but to show that the application of law, despite its limitations, should be proactive in its approach in protecting and managing Native American cultural resources.