Nowhere Else but Home: A National Resting Place for Indigenous Australian Ancestral Remains

Abstract

This article addresses the establishment of the National Resting Place, a new Australian cultural institution designed to perform a vital role in the care of Ancestral Remains. Exploring the history of why there are, and have been, many thousands of Ancestral Remains in Australia that need to be repatriated, reburied or cared for as a community determines, this article demonstrates the physical and cultural harm caused to Indigenous people through the cultural and professional practices of scientists, anatomists, and collectors throughout the main era of collecting, highlighting how the methods and norms of collecting in this era led to a lack of provenance and other identifying information for many Ancestral Remains. The article identifies the challenges of repatriation in the Australian context and discusses the emergence of a new model, the National Resting Place, to provide an Indigenous-centred response to the care of Ancestral Remains in Australia.