On Tuesday, Sept. 7, Megan Murphy joined the UCR Library as the new UCR NAGPRA (Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act) Specialist.

Megan has a BA in Archaeology from Dickinson College and an MA in Anthropology with a focus on Archaeology at University of Colorado, Boulder, where she also served as a Teaching Assistant.

Megan has extensive experience in working on repatriating human remains, cultural objects, and funerary objects, having interned at both the University of Knoxville in Tennessee and the University of Pennsylvania on NAGPRA projects at those institutions. She has also done an archaeology internship at Fort Vasquez Museum and an oral history internship at Louisville Historical Society.

Megan will be working closely with Professor Gerald Clarke, the UCR NAGPRA Repatriation Coordinator, to contact proactively and consult with all possible tribes affiliated with the small number of Native American human remains and artifacts covered by either the federal NAGPRA or state CalNAGPRA laws and facilitate tribal claims for their repatriation. This work will include preparing and submitting notices to be published in the Federal Register.

In addition, she will be working closely with Dr. Matt Hall, the Director of the Archaeological Curation Unit on campus to re-inventory the 600 cubic foot collection of artifacts held by the unit in compliance with CalNAGPRA as per the requirements of Assembly Bill 275, which significantly amended the law in September 2020. The same law will require at a minimum confirming that the UCR Library’s inventories of its holdings of Native American artifacts, archives, artwork, etc., primarily in Special Collections and University Archives, meet the requirement of AB275 (which requires inventorying all object, artwork, artifacts, archives, etc. in consultation with tribal leaders in order to identify which materials do or do not fall under the purview of AB275).

Megan will also be assisting the University Librarian Steven Mandeville-Gamble in his role as UCR NAGPRA Administrator to help organize meetings and support the work of the new UCR Repatriation Oversight Committee, once it is convened in late September 2021. Megan will divide her time between her office on the fourth floor of Rivera Library and in Watkins Hall, working on the inventory of the Archaeological Curation Unit.

Please join us in welcoming Megan to the UCR Library team!