By returning human remains to their cultural communities, museums contribute to healing and reconciliation
The brains of 27 Filipinos, taken without consent from the families of the deceased in the early 20th century for racial studies, have been found by a team of intrepid reporters as recorded among the holdings of the Smithsonian Institution.
Reporters of the Washington Post spent a year examining the human remains collection as well as thousands of documents at the National Museum of Natural History in Washington, DC, administered by the Smithsonian.
The museum is the most-visited within the Smithsonian, and has one of the world’s largest collections of body parts, at least 30,700 of them, including bones, teeth, skulls, and mummies.
In an ongoing exclusive series, the first article of which was published Aug. 14 and shared with me by the WP, it was reported that the museum houses 255 brains, taken upon death from Black and Indigenous people, among them Filipinos “exhibited” at the 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exposition (St. Louis World’s Fair).
History buffs will recall that at the time, the U.S. was less than 10 years into its occupation of the Philippines, after buying the archipelago for $20 million from Spain.
The Fair showcased some 1,200 “primitive” Filipinos from at least 10 ethnic groups in a 47-acre artificial village, an anthropological exhibit where White folks gawked at the Filipinos as if the latter were animals in a zoo.
Among the people there were Igorots, considered by anthropologist Albert Jenks as the most “uncivilized” tribe in the Philippines.
Eating dog, a ceremonial activity for Igorots, was made a daily spectacle at the Fair to emphasize how “savage” Filipino customs were.
The exhibit was one of the ways the U.S. government sought to justify the occupation of the Philippines under the New Manifest Destiny, which pushed for the expansion of territory to project American dominance and culture and White superiority.
Using the Philippine village at the Fair as evidence of the “backwardness” of “their little brown brothers,” the U.S. whitewashed its colonization activities and led its citizens to believe that its interference in Philippine affairs was its responsibility and duty.
Going back to the brains, the Washington Post found that their acquisition for the Smithsonian’s ‘racial collection’ was driven by one man, Ales Hrdlicka.
An anthropologist and curator who led the Smithsonian’s physical anthropology division for over 40 years, he believed that White people were superior and collected body parts in an attempt to prove his racist theories.
However, the Post learned that while Hrdlicka offered the brains to other researchers for their use, they found no evidence that he did any substantive research himself on the brains he collected.
The summer of the Fair, Hrdlicka traveled to St. Louis, “hoping to take brains from the Filipinos who died” there.
He returned to D. C. with the brain of a Bontoc man and the cerebellum of a person from Suyoc. Some months later, doctors at the Fair sent him the brains of a Tagalog person and a Filipino Muslim.
The Post interviewed Filipino-American activist and artist Janna Añonuevo Langholz, who believes that the Suyoc cerebellum is that of Maura, a Kankanaey Igorot who died of pneumonia before the Fair began.
She was the only person from the Suyoc group whose death was reported in the press.
The brains of the 23 other Filipinos were taken from various sources around the Philippines, including some patients at the Philippine Medical School (now the University of the Philippines-Manila College of Medicine).
The Post article goes on to discuss ethical ways of dealing with the brains and other collected body parts, including the repatriation of the remains.
It also shares more interesting information, including how the Philippine Embassy in D.C. responded when contacted by the Smithsonian after the Post began reporting.
“Revealing the Smithsonian’s ‘Racial Brain Collection,’” written by Nicole Dungca and Claire Healy, is a bombshell debut for the series and is a must-read.
The succeeding articles are to be anticipated for more details on the brain collection, which has never been publicly displayed.
It was only when the Post started investigating that anyone realized how large the collection is, and how touching and poignant the stories behind some of the remains.
All this information provokes thought about the ethics of acquiring, keeping, and maintaining artifacts in museums.
The issue of museums holding human body parts without consent poses a moral dilemma, as it perpetuates a history of exploitation and disregards the dignity and rights of the deceased and their descendants.
These remains often originate from marginalized communities (as the Post has shown in this instance) and have been subjected to colonial exploitation and scientific curiosity.
Museums, by holding onto these artifacts, perpetuate a legacy of cultural theft and objectification.
In particular, the Smithsonian’s brain collection is particularly repugnant as the vast majority of the remains were taken without consent in an attempt to prove a reprehensible and immoral concept – White supremacy.
Returning these ill-gotten remains to their rightful descendants or cultural communities is an act of acknowledging the past wrongs and granting closure to grieving families and communities.
Restitution and repatriation are vital steps toward rectifying historical injustices and fostering a more equitable future.
By returning human remains to their cultural communities, museums contribute to healing and reconciliation.
This process embodies the principles of respect, empathy, and recognition of shared humanity—which should be the purpose of museums in the first place.
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