Consultation and Collaboration: A Starting Point for Museums and Indigenous Tribes

The Texas Department of Transportation, the Texas Historical Commission, the Bullock Texas State History Museum, and our Tribal Advisory Committee are collaborating on this series of workshops that will be offered around the state in Spring 2023. Locations include Austin, Edinburg, Victoria, Longview, Abilene, El Paso, and Canyon. Click on "Workshop Registration" below to sign up.

Workshop participants will learn the importance of and how to build lasting relationships with federally recognized American Indian tribes in Texas, or ancestral to Texas, as well as how to integrate tribal history and culture into state and local interpretation. Examples of how American Indians have been represented in museums in the past will be contrasted with how they are represented in collaborative or Indigenous-led exhibits.

Topics discussed will include identifying culturally insensitive interpretation and practices in your own institution and when and why it's necessary to work with tribes when making those assessments. Participants will learn who to contact within tribes, how to contact them, how to cultivate that two-way relationship, and how to be respectful of their knowledge and artifacts.

Consultation and Collaboration: A Starting Point for Museums and Indigenous Tribes is a collaboration between the Bullock Texas State History Museum, the Texas Historical Commission, and the Texas Department of Transportation.