Abstract
Katsinam (plural of katsina) are effigies central to the religion of the Hopi people of northern Arizona in the United States. Since 2013 the Hopi have sought the return of katsinam being sold in French auction houses. The Hopi have employed a series of legal actions to stop the auctions. All such actions, however, have been consistently denied by French courts. This paper uses social science analysis to understand why the legal actions of the Hopi failed. This paper treats the case of the katsinam as a cautionary lesson in cultural heritage studies, with the goal of drawing insights that can inform other situations involving the repatriation of Indigenous cultural heritage.
Acknowledgement
I thank the reviewers and editorial staff with their thoughtful comments on earlier draughts of this manuscript. Their suggestions improved this paper dramatically. I also wish to thank Jean-Patrick Razon, Pierre Servan-Schreiber, Sam Tenakhongva, and the Hopi people for their patience and understanding on this project.