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Alex W. Barker, who joined the SAR board of directors in August, has been appointed by President Biden to the federal government’s Cultural Property Advisory Committee (CPAC).

Alex W. Barker

Barker, who currently serves as director of the Arkansas Archaeological Survey, is a former president of the American Anthropological Association. Earlier in his career he served as director of the Museum of Art and Archaeology of the University of Missouri and as a member of the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act National Review Committee. He was awarded a doctorate in anthropology from the University of Michigan in 1999.

“Heritage plays a crucial role in people’s identity, in how they think of themselves and how they imagine the world came to be as it is.  Balancing who controls different kinds of heritage—choosing, that is, between a common human legacy and the unique legacy of individual communities—is a constant challenge. CPAC helps the federal government negotiate these issues to better comply with the 1970 UNESCO Convention. I look forward to being part of that process.”—Alex Barker

Another current SAR director, Jeremy Sabloff, served as CPAC’s chair from 2016 to 2020.