This portal is a gateway to the cultural materials of Plateau peoples that are held in Washington State University’s Libraries, Manuscripts, Archives and Special Collections (MASC), the Museum of Anthropology and by national donors. The collections represented here have been chosen and curated by tribal consultants working in cooperation with University and Museum staff.
This project is a collaboration between the Plateau Center for American Indian Studies at Washington State University and tribal consultants from the Umatilla, Coeur d’Alene and Yakama nations. The Plateau Peoples’ Web Portal is a gateway to Plateau peoples’ cultural materials held in Washington State University’s Libraries, Manuscripts, Archives and Special Collections (MASC), the Museum of Anthropology and national donors including the National Anthropological Archives at the Smithsonian Institution. The materials in the portal have been chosen and curated by the tribes. Tribal administrators, working with their tribal governments, have provided information and their own additional materials to the portal as a means of expanding and extending the archival record. Typically, museums and archives curate exhibitions, annotate and catalogue content based on familiar sets of metadata (information about information). Oftentimes, however, the curation process and the associated metadata are removed from the originating communities. This project aims to create not just a digital portal to view content, but also a different paradigm for the curation, distribution, and reproduction of Native peoples’ cultural materials.
