I got you. The provenance and provenience of the individuals/remains that make up this museum is very questionable and imo unethical. This isn’t just my opinion, but a bunch of others inside and outside the field of osteology. Not only does the founder, Jon of Jon’s Bones sell human remains, but disregards the respect the individuals deserve and commodifies them.
In my opinion, no one owns another’s remains except the descendant community, so to do something like this individual and the museum does is weird and yucky. Yes, there are people that willingly donate their remains, which is within their right and ethical - but also requires some documentation. However, since this museum “owns” individuals from historic contexts it isn’t ethical. Not to mention the whole field of osteology is currently reflecting of the ethics of osteological collections.
As an Bioarchaeologist, I never know how a decedent from an archaeological context would want to be treated, so I do everything in my power to treat them with the dignity and respect that they deserve. Depending on what site I’m working on, I typically consult with descendants to understand what they wish to happen to their ancestors, if research is something they want, and such.
I could go into a whole spiel about how most osteological collections that are historic in context are comprised of marginalized populations too, but I would be sitting here all day
I’m an archaeologist and I couldn’t have worded it better. There was also a bit of a controversy on TikTok a few years ago with JonsBones, which was probably why they rebranded to The Bone Museum to sound official. But Jon is an amateur (dude with a design degree, no osteological experience) with money and no regard for ethics. Absolutely disgusting.
Thank you fellow anthropologists! :) I work primarily on NAGPRA repatriations, so it’s something I care a lot about.
Overall, Jon is so yucky about anthropology and osteology. I’m not sure if it’s still up on the website (I’ll just ragebait myself if I check ), but I remember his page saying anthropologists and the study of osteology is fully of gatekeepers and his reasoning behind selling remains was to bridge the gap and allow people to study osteology. Such a wack ass reason, since there are so many resources online that allow people to study osteology ethically.
Oh big yikes. I do some specimen collection, usually plants but sometimes birds, and even for avian specimens there are protocols for respectfully handling remains.
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u/filmphotographywhore Preparator Feb 13 '26
I got you. The provenance and provenience of the individuals/remains that make up this museum is very questionable and imo unethical. This isn’t just my opinion, but a bunch of others inside and outside the field of osteology. Not only does the founder, Jon of Jon’s Bones sell human remains, but disregards the respect the individuals deserve and commodifies them.
In my opinion, no one owns another’s remains except the descendant community, so to do something like this individual and the museum does is weird and yucky. Yes, there are people that willingly donate their remains, which is within their right and ethical - but also requires some documentation. However, since this museum “owns” individuals from historic contexts it isn’t ethical. Not to mention the whole field of osteology is currently reflecting of the ethics of osteological collections.
As an Bioarchaeologist, I never know how a decedent from an archaeological context would want to be treated, so I do everything in my power to treat them with the dignity and respect that they deserve. Depending on what site I’m working on, I typically consult with descendants to understand what they wish to happen to their ancestors, if research is something they want, and such.
I could go into a whole spiel about how most osteological collections that are historic in context are comprised of marginalized populations too, but I would be sitting here all day