Living Repatriation names repair that goes beyond the return of objects, records, land, ancestors, or formal authority. It asks whether Native peoples have usable, self-governed, and durable pathways to make return livable across generations.
Plainly: return is not complete until people have the real conditions needed to remember, reconnect, protect, teach, govern, and carry continuity forward.
Repair after continuity damage
Central claim
The paper develops living repatriation as a repair framework for cases where colonial harm damaged not only things that were taken, but the living pathways through which Native peoples remain connected to themselves across time.
What it is not
It is not forced return, racial sorting, nostalgia, unrestricted disclosure, a blame claim, or a replacement for existing repatriation law. It is a criterion for asking whether return has become livable.