The science provided additional documentation in a specific idiom.

Both forms of knowledge are real, and neither supersedes the other.

The Bigger Question the Study Raised

The Sitting Bull DNA study received attention from the scientific community for the methodological advance it represented, and from the general public for the story of Sitting Bull’s family and the repatriation that preceded the research.

Both forms of attention were appropriate.

But the study also raised, for researchers and ethicists working at the intersection of genetics and Indigenous affairs, a set of questions that extend well beyond the specific findings.

The most important of these questions is about consent, authority, and the purpose of research.