Despite desire from Native Americans in Illinois, the ban on Native imagery for mascots in K-12 schools stalled in the Senate after it made its way out of the House.

The Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, or NAGPRA, is a federal law that requires a museum or institution to publish public notices if any human remains or funerary objects it holds belong to a tribal nation.

Glamorous Quinceañera dresses and an Indigenous ceremonial mask are among the items that will be on display in “Aquí en Chicago,” an upcoming Chicago History Museum exhibit celebrating the long history of Latinos in the city.

More than 175 years after their reservation in Illinois was illegally sold at auction, the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation is now in line to get their land back.

In the news this week: Doctors in Switzerland are expanding their range of prescriptions to include visits to art galleries and museums. You don’t need a prescription to experience the arts in Cook County.

Nearly two centuries after losing its reservation in Illinois in a land sale that most people now concede was illegal, the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation could soon get its land back.

Chicago is home to one of the largest urban Native American populations in the United States. More than 65,000 Native Americans live in the greater metropolitan area, representing about 175 different tribes.

The report, which concluded a three-year investigation, uncovered that at least 973 children died while under the care of these institutions, with many more expected to have suffered similar fates. These schools were established to forcibly assimilate Native American children — often through violent tactics.

The Prairie Band Potawatomi are now headquartered in northeast Kansas. But they once had a reservation in what is now DeKalb County, a reservation that officials now agree was illegally sold out from under them in 1850.

The bill would authorize the state to hand over what is now Shabbona Lake and State Park to the tribe for $1. It also allows the tribe and the Department of Natural Resources to enter into a land management agreement under which the land would remain open to the public for recreational use for an unspecified period.

Larissa FastHorse is the first Native American woman to have a play produced on Broadway. “The Thanksgiving Play” is now onstage at Steppenwolf Theatre. It’s a satire about earnest theater folks who attempt to stage a historically accurate Thanksgiving play.

“Vigilance: Learning From the Legacies of BIPOC Environmental Leaders” is inspired by the work of Hazel Johnson, a Black Chicagoan known as the mother of the environmental justice movement.

A U.S. Department of the Interior decision places portions of Shab-eh-nay Reservation land, which is located in DeKalb County, into trust for the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation, which gives the tribal nation sovereignty over the land.

A bill pending in the General Assembly would give back roughly 1,500 acres of park land in DeKalb County to the Prairie Band Potawatomi Nation. That tribe once occupied much of the Great Lakes region but was forcibly removed in the 19th century.

“What’s disappointing is that it takes a federal law to push institutions and agencies to comply and to even just create consultation with tribes,” said Eli Suzukovich, director of cultural preservation and compliance for the Office for Research at Northwestern University.

Updated federal regulations require museums to obtain “free, prior and informed consent” from affiliated tribes before displaying or doing research on Native human remains or cultural items.