Episode 292 - Death and Dying 101 with Ryan Seidemann: Episode 11
This week on the Ordinary Extraordinary Cemetery, Jennie and Dianne are joined by guest host Ryan Seidemann for a round of thought-provoking questions from his summer semester students at Arizona State University. Several of these questions are especially timely given the recent case of a cemetery being bulldozed unknowingly and heartbreakingly to descendants in Hickman County, Tennessee.
Why do companies push so hard to develop over cemeteries in urban environments when the legal and ethical ramifications seem to outweigh any benefit? How do cemeteries tied to marginalized communities keep getting erased or ignored — and what would true community control actually look like? How can communities and policymakers protect historic cemeteries when there are no living descendants and no funding for preservation? And should there be more robust legal requirements for documentation and preservation before any ground is broken near a cemetery?
Join Jennie, Dianne, and Ryan as they discuss how to balance progress with respect for the dead and their descendants.
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Lawyer, Archeologist, Anthropologist, Professor
Ryan M. Seidemann earned a Bachelor of Arts in Anthropology from Florida State University, focusing on human remains analysis with research at the Smithsonian Institution and the Cleveland Museum of Natural History. He completed a Master’s degree in Anthropology at Louisiana State University with a thesis on Maya skeletal remains from Belize. His early work in cultural resource management ranged across the Southeastern United States, with surveys and site excavations on Archaic peoples to inhabitants of New Orleans in the nineteenth century. Ryan later earned both a Bachelor of Civil Law and a Juris Doctorate at LSU and, in 2021, a Ph.D. in Urban Studies/Urban Anthropology from the University of New Orleans, with a dissertation on cemetery preservation inequities in New Orleans.
Throughout his law practice in both Louisiana and Vermont, Ryan has continuously show cased his ability to balance the intersecting worlds of cultural resources management, archaeology, cemeteries, and law. Ryan previously served as an Assistant Attorney General (2005-2024) and Chief of the Lands & Natural Resources Section (2007-2024) of the Louisiana Department of Justice. In that position, he represented the Louisiana Department of Natural Resources, the Office of State Lands, Louisiana Cemetery Board, and the Louisiana Division of Archaeology, among other government agencies. He has argued cases in most Louisiana district courts, all Louisiana appellate courts, and multiple times before the Louisiana Supreme Court. Ryan has authored or co-authored more than 100 publications on hu… Read More
