Amidst the influencers, cute animals, memes and other videos on Instagram lives a bizarre, dark and strangely legal underworld where people buy and sell human skulls, bones and body parts. Jordan Erica Webber and Joshua Rivera dig deep into this macabre marketplace where they meet with Henry Scragg, proprietor of curiositiesfromthe5thcorner, and actual buyer and seller of human skulls and other death-related oddities. They also learn that the trading of human bones is nothing new and actually dates back to about the 1800s. Writer Oscar Schwartz's article outlines the history of the troublesome practice as it was used in phrenology and other outdated sciences, and attributes it to cultural appropriation. And although Instagram is now the go-to to buying marketplace, it began on eBay and other sites in the early days of the internet, and is showing no signs of slowing. Oscar explains how this trading in body parts is a remnant of colonialists who exploited and even killed indigenous people, but Henry defends his business as embracing death as part of life, detailing how one can be a responsible and discerning skull-trader. So is the trading of human remains just another legitimate-albeit-unusual business, or is it perpetuating an outdated practice that exploits disenfranchised people and their culture?

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