Joan E. Cashin (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781469643205
- eISBN:
- 9781469643229
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/northcarolina/9781469643205.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, American History: 19th Century
Material objects lie at the crux of understanding individual and social relationships throughout history, and the Civil War generation is no exception. Before, during, and after the war, Americans ...
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Material objects lie at the crux of understanding individual and social relationships throughout history, and the Civil War generation is no exception. Before, during, and after the war, Americans from all walks of life created, used, revered, exploited, discarded, mocked, and destroyed objects for countless reasons. These objects had symbolic significance for millions of people. The essays in this volume consider a wide range of material objects, including weapons, Revolutionary artifacts, landscapes, books, vaccine matter, human bodies, houses, clothing, and documents. Together, the contributors argue that material objects can shed new light on the social, economic, and cultural history of the conflict. This book will fundamentally reshape our understanding of the war.Less
Material objects lie at the crux of understanding individual and social relationships throughout history, and the Civil War generation is no exception. Before, during, and after the war, Americans from all walks of life created, used, revered, exploited, discarded, mocked, and destroyed objects for countless reasons. These objects had symbolic significance for millions of people. The essays in this volume consider a wide range of material objects, including weapons, Revolutionary artifacts, landscapes, books, vaccine matter, human bodies, houses, clothing, and documents. Together, the contributors argue that material objects can shed new light on the social, economic, and cultural history of the conflict. This book will fundamentally reshape our understanding of the war.
Philipp Schorch and Conal McCarthy (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781526118196
- eISBN:
- 9781526142016
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9781526118196.001.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Anthropology, Global
What is the future of curatorial practice? How can the relationships between Indigenous people in the Pacific, collections in Euro-American institutions, and curatorial knowledge in museums globally ...
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What is the future of curatorial practice? How can the relationships between Indigenous people in the Pacific, collections in Euro-American institutions, and curatorial knowledge in museums globally be (re)conceptualised in reciprocal and symmetrical ways? Is there an ideal model, a ‘curatopia,’ whether in the form of a utopia or dystopia, which can enable the reinvention of ethnographic museums and address their difficult colonial legacies? This volume addresses these questions by considering the current state of the play in curatorial practice, reviewing the different models and approaches operating in different museums, galleries and cultural organisations around the world, and debating the emerging concerns, challenges, and opportunities. The subject areas range over native and tribal cultures, anthropology, art, history, migration and settler culture, among others. Topics covered include: contemporary curatorial theory, new museum trends, models and paradigms, the state of research and scholarship, the impact of new media, and current issues such as curatorial leadership, collecting and collection access and use, exhibition development, and community engagement. The volume is international in scope and covers three broad regions—Europe, North America and the Pacific. The contributors are leading and emerging scholars and practitioners in their respective fields, all of whom have worked in and with universities and museums, and are therefore perfectly placed to reshape the dialogue between academia and the professional museum world.Less
What is the future of curatorial practice? How can the relationships between Indigenous people in the Pacific, collections in Euro-American institutions, and curatorial knowledge in museums globally be (re)conceptualised in reciprocal and symmetrical ways? Is there an ideal model, a ‘curatopia,’ whether in the form of a utopia or dystopia, which can enable the reinvention of ethnographic museums and address their difficult colonial legacies? This volume addresses these questions by considering the current state of the play in curatorial practice, reviewing the different models and approaches operating in different museums, galleries and cultural organisations around the world, and debating the emerging concerns, challenges, and opportunities. The subject areas range over native and tribal cultures, anthropology, art, history, migration and settler culture, among others. Topics covered include: contemporary curatorial theory, new museum trends, models and paradigms, the state of research and scholarship, the impact of new media, and current issues such as curatorial leadership, collecting and collection access and use, exhibition development, and community engagement. The volume is international in scope and covers three broad regions—Europe, North America and the Pacific. The contributors are leading and emerging scholars and practitioners in their respective fields, all of whom have worked in and with universities and museums, and are therefore perfectly placed to reshape the dialogue between academia and the professional museum world.
Élisabeth Anstett and Jean-Marc Dreyfus (eds)
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2017
- ISBN:
- 9781526107381
- eISBN:
- 9781526120694
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9781526107381.001.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Social and Cultural Anthropology
This book addresses the practices, treatment and commemoration of victims’ remains in post-genocide and mass violence contexts. Whether reburied, concealed, stored, abandoned or publically displayed, ...
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This book addresses the practices, treatment and commemoration of victims’ remains in post-genocide and mass violence contexts. Whether reburied, concealed, stored, abandoned or publically displayed, human remains raise a vast number of questions regarding their legal, ethical and social uses.
Human Remains in Society will raise these issues by examining when, how and why bodies are hidden or exhibited. Using case studies from multiple continents, each chapter will interrogate their effect on human remains, either desired or unintended, on various political, cultural or religious practices. How, for instance, do issues of confiscation, concealment or the destruction of bodies and body parts in mass crime impact on transitional processes, commemoration or judicial procedures?Less
This book addresses the practices, treatment and commemoration of victims’ remains in post-genocide and mass violence contexts. Whether reburied, concealed, stored, abandoned or publically displayed, human remains raise a vast number of questions regarding their legal, ethical and social uses.
Human Remains in Society will raise these issues by examining when, how and why bodies are hidden or exhibited. Using case studies from multiple continents, each chapter will interrogate their effect on human remains, either desired or unintended, on various political, cultural or religious practices. How, for instance, do issues of confiscation, concealment or the destruction of bodies and body parts in mass crime impact on transitional processes, commemoration or judicial procedures?
Kate Hill
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780719081156
- eISBN:
- 9781526115058
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9780719081156.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Cultural History
This book examines the roles and activities of women in British museums between 1850 and 1914. It shows women were active as employees, volunteers, donors, visitors, and patrons of museums, and ...
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This book examines the roles and activities of women in British museums between 1850 and 1914. It shows women were active as employees, volunteers, donors, visitors, and patrons of museums, and examines the ways in which the growth of archaeology and anthropology in museums affected women, as well as their role in museums inspired by John Ruskin. It argues that to recover the extent of women’s agency in museums, we need to think of museums as distributed networks of people and objects; activities and objects outside as well as inside the museum institution worked to create knowledge and subjectivity. Such an approach reveals the rich new ways in which museums were developed by women, who brought new types of object such as social historical artefacts, and new ways of valuing and communicating those objects, as well as new concerns with community engagement and outreach. Yet the book also outlines the limits of women’s museum roles, showing how they were unable to have much influence over large, national museums, and colonised instead small, regional museums, especially those situated in slum areas. Nevertheless, it argues that women and museums between them formulated a distinctive arena for the understanding of modernity, in contrast to many other manifestations of modernity, and that museums and women helped to make each other modern.Less
This book examines the roles and activities of women in British museums between 1850 and 1914. It shows women were active as employees, volunteers, donors, visitors, and patrons of museums, and examines the ways in which the growth of archaeology and anthropology in museums affected women, as well as their role in museums inspired by John Ruskin. It argues that to recover the extent of women’s agency in museums, we need to think of museums as distributed networks of people and objects; activities and objects outside as well as inside the museum institution worked to create knowledge and subjectivity. Such an approach reveals the rich new ways in which museums were developed by women, who brought new types of object such as social historical artefacts, and new ways of valuing and communicating those objects, as well as new concerns with community engagement and outreach. Yet the book also outlines the limits of women’s museum roles, showing how they were unable to have much influence over large, national museums, and colonised instead small, regional museums, especially those situated in slum areas. Nevertheless, it argues that women and museums between them formulated a distinctive arena for the understanding of modernity, in contrast to many other manifestations of modernity, and that museums and women helped to make each other modern.
Annabel Jane Wharton
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- January 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780816693382
- eISBN:
- 9781452950853
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Minnesota Press
- DOI:
- 10.5749/minnesota/9780816693382.001.0001
- Subject:
- Architecture, Architectural History
Buildings are not benign; rather, they commonly manipulate and abuse their human users. Architectural Agents makes the case that buildings act in the world independently of their makers, patrons, ...
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Buildings are not benign; rather, they commonly manipulate and abuse their human users. Architectural Agents makes the case that buildings act in the world independently of their makers, patrons, owners, or occupants. And often they act badly. Treating buildings as bodies, Annabel Jane Wharton writes biographies of symptomatic structures in order to diagnose their pathologies. The violence of some sites is rooted in historical trauma; the unhealthy spatial behaviors of other spaces stem from political and economic ruthlessness. The places examined range from the Cloisters Museum in New York City and the Palestine Archaeological Museum (renamed the Rockefeller Museum) in Jerusalem to the grand Hostal de los Reyes Católicos in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, and Las Vegas casino resorts. Recognizing that a study of pathological spaces would not be complete without an investigation of digital structures, Wharton integrates into her argument an original consideration of the powerful architectures of video games and immersive worlds. Her work mounts a persuasive critique of popular phenomenological treatments of architecture. Architectural Agents advances an alternative theorization of buildings’ agency—one rooted in buildings’ essential materiality and historical formation—as the basis for this significant intervention in current debates over the boundaries separating humans, animals, and machines.Less
Buildings are not benign; rather, they commonly manipulate and abuse their human users. Architectural Agents makes the case that buildings act in the world independently of their makers, patrons, owners, or occupants. And often they act badly. Treating buildings as bodies, Annabel Jane Wharton writes biographies of symptomatic structures in order to diagnose their pathologies. The violence of some sites is rooted in historical trauma; the unhealthy spatial behaviors of other spaces stem from political and economic ruthlessness. The places examined range from the Cloisters Museum in New York City and the Palestine Archaeological Museum (renamed the Rockefeller Museum) in Jerusalem to the grand Hostal de los Reyes Católicos in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, and Las Vegas casino resorts. Recognizing that a study of pathological spaces would not be complete without an investigation of digital structures, Wharton integrates into her argument an original consideration of the powerful architectures of video games and immersive worlds. Her work mounts a persuasive critique of popular phenomenological treatments of architecture. Architectural Agents advances an alternative theorization of buildings’ agency—one rooted in buildings’ essential materiality and historical formation—as the basis for this significant intervention in current debates over the boundaries separating humans, animals, and machines.
Samuel J. M. M. Alberti
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- May 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780199584581
- eISBN:
- 9780191725159
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199584581.003.0007
- Subject:
- History, History of Science, Technology, and Medicine
Finally, Chapter 7 traces the diminution of audiences as the medical museum ceased to be such a prestigious site for the construction and reception of pathology. In part an epilogue, it traces the ...
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Finally, Chapter 7 traces the diminution of audiences as the medical museum ceased to be such a prestigious site for the construction and reception of pathology. In part an epilogue, it traces the largely unknown fate of anatomical pathology in the twentieth century, and the function and fate of collections from their rude health in the inter-war period to the regulatory changes of the twenty-first century, including a contrast between the use of pathological specimens in Gunther von Hagens's Body Worlds and the impact of the Human Tissue Act on (more formal) pathology museums. The conclusion concludes by considering the construction of material abnormality on display and the key features of the pathological specimen.Less
Finally, Chapter 7 traces the diminution of audiences as the medical museum ceased to be such a prestigious site for the construction and reception of pathology. In part an epilogue, it traces the largely unknown fate of anatomical pathology in the twentieth century, and the function and fate of collections from their rude health in the inter-war period to the regulatory changes of the twenty-first century, including a contrast between the use of pathological specimens in Gunther von Hagens's Body Worlds and the impact of the Human Tissue Act on (more formal) pathology museums. The conclusion concludes by considering the construction of material abnormality on display and the key features of the pathological specimen.
Ruth B. Phillips
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781526118196
- eISBN:
- 9781526142016
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9781526118196.003.0010
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Anthropology, Global
If you are standing on the shores of the Ottawa River looking at the Canadian Museum of History, the national library and archives and other national repositories of Aboriginal heritage, you might ...
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If you are standing on the shores of the Ottawa River looking at the Canadian Museum of History, the national library and archives and other national repositories of Aboriginal heritage, you might well despair at the comprehensive losses of curatorial expertise, programs of research, and will to work collaboratively with Aboriginal people which befell these institutions under the government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Looking harder, however, neither the shifting political ideologies nor the era of financial constraint that began with the global financial crisis of 2008 seems to have thrown processes of decolonisation and pluralist representation that began to take root in Canada during the 1990s into reverse. Two exhibition projects that unfolded during that same period provide evidence of that the changes in historical consciousness of settler-indigenous relationships and the acceptance of cultural pluralism have provided a counterweight to the intentions of a right wing government to restore old historical narratives. This chapter discusses them as evidence of this deep and, seemingly, irreversible shift in Canadian public’s expectation s of museum representation. The first involves plans for the new exhibition of Canadian history being developed for the 150th anniversary of Canadian confederation in 2017, specifically a fishing boat named the Nisga’a Girl which was presented by a west coast First Nation to mark the successful resolution of its land claim. The second is the Sakahan exhibition of global indigenous art shown in 2013 at the National Gallery of Canada and which marked a notable departure from its past scope. While utopia has by no means been achieved, neither, surprisingly, was dystopia realised during the years of conservative reaction.Less
If you are standing on the shores of the Ottawa River looking at the Canadian Museum of History, the national library and archives and other national repositories of Aboriginal heritage, you might well despair at the comprehensive losses of curatorial expertise, programs of research, and will to work collaboratively with Aboriginal people which befell these institutions under the government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Looking harder, however, neither the shifting political ideologies nor the era of financial constraint that began with the global financial crisis of 2008 seems to have thrown processes of decolonisation and pluralist representation that began to take root in Canada during the 1990s into reverse. Two exhibition projects that unfolded during that same period provide evidence of that the changes in historical consciousness of settler-indigenous relationships and the acceptance of cultural pluralism have provided a counterweight to the intentions of a right wing government to restore old historical narratives. This chapter discusses them as evidence of this deep and, seemingly, irreversible shift in Canadian public’s expectation s of museum representation. The first involves plans for the new exhibition of Canadian history being developed for the 150th anniversary of Canadian confederation in 2017, specifically a fishing boat named the Nisga’a Girl which was presented by a west coast First Nation to mark the successful resolution of its land claim. The second is the Sakahan exhibition of global indigenous art shown in 2013 at the National Gallery of Canada and which marked a notable departure from its past scope. While utopia has by no means been achieved, neither, surprisingly, was dystopia realised during the years of conservative reaction.
Bryony Onciul
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781526118196
- eISBN:
- 9781526142016
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9781526118196.003.0011
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Anthropology, Global
Curation is increasingly recognised as a profession of high standing which requires extensive higher education. However, the proliferation of community engagement since the 1980s has placed new ...
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Curation is increasingly recognised as a profession of high standing which requires extensive higher education. However, the proliferation of community engagement since the 1980s has placed new pressures and expectations on curators, thus complicating their role. This is particularly evident in the case of ethnographic curators working with indigenous communities. This chapter explores these issues by considering the ways that working with Blackfoot First Nations communities have affected the role and work of curators at three key museums, two in Canada and one in the UK. Historically museums, and de facto their curators, were often seen as an enemy by many indigenous communities as they appeared as a physical manifestation of colonialism. The historical practice of collecting sacred cultural material, and even the bones and bodies of indigenous people, have made museums synonymous with sites of death, both physical and cultural. Yet, nowadays they also present an exceptional resource and opportunity to revive and re-invigorate pre-colonial cultural knowledge and practice through their collections. Consequently, curators often find themselves in the dubious position of being both potential foe and ally. This is complicated further when curators work cross-culturally and try to embrace both indigenous and western ways of working, as this chapter explores. It has been argued that curators have moved from the position of ‘expert’ to that of ‘facilitator’ but this oversimplifies the complexities of voice, accountability and power in the representation of culture. There is a need for a more nuanced understandings of the pressures community engagement places on the role of curatorship, especially in this current time of increasing expectations on engagement and decreasing resources to support museological work.Less
Curation is increasingly recognised as a profession of high standing which requires extensive higher education. However, the proliferation of community engagement since the 1980s has placed new pressures and expectations on curators, thus complicating their role. This is particularly evident in the case of ethnographic curators working with indigenous communities. This chapter explores these issues by considering the ways that working with Blackfoot First Nations communities have affected the role and work of curators at three key museums, two in Canada and one in the UK. Historically museums, and de facto their curators, were often seen as an enemy by many indigenous communities as they appeared as a physical manifestation of colonialism. The historical practice of collecting sacred cultural material, and even the bones and bodies of indigenous people, have made museums synonymous with sites of death, both physical and cultural. Yet, nowadays they also present an exceptional resource and opportunity to revive and re-invigorate pre-colonial cultural knowledge and practice through their collections. Consequently, curators often find themselves in the dubious position of being both potential foe and ally. This is complicated further when curators work cross-culturally and try to embrace both indigenous and western ways of working, as this chapter explores. It has been argued that curators have moved from the position of ‘expert’ to that of ‘facilitator’ but this oversimplifies the complexities of voice, accountability and power in the representation of culture. There is a need for a more nuanced understandings of the pressures community engagement places on the role of curatorship, especially in this current time of increasing expectations on engagement and decreasing resources to support museological work.
Billie Lythberg, Wayne Ngata, and Amiria Salmond
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781526118196
- eISBN:
- 9781526142016
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9781526118196.003.0015
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Anthropology, Global
Current ontological critiques point to how discourses of diversity like multiculturalism help domesticate difference by making it fit into pre-determined categories, such as those we are accustomed ...
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Current ontological critiques point to how discourses of diversity like multiculturalism help domesticate difference by making it fit into pre-determined categories, such as those we are accustomed to thinking of as cultures. These ways of conceiving relations within and between groups of people—common to anthropology and museums, as well as to liberal democratic regimes of governance—assert that differences between peoples are relatively superficial in that our cultures overlay a fundamental and universal sameness. Museums showcasing cultural artefacts have thus helped domesticate difference by promoting world-making visions of (natural) unity in (cultural) diversity. Yet some artefacts exceed the categories designed to contain them; they oblige thought and handling beyond the usual requirements of curatorial practice. This chapter considers the challenges of ‘curating the uncommons’ in relation to work carried out by and with the Māori tribal arts management group Toi Hauiti and their ancestor figure, Paikea, at the American Museum of Natural History in New York.Less
Current ontological critiques point to how discourses of diversity like multiculturalism help domesticate difference by making it fit into pre-determined categories, such as those we are accustomed to thinking of as cultures. These ways of conceiving relations within and between groups of people—common to anthropology and museums, as well as to liberal democratic regimes of governance—assert that differences between peoples are relatively superficial in that our cultures overlay a fundamental and universal sameness. Museums showcasing cultural artefacts have thus helped domesticate difference by promoting world-making visions of (natural) unity in (cultural) diversity. Yet some artefacts exceed the categories designed to contain them; they oblige thought and handling beyond the usual requirements of curatorial practice. This chapter considers the challenges of ‘curating the uncommons’ in relation to work carried out by and with the Māori tribal arts management group Toi Hauiti and their ancestor figure, Paikea, at the American Museum of Natural History in New York.
Andrea Witcomb
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781526118196
- eISBN:
- 9781526142016
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9781526118196.003.0017
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Anthropology, Global
Australia’s first Migration Museum in Adelaide recognised from its inception in 1986, that representing migration history could not be done without acknowledging its intimate association with ...
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Australia’s first Migration Museum in Adelaide recognised from its inception in 1986, that representing migration history could not be done without acknowledging its intimate association with colonisation and the dispossession of indigenous people. Their first move therefore, was to create a distinction between all migrants, a category that included British ‘settlers’, and Indigenous Australians. This was significant not only because it implicated colonisation within migration history but because it made all non-Indigenous Australians migrants. The move though, was not easy to establish, largely because, in the public imagination, migrants were the other to mainstream or ‘British Australia’. In the mid-1990s, however, it seemed to work as Australia was indeed seen as a country that was relatively successful in integrating various waves of migration into its historical narratives while valuing cultural diversity and recognising the prior occupation of the land by Aboriginal people. The ‘War on terror’, the arrival of asylum seekers and the threat of internal terrorist attacks, along with changes in immigration policy and a general climate of fear has changed that, and migration museums are now working to combat a new wave of racism. To do so, I argue, they have developed a new set of curatorial strategies that aim to facilitate an exploration of the complexity of contemporary forms of identity. This chapter provides a history of the development of curatorial strategies that have helped to change the ways in which relations between ‘us and them’ have changed over the years in response to changes in the wider public discourse. My focus will be on both collecting and display practices, from changes to what is collected and how it is displayed, to the changing role of personal stories, the relationship between curators and the communities they work with, and the role of exhibition design in structuring the visitor experience.Less
Australia’s first Migration Museum in Adelaide recognised from its inception in 1986, that representing migration history could not be done without acknowledging its intimate association with colonisation and the dispossession of indigenous people. Their first move therefore, was to create a distinction between all migrants, a category that included British ‘settlers’, and Indigenous Australians. This was significant not only because it implicated colonisation within migration history but because it made all non-Indigenous Australians migrants. The move though, was not easy to establish, largely because, in the public imagination, migrants were the other to mainstream or ‘British Australia’. In the mid-1990s, however, it seemed to work as Australia was indeed seen as a country that was relatively successful in integrating various waves of migration into its historical narratives while valuing cultural diversity and recognising the prior occupation of the land by Aboriginal people. The ‘War on terror’, the arrival of asylum seekers and the threat of internal terrorist attacks, along with changes in immigration policy and a general climate of fear has changed that, and migration museums are now working to combat a new wave of racism. To do so, I argue, they have developed a new set of curatorial strategies that aim to facilitate an exploration of the complexity of contemporary forms of identity. This chapter provides a history of the development of curatorial strategies that have helped to change the ways in which relations between ‘us and them’ have changed over the years in response to changes in the wider public discourse. My focus will be on both collecting and display practices, from changes to what is collected and how it is displayed, to the changing role of personal stories, the relationship between curators and the communities they work with, and the role of exhibition design in structuring the visitor experience.
Vilsoni Hereniko
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781526118196
- eISBN:
- 9781526142016
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9781526118196.003.0021
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Anthropology, Global
Although I am a strong advocate for access to collections in museums and although I see new technologies as a necessary part of this goal, I do not think that technology and its associated impacts ...
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Although I am a strong advocate for access to collections in museums and although I see new technologies as a necessary part of this goal, I do not think that technology and its associated impacts and benefits should be the end goal. Rather, they should exist collaboratively with physical museums that mirror the robust developments in digital technology. The physical museum needs to be transformed so that their material collections can stimulate cultural production by living artists and cultural practitioners. This juxtaposition of the past and the present, the dead and the living, ensures that museums remain vibrant and vital spaces for the multicultural communities around them.Less
Although I am a strong advocate for access to collections in museums and although I see new technologies as a necessary part of this goal, I do not think that technology and its associated impacts and benefits should be the end goal. Rather, they should exist collaboratively with physical museums that mirror the robust developments in digital technology. The physical museum needs to be transformed so that their material collections can stimulate cultural production by living artists and cultural practitioners. This juxtaposition of the past and the present, the dead and the living, ensures that museums remain vibrant and vital spaces for the multicultural communities around them.
Joan E. Cashin (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- May 2019
- ISBN:
- 9781469643205
- eISBN:
- 9781469643229
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/northcarolina/9781469643205.003.0001
- Subject:
- History, American History: 19th Century
Most historians of the Civil War era have neglected material culture studies, but the field has a great deal to offer to scholars. Numerous relics survive from the time period, and they can be found ...
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Most historians of the Civil War era have neglected material culture studies, but the field has a great deal to offer to scholars. Numerous relics survive from the time period, and they can be found in museums, historical societies, and state archives; they are also mentioned frequently in the manuscripts. People who lived through the war used objects to convey a host of powerful cultural messages about their experiences.Less
Most historians of the Civil War era have neglected material culture studies, but the field has a great deal to offer to scholars. Numerous relics survive from the time period, and they can be found in museums, historical societies, and state archives; they are also mentioned frequently in the manuscripts. People who lived through the war used objects to convey a host of powerful cultural messages about their experiences.
Robert Baron
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- September 2017
- ISBN:
- 9781496805980
- eISBN:
- 9781496806024
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Mississippi
- DOI:
- 10.14325/mississippi/9781496805980.003.0002
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Cultural Studies
The prologue reflects on the relationship of conventional museum curatorial practice to Smithsonian Folklife Festival curatorial practices. In particular, it examines the multiple mediations in which ...
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The prologue reflects on the relationship of conventional museum curatorial practice to Smithsonian Folklife Festival curatorial practices. In particular, it examines the multiple mediations in which Festival curators are involved and the process of “presenting” artists and participants to the public. It raises questions about the perils of objectification of artists within these “living exhibitions” and argues for dialogic approaches to developing Festival programs that incorporate participatory or community curation.Less
The prologue reflects on the relationship of conventional museum curatorial practice to Smithsonian Folklife Festival curatorial practices. In particular, it examines the multiple mediations in which Festival curators are involved and the process of “presenting” artists and participants to the public. It raises questions about the perils of objectification of artists within these “living exhibitions” and argues for dialogic approaches to developing Festival programs that incorporate participatory or community curation.
Betty Belanus
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- September 2017
- ISBN:
- 9781496805980
- eISBN:
- 9781496806024
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Mississippi
- DOI:
- 10.14325/mississippi/9781496805980.003.0013
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Cultural Studies
This chapter uses the 2008 Bhutan program to examine visitor experience and the role of curators in crafting these experiences. Using the suggestive possibilities of a portable Buddhist shrine ...
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This chapter uses the 2008 Bhutan program to examine visitor experience and the role of curators in crafting these experiences. Using the suggestive possibilities of a portable Buddhist shrine featured in the program and basing the analysis on 20 years of experience working with the Festival and its evaluation, the author lays out a framework for analyzing four levels of Festival visitor engagement: Level 1—Sensory Cultural Enlightenment/Being Present; Level 2—Choosing a Route/Moving Through; Level 3—Viewing and Taking part in the Live Performance/Active Experiencing; and Level 4—Revealing the Deeper Layers/Discovering More. The chapter concludes with observations about visitor studies relevant to museums as well as festivals.Less
This chapter uses the 2008 Bhutan program to examine visitor experience and the role of curators in crafting these experiences. Using the suggestive possibilities of a portable Buddhist shrine featured in the program and basing the analysis on 20 years of experience working with the Festival and its evaluation, the author lays out a framework for analyzing four levels of Festival visitor engagement: Level 1—Sensory Cultural Enlightenment/Being Present; Level 2—Choosing a Route/Moving Through; Level 3—Viewing and Taking part in the Live Performance/Active Experiencing; and Level 4—Revealing the Deeper Layers/Discovering More. The chapter concludes with observations about visitor studies relevant to museums as well as festivals.
Alison Griffiths
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780231161060
- eISBN:
- 9780231541565
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Columbia University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7312/columbia/9780231161060.003.0008
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
The book closes with an examination of the contemporary period, with brief discussion of several prison museums and current media access in Sing Sing prison, the subject of Chapter Four. The prison ...
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The book closes with an examination of the contemporary period, with brief discussion of several prison museums and current media access in Sing Sing prison, the subject of Chapter Four. The prison museum is a fascinating simulacrum, a semiotic frenzy that is haunting and, by public reputation, often haunted. Visitors manifestly seem to love imagining what it must be like to be incarcerated, and in many ways prisons have always functioned as de facto museums, given the large number of visitors allowed to tour facilities in the eighteenth through early twentieth centuries. The conclusion also adumbrates some features of contemporary media use at Sing Sing prison, less an attempt to construct an exhaustive history of media use in prisons than to offer a snapshot of some recent changes, including the introduction of in-cell television at Sing Sing in April 2015.Less
The book closes with an examination of the contemporary period, with brief discussion of several prison museums and current media access in Sing Sing prison, the subject of Chapter Four. The prison museum is a fascinating simulacrum, a semiotic frenzy that is haunting and, by public reputation, often haunted. Visitors manifestly seem to love imagining what it must be like to be incarcerated, and in many ways prisons have always functioned as de facto museums, given the large number of visitors allowed to tour facilities in the eighteenth through early twentieth centuries. The conclusion also adumbrates some features of contemporary media use at Sing Sing prison, less an attempt to construct an exhaustive history of media use in prisons than to offer a snapshot of some recent changes, including the introduction of in-cell television at Sing Sing in April 2015.
Christopher Reed
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- September 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780231175753
- eISBN:
- 9780231542760
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Columbia University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7312/columbia/9780231175753.003.0003
- Subject:
- Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
Explores the collecting and exhibition practices of Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts, which set a standard for the display of Asian art in museums worldwide. Scholars such as Edward Morse and Ernest ...
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Explores the collecting and exhibition practices of Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts, which set a standard for the display of Asian art in museums worldwide. Scholars such as Edward Morse and Ernest Fenollosa, funded by “Brahmin” patron-scholars such as William Sturgis Bigelow and Percival Lowell, provoked European Japanists into debates over the authenticity and excellence of Japanese prints and ceramics that foregrounded the Bostonians’ creation of a canon of Japanese art and religion associated with masculine aristocracy. Challenges to these gendered hierarchies came in the form of novels and, most dramatically, from Isabella Stewart Gardner’s collection of East Asian art, closed to the public and dispersed after her death.Less
Explores the collecting and exhibition practices of Boston’s Museum of Fine Arts, which set a standard for the display of Asian art in museums worldwide. Scholars such as Edward Morse and Ernest Fenollosa, funded by “Brahmin” patron-scholars such as William Sturgis Bigelow and Percival Lowell, provoked European Japanists into debates over the authenticity and excellence of Japanese prints and ceramics that foregrounded the Bostonians’ creation of a canon of Japanese art and religion associated with masculine aristocracy. Challenges to these gendered hierarchies came in the form of novels and, most dramatically, from Isabella Stewart Gardner’s collection of East Asian art, closed to the public and dispersed after her death.
Minna Törmä
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- May 2014
- ISBN:
- 9789888139842
- eISBN:
- 9789888268405
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Hong Kong University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5790/hongkong/9789888139842.003.0007
- Subject:
- History, Asian History
Sirén was working as an independent scholar without an institutional attachment. So, he decided to look for a position either in a university or a museum. Unfortunately his discussions with J.G. ...
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Sirén was working as an independent scholar without an institutional attachment. So, he decided to look for a position either in a university or a museum. Unfortunately his discussions with J.G. Andersson at the new Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities in Stockholm came to nothing. Sirén, shortly after, began to work as a curator in the Department for Painting and Sculpture at the Nationalmuseum in Stockholm.Less
Sirén was working as an independent scholar without an institutional attachment. So, he decided to look for a position either in a university or a museum. Unfortunately his discussions with J.G. Andersson at the new Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities in Stockholm came to nothing. Sirén, shortly after, began to work as a curator in the Department for Painting and Sculpture at the Nationalmuseum in Stockholm.
Amber K. Regis
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- January 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781784992460
- eISBN:
- 9781526128317
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Manchester University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7228/manchester/9781784992460.003.0006
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
This chapter explores dramatic representations of the Brontës during the early 1930s in the broader context of heritage, tourism and scholarly editing. Following the public opening of the Parsonage ...
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This chapter explores dramatic representations of the Brontës during the early 1930s in the broader context of heritage, tourism and scholarly editing. Following the public opening of the Parsonage Museum in 1928, and contemporary with the serial publication of the Shakespeare Head Brontë between 1931 and 1938, increasing numbers of playwrights and theatre makers turned their attention to the lives and work of the Brontë family. The resulting biodramas set their scene in the family home turned museum, filling their stages with prop replicas of personal possessions turned museum objects and weaving dialogue from lines extracted from the Brontë corpus. This chapter focuses upon two case studies(Alfred Sangster’s The Brontës and Rachel Ferguson’s Charlotte Brontë (to examine how biodrama engages with archival and curatorial evidence, exposing contingencies and exploring how textual and material remained are used to sustain biographical ‘myths’—traditions that supply a lack within, or counter the historical record. Biodrama is critical in its praxis: these plays dramatise the problems of performing the museum and archive, where objects and documents can be made to speak variously, sometimes falsely.Less
This chapter explores dramatic representations of the Brontës during the early 1930s in the broader context of heritage, tourism and scholarly editing. Following the public opening of the Parsonage Museum in 1928, and contemporary with the serial publication of the Shakespeare Head Brontë between 1931 and 1938, increasing numbers of playwrights and theatre makers turned their attention to the lives and work of the Brontë family. The resulting biodramas set their scene in the family home turned museum, filling their stages with prop replicas of personal possessions turned museum objects and weaving dialogue from lines extracted from the Brontë corpus. This chapter focuses upon two case studies(Alfred Sangster’s The Brontës and Rachel Ferguson’s Charlotte Brontë (to examine how biodrama engages with archival and curatorial evidence, exposing contingencies and exploring how textual and material remained are used to sustain biographical ‘myths’—traditions that supply a lack within, or counter the historical record. Biodrama is critical in its praxis: these plays dramatise the problems of performing the museum and archive, where objects and documents can be made to speak variously, sometimes falsely.
Peggy Levitt
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781474428231
- eISBN:
- 9781474438391
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Edinburgh University Press
- DOI:
- 10.3366/edinburgh/9781474428231.003.0003
- Subject:
- Political Science, Public Policy
The goal of this volume is to reconsider citizenship, integration, and diversity in the context of heightened mobility and permanent impermanence, where large numbers of migrants are long-term ...
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The goal of this volume is to reconsider citizenship, integration, and diversity in the context of heightened mobility and permanent impermanence, where large numbers of migrants are long-term partial members of their societies of origin and settlement. Although cultural institutions are often sites where these categories are (re) negotiated, they are often left out of the scholarly conversation. In the first part of this chapter, I explore how one type of cultural institution—museums—are responding to immigration and globalization around the world. I ask if and how they are changing notions of citizenship, nationhood, and pluralism. The second half looks at new forms of transnational social protection that arise in response to the current world on the move.Less
The goal of this volume is to reconsider citizenship, integration, and diversity in the context of heightened mobility and permanent impermanence, where large numbers of migrants are long-term partial members of their societies of origin and settlement. Although cultural institutions are often sites where these categories are (re) negotiated, they are often left out of the scholarly conversation. In the first part of this chapter, I explore how one type of cultural institution—museums—are responding to immigration and globalization around the world. I ask if and how they are changing notions of citizenship, nationhood, and pluralism. The second half looks at new forms of transnational social protection that arise in response to the current world on the move.
Teresa Barnett
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2014
- ISBN:
- 9780226059600
- eISBN:
- 9780226059747
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Chicago Press
- DOI:
- 10.7208/chicago/9780226059747.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, American History: 19th Century
This book examines the range of things from the past that nineteenth-century Americans called relics—the objects and part objects that were collected solely because they had been associated with a ...
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This book examines the range of things from the past that nineteenth-century Americans called relics—the objects and part objects that were collected solely because they had been associated with a prominent person or event. It argues that, although its premises were in many ways far removed from those of our own historical artifacts, the relic was nonetheless a coherent form of representation in its own right and embodied a historically specific vision about what things from the past meant. In attempting to recuperate the relic’s meanings, the book advances three main arguments. First, it argues that, however "primitive" or "superstitious" relics may appear to us, they were in fact an expression of the nineteenth century's new sense of the historical. They embodied a new consciousness of the gulf between past and present and of time as a unidirectional process. Second, unlike the twentieth century’s historical artifacts, the relic was modeled not on the scientific specimen but on a form that we may think of as entirely irrelevant to historical knowledge--the sentimental memento. Its purpose, that is, was not to provide objective knowledge about the past but to enable an affective connection with it. And, finally, the book argues that relics solicited a variety of investments that went far beyond the disinterested visual inspection promoted by professionalized museums. Ultimately relics were used not simply to represent the past but to rework it. They were material objects with which active psychic, political, and historical work could be done.Less
This book examines the range of things from the past that nineteenth-century Americans called relics—the objects and part objects that were collected solely because they had been associated with a prominent person or event. It argues that, although its premises were in many ways far removed from those of our own historical artifacts, the relic was nonetheless a coherent form of representation in its own right and embodied a historically specific vision about what things from the past meant. In attempting to recuperate the relic’s meanings, the book advances three main arguments. First, it argues that, however "primitive" or "superstitious" relics may appear to us, they were in fact an expression of the nineteenth century's new sense of the historical. They embodied a new consciousness of the gulf between past and present and of time as a unidirectional process. Second, unlike the twentieth century’s historical artifacts, the relic was modeled not on the scientific specimen but on a form that we may think of as entirely irrelevant to historical knowledge--the sentimental memento. Its purpose, that is, was not to provide objective knowledge about the past but to enable an affective connection with it. And, finally, the book argues that relics solicited a variety of investments that went far beyond the disinterested visual inspection promoted by professionalized museums. Ultimately relics were used not simply to represent the past but to rework it. They were material objects with which active psychic, political, and historical work could be done.
