Pub Date : 2022-06-07DOI: 10.1177/15501906221101188
A. Hamilton, Bronwyn Hopwood
Mathematical approaches assessing similarity in terms of culture, geography, and zoological components were applied to nine online collections of New Guinean necklaces. When mapped in multidimensional space for peoples, no strong clustering of collections was found, and for provinces two collections formed a distinct cluster from the rest. In zoological space there was no clustering, but one collection occupied a distinctly separate space. A highly significant (p < .001) effect of collection on the zoological species richness was found. There were significant differences (p < .05) in zoological entropy between several collections, and a degree of uncertainty or surprise in the zoological composition of the necklace collections. The processes behind such patterns are likely complex, and may reflect issues of funding, unconscious bias, and colonial or missionary histories. The methods explored provide diagnostic tools useful for testing the underlying structures and bias of collections.
{"title":"Online Museum Collections as Artifacts: A Case Study of New Guinean Necklaces Illustrating Mathematical Approaches as Diagnostics for Collections Management","authors":"A. Hamilton, Bronwyn Hopwood","doi":"10.1177/15501906221101188","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/15501906221101188","url":null,"abstract":"Mathematical approaches assessing similarity in terms of culture, geography, and zoological components were applied to nine online collections of New Guinean necklaces. When mapped in multidimensional space for peoples, no strong clustering of collections was found, and for provinces two collections formed a distinct cluster from the rest. In zoological space there was no clustering, but one collection occupied a distinctly separate space. A highly significant (p < .001) effect of collection on the zoological species richness was found. There were significant differences (p < .05) in zoological entropy between several collections, and a degree of uncertainty or surprise in the zoological composition of the necklace collections. The processes behind such patterns are likely complex, and may reflect issues of funding, unconscious bias, and colonial or missionary histories. The methods explored provide diagnostic tools useful for testing the underlying structures and bias of collections.","PeriodicalId":422403,"journal":{"name":"Collections: A Journal for Museum and Archives Professionals","volume":"2019 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-06-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"131658357","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-05-16DOI: 10.1177/15501906221096814
Amelia Allsop
What role can oral history play in business archives and in public history contexts in Hong Kong today? This article addresses the work of The Hong Kong Heritage Project (HKHP), a major business archive and soon-to-be museum and its work in collecting and recording oral histories since 2007. It situates the work of HKHP within the wider Hong Kong cultural context and investigates the methodologies used by the project to record 530 oral history interviews, the largest collection of oral histories held by a private cultural institution in Hong Kong. In addition, the article examines the challenges and opportunities of collecting oral history in a for-profit environment and the application and uses of oral history in exhibition contexts as a tool to foster audience engagement as well as to encourage understanding and empathy for history as well as other people.
{"title":"Walking Books? The Oral History Method at The Hong Kong Heritage Project","authors":"Amelia Allsop","doi":"10.1177/15501906221096814","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/15501906221096814","url":null,"abstract":"What role can oral history play in business archives and in public history contexts in Hong Kong today? This article addresses the work of The Hong Kong Heritage Project (HKHP), a major business archive and soon-to-be museum and its work in collecting and recording oral histories since 2007. It situates the work of HKHP within the wider Hong Kong cultural context and investigates the methodologies used by the project to record 530 oral history interviews, the largest collection of oral histories held by a private cultural institution in Hong Kong. In addition, the article examines the challenges and opportunities of collecting oral history in a for-profit environment and the application and uses of oral history in exhibition contexts as a tool to foster audience engagement as well as to encourage understanding and empathy for history as well as other people.","PeriodicalId":422403,"journal":{"name":"Collections: A Journal for Museum and Archives Professionals","volume":"53 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-05-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"130926881","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-04-21DOI: 10.1177/15501906221089573
Shirley Maloney Mueller
Although there are many illustrations of porcelain production in Jingdezhen before the mid-nineteenth Century, late handcrafted porcelain production scenes are unknown. Here, I describe a recently discovered set of seventeen handcrafted porcelain plaques datable from the end of the nineteenth to the first part of the twentieth century which fill in that gap. These plaques are unique in that they are three dimensional, carved rather than molded, and sagger production is emphasized, a characteristic not found on earlier depictions. Furthermore, Chinese script on each plaque describes the step(s) of porcelain production portrayed. In summary, these plaques are not only additive to previous depictions of Jingdezhen porcelain production but historically significant in that they portray a later date than those described earlier.
{"title":"Plaques Portraying Late Porcelain Production in Jingdezhen","authors":"Shirley Maloney Mueller","doi":"10.1177/15501906221089573","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/15501906221089573","url":null,"abstract":"Although there are many illustrations of porcelain production in Jingdezhen before the mid-nineteenth Century, late handcrafted porcelain production scenes are unknown. Here, I describe a recently discovered set of seventeen handcrafted porcelain plaques datable from the end of the nineteenth to the first part of the twentieth century which fill in that gap. These plaques are unique in that they are three dimensional, carved rather than molded, and sagger production is emphasized, a characteristic not found on earlier depictions. Furthermore, Chinese script on each plaque describes the step(s) of porcelain production portrayed. In summary, these plaques are not only additive to previous depictions of Jingdezhen porcelain production but historically significant in that they portray a later date than those described earlier.","PeriodicalId":422403,"journal":{"name":"Collections: A Journal for Museum and Archives Professionals","volume":"71 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-04-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"123567069","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-03-02DOI: 10.1177/15501906221081114
Lissette M. Jiménez, Christine A. Fogarty, Edward M. Luby
Non-systematically excavated archaeological legacy collections of antiquities are often undervalued or overlooked by museums because of their unknown provenience and questionable or problematic provenance. This article describes how extensive research into the provenance of an ancient Egyptian legacy collection purchased in Egypt in 1884 by Adolph Sutro that is now stewarded by the Global Museum at San Francisco State University exposes a new expansive research potential for the collection, enabling Museum Studies students and faculty and museum staff to construct innovative interpretive frameworks through integrated Museum Studies curriculum, educational public programming, and exhibitions of the collection in the museum. This case study underscores the importance of provenance research for contextualizing legacy collections and illustrates how this research can be a catalyst for important discussions of the antiquities trade, colonial collecting practices, public educational significance, and ethical collection stewardship, curation, and display.
{"title":"More Than “A Room of Antiquities” at the Global Museum: Constructing New Meanings Through the Provenance Research of an Ancient Egyptian Legacy Collection","authors":"Lissette M. Jiménez, Christine A. Fogarty, Edward M. Luby","doi":"10.1177/15501906221081114","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/15501906221081114","url":null,"abstract":"Non-systematically excavated archaeological legacy collections of antiquities are often undervalued or overlooked by museums because of their unknown provenience and questionable or problematic provenance. This article describes how extensive research into the provenance of an ancient Egyptian legacy collection purchased in Egypt in 1884 by Adolph Sutro that is now stewarded by the Global Museum at San Francisco State University exposes a new expansive research potential for the collection, enabling Museum Studies students and faculty and museum staff to construct innovative interpretive frameworks through integrated Museum Studies curriculum, educational public programming, and exhibitions of the collection in the museum. This case study underscores the importance of provenance research for contextualizing legacy collections and illustrates how this research can be a catalyst for important discussions of the antiquities trade, colonial collecting practices, public educational significance, and ethical collection stewardship, curation, and display.","PeriodicalId":422403,"journal":{"name":"Collections: A Journal for Museum and Archives Professionals","volume":"40 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"114706316","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-03-02DOI: 10.1177/15501906221079223
Maureen Lazarus, H. Pardoe
The Endeavour voyage was the first expedition from Britain to carry professional botanists and natural history artists. The main purpose was to observe the Transit of Venus. However, Cook had secret orders to explore and map the elusive southern continent. Joseph Banks, a wealthy naturalist, was consumed with excitement at the prospect of undiscovered plants, animals, and people. He arranged for a party of naturalists to accompany the expedition. Banks employed three artists: Parkinson; Buchan; and Spöring. Daniel Solander was his scientific partner. Contemporary diaries reveal how these men, from different backgrounds and nations, worked together to compile 3,000 specimens and over 1,300 drawings. Banks intended to publish the drawings quickly, but publication was delayed. When Solander died, the publication lost momentum and Banks was preoccupied by other projects. Banks’ Florilegium was finally published over 200 years later, a lasting legacy of the talents, dedication, and bravery of the artists.
{"title":"Naturalists on the Endeavour Voyage (1768–1771): Personalities, Pursuits, and Problems","authors":"Maureen Lazarus, H. Pardoe","doi":"10.1177/15501906221079223","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/15501906221079223","url":null,"abstract":"The Endeavour voyage was the first expedition from Britain to carry professional botanists and natural history artists. The main purpose was to observe the Transit of Venus. However, Cook had secret orders to explore and map the elusive southern continent. Joseph Banks, a wealthy naturalist, was consumed with excitement at the prospect of undiscovered plants, animals, and people. He arranged for a party of naturalists to accompany the expedition. Banks employed three artists: Parkinson; Buchan; and Spöring. Daniel Solander was his scientific partner. Contemporary diaries reveal how these men, from different backgrounds and nations, worked together to compile 3,000 specimens and over 1,300 drawings. Banks intended to publish the drawings quickly, but publication was delayed. When Solander died, the publication lost momentum and Banks was preoccupied by other projects. Banks’ Florilegium was finally published over 200 years later, a lasting legacy of the talents, dedication, and bravery of the artists.","PeriodicalId":422403,"journal":{"name":"Collections: A Journal for Museum and Archives Professionals","volume":"18 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"126092688","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-03-01DOI: 10.1177/15501906211072908
G. McMaster, M. Rattray, Natalja Chestopalova, Brittany Pitseolak Bergin, Mariah Meawasige, Maya Filipp, Yiyi Shao, B. Griebel
Over the past decade, a multitude of digital platforms engaging with Indigenous collections of ancestral belongings have been developed for the public in an effort to reconsider and reconceptualize notions of access and Indigenous ownership in virtual space. An initiative in partnership with the Onsite Gallery, the Virtual Platform for Indigenous Art (VPIA) is a newly developed resource that originates from Dr. Gerald McMaster’s Entangled Gaze Project at the Wapatah Centre for Indigenous Visual Knowledge, OCAD University in Toronto, Canada. VPIA is a strategic digital platform that brings together a specific dataset of Indigenous artworks and cultural belongings that portray European and Asian newcomers to Turtle Island, drawn from global museum collections. The platform’s innovative approach to collections is grounded in a dual record format, where visitors are invited to create a Community-Member profile and contribute knowledge and information to artwork pages that consist of a permanent institutional record and an evolving community-generated VPIA record. The VPIA is intended to bridge communities and institutions to facilitate digital contributions of novel ideas about the Turtle Island contact zone and the implications of the colonial period, from early contact through to the twentieth century.
{"title":"The Virtual Platform for Indigenous Art: An Indigenous-led Digital Strategy","authors":"G. McMaster, M. Rattray, Natalja Chestopalova, Brittany Pitseolak Bergin, Mariah Meawasige, Maya Filipp, Yiyi Shao, B. Griebel","doi":"10.1177/15501906211072908","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/15501906211072908","url":null,"abstract":"Over the past decade, a multitude of digital platforms engaging with Indigenous collections of ancestral belongings have been developed for the public in an effort to reconsider and reconceptualize notions of access and Indigenous ownership in virtual space. An initiative in partnership with the Onsite Gallery, the Virtual Platform for Indigenous Art (VPIA) is a newly developed resource that originates from Dr. Gerald McMaster’s Entangled Gaze Project at the Wapatah Centre for Indigenous Visual Knowledge, OCAD University in Toronto, Canada. VPIA is a strategic digital platform that brings together a specific dataset of Indigenous artworks and cultural belongings that portray European and Asian newcomers to Turtle Island, drawn from global museum collections. The platform’s innovative approach to collections is grounded in a dual record format, where visitors are invited to create a Community-Member profile and contribute knowledge and information to artwork pages that consist of a permanent institutional record and an evolving community-generated VPIA record. The VPIA is intended to bridge communities and institutions to facilitate digital contributions of novel ideas about the Turtle Island contact zone and the implications of the colonial period, from early contact through to the twentieth century.","PeriodicalId":422403,"journal":{"name":"Collections: A Journal for Museum and Archives Professionals","volume":"34 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"123900285","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-03-01DOI: 10.1177/15501906211073105
J. Mataga, F. M. Chabata, Charity Nyathi
This essay builds on the emerging (museum) decolonizing perspectives to (i) explore the biographical details and modes of curation and classification to which “ethnographic”1 objects collected during the colonial era have been exposed; to (ii) foreground the complexities of inherited colonial museum processes embedded in African urban contexts; and, to (iii) consider alternative modes of engagement with ethnographic objects and local Indigenous communities to challenge the embedded regimes of care and the marginalization rendered to Indigenous epistemologies. One of the biggest questions facing museums in the world today is how to deal with the hordes of objects collected from various Indigenous communities and placed in museums far away from the communities who made and used them. Using the case of an “ethnographic” collection in a former colonial museum, we call for a paradigm shift in museum practices, and challenge the present state of affairs of museum curatorship. We then briefly suggest possible ways in which such museums can confront their imperial histories and unsettle their inherited regimes of care and representation. We call for museums to enter into conversations with communities, listening to them and effecting curatorial activities that re-center local ways of knowing, while embracing the complexities associated with such engagements.
{"title":"Sepulcherised Objects and Their Decolonial Futures in African Museums: The “Robert Edward Codrington Collection” at the Zimbabwe Natural History Museum","authors":"J. Mataga, F. M. Chabata, Charity Nyathi","doi":"10.1177/15501906211073105","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/15501906211073105","url":null,"abstract":"This essay builds on the emerging (museum) decolonizing perspectives to (i) explore the biographical details and modes of curation and classification to which “ethnographic”1 objects collected during the colonial era have been exposed; to (ii) foreground the complexities of inherited colonial museum processes embedded in African urban contexts; and, to (iii) consider alternative modes of engagement with ethnographic objects and local Indigenous communities to challenge the embedded regimes of care and the marginalization rendered to Indigenous epistemologies. One of the biggest questions facing museums in the world today is how to deal with the hordes of objects collected from various Indigenous communities and placed in museums far away from the communities who made and used them. Using the case of an “ethnographic” collection in a former colonial museum, we call for a paradigm shift in museum practices, and challenge the present state of affairs of museum curatorship. We then briefly suggest possible ways in which such museums can confront their imperial histories and unsettle their inherited regimes of care and representation. We call for museums to enter into conversations with communities, listening to them and effecting curatorial activities that re-center local ways of knowing, while embracing the complexities associated with such engagements.","PeriodicalId":422403,"journal":{"name":"Collections: A Journal for Museum and Archives Professionals","volume":"18 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"130456555","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-03-01DOI: 10.1177/15501906211072916
R. Wheeler, Jaime Arsenault, Marla Taylor
Institutions have been slow to respond to calls from Indigenous nations, organizations, and scholars to require free, prior, and informed consent before authorizing use of their cultural heritage materials in publications, exhibition, and research. In the United States, the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act of 1990 fundamentally changed the relationship between museums, archaeologists, and Indigenous nations, requiring institutions to inventory their collections and consult with descendant communities on repatriation of specific Indigenous collections. In response, institutions and their personnel have come to view Indigenous collections as those subject to NAGPRA and those that are not—NAGPRA/Not NAGPRA. Many Indigenous nations, however, do not accept this demarcation, resulting in continued frustration and trauma for those descendant communities. This case study follows the evolving relationship between the White Earth Band of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe and the Robert S. Peabody Institute of Archaeology. Beginning with repatriation, the relationship has expanded to consider how the museum and Indigenous nation can collaborate on the care and curation of cultural heritage materials that remain at the Peabody Institute. Most recently, White Earth and the Peabody have executed an MOU that governs how the museum will handle new acquisitions, found-in-collections materials, and donor offers. The relationship with the White Earth also has influenced how the Peabody Institute approaches its holdings of Indigenous cultural heritage materials more broadly, blurring the line between NAGPRA and Not NAGPRA collections. The Peabody Institute is working to revise its collections policy to require free, prior, and informed consent prior to use of Indigenous cultural heritage materials in publications, exhibitions, and research.
{"title":"Beyond NAGPRA/Not NAGPRA","authors":"R. Wheeler, Jaime Arsenault, Marla Taylor","doi":"10.1177/15501906211072916","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/15501906211072916","url":null,"abstract":"Institutions have been slow to respond to calls from Indigenous nations, organizations, and scholars to require free, prior, and informed consent before authorizing use of their cultural heritage materials in publications, exhibition, and research. In the United States, the Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act of 1990 fundamentally changed the relationship between museums, archaeologists, and Indigenous nations, requiring institutions to inventory their collections and consult with descendant communities on repatriation of specific Indigenous collections. In response, institutions and their personnel have come to view Indigenous collections as those subject to NAGPRA and those that are not—NAGPRA/Not NAGPRA. Many Indigenous nations, however, do not accept this demarcation, resulting in continued frustration and trauma for those descendant communities. This case study follows the evolving relationship between the White Earth Band of the Minnesota Chippewa Tribe and the Robert S. Peabody Institute of Archaeology. Beginning with repatriation, the relationship has expanded to consider how the museum and Indigenous nation can collaborate on the care and curation of cultural heritage materials that remain at the Peabody Institute. Most recently, White Earth and the Peabody have executed an MOU that governs how the museum will handle new acquisitions, found-in-collections materials, and donor offers. The relationship with the White Earth also has influenced how the Peabody Institute approaches its holdings of Indigenous cultural heritage materials more broadly, blurring the line between NAGPRA and Not NAGPRA collections. The Peabody Institute is working to revise its collections policy to require free, prior, and informed consent prior to use of Indigenous cultural heritage materials in publications, exhibitions, and research.","PeriodicalId":422403,"journal":{"name":"Collections: A Journal for Museum and Archives Professionals","volume":"25 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121605941","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-03-01DOI: 10.5040/9781501311680.ch-013
Nathan Sentance
{"title":"Introduction to Section Two","authors":"Nathan Sentance","doi":"10.5040/9781501311680.ch-013","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5040/9781501311680.ch-013","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":422403,"journal":{"name":"Collections: A Journal for Museum and Archives Professionals","volume":"31 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"134096256","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2022-03-01DOI: 10.1177/15501906211066321
B. Clements
In Museums, Infinity, and the Culture of Protocols: Ethnographic Collections and Source Communities, Howard Morphy expands the idea of the “universal museum” into the “infinite museum.” Because museums have stakeholders who exist around the world and into the distant future, he argues, they are mandated to perpetually preserve collections and collections access. Morphy identifies repatriation and access protocols as threats to museum mandates and the rights of future stakeholders. In this review I will restrict myself to one of several potential discussions of this work: that Morphy’s account does not take the roles of Indigenous sovereignties seriously enough, thus undermining them as bases for heritage governance. Morphy begins by reflecting on his life in museums, from his boyhood fascination with displays at the Pitt Rivers Museum to his professional roles there as a collector, curator, and anthropologist. Then, in the second and third chapters, he lays out an history of anthropological museum collecting to argue that ethnographic museums promote global appreciation for Indigenous cultures. This history, he believes, originated in colonial violence but shifted to anthropological contexts formed by Indigenous agency, partnership, and—increasingly—collaboration. In the fourth chapter, Morphy makes his case for preserving the remains of ancient Indigenous ancestors in museum collections for research. Here he outlines the implications of his “infinity perspective” for the definition and agency of stakeholder groups.1 In the case of reburial for ancestors and their grave goods, “the wish of a particular group to destroy an object may be framed as a denial of the rights of future generations to have a say in the decision and to have access to the objects themselves.”2 Morphy argues in his penultimate chapter for the importance of open access to museum collections. He sees open access as resolving the inequities of cultural gatekeeping and warns that movements toward repatriation and respecting sometimes restrictive protocols “result in the information
{"title":"Book Review: Museums, Infinity and the Culture of Protocols: Ethnographic Collections and Source Communities","authors":"B. Clements","doi":"10.1177/15501906211066321","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1177/15501906211066321","url":null,"abstract":"In Museums, Infinity, and the Culture of Protocols: Ethnographic Collections and Source Communities, Howard Morphy expands the idea of the “universal museum” into the “infinite museum.” Because museums have stakeholders who exist around the world and into the distant future, he argues, they are mandated to perpetually preserve collections and collections access. Morphy identifies repatriation and access protocols as threats to museum mandates and the rights of future stakeholders. In this review I will restrict myself to one of several potential discussions of this work: that Morphy’s account does not take the roles of Indigenous sovereignties seriously enough, thus undermining them as bases for heritage governance. Morphy begins by reflecting on his life in museums, from his boyhood fascination with displays at the Pitt Rivers Museum to his professional roles there as a collector, curator, and anthropologist. Then, in the second and third chapters, he lays out an history of anthropological museum collecting to argue that ethnographic museums promote global appreciation for Indigenous cultures. This history, he believes, originated in colonial violence but shifted to anthropological contexts formed by Indigenous agency, partnership, and—increasingly—collaboration. In the fourth chapter, Morphy makes his case for preserving the remains of ancient Indigenous ancestors in museum collections for research. Here he outlines the implications of his “infinity perspective” for the definition and agency of stakeholder groups.1 In the case of reburial for ancestors and their grave goods, “the wish of a particular group to destroy an object may be framed as a denial of the rights of future generations to have a say in the decision and to have access to the objects themselves.”2 Morphy argues in his penultimate chapter for the importance of open access to museum collections. He sees open access as resolving the inequities of cultural gatekeeping and warns that movements toward repatriation and respecting sometimes restrictive protocols “result in the information","PeriodicalId":422403,"journal":{"name":"Collections: A Journal for Museum and Archives Professionals","volume":"32 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2022-03-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"130296747","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
京公网安备 11010802042870号
京ICP备2023020795号-1
扫码关注我们
求助内容：
应助结果提醒方式：