Colonialism, museums and material culture wennergren international symposium series. She charmed america with her smart, likable, downtoearth personality as she campaigned for her husband, then vicepresidential candidate john edwards. Nevertheless, the term material culture, if not ideal, has the advantage of being concise, accurate, and in general use. Furthermore, sacred objects in museum collections are removed from their original context and it is very difficult to associate them with sacred meanings. Graffiti revelations and the changing meanings of kilmainham. Museum frictions is the third volume in a bestselling series on culture, society, and museums. See constance classen and david howes, the museum as sensescape. A key function of museums is to act as repositories of cultural memory, gathering up material objects and information to guard against its anticipated loss. According to the colonial model of the collection, once artifacts have been acquired. Colonialism, museums and material culture, edited by e. This groundbreaking volume applies this idea to material culture and the social practices that endow objects with meanings in both colonial and.
Type book authors elizabeth edwards, chris gosden, ruth b. Australian aboriginal expressions of connection in relation to museum artefacts diane hafner journal of material culture 20 18. Although on face value, museum collections are largely perceived as static entities hidden away in storerooms or trapped behind glass cases, new research shows that over time and across space interactions between objects and a wide range of people have generated a complex assemblage of material and social networks. Afterword uncertain trajectories and refigured social worlds. Dec 06, 2012 drawing together an international group of scholars from a variety of disciplinary and cultural backgrounds, colonialism and the object explores the impact of colonial contact with other cultures on the material culture of both the colonized and the imperial nation. Wennergren international symposium series includes bibliographical references and index. Colonialism, museums and material culture wenner gren international symposium english ed by edwards, elizabeth isbn. Library of congress cataloginginpublication data sensible objects. Colonialism, museums and material culture, and unpacking culture. Apr 03, 2018 11 museums did not always forbid sensory experience.
Slavery, colonialism and museums representations in great. As indicated above, the anthropological concept of culturewhich enables us to say that colonialism needs to be analyzed as culturehas at least partly emerged as an instrument of colonial control dirks 1992b. Everyday low prices and free delivery on eligible orders. The common, typically polemical, notion is that rapacious museums are merely a final resting point for captive static objects, with repatriation viewed as simply restorative compensation.
Anthropologists of the senses have long argued that cultures differ in their sensory registers. This groundbreaking volume applies this idea to material culture and the social practices that endow objects with meanings in both colonial and postcolonial. Jan 01, 2006 it challenges the privileged position of the sense of vision in the analysis of material culture. Western sensibilities and indigenous artifacts, in sensible objects. Colonialism, museums and material culture available in paperback. Gosden, chris, ruth phillips, and elizabeth edwards editors 2006 sensible objects. A robust challenge to this view was developed in the declaration on the importance and value of universal museums signed in 2002 by the directors of 19. Colonialism neel ahuja associate professor, department of feminist studies. Sensible objects colonialism, museums and material culture. Colonialism, museums and material culture professor elizabeth edwards, elizabeth edwards, chris gosden, ruth phillips, edith anderson feisner berg publishers, 2006 social science 306 pages. Elizabeth edwards, chris gosden, ruth b phillips eds, sensible. Colonialism, museums and material culture elizabeth edwards, chris gosden, ruth phillips anthropologists of the senses have long argued that cultures differ in. In other words, objects are real in themselves rather than mere expressions of a basically textualised, mental world, and this material reality can be put in use in museums through handson activities, attention to objects as expressive art works etc. Colonialism, museums and material culture by elizabeth edwards, chris gosden.
It challenges the privileged position of the sense of vision in the analysis of material culture. Toward the indigenization of canadian museums, 2011 museum transformations, coedited with annie e. Exploring the healing potential of handling museum objects. Colonialism, museums and material culture ken arnold pdf. It embraces the class of objects known as artifacts. This groundbreaking volume applies this idea to material culture and the social practices that endow objects with meanings in both colonial and postcolonial relationships. Drawing on fieldwork from newfoundland, canada, and in conversation with gells art and agency 1998, it focuses on the process of abduction whereby, in their discovery and handling, pieces of stone become artefacts that index the presence of an absent other.
One of the consequences of british colonialism across the world was the appropriation of cultural artifacts, sacred and precious objects. Colonialism, museums and material culture wennergren international symposium series elizabeth edwards, chris gosden on. Elizabeth edwards, chris gosden, ruth b phillips eds, sensible objects. Rosales elizabeth edwards, chris gosden and ruth philips. Officially closing in 1910, it reopened a number of times for emergencies before its final closure after the irish civil war 192223. This volume covers the historical relationship and contemporary interests of archaeology and anthropology. Colonialism, museums and material culture wennergren international symposium series edwards, elizabeth on. This volume applies this idea to material culture and the social practices that endow objects with. The first two volumes in the series, exhibiting cultures and museums and communities, have become defining books for those interested in the politics of museum display and heritage sites.
When different cultures came into contact through european colonialism, people realized that displaying exotic objects and bodies in museums involved considerable violence to. Papers from the annual conference of the museum ethnographers group held at the national maritime museum, greenwich, 2122 may 2007 published by. Colonialism and the object empire, material culture and. Royal anthropological institute of great britain and ireland. Afterword uncertain trajectories and refigured social.
Drawing together an international group of scholars from a variety of disciplinary and cultural backgrounds, colonialism and the object presents case studies of objects from india, pakistan, new zealand, china and africa which were all collected by or exhibited in the institutions of the british empire. Akple is whitish grey in color and mostly rolled into spherical ball, varying in diameter for the person whom the akple is going to be served to. Curators express the difficulty of collecting the material culture of everyday life. Idsemug9254 l01, fashion, culture, and the body nyu london. This article is a theoretical and ethnographic exploration of the possibility of touching the past. Modern colonial states, in turn, aim to reshape matter the. After 1924 it lay abandoned until reopening as a heritage attraction in the early 1960s. This wiki will include published works, projects, as well as policy work. Drawing together an international group of scholars from a variety of disciplinary and cultural backgrounds, colonialism and the object presents case studies of objects from india, pakistan, new zealand, china and africa which were all collected by. In western museum settings, artifacts are preeminently objects for the eye. Drawing together an international group of scholars from a variety of disciplinary and cultural backgrounds, colonialism and the object explores the impact of colonial contact with other cultures on the material culture of both the colonized and the imperial nation. Arts and commodities in colonial and postcolonial worlds 1999.
Arts and commodities in colonial and postcolonial worlds. The book includes intensive casestudies of objects from india, pakistan, new zealand, china and africa. For more than one hundred years the museums of great britain have functioned to bolster national white pride and glorify british culture by showcasing a wide array of artifacts. Phillips date 2006 publisher berg pub place oxford volume wennergren international symposium series isbn10 1845203232, 1845203240 isbn 9781845203245 ebook.
Ken arnold vol 12, no 3 2014 elizabeth edwards, the camera as historian amateur photographers and historical imagination, 18851918. Degrowing museum collections for new heritage futures. Enchanted objects, american women collectors and the making of culture, 18001940 kate hill pdf. Colonialism, museums and material culture elizabeth edwards, chris gosden, ruth phillips anthropologists of the senses have long argued that cultures differ in their sensory registers. Akple is a ghanaian dish indigenous to the ewe tribe of the volta region. Turnblad memorial fund exhibiting african masks in the 21stcentury museum. Empire, material culture and the museum museum meanings flynn, tom, barringer, tim on. Colonialism, museums and material culture, coedited with elizabeth edwards and chris gosden, 2006 museum pieces. For their book, chris gosden and chantal knowles inventoried objects end page 410 preserved in museum collections and then used these databases as a means to link the history of colonialism, the discipline of anthropology, and the study of material culture. The souvenir in native north american art from the northeast, 17001900.
The book includes intensive casestudies of objects from india, pakistan, new zealand, china and africa, all of. Edwards et al eds sensible objects colonialism, museums. Tactile memory, the abduction of agency and presence of the past. Material the word material in material culture refers to a broad, but not unrestricted, range of objects. Another classic in the making, museum frictions is a lavishly illustrated examination of. Material culture and the movement of goods linked all participants. Africa, sierra leone, mende culture, sande society mask, 20th century, wood, fiber, christina n. Colonialism, museums and material culture by elizabeth edwards, chris gosden, ruth b. Anthropolgy and archaeology provides a valuable and muchneeded introduction to the theories and methods of these two interrelated subjects. Objects connected with ritual and tradeincluding blowpipes, headbinding bark cloth, pigtusk ornaments, shields, and shell moneywhich were collected in papua new guinea between 1910 to 1939 and are.