Rose Shakinovskys, work shown at Goodman Galley in Cape Town (2007) International Colloquium: Beyond Modernity. Do Ethnography Museums Need Ethnography?
Today’s global processes and the tensions accompanying new migrations force the museum to enter the social and political arena as a protagonist. Specific tools for an operational interpretation of such contemporary landscape – where “second encounters” between multicultural publics and ethnography museums pair the more “traditional” ones with “source communities” – are still to be designed. Moreover, such important challenges find museums in times of a general cultural and economic crisis.
This international colloquium is based on an analytical reassessment of the “first encounters” phase of ethnographic museography, and it aims at sharing reflections on its legacy for the contemporary politics of museum representation, in the light of the global crisis that our institutions face today.
Half a century ago, William Sturtevant asked himself: “Does anthropology need museums?” Starting with an open debate on the current perspectives on ethnographic museography and on the significance of our institutions’ recent routes – which, in many cases, respond to the various instances of contemporary society – we wish to ask ourselves: Do ethnographic museums need ethnography?
- Museums Facing Contemporary Challenges
- Session 1 – Ethnography Museums: New Missions and Work in Progress
- Session 2 – Between Past and Present: Museums, Collections, Representations
- Session 3 – Issues and Problems for the 21st Century. Do Ethnographic Museums Need Ethnography?
International Colloquium
Museo Nazionale Preistorico Etnografico
Rome Italy, April 18-20, 2012
Museology /