Abstract
Ought de-colonized museum research, collecting and curatorial practices be dismissed as "moves to innocence "? Or, can they be seen as credible and authentic gestures toward a redefinition of moral relations with indigenous peoples and cultures from whom ethnographic collections were originally made? This article analyzes a case study of "de-colonized" museum collecting and research practices by way of thinking about this issue. It focuses on the Australian Museums "Sepik Documentation Project" (1988). I argue that this project enacted a de-colonized mode of collection that emphasized status inclusivity and acknowledged the legitimacy of indigenous trade relationships and knowledge.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 110-143 |
| Number of pages | 13 |
| Journal | Journal de la Societe des Oceanistes |
| Volume | 146 |
| Issue number | 1 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Jan 1 2018 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:he research from which this article is derived was conducted collaboratively by Kathleen Barlow, Lissant Bolton, Smith Jakai, James Kaparo, John Sauma, the late Kem Saupe, the late Mu-rakau Wino and myself. It was funded by he Australian Museum, the National Museum and Art Gallery of Papua New Guinea and he Wil-ford Fund for Research in the Department of Anthropology, University of Minnesota. he clarity of the article, such as it is, beneitted a bit from a detailed reading by a generous anonymous reader. hanks also to Markus Schindlbeck, Philippe Pel-tier and Christian Kaufmann for organizing this useful project.
Keywords
- De-colonized research
- Lower Sepik
- Material culture
- Museum collecting
- Papua New Guinea
