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Learning at the Museum Frontiers
Identity, Race and Power
Viv Golding
LEARNING AT THE MUSEUm FRONTIERS
For the extended family
Learning at the
Museum Frontiers
Identity, Race and Power
VIv GOlDING
University of Leicester, UK
© Viv Golding 2009
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
recording or otherwise without the prior permission of the publisher.
Viv Golding has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to
be identified as the author of this work.
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

Golding, Viv.
Learning at the museum frontiers : identity, race and
power.
1. Museums--Educational aspects. 2. Museums--Social
aspects.
I. Title
069'.01-dc22
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Golding, Vivien.
Learning at the museum frontiers : identity, race and power / by Viv Golding.
p. cm.
ISBN 978-0-7546-4691-4
1. Museums--Educational aspects. 2. Museums--Social aspects. 3. Museums--Philosophy.
I. Title.
AM7.G555 2009
069'.15--dc22
2009008176
ISBN 978-0-7546-4691-4 (hbk)
ISBN
Contents
List of Figures and Plates vii

Preface ix
Acknowledgements xi
Section 1 Introduction: The Spatial Politics of the Museum Frontiers 1
1 Race: Repositioning and Revaluing Cultural Heritage 21
2 Space: The Museum and the New Spatial Politics of the Frontiers 41
Section 2 Including New Voices and Forms of Practice 67
3 Power: Inserting New Visibilities in the Museum Margins 79
4 Control: Shifting Relationships in the Whole Museum 107
Section 3 Critical Collaborative Museum Pedagogy 131
5 Identity: Motivation and Self-esteem 139
6 Towards a New Museum Pedagogy: Learning, Teaching and Impact 165
Conclusion: Pedagogy in Museums 191
Bibliography 203
Index 223
This page has been left blank intentionally
List of Figures and Plates
Figures
I.1 Feminist-hermeneutic research circle of

interpretation and understanding 8
2.1 Was that Sethe or her sister? 53
5.1 Feminist-hermeneutic circle of understanding 149

5.2 Part/whole concept describing the ‘Inspiration Africa!’ curriculum 163
Plates
1 Tea traits: Hornimania. Media cartoon of Fred Horniman dressed

in Chinese costume near one of the tea chests, from which the
family fortune derived, and surrounded by a wealth of ‘Oriental’
and other ‘curios’, including the butterfly originally discovered in
his collection and named after him 10
2 Ethnographical saloon of the Surrey House Museum c. 1982 showing
Frederick Horniman with wife Rebeka, friends and colleagues 11
3 Curator Richard Quick’s children, Richard and Louise,
posing with parts of the collection c. 1901 12
4 Entrance to the Horniman Museum c. 1901, showing the original
building with the clock tower 13
5 Comparative displays of material culture c. 1901 14
6 The ‘Races of Man’ display at the Horniman Museum, 2008 46
7 Drawing in the narrow space between cases in the
North Hall Gallery, 1999 47
8 Eloi maternity figure in African Worlds at the Horniman Museum 52
9 The Igbo ijeli seen from the balcony in African Worlds at the
Horniman Museum with Benin displays in the distance, 2007 70
10 An example of a layered text panel showing the Midnight Robber
carnival mask with a family of visitors reading in the background at
the Horniman Museum, 2007 73
11 The uplighting of the Nkisi Power sculpture 74
12 One entrance to African Worlds at the Horniman Museum,
showing the central walkway, 2007 75
viii Learning at the Museum Frontiers
13 Small visitors caught in awe and wonder with the Dogon masks
in African Worlds at the Horniman Museum, 2007 76
14 Doh ho Suh’s sculptural screen at the Museum of World Culture,
Göteborg, Sweden, 2006 83
15 HIV condom costume at the Museum of World Culture,
16 HIV dolls at the Museum of World Culture,
17 Slavery projection at the Museum of World Culture,
18 Musical instruments wall and the Bob Marley video at the
Museum of World Culture, Göteborg, Sweden, 2006 96
19 Noor Ebrahim in dialogue with children on the map at
District Six Museum, Cape Town, South Africa, 2006 122
20 Close up of young people on the floor map at District Six Museum,
Cape Town, South Africa, 2006 123
21 Haitian Voudou Shrine, African Worlds at the
Horniman Museum, 2004 144
22 Christchurch Ijele, African Worlds at the
Horniman Museum, 2004 160
23 New Woodlands Respect Stool and Kyrinie 188
Preface
Eilean Hooper-Greenhill
Learning at the Museum Frontiers: Identity, Race and Power is challenging and
thought provoking, seeking to bring issues of discrimination in general and racist
and sexist prejudice in particular, under a critical lens of analysis. The focus of
investigation is the anthropology museum – the collections, curators and audiences –
which are considered from the perspective of a professional museum educator of
some twenty years standing who situates herself as a member of several excluded
communities. From this perspective, Golding asks important questions about the
social and inclusive responsibilities of museums which have in the past acted to
marginalise and exclude. Complex philosophical ideas and theories are illuminated
by extensive use of examples drawn from her educational practice where the
collaborative construction of exhibitions and diverse programming reveals both
the silences and erasures of Black voices in museum and the richness that can
ensue following their inclusion.
This book is at one level a highly personal account, written with a deep
commitment to the power of the museum to affect social and cultural change and
with a strong belief in the value of hopeful striving to bring this change about. At
the same time, the book is firmly embedded in what might be called ‘the Leicester
tradition’ in that it unashamedly melds theory with practice and calls unequivocally
on museums to review their received traditions in the light of new ideas, raised
expectations and greater social responsibilities. Museums have the power to take
a lead in cultural change and this book shows how this may be both thought
through and brought into being. At a time when the exceptional educational value
of museums is beginning to be fully appreciated, this book offers a new strand of
analysis inspired by philosophy and grounded in practice.
I warmly recommend this book to students of Museum Studies around the
world.
Eilean Hooper-Greenhill, Langtree

January 2009
Acknowledgements
In this book I discuss ideas that have been developed since embarking on PhD
research in 1995 with Professor Eilean Hooper-Greenhill as my supervisor. It
seems worth pointing out for postgraduate students today the juggling act that
marked my PhD study, which was completed in 2000 while a part-time student
engaged in full time museum work and alongside family responsibilities. To my
present students in the PhD community at the University of Leicester, I know the
completion of these projects presents no easy task, but I echo Barack Obama’s
successful campaign to become president of the United States in 2008, ‘yes we
can!’
My PhD progress was due in large part to my fellow students, notably Miriam
Clavir, Nikki Clayton, Hadwig Krautler and Theano Moussouri. The interest
and support of fellow museum professionals at Horniman during this period
must also be acknowledged and I thank Margaret Birley, Sheila Humbert, Nikki
Levell, Anthony Shelton, Danny Staples, Janet Vitmayer and Finbarr Whooley in
particular. In addition, over the ten years I worked at Horniman I was fortunate
to engage in many conversations with thoughtful schoolteachers and university
lecturers who were similarly concerned to promote intercultural understanding
and challenge discrimination in their working lives. Most notably amongst these
colleagues from my Horniman days is Dr Joan Anim-Addo, who continues to
give me unstinting support, alongside Dr Denis Atkinson, Dr Paul Dash, Juliet
Desailley, Amoafi Kwappong, Karen Mears and Thelma Perkins, who I now count
as dear friends. Subsequently I am indebted to discussions with the wonderful
groups of Masters and PhD students in the Universities of Leicester and Göteborg
where I have been working since 2002.
It was not until I joined the Department of Museum Studies at the University
of Leicester that the process of actually writing this book, from PhD fieldwork,
began. I am especially grateful to Dr Richard Sandell, Head of the Department
of Museum Studies who has provided excellent editorial advice and consistent
support over the years of writing. I also greatly appreciate the advice of my
Leicester colleagues Dr Katharine Edgar, Dr Andy Sawyer and Dr Sheila Watson
and who have made helpful comments on an early draft of the book. Professor
Simon Knell, Professor, Eilean Hooper-Greenhill, Professor Sue Pearce, Jocelyn
Dodd, Dr Sandra Dudley, Suzanne MacLeod and Dr Ross Parry at Leicester must
be also thanked for academic guidance, as well Gus Dinn, Barbara Lloyd, Jim
Roberts and the whole office team for ongoing general assistance.
Learning at the Museum Frontiers: Identity, Race and Power would not have
been completed without the period of research leave granted by the University of
xii Learning at the Museum Frontiers
Leicester in 2005. At Leicester I was able to engage in periods of further fieldwork

around the world including Korea, Japan, Sweden and South Africa, which has
enhanced my initial thought considerably. The Department of Museum Studies at
the University of Leicester sponsored my participation in the 2006 International
Council for the Training of Museum Professionals (ICTOP) conference in Cape
Town, which Dr Jatti Bredekamp organised. While I have selected District Six
Museum for special mention in Chapter 4 with regards their creative memory
work it was my pleasure to meet many excellent staff in Cape Town, who were
all most generous in sharing their knowledge and expertise. At District Six
Museum I specially acknowledge the warmth of Bonita Bennett, Mandy Sanger,
Noor Ebrahim, Tina Smith and Chrischené Julius who invited me to discuss key
concepts while cleaning the floor map.
In addition to the University of Leicester I am grateful to the British
Academy for funding a period of fieldwork in October 2004 to present a paper
at the International Council of Museums (ICOM) General Conference in Seoul,
where I was fortunate to meet members of the International Council of Museum
Ethnographers (ICME) thanks to the help of Dr Per Rekdal. At Seoul I invited to
join the ICME Board as editor of the Newsletter, while Dr Daniel Winfree Papuga
was president (2004-2007). I would like to extent special thanks to Daniel, to Dr
Annette Fromm and to the other members of the ICME board for much stimulating
and challenging discussion over this period.
I am also grateful to the Daiwa Foundation for funding a seminar series in
Japan (2005), where I was most warmly welcomed at the National Museum of
Japanese History, Lake Biwa Museum and the Edo-Tokyo Museum. I am very
pleased to acknowledge the influence of this funding in Chapter 4, as well as the
close contact that I maintain with Dr Nunotani at Lake Biwa Museum and Yukiko
Hashimoto who organised a second seminar in Edo-Tokyo Museum in 2006.
As well as the people mentioned above there are a great many colleagues
working in museums and universities around the world to whom I owe debt in
this book. I am grateful to Dr Lejo Schenk, Director of the Tropen Museum,
Amsterdam, who invited me to speak at conference there in 2002, together with
Deirdré Prins-Solani from Robben Island Museum whose work continues to
inspire me. In Göteborg Sweden my professional relationship and friendship with
Cajsa Lagerkvist, Dr Diane Walters and Professor Peter Davies has sustained my
research into what a museum is and can be to the benefit of its wider communities.
Back home in Leicester the good humour and insights of Professor Patrick Boylan,
Professor Audrey Osler and Dr Nazikat Waggle has been much appreciated.
I would like to acknowledge the earlier publication, substantially extended,
of some material presented here. In Chapter 1, I refer to a Benin project that is
considered in detail in Joan Anim-Addo and Suzanne Scafe’s 2007 edited volume
I Am Black / White / Yellow. Chapter 2, draws in part on long-term collaboration
with Dr Joan Anim-Addo and the Caribbean Women Writers Alliance (CWWA)
that continues as the Black Body in Europe research network, which was first
outlined in Hazel Moffatt and Vicky Woollard’s 1999 edited volume Museum and
Acknowledgements xiii
Gallery Education A Manual of Good Practice that AltaMira Press now hold the
copyright of. Chapters 5 and 6, reflect on three of the twelve ‘Inspiration Africa!’
collaborative projects undertaken with Jacqui Callis and Tony Minion at the
Cloth of Gold Arts Organisation. A part of the Telegraph Hill work discussed in
Chapter 5 was published in 2004 in the Journal of Museum Ethnography 16:19-36,
Hampshire, UK. Other ‘Inspiration Africa!’ projects, not discussed in this book,
have been considered in Simon Knell, Suzanne Macleod and Sheila Watson’s 2007
edited volume Museum Revolutions, published by Routledge; Sheila Watson’s
2007 edited volume Museums and their Communities, published by Routledge,
and the International Journal of Intangible Heritage, Volume 1, as well as in the
2004 Conference papers that are available at the ICOM-ICME website <http://
museumsnett.no/icme/> accessed on 12.01.2008.
I would like to thank Ashgate Publishing who have been particularly patient in
awaiting the completion of this monograph, long delayed by periods of ill health
in my family. Neil Jordan and Aimée Feenan in particular have been especially
kind and helpful in getting this volume to press. I also acknowledge the meticulous
work of Amy Barnes, who took on the role of proofreading and compiling the
index for Ashgate, while completing her PhD at the University of Leicester.
My immediate family have provided an endless reserve of encouragement and
support over the years: my mum Jean Law; my daughters Erika, Natalie, Anna and
their dad David Forster. Thanks also to the close friends – the extended family –
who have encouraged me to push on and helped me to refine my arguments, in
addition to those noted above I thank Kofi Anim-Addo, Anyaa Anim-Addo, Ian
Baker, Paul Hope and so many students, past, present and future, who inevitably
become friends and part of that extended family!
Picture Acknowledgements
I must thank a number of individuals and institutions for permission to reproduce

images.
Plates 1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 11 and 21 are reproduced with thanks to my colleagues at

Horniman Museum, notably Janet Vitmayer and Finbarr Whooley.
Plates 7, 22 and 23 were taken during a Horniman workshop and the ‘Inspiration
Africa!’ exhibition by David Forster.
Section 1
Introduction: The Spatial Politics of the
Museum Frontiers
I foreground this book with two powerful Black voices. First let us look at a piece
of creative writing taken from the Nobel prize-winning Toni Morrison’s novel The
Bluest Eye, which highlights a subtle but pernicious racism, arising from the lived
experience of daily life. Morrison states:
It had begun with Christmas and the gift of dolls. The big, the special, the
loving gift was always a big, blue-eyed Baby Doll. … Adults, older girls, shops,
magazines, newspapers, window signs – all the world agreed that a blue-eyed,
yellow-haired, pink-skinned doll was what every girl child treasured. “Here,”
they said, “this is beautiful, and if you are on this day ‘worthy’ you may have
it.” … I could not love it. But I could examine it to see what all the world said
was lovable. … It was as though some mysterious all-knowing master had given
each one a cloak of ugliness to wear, and they had each accepted it without
question. The master said, “You are ugly people.” They looked about themselves
and saw nothing to contradict the statement; saw, in fact, support for it leaning at
them from every billboard, every movie, every glance. “Yes,” they had said you
are right. (Morrison 1990: 13, 14, 28) [my emphasis]
Morrison’s The Bluest Eye speaks of the awful negative power of racism to
adversely impact on the identity of the young Black child. Racism like colonialism
objectifies people. It forces the Black ‘other’ to act not as agent but as subject –
passively. Racism sees only limited aspects of the other – humanity the whole
complex human being in social relationships is reduced to black skin. As Franz
Fanon testifies:
I found that I was an object … the glances of the other .xed me there … like a
chemical dye. I was indignant, demanding an explication. … Nothing happened.
I burst apart. Now the fragments have been put together again by another self.
(Fanon 1993: 109) [my emphasis]
I employ the capital ‘B’ to describe Black people throughout my writing. This marks
an act of political allegiance to address historic wrongdoing and denigration of ‘Others’ as
not only inferior but less than human in times of slavery.
Reading Morrison and Fanon from the perspective of the museum, ethical and
existential questions arise. What is the role of the contemporary museum? How
can museum professionals act to combat racism and its pernicious effects today?
Who will take responsibility and ‘speak truth to power’ when it diminishes our
fellows? (Said 1993: 63-75). These questions are focal points for all citizens living
in the post-modern world and in my museum career with anthropology collections
I have found Black writers offer a productive way forward, which I demonstrate
in Learning at the Museum Frontiers: Identity, Race and Power. Overall the book
argues that museums can hold up a hope for challenging racist mindsets essentially
through respectful dialogical exchange that I term feminist-hermeneutics. My
intention is to guide the reader through unfamiliar philosophical terrain that has
proved useful to progress learning in the museum as Eilean Hooper-Greenhill
and Hugh Genoways have notably shown (Hooper-Greenhill 2006; Genoways
2006). At this early point in the book it is only necessary to point out that I have
developed feminist-hermeneutics from the politically mindful Black feminist
thought of writers including Patricia Hill-Collins, Audre Lourde and bell hooks
with the more abstract philosophical hermeneutics of Hans Georg Gadamer
(Hill-Collins 1991; Lorde 1996; hooks 1992, 1994; Gadamer 1980, 1981, 1986).
Basically feminist-hermeneutic practice is akin to Fanon’s notion of ‘authentic
communication’, which urges ‘Why not simply attempt to touch the other, to feel
the other, to reveal myself to the other?’ (Fanon 1993: 231). Such communication
in the museum is neither an easy task nor one we might simply fix forever like a
mathematical equation, but it is worth striving towards and has an enduring value
that lies in learning about the other and most importantly about the self – the self
who does not remain unchanged.
In other words, what I want to do in this book is to look at the way in which the
meaning of certain pernicious ideas about ‘other’ peoples and their cultures, which
appear to be based on obvious factual evidence can change when they are questioned
in between locations, at the frontiers of traditional disciplinary boundaries, and
beyond the confines of institutional spaces. Specifically I present a view of the
museum frontiers – a spatio-temporal site for acting in collaborative effort with
other institutions, which provides a creative space of respectful dialogical exchange
for promoting critical thought, for questioning taken-for-granted ideas in general
and for challenging racist and sexist mindsets in particular. Ultimately I argue that
frontier museum work can progress lifelong learning, ‘intercultural understanding’
and what is known in the UK as community cohesion (Golding 2006a, 2006b, 2007).
In this I build on the work to further the social role of the museum and progress a
more inclusive society undertaken by Richard Sandell, Jocelyn Dodd and David
Fleming (Sandell 2007, 2004, 2003; Dodd and Sandell 2001; Fleming 2004). I
also refer to the White Paper on Intercultural Dialogue, launched in 2008 by the
‘Museums’ is a generic term used throughout the book that follows American practice
and includes art museums, which are commonly referred to as art galleries in the UK.
Introduction: The Spatial Politics of the Museum Frontiers
Council of Europe in Strasborg (<http://www.coe.int/t/dg4/intercultural/Source/

White%20Paper_final_revised_EN.pdf> accessed on 28.11.2008).
Whether the museum holds some power to effect change in society is a large
claim that may be questioned (Appleton 2001). Yet we certainly see museums
increasingly present in the mass media, with stories often sparking intensive
campaigns: urging the ‘nation’ to save ‘our’ treasures such as Raphael’s ‘Madonna
of the Pinks’ for example in the UK and generally to be more ‘family friendly’ –
both calls meeting high degrees of success (RCMG 2007; Birkett 2006). Alongside
this public attention, the academic literature on museology continues to expand
at a rapid pace to serve the increasing demand for places on degree courses in
museum related studies, as well as the changing needs of the profession over the
last two decades since Peter Vergo called for a ‘radical re-examination of the role
of museums’ or a ‘new museology’ (Vergo 1989: 3; Macdonald 2006, 1996: 8).
Learning at the Museum Frontiers: Identity, Race and Power bridges these
public professional and academic worlds by joining the academic texts on
museology with praxis, that is my own theoretically grounded educational work
in the field and at the borderlands beyond the walls of the museum building. I
draw on specific examples largely from my 10 year period as Head of Formal
Education at the Horniman Museum, in South London, working primarily with
the notable and nationally designated anthropology collection of material culture
from sub-Saharan Africa. This personal focus highlights vital issues of relevance
to museums around the world, such as the contested ownership of cultural property
and the representation of indigenous knowledge, which have recently become
the subject of much public debate and interest in the professional, academic and
general press (Simpson 1996; Kreps 2003).
Thus while the book interrogates significant themes that I have grappled with
at a local level and which are evident in the title, it considers these key ideas
throughout from international perspectives and aims to show the wider relevance
of an audience-focused learning lens beyond the UK. I shall now briefly elucidate
the key themes of the book: power, learning, race and ‘frontiers’.
Power. I contend the museum has in part a history of power. Museums have
demonstrated the power of wealth and privilege – of the church, the king and
the merchant since their inception, which in the Western world can be traced
to fifteenth-century Florence, when the Medici family came to prominence and
established their Palace (Hooper-Greenhill 1992; Bennett 1995). A new power –
of the Nation and the citizen – can be traced to the establishment at the end of
the eighteenth century, with the French Revolution and the formation from the
princely collection of the Louvre in 1789, to ‘stand for the Republic and its ideal of
equality’ (Duncan 1995: 35). The historical power of the museum can be seen not
only to confirm conventional social hierarchies, but also to mark the overturning of
older orders of control, and this would appear to lie at the heart of the widespread
and continuing growth reported by UNESCO (the United Nations Educational,
Scientific and Cultural Organisation), at a staggering rate of 90 percent since 1946
(UNESCO 1995: 184).
In today’s age of globalisation, museums around the world retain the

older powers of treasure house, place of knowledge, sanctuary and shrine, in
combination with a newer role as a forum and a vital role in democracy, which
it is a central concern to examine in this book. While this democratic exchange
can spark bitter controversy, since the museum in the socio-cultural landscape
of the twenty-first century can be perceived as an icon of western colonialism in
particular contexts, this effect is often in contradistinction to curatorial intentions.
For example at the Royal Ontario Museum’s exhibition Into the Heart of Africa,
where African Canadians protested against the museum as a storehouse of imperial
loot, tainted by a colonial past, an anachronism, and at the Smithsonian where the
Enola Gay was viewed as of no use or even a hindrance in developing a cohesive
community (Philip 1994; Reigel 1996; Schildkrout 1991; Gieryn 1998). Learning
at the Museum Frontiers argues the opposite. The museum, as it will show, has
the potential to function as a ‘frontier’: a zone where learning is created, new
identities are forged; new connections are made between disparate groups and
their own histories (Philip 1992). In some cases, collections are shown to have a
new and more positive power: to help disadvantaged groups, to raise self-esteem
and even to challenge racism by progressing learning.
Learning is a major theme and thread running through the book. Currently in
the UK, education in the museum is widely distinguished by a focus on the learner,
with the department of museum education often renamed the department of museum
learning and the education policy renamed learning policy. This practice mirrors the
child-centred or learner-centred approaches to education long pioneered notably
by John Dewey and Paulo Freire, which challenged views of education as a ladder
with incremental steps of knowledge that must be acquired and measured by testing
at various stages (Dewey 1968; Freire 1985, 1996, 1998). Learning for Dewey
and Freire emphasises individual potential and takes metaphors from the garden –
nourishment, growth, blossoming. This is distinct from the approach adopted
by more conservatively minded educators, whose major concern lies with the
authority of the professional educator and takes metaphors from the marketplace –
the banking system, competition, assessment. I approve the direction towards
learning in the museum today, which clearly does not denigrate the vital role of
the museum educator. Contrariwise, the educator works hard building bridges that
close the knowledge gap between the museum and the museum visitor; addressing
the complex issues of diversity and developing theoretically grounded and creative
approaches to learning with new audiences.
Furthermore, in the museum recent terminological changes most importantly
reflect a whole museum approach to the visitor learning experience. The V&A
(Victoria and Albert Museum) is one prime examples of the education department
responsible for driving education policy and strategy throughout the whole
museum since the early 1990s (<http://www.vam.ac.uk> accessed on 30.11.2008).
The V&A operates with a broad definition of learning:
Learning is a process of active engagement with experience; it is what people

do when they want to make sense of the world. It may involve the development
or deepening of skills, knowledge, understanding, awareness, values, ideas and
feelings, or an increase in the capacity to reflect. Effective learning leads to change,
development and the desire to learn more. (<http://www.inspiringlearningforall.
gov.uk> accessed on 30.11.2008)
This view of learning, in the context of the museum, vitally places the learner
at the heart of provision. It recognises that since different people have preferred
styles of learning they can be engaged in the learning process in diverse ways with
a variety of stimuli throughout their lives – literally from the cradle to the grave
(<http://www.inspiringlearningforall.gov.uk> accessed on 30.11.2008).
Race. While it can be argued that the ‘inspiring’ definition does not pay
sufficient attention to the socio-political context of learning – the economic
poverty and racism in society, which prevents all our children from flourishing
and developing their full potential – with its emphasis on lifelong learning it is
especially helpful for museum educators concerned with inclusion in general and
antiracism in particular, since it prioritises a place for individuals who have not
achieved according to the usual timings through the school system. In the UK a
disproportionate number of Black children are included in this group as Baroness
Catherine Ashton, Parliamentary Undersecretary of State for Early Years and
Schools Standards notes, in the report of the 2002 conference, Towards a Vision of
Excellence: London schools and the Black Child.
We cannot ignore the fact that the education service as a whole is clearly still
not meeting the needs of many black children. There has been some recent
improvement, but it remains the case that black pupils are more likely than white
pupils to be excluded from school, and are half as likely to leave school with five
A-C GCSEs as their peers from some of the groups. The position for our black
boys is even more worrying. (Ashton 2002: 11)
It is almost 30 years since Rampton first highlighted the ‘under-achievement’

of African Caribbean pupils in UK schools, which in recent government reports
is seen to persist today (Rampton 1981; Scarman 1981: 9, 1996; Gillborn and
Gipps 1996; Ashton 2002). In Learning at the Museum Frontiers I contend
that the museum can help to tackle this problem, by taking the responsibility to
examine our ‘policies and methods’ for signs of the ‘institutionalised racism’
such as that which the Macpherson Report uncovered when investigating the
racist murder of the teenager Stephen Lawrence in South London (Macpherson
1999: 6.18). Macpherson follows Stokely Carmichael in defining institutional
racism as originating ‘in the operation of anti-black attitudes and practice’, which
he underlines as playing a role in this failure of society (Macpherson 1999:
6.22). Following Macpherson, multiethnic collaboration is key to success here.
Collaborative case study examples demonstrate the need for a multiethnic team,
‘visibly committed to antiracism’, to both develop and deliver the museum/school

curriculum jointly (Gillborn and Gipps 1996). Specifically case study collaboration
with Black school and university educators, creative writers, musicians and
storytellers is seen to enable more creative approaches to education and learning
as a useful part of antiracism at the museum frontiers.
Throughout the museum case studies presented, practical ideas are shown
to reinforce the recommendations of reports such as Macpherson’s in the UK,
as well as global initiatives that also highlight the need for institutions to form
alliances and tackle injustice, such as The International Convention on the Rights
of the Child (CRC) 1989, where certain articles highlight basic human rights and
responsibilities. For example the right ‘to preserve identity, including nationality,
name and family relations’ (Article 8); the right to ‘freedom of expression …
either orally, in writing … in the form of art or through any other medium of
the child’s choice’ (Article 13); and the right of ‘ethnic, religious or linguistic
minorities or persons of indigenous origin … to enjoy his or her own culture, to
profess and practice his or her own religion, or to use his or her own language’
(Article 30) which are vital to all museum collaboration as will become clear in
subsequent chapters (<http://UNICEF> accessed on 29.11.2008). These tenets are
crucial to new ways of working at the museum frontiers.
The last of the major themes running through this book is the notion of the
museum ‘frontier’. It is vital to the book’s antiracist intention. The ‘frontiers’
refers to an effective sharing of ideas and the development of programmes both
inside and outside of the Museum. It is elucidated within ‘feminist-hermeneutics’
that brings together distinct viewpoints. Gadamer’s philosophical hermeneutics
helps us to understand how in a ‘fusion of horizons’ – the museum visitor’s and the
museum object’s – ‘meaning’ or sense is made in a process of dialogical exchange,
which is akin to deep respectful conversation. To engage in such dialogue the
‘partners’ in the exchange need to regard each other as equals, in terms of ‘I’ meeting
‘Thou’, which demands a recognition of individual ‘prejudices’ or prejudgements
that inevitably arise from specific histories or ‘traditions’ (Gadamer 1981). It is
only by acknowledging our historical prejudices and traditions in the ‘I-Thou’
dialogue, which can ‘fuse our horizons’ in understanding that future possibilities
may be expanded. Additionally Gadamer’s privileging language use in ways that
echo Wittgenstein is important for progressing understanding and learning in
the museum, similarly employing the concept of ‘play’ and ‘language games’ or
understanding as a ‘linguistic event, a game with words’ (Gadamer 1981: 446-7;
Wittgenstein 1974). He also crucially highlights the lifelong and life-wide nature
of understanding when he states ‘language games are where we, as learners – and
when do we cease to be that? – rise to the understanding of the world’. Perhaps most
critically he stakes a ‘claim to special humane significance’ for creatively entering
the play of word games, which he highlights as ‘a discipline of questioning and
research, a discipline that guarantees truth’ (Gadamer 1981: 447).
While Gadamer stoutly re-values the truth-telling of the arts and importantly
defends subjectivity, noting the ‘reflective appropriation’ of tradition, rather than
the dogmatic ‘scientific’ objective ‘opposition and separation’ from histories, he

assumes an unproblematic access to such appropriation (Gadamer 1977: 28).
However these apolitical notions work well with postcolonial and Black feminist
theory, which offers new ways of seeing the relationships between dominant and
marginalised or disadvantaged groups (Hill-Collins 1991; Lorde 1996; hooks
1992, 1994; Gadamer 1980, 1981, 1986). Most importantly the concept of the
museum frontiers marks a major revaluing of Black knowledge, not simply by
‘adding on’ previously marginalised or excluded discourses in the temporary
exhibition space – to leave the classic canon basically preserved – but rather to
locate Black perspectives right at the heart of theory building. While the notion of
the museum frontiers resonates in Mary Louise Pratt and James Clifford’s idea of
the museum as a ‘contact zone’ that permits connection between individuals and
communities through facilitating connections – between peoples and cultures –
across time and across space; it is a new theoretical positioning within feminist-
hermeneutics, I argue, which in turn may more fundamentally transform the
museum at the level of theory-based practice (Pratt 1992; Clifford 1999: 435-457).
This distinction will be more fully explained in the case study examples. Here I
offer Figure 1 to clarify these notions with reference to the collaborative research
with the Caribbean Women Writer’s Alliance (CWWA) and during ‘Inspiration
Africa!’ that underpins Section 1 and Section 3.
Perhaps the enduring appeal of this frontier notion lies in part in the value
of theory-based practice for individuals working within educational institutions,
including the museum, at all levels of management. At the University of Leicester,
Department of Museum Studies we do not attempt to impart a ‘rule book’ of
essential theory for students to follow slavishly when they leave us to pursue their
careers around the world, but rather attempt to nurture deeper critical thought as
a vital underpinning to future ‘situated’ practice (Haraway 1991b). Thus, while
in this book insights from the Foucauldian discourse, into the relation between
space and power, might be shown to reinforce feminist-hermeneutic practice in
London, England, insights from Marx, Confucius or the Prophet Mohamed ‘peace
be upon Him’ may well prove pertinent at other locations. The website The Spirit
of Islam: Experiencing Islam through Calligraphy at the Museum of Anthropology
(MoA) in Vancouver, Canada provides a wonderful example of best practice –
an online curriculum that consists of six lessons each providing practical, easy
to use tools for educators to build their knowledge and understanding of Islam
while introducing students to a rich variety of related images, ideas, audio and
text. Most impressively many tools are designed specifically to address issues of
stereotyping (<www.moa.ubc.ca/spiritofislam/resources/educationoverview.html>
accessed on 06.09.2008). This MOA achievement has built on long collaborative
relationships with First Nations people, which proved fruitful for representation in
the museum and countered the ‘cannibalistic’ tendency to trap the ‘other’ behind
‘our’ glass case displays and frame their knowledge according to western criteria
(Ames 1995: 3-4).
3. Interpretation
2. At the Frontiers and Understanding
Horizons Fuse progressed in
Histories and the Present
Traditions in the I –Thou Dialogical
Present Exchange and
Collaborative Action
Data Collection
4. Experiences
1. Prejudices from and Anomalies
Past Histories and Challenge
Traditions brought Prejudices in
to the Frontiers For the Present
Collaboration Play of Language
and Programme Games
5. Self-reflection
Design and Change.
Openness to New
Explanations and
Possibilities for
Future Lives
Figure I.1 Feminist-hermeneutic research circle of

interpretation and understanding
What needs emphasising here is that theoretically grounded practice can further
our understanding of how the museum has functioned hierarchically in the past and
point to ways in which traditional power structures can be subverted in the present,
which can benefit all our futures. In other words, the museum that traditionally
marginalised or excluded certain groups such as Black women need not – through
adhering to frontier practice – continue to do so. Most importantly, the strong
theoretical grounding of the new ways of working and the emphasis on research
can allay fears in the profession that standards will slip and vital scholarship lost,
Learning at the Museum Frontiers demonstrates the contrary, a commitment to
truth and an enhancement of knowledge.
In looking at these four major themes, I have been outlining some rather
complex notions in the abstract, but at each chapter of Learning at the Museum
Frontiers I offer specific museum examples to illustrate my argument. Since a
number of chapters draw on the Horniman Museum, London UK, perhaps it will
be helpful at this early point to introduce this key field site.
A Brief History of Education at the Horniman Museum
Frederick John Horniman (1835-1906) founded his collections in the second half
of the nineteenth century – ‘the boom time in the establishment of museums’
(Vergo 1989: 8). Frederick entered the family tea firm at 14 years old. He married
Rebekah Emslie at the age of 23 and moved to the site of the present-day museum,
Surrey House, 100 London Road, SE23, from where he also took on the duties
of a Liberal MP for Falmouth and Penryn (1895-1904). His collections were
displayed and shared with visitors to Surrey House or the ‘Surrey House Museum’
as it was affectionately known in the media. In 1889 the Horniman family, which
included a daughter Annie and a son Emslie, moved their home to another house
in the gardens, Surrey Mount. On Christmas Eve 1890 the objects were officially
opened to the general public in the ‘Horniman Free Museum’ at the London Road
house. The Museum was initially opened from 2.00-9.00pm on Wednesdays and
Saturdays with Mr Watkins employed as the Naturalist and Mr Quick employed as
Curator. Richard Quick was originally trained as an artist and his efforts to impose
a rational order onto Frederick’s collections largely consisted of constructing
huge scrapbooks, where he pasted bills, letters and his own sketches of recent
acquisitions. He speaks of aesthetics: ‘rearranging’ and ‘relining’ certain display
cases ‘with a light green paper, which is found to make a good background’
(Annual Report 1896: 9).
Fred was not an academic university-educated scholar but a passionate collector
of ‘curios’ as they were called at the time and purchased vast numbers from friends
in the missionary and colonial services (Duncan 1972: 3-6). According to Nicky
Levell, Frederick had amassed approximately 7,920 objects by 1901 (Levell 1997).
The breadth and diversity of objects he desired and his ‘method’ of collection is
explained in a letter Mrs Keddie wrote to Richard Quick in 1896, from Gaya
Bengal. She states. ‘Mr Horniman has asked me to send a lot of curiosities. … He
said all sorts of things’ (Quick 1896: 45). Perhaps his business eye attracted him
to the diversity of objects, which we see him warmly lampooned with in media
cartoons (see Plate 1).
10 Learning at the Museum Frontiers
Plate 1 Tea traits: Hornimania. Media cartoon of Fred Horniman dressed

in Chinese costume near one of the tea chests, from which the
family fortune derived, and surrounded by a wealth of ‘Oriental’
and other ‘curios’, including the butter.y originally discovered in
his collection and named after him
Source: © Horniman Museum, cuttings file, 1888-1891.
Introduction: The Spatial Politics of the Museum Frontiers 11
The richness of these collections ranging from a Spanish torture chair (a fake),
mummy hands, human skeletons and gods, Elizabethan, African and Japanese
Rooms as well as the special displays of live creatures including a pair of live
bears and an East African monkey called Nellie – certainly proved tremendously
popular with the public. Plate 2 shows Frederick and Rebeka Horniman (second
and forth from left) with two friends and the curators Quick and Watkins (third
and sixth from left) in the ‘African and Japanese Room’ or Ethnographical Saloon
of the Surrey House Museum in 1892. Quick’s first Annual Report of 1891
notes the museum made ‘Arrangements for the reception of Schools, Societies
and Clubs, in large and small numbers’. From 1891-1892, a ‘total attendance of
1,070’ individuals from 41 institutions, took advantage of the ‘Free’ admittance,
and ‘catalogue guide’ which was ‘supplied gratis’ (Annual Report 1892: 8).
Horniman’s generous and enthusiastic nature is evident in the regular invitations
he extended to children from the local board schools and orphanages, to attend
organised events and activities such as races in his spacious grounds. For example
on 6 July 1893 ‘about 100 children [from 4 local orphanages] … were shown over
the museum, and afterwards passed onto the lawn at the back, where lemonade and
buns were discussed, and greatly appreciated’ (Annual Report 1893: 7). Plate 3
shows Richard’s Quick’s children posing with parts of the collection as they might
with toys at the zoo and may hint at the tactile multisensory approaches adopted by
Horniman and Quick at this time – a theme I return to in Section 3.
Plate 2 Ethnographical saloon of the Surrey House Museum c. 1982 showing

Frederick Horniman with wife Rebeka, friends and colleagues
Source: © Horniman Museum.
Plate 3 Curator Richard Quick’s children, Richard and Louise,

posing with parts of the collection c. 1901
In 1897, the Diamond Jubilee Year of Queen Victoria, 90,383 people visited
the Horniman Free Museum and 120,210 visited the gardens. Frederick was
inspired to commission a purpose-built museum in 1898. Two years later Harrison
Townsend’s art-nouveau design in Doulting stone, with Anning-Bell’s decorative
mosaic panel adorning the entrance, was completed at a cost of about £40,000.
On 1 May 1901, in an act of great benevolence the Museum was officially given
as a gift to ‘the people of London for ever, as a free museum, for their recreation,
instruction and enjoyment’, according to the inscription on the entrance plaque
which expresses an emphasis on the twin educational and recreational functions
of his museum. Plate 4 shows the new museum. Horniman states as his aim for the
collections, to: ‘interest and inform others who may not have had the opportunity
to visit other places’, illustrating a democratic concern for the educational potential
of the objects and a liberal view that education may lead people to a better life
(Annual Report 1901: 4).
Plate 4 Entrance to the Horniman Museum c. 1901, showing the original

building with the clock tower
The London County Council were responsible for administering Horniman’s bequest
and immediately enlisted Dr Alfred Cort Haddon, an esteemed anthropologist
from Cambridge University as Advisory Curator (1902-1915), and Dr Herbert
Spencer Harrison as Resident Curator (1904-1937). Haddon was concerned to
make ‘the museum an educational centre of great value, as well as a place of
recreation’ and began to organise the ethnographic artifacts according to the new
‘scientific’ principles of anthropology (Duncan 1972: 14; L.C.C. Report 1903).
This science applied Darwin’s biological theory of organic evolution to account
for the different social structures around the world. The technical achievements
of societies were regarded as manifest in the products of their material culture
and this provided evidence of their position on the social evolutionary scale: from
the most advanced and civilised or European societies, to the most ‘primitive’
and least technically accomplished or non-European societies. Plate 5 shows the
comparative displays in the South Hall, 1904.
Plate 5 Comparative displays of material culture c. 1901

Haddon and Harrison who were originally trained as biologists rapidly transformed
the displays in accordance with the evolutionary thought which General Pitt
Rivers was developing at this time, whereby ‘the privileged evidence was to be
that based on the comparison of artefacts’ (Chapman 1984: 22). A popular series of
Saturday Lectures and Handbooks on the collections reinforced the museum’s new
educational message of rational classification from an evolutionary perspective.
At this time the Curator’s educational programmes for adult visitors perfectly
complemented the museum display. Alongside this adult service an L.C.C.
appointed supply teacher organised school visits to the museum and arranged for
the ‘instruction’ of school pupils, until January 1949 when a full-time teacher was
seconded from the permanent teaching service of the L.C.C.
In the 1950s the museum teacher worked with the schoolchildren and their
class-teachers in a small room off the North Hall. The room was quite inadequate;
lacking proper storage and display space for the children’s work but the service
grew in response to demand and 18,619 pupils attended the museum as part of
a school visit in 1968. These school visitor figures led to the construction of a
two storey Education Centre and the appointment of a second full-time teacher in
1969. The Education Centre provided excellent facilities for: art and craft work
including a pottery kiln, object handling and storage, lavatories, a lunchroom and a
cloakroom. A reputation for innovative educational activities with museum objects
grew but the work of the museum teacher was isolated from the development of
the museum displays; a situation which was exacerbated by the different salaries
and conditions of employment for curators and teachers.
Throughout the 1970s and 1980s the Education Department grew under the
parallel leadership of Mary Mellors for the formal (school and colleges) sector
and Dr Elizabeth Goodhew for the informal (community) sector. While there was
no tradition for Mellors and Goodhew to work exclusively on exhibitions they
were increasingly seen as vital audience advocates in the 1990s by the Directors
Richard Boston, Mike Houlihan and Janet Vitmayer who ensured a place for
educational staff on upcoming exhibition teams. Alongside this role the education
department worked closely from the Horniman collections and ensured the new
programmes they initiated were relevant to local audience needs through direct
and long-term two-way collaboration with representatives, serving on school
councils for example. They held a dedicated budget for their work and set aside
a proportion to maintain and expand the handling collections, through the active
field research of curatorial teams from the ethnography, musical instruments and
natural history departments. Thus ethnographic displays changed over these years
with some wonderful temporary exhibitions curated by Keith Nicklin, Ken Teague
and Natalie Tobert (Yoruba 1991; Patterns of Life 1991; Sacred Lands Devoted
Lives 1994) from the ethnographic department, although an overriding presentation
of ‘cultural otherness’ remained in the museum as a whole until the late 1990s.
In 1994 severe subsidence was discovered in the South Hall and a major
programme of renovation was undertaken as a matter of urgency with Heritage
Lottery Funding (HLF). Horniman was most fortunate to secure Anthony Shelton
as the Head of Anthropology to progress the intellectual concept behind the
development of two new exhibitions in both the South Hall and the old Lecture
Theatre. Shelton’s original conception was for a contrast between the two galleries
An A-Z of Collectors and African Worlds, which were designed to engage in a
visual dialogue with each other. I regard this work as a notable ‘exhibition
experiment’ and return to a detailed appraisal of the African Worlds exhibition
at Section 2 (Macdonald and Basu 2006). Before proceeding, it will be helpful to

outline the whole structure and the key themes readers will encounter in Learning
at the Museum Frontiers.
Structure and Themes
Learning at the Museum Frontiers is organised into three broad sections and six
chapters, with this introduction and a conclusion. The opening Section 1 deals
with the spatial politics of race, knowledge and truth in the museum. This section
establishes the philosophical, political and social framework of the book. Section
1 provides an overview of museum histories and the problematic relation of truth
and knowledge in the imperial, colonial and postcolonial museum context with
reference to both the tangible and the intangible heritage of global communities.
The material culture that underpins the dialogue here includes contemporary
creative responses to objects taken as war loot from Nigeria in 1897, the Benin
bronzes and maternity sculpture collected by anthropological fieldwork in the early
1900s, which is housed in the African Worlds exhibition at Horniman in the UK.
Objects such as these are seen to raise new voices and visibilities at the museum
frontiers; exemplifying collaborative practice and polyvocality (Shelton 2000).
First, Chapter 1, Race: Repositioning and Revaluing Cultural Heritage,
investigates the stubborn persistence of the discredited notion of ‘race’, and the
relationship of racialised ideas with enlightenment perspectives on truth and
knowledge that linger in the museum context. Chapter 1 also considers post-
colonial challenges to the racist fixing of meaning by ‘us’ in Western museum
displays of ‘them’ the ethnographic other, against the historico-political background
of thinking on ‘race’. This chapter addresses controversy arising from racist
viewpoints constructed by the European ‘self’ on the Black and Oriental ‘other’, in
both traditional and more recent exhibitions. It explores the changing boundaries
of ‘Blackness’ and ‘ethnicities’ with reference to Jews, Gypsies and Poles and
critiques both multicultural and antiracist responses to this ‘othering’ (Back and
Solomos 2000; Young 2001; Gilroy 1994a, 1994b; Morrison 1990, 1994). The
contested histories of contemporary world art and culture are explored in the light
of the ‘art/artifact’ and ‘primitivism’ debates through strategies underpinning
seminal exhibition including African Worlds (Vogel 1988; Philip 1992; Shelton
2000; Arinze 2000).
Then, in Chapter 2, Space: The Museum and the New Spatial Politics of the
Frontiers, my long-term collaborative research with the Caribbean Women Writer’s
Alliance (CWWA) is outlined with reference to some notes on methodology and the
development of third or ‘liminal’ museum spaces of ‘enunciation’ within diaspora
and hybridity theory (Bhabha 1994; Hall 1994, 1996; Said 1985, 1993). This
chapter explores the specific contribution of Black women’s writing to engage wider
museum audiences including those in danger of disaffection, by working creatively
to counter the dominant discourses of deficiency. Hill-Collins and Morrison are
notable among key figures here in revaluing African ethical perspectives. For
example they point us to the possibility of employing new metaphors that might
progress learning at the borderlands of cultures and spaces (Hill-Collins 1991;
Morrison 1988, 1993; hooks 1992, 1994; Lorde 1996). Marlene Norbese Philip’s
attention to sensual ways of knowing and finding expression in the Caribbean
voice is also important in marking the potential for new theoretical relationships;
specifically how the ‘I and I’ dialogue within Rastafarianism pertinently echoes
Gadamer’s concept of ‘I and Thou’ in conversation (Philip 1993; Gadamer 1981).
Finally addressing issues surrounding enslavement and the abolition of the slave
trade are seen to be vital for collaborative practice in the UK and in American
Plantation Museums (Anim-Addo 1998; Eichstedt and Small 2002).
Overall in this opening section, attention is drawn to developing a respectful
dialogical space for the ‘citizen’ according to the tenets of feminist-hermeneutics,
which is shown to empower the socially excluded to take action in the world
outside of the museum. Essentially this new location of dialogue provides an
opportunity to counter the pernicious influence of the media, which too often
shows the starving ‘primitive’ African. Respectful dialogical exchange permits the
taken for granted notions about oneself and other people to be questioned, limiting
self-concepts to be debated, and new hopes and dreams for a brighter future to be
explored. Taken together chapters one and two suggest the need for emancipatory
research and liberatory praxis, and address specific themes that contribute to the
extension of this discussion in Section 2.
The two chapters in the second section of the book, Including New Voices
and Forms of Practice, demonstrate how the passive view of the Black person,
as objectively framed in traditional exhibitions, can be further transformed
in ways that go far beyond the subtle subversions of knowledge, which can be
achieved fleetingly through: workshops and temporary intellectual collaboration
as in the UK and USA Plantation examples. The discussion is extended here to
Europe and Africa, with specific reference to more intensive work undertaken by
museums in Sweden and South Africa, where the struggle for stronger permanent
transformation through structural changes to the management systems, with
indigenous and diverse community groups taking greater control of the museum
space is evident.
In Chapter 3, Power: Inserting New Visibilities in the Museum Margins, I
consider instances of museum exhibitions which challenge our idea of what a
museum is and what it might be, when there is a determination to flatten the
hierarchical lines of power in the management structure from the notion of
‘poetics and politics’ (Karp and Lavine 1991). This chapter explores detailed
artist interventions into exhibition work and intensive theoretical collaboration
over museum displays that displace absolute curatorial authority. The discussion
focuses on the remarkable Museum of World Culture (MWC), in Göteborg, Sweden
that highlights issues of contemporary global concern through exhibition and artist
installation, for example the HIV-AIDS exhibition and Fred Wilson’s installation
Dwelling of the Demons. Additionally I give an overview of the Voices from a
Global Africa gallery, which features historical voices of oppression and resistance
as well as contemporary voices from local people with roots in the Horn of Africa
and Paul Gilroy’s attention to Bob Marley. I argue that the imaginative effort at
MWC permits a vast increase in intellectual and physical access to cultures and a
great widening of participation in the museum.
Chapter 4, Control: Shifting Relationships in the Whole Museum, focuses on
South Africa to consider the historical period from the end of the twentieth century,
which saw more dramatic shifts in the power structures of the museum. Indigenous
groups claimed the right to their land and to democratic government. They also
asserted the just claim to fully represent themselves within their own community
museums where newly empowered management teams pointed to the possibility of
raising controversial issues of ownership and contested histories in apartheid within
a new framing of knowledge throughout the whole museum. Difficult material and
troubled histories, previously hidden in traditional displays or basement stores
could now be highlighted in a non-tokenistic way by those artists, writers, and
academics in permanent positions inside the museum institution. The chapter is
illustrated with examples of the museum offering a site of truth, reconciliation and
therapeutic healing in post-Apartheid South Africa. Topics considered in Chapter
4 include management and community initiatives at District 6 Museum (D6M)
Museum in Cape Town, South Africa, specifically creative recollection with Black
Elders and imaginative intergenerational work.
Overall the two chapters in Section 2 directly confront the charge of ‘tokenism’
to show how the imaginative effort and political commitment of museums in the
twenty-first century might positively impact on the museum poetics, to progress
intercultural relationships amongst international, national and local communities
today. Most importantly the museums highlighted here demonstrate the possibility
of working with individual and collective memories of the most terrible histories
in ways that do not continue to gnaw away destructively, deep in the psyche, but
impact positively and empower communities to move forward together (Morrison
1994b).
Having laid new theoretical foundations rooted in antiracism and outlined
some instances of museums’ power-sharing internationally, the final Section 3 of
the book, Critical Collaborative Museum Pedagogy, focuses on inclusive museum
education and learning, and in particular on innovative opportunities for the
construction of new identities with diverse young audiences. Overall, Section 3
investigates new forms of practice to raise schoolchildren’s voices through a new
theory-based practice seen in a project of two years duration entitled Inspiration
Africa! This section emphasises the role of the museum in addressing the low
self-esteem, which impacts on poor motivation and weak academic performance
amongst socially excluded communities, especially Black learners. The two
final chapters offer a number of success stories, which demonstrate the value of
creatively re-reading traditional objects, not only to spark imagination and curiosity,
but also to highlight the need for negotiating rights and responsibilities within
a global citizenship agenda that might enhance social cohesion and intercultural
understanding in contradistinction to stereotype and fear (Osler 2007).
Chapter 5, Identity: Motivation and Self-esteem, explores the roots of Black
underachievement as well diverse ranges of holistic mind and body museum
approaches, to raise self-esteem, motivation and ‘flow learning’ (Csikszentmihalyi
1995; Falk and Dierking 2000; Hein 1999). The objects, which are central to the
discussion here, revolve around material culture displayed at Horniman including
the Haitian shrine and the Igbo ijeli mask. These objects are utilised innovatively
in writing, dramatic telling and performing of new identities and new stories, in
collaboration with writers, storytellers and musicians. With a focus on voice and
language activities the chapter demonstrates how new ways of creative interpretive
working can facilitate the construction of more positive, diaspora hybrid identities,
so vital for audiences who experience social exclusion.
In the final Chapter 6, Towards a New Museum Pedagogy: Learning, Teaching
and Impact, the learning of new museum audiences, in terms of teaching impact,
is subject to evaluation. Firstly drawing on French feminism, learning is regarded
as importantly an active ‘power to’ see, hear, move, and speak in the Foucauldian
sense, which reinforces a constructivist museum position and a radical new museum
pedagogy. Next, the differing terminology in the UK and the USA to describe
disabled children is closely considered. Then the chapter examines the use of an
Ashanti stool as the focus for imaginative work on the theme of ‘respect’ with a
special audience of younger learners, who have Special Educational Needs (SEN),
specifically Educational and Behavioural Difficulties (EBD). Overall, Chapter 6
critically considers the idea of progressing embodied knowledge or more sensual
and cross-cultural routes to knowledge. This is seen to be achieved with reference
to a most disadvantaged audience by employing the ‘both and’ sensory approaches
of feminist-hermeneutics at the museum frontiers, to promote active learning in
contradistinction to the ‘either-or’ of binary reasoning.
Taken together these two chapters outlining ‘Inspiration Africa!’ at the frontiers
of the Horniman Museum develops a respectful dialogical space, where socially
excluded individuals and groups, too often Black youth, might become citizens
and empowered to take action in the world outside of the museum. Essentially
this new location of dialogue is seen to provide an opportunity to counter the
influence of the media that perpetuates negative ideas of Black people, such as
weak-mindedness and criminality.
Then the concluding chapter draws the common threads of the six chapters,
covering the learning of diverse audiences at three continents, together. Overall I
argue it is the museums promoting an open yet respectful dialogical space, one that
shares characteristics of my own feminist-hermeneutic praxis, which progresses
notions of democracy and global citizenship. The strengthening and expanding
of the relationship between museums and communities through questioning
traditional cultural authorities and reasserting new power structures and identities
is shown to be a principal theme of the book and one of the most urgent concerns
for contemporary museums. Through museums, the citizen may honestly examine
taken for granted notions about other people and oneself, subject limiting self-
concepts to rigorous debate, and imaginative interpretation; then new hopes and
dreams for a brighter future may be explored.
The conclusion further demonstrates and justifies the value of creative
collaboration at the museum frontiers for diverse audiences. Taken as a whole the
book illustrates a new praxis that highlights both the differences and the similarities
between and within seemingly diverse or unified groups of people; thereby
agreeing with Gupta and Fergusson’s point that the distance between rich people
in different continents is often closer than that between ‘different’ classes in ‘same’
city (Gupta and Ferguson 2002). Overall the book not only addresses the ways in
which factors of class, gender, race, disability and sexuality intersect within fields
of power, but also points to helpful ways of empowering disadvantaged peoples by
re-analysing certain sorts of negative experiences that have been felt in the mind
and the body and result in dis-ease (Trinh 1989).
Chapter 1
Race: Repositioning and Revaluing
Cultural Heritage
Introduction: Racism and ‘Post’ Thought in the Museum Today
Issues of ‘race’, racism and social justice remain pertinent for the twenty-first
century museum: national UK television and the Danish print media face charges
of racism over the publication of some notorious, not very well drawn cartoons,
satirising the Prophet Mohamed – peace be upon him; ‘race riots’ are seen in
Paris France, legal cases of race-hate murder are being dealt with across Europe;
while in the USA the notorious lynching rope is once again seen in the streets
and Universities, specifically targeted to threaten Black citizens. Set against such
discord, this book lights a different pathway, a new collaborative museum practice,
which is interdisciplinary, heterogeneous and multiple. It is essentially dialogical
across races and nations. It is aligned with the wealth of work in contemporary
museums that aims to undermine the historical pattern of museums speaking about
and speaking for ‘others’, usually Black others.
As a mixed race disabled academic I have strong feelings on these issues.
While the overwhelming election victory of Barack Obama as President of the
USA in 2008 makes me optimistic for the future, I consider it urgent for museums
to address the historical background of slavery because the pernicious legacy of
racism lingers. Toni Morrison illuminates this history. She comments.
From a woman’s point of view, in terms of confronting the problems of where

the world is now, black women had to deal with “post-modern” problems in
the nineteenth century and earlier. … Certain kinds of dissolution, the loss of
and the need to reconstruct certain kinds of stability. Certain kinds of madness,
deliberately going mad in order, as one of the characters says in the book, “in
order not to lose your mind” … Slavery broke the world in half, it broke it in
every way. It broke Europe. It made them into something crazy. You can’t do that
for hundreds of years and it not take a toll. They had to dehumanise, not just the
slaves but themselves. They have had to reconstruct everything in order to make
that system appear true. It made everything in World War II possible. It made
World War 1 necessary. Racism is the word that we use to encompass all this.
The idea of scientific racism suggests some serious pathology. (Morrison 1994a:
178) [my emphasis]
I open this chapter with the words of Toni Morrison in conversation with Paul
Gilroy, since I take a post-modern feminist position throughout this book, but
follow Morrison’s regard for the limited and Eurocentric notions of the concept.
To define the key terms, modernism, in sociological thought, may be distinguished
by ‘reflexiveness’ and ‘an aesthetic self-consciousness’ involving a break with
the paradigm of ‘realism’ in ‘representation’, while modernity is identified with
paradigm shift from a God created universe to a belief in man’s [sic] rationality
and the triumph of scientific truth that characterised the Age of Enlightenment in
the eighteenth century, which I consider below (Jary and Jary 2000: 392). At this
point let us simply note that post-modernism like feminism is ‘contested terrain’,
which it is difficult to define precisely and briefly (Usher and Bryant 1994). Carole
Boyce Davies helpfully critiques the ‘post’ in postmodernism and post-colonialism
for being premature, totalising, recentering the status quo male position against the
resistant discourses of women (Boyce Davis 1994: 81). She detects pessimism and
belatedness in ‘post’ theorising, against a radical energy and creative optimism
directed to the future by new subjects and ‘uprising’ texts that we shall see in
subsequent chapters.
Toni Morrison’s discussion of postmodernism is illuminating for showing
transatlantic slavery or in my preferred term the Atlantic holocaust to reveal
the bankruptcy of modernism, as characterised by a faith in rationality and the
progress of science, as the Atlantic holocaust necessarily heralds a new period
of postmodernism for the enslaved peoples. Specifically Morrison refigures and
relocates the notions of the postmodern historically with reference to the Atlantic
holocaust and within Black feminist politics. This particular lens illuminates the
postmodern disillusionment with grand narratives and expands our understanding
of these ideas for the museum context.
For example her language is wonderfully economical in its destructive
analytical force on slavery. She employs just three words to note: It broke Europe;
six words to observe Slavery broke the world in half and six more to detect slavery
fragmenting the world to pieces it broke it in every way. It is useful to recall the
power of such textual economy when developing museum text and facilitating
audiences to construct their own textual responses. Furthermore Morrison notes the
problem of racist ‘knowledge’ emerging when a ‘scientific’ world-view based on
observation and realism treated Black subjects as inanimate objects, and excluded
the investigating self from its objectification; for the contemporary museum, this
urges self-reflexivity and striving for more equal subject positions. Morrison’s
stress on the potential of employing ‘fragmentation’ and a series of subversive
strategies informed by Black feminist thought as techniques of resistance when
a grand logic of emancipation may prove impossible, also provides a refreshing
perspective for inserting small scale project work into wider museum planning
(Lyotard 1984).
Thus Morrison’s text points to exciting possibilities for museum learning,
where new audiences may be empowered to look through new lens of their own
make. In brief there is no orthodoxy and I argue that postmodernism can present a
Race: Repositioning and Revaluing Cultural Heritage 23
useful framework for progressing museum learning, since it marks a questioning

of universalising tendencies and a collapse of the essentialist, ‘grand narrative’ of
the centre in favour of multiple diverse mini-narratives at numerous new mini-
centres. Yet it is important to note here that I incorporate certain radical and
liberatory features of the modernist discourse into a postmodern-feminist stance
in the museum. Therefore my view does not abandon us to an, ‘anything goes’
dispensation (Crimp 1985: 44). On the contrary I consider it a ‘political necessity’
to open up the museum to a range of fruitful positionings, blurring the traditional
boundaries between the ‘personal and political’ realms, dissolving the opposition
between ‘theory and practice’, to open the ‘closed system’ of the museum to the
‘discourse of others’, to a ‘heterogeneity of texts’ and multiple re-writings (Foster
1985: viii-ix).
Overall this chapter cites ways of thinking and working which demand a
restructuring of museum ‘knowledge’ and the whole notion of what counts as
knowledge in the museum context. It cites a more engaged positioning for museum
researchers and workers, which most importantly emphasise a new sensitivity to
difference and similarity. This is an optimistic view. It follows the Gadamerian
discourse on knowledge, which seeks out multiple meanings and a praxis based on
the Black feminist thought that facilitates a number of ways for ‘situated’ subjects
to produce their own ‘little narratives’ of self-legitimation and constant reinvention
(Gadamer 1981; Lyotard 1984: 60; Haraway 1991b).
Next the chapter explores the general terrain of ‘race’ and ‘racism’ in society,
as well as the interaction of these issues on the museum of the past, the present
and the future. First the emergence of the term ‘race’ is sketched historically from
the eighteenth century, the age of Enlightenment, imperialism and colonialism,
when ‘lower’ Black ‘races’ were treated in abhorrent and inhuman ways to profit
‘superior’ white ‘races’ under the growth of European capitalism to the changing
discourse on ‘race’, ‘racisms’, ‘ethnicity’ and ‘difference’ that came about under
the ‘New Conservative’ and ‘New Labour’ governments in the UK during the
last decades of the twentieth century and the first decade of the twenty-first.
Having covered the historico-social background, albeit briefly, I return to a more
detailed consideration of the binary distinction that lies so stubbornly at the root
of western thought in the context of the modernist museum. Specifically I look
at the postmodern and postcolonial challenges to the binary notions of ‘self’ and
‘other’, ‘art’ and ‘artefact’, which have negatively impacted upon representation
to result in controversy in the museum, but which need not, as I demonstrate with
key examples of African art exhibitions, continue to do so. In the main, reference
is made to the UK situation within which most of my professional work takes
place, although points of contact are made with other regions of our globalised
world – USA and Canada – to address the pernicious effects that taken-for-granted
ideas of race and racism continue to play in the museum and in the wider social
world today.
Defining ‘Race’: Biology versus Language and Socio-political Change
In 1943 the American anthropologist Ruth Benedict gave us the ‘briefest possible
definition’, stating ‘race is a classification based on hereditary traits’ (Benedict
2000: 113). Benedict notes the confusion of hereditary traits, ‘outward visible
signs such as the colour of skin, colour and texture of hair’ with learned, socially
acquired behaviours such as language. The term Aryan, which refers to an Indo-
European language group not the German race, is one example of a mistaken focus
on biology that leads to racism or ‘the dogma that one ethnic group is condemned
by nature to congenital superiority and another group is destined to congenital
inferiority (ibid. 114).
Benedict further observes how language in the ‘culture bearing animal’ may
be a cause for ‘domination over all creation’ precisely since it is not given at
birth in ‘germ cells’, like the communicating behaviour we observe in wasps
and ants (Benedict 2000: 115). She contends the importance of cultural change
and transformation and points to non-biological transmission permitting greater
adaptability and change in cultural groups so that the aggressive Scandinavians of
the ninth century become the peaceful citizens of the twentieth, while the Japanese
who were prized for traits of aesthetic appreciation and ceremoniousness and
enjoyed a peace unrivalled in the west for 11 centuries of their recorded history,
began to increase military aggression and become one of the most warlike nations
of the world from 1853. It is provincialism according to Benedict that writes history
as a celebration of one particular group although this obscures the dynamism of
human culture, which results from the contribution by many diverse peoples over
time, not whole ‘races’ but ‘certain fragments of an ethnic group which were for
certain historio-political reasons favourably situated at the moment’ (Benedict
2000: 118).
One ‘favourable moment’ for the development of the modern museum is the age
of the Enlightenment in post-industrial Europe. Despite differences of emphasis
in Europe, the Enlightenment can be understood as signalling a decisive break
from traditional to modern thought, and social organisation, notably the French
Revolution.
The contemporary museum arises out of these new rational ways of thinking
and organising social space such as the pedagogic aims of universal education. It
is also intimately connected with the ideologies of imperialism, racism and social
Darwinism, which I consider next.
Imperialism, Colonialism, Humanism and the Enlightenment
It is argued that racial ideologies and practices interact with other sets of ideas and
values in specific historical circumstances and further that these notions persist
over time (Said 1993). For the contemporary museum to combat racism within
the western world and the racialised social relations in the wider world today,
some understanding of the rise of western imperialism and colonialism from the
eighteenth century is required.
First to define the key terms: imperialism can be defined as an overarching
ideology, which serves to legitimate colonialism – the economic and military
control of one nation over another by settlement (McLeod 2000: 7-8). Colonialism
is therefore regarded as one specific historical experience of imperialist ideology.
This means that while in the current ‘postcolonial age’ – a moot point as we noted
earlier – resistance of previously colonised peoples that secured independence
from settlers, the wider imperialist mindsets can be seen to persist from the earlier
times.
Against imperialism, what is important to highlight here is that taking a long
perspective, phenotypical and cultural differences were not simply produced from
the mid eighteenth century onwards, nor even from the sixteenth century period of
European expansion and exploration in the world. In earlier periods and looking
back to ancient societies in Egypt, Greece and Rome, while differences on the
basis of skin colour and ‘curly hair’ were noted, it was not with any significant
social consequences attached. It was in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries
that notions of race as sets of discreet categories of physical appearances were
developed, and it was upon these physical attributes that diverse theories justified
oppressive social practices.
Nevertheless while the notion of race has taken various forms in different
national contexts over time, it is the mid eighteenth century, at the high point of the
Enlightenment, when ideas about race and racism became articulated. At this time
popular, scientific and political discourses began to divide humanity into distinct
groups with shared physical characteristics and the dissemination of such notions
was progressed through the rise of print media. Additionally, different origins were
attributed to the groupings and different socio-cultural significance attached to the
racialised boundaries (Bulmer and Solomos 1999: 7). To take just one example,
Edward Long’s 1774 History of Jamaica, a British colony, portrayed enslaved
Africans as lazy, lying, profligate, promiscuous, cowards, savages debased, ugly
and therefore demonstrably inferior to their white masters who were fulfilling a
role of natural superiority. On the other hand, Black ‘Sambo’ characteristics are
contradictory in Long. He uses opposing terms to describe the Black ‘other’ who
is childish but sly, slavish and cunning, a lap dog and a wild animal (Solomos and
Back 1996: 40-41).
These contradictory perspectives highlight the inherent difficulties in dualist
positioning, which emerge in the humanist ideology of the Enlightenment period.
In short, humanism as a philosophy set up Essential and Universal ideals of ‘Man’
based on a view of ‘Human Nature’, which is seen as at a remove from history,
geography and socio-political circumstances. Humanist man of the Enlightenment
age was seen as the measure of all things, in opposition to earlier claims that God
created and ordered the universe. Enlightenment man could draw on scientific
method to justify claims to Universal Truth and Knowledge as certain and objective.
Alongside his human nature, man was gradually thought to have certain inalienable
human rights and responsibilities as citizens in the democracy of the nation state.
Yet as certain postcolonial theorists note, the early notions of the humanist ‘man’
are exclusive. Man is European. European man was more and more aggressively
engaged in global expansion, increasing trading networks and gaining power
over ‘other’ indigenous people and their lands throughout the eighteenth century.
At this time the ‘scramble for Africa’ divided the continent into colonies under
imperial rule. Said highlights this European expansion and appropriation of ‘other’
lands as, fundamentally, acts of geographical violence (Said 1993: 1-15). Fanon
also points to the violent negativity of a British colony, where ‘Man’ ‘the settler …
plunders … violate and starves’ the colonised dehumanised ‘other’ (Fanon 1990:
40). He states:
That same Europe where they were never done talking of Man, and where they
never stopped proclaiming that they were only anxious for the welfare of Man:
today we know with what sufferings humanity has paid for every one of their
triumphs of the mind. (Fanon 1990: 251)
Fanon further highlights how ‘Western bourgeois racial prejudice’ towards ‘the
nigger and the Arab is a racism of contempt; it is a racism which minimises what
it hates’, while at the same time the bourgeois ideology invites ‘the sub-men to
become human’, taking ‘as their prototype Western humanity as incarnated in
the Western bourgeoisie’ (Fanon 1990: 131). Fanon’s words recall John Stuart
Mill, who wrote in 1859 of ‘The sacred duties which civilised nations owe to the
independence and nationality of each other’, which is distinct from the ‘barbarous
people’ who have ‘no rights as a nation, except a right to such treatment as may, at
the earliest possible period, fit them for becoming one’ (Mill 1984: 118).
Benin City, Nigeria: 1668 to Today
In offering a concise overview there is a danger of over simplifying the issues,

continuing to make sweeping statements and global assertions along the lines of
the older essentialism and universals, when what is required in critique is the need
to observe the complexity, the significance of particular instances (Young 2001).
A brief outline of educational work with material culture from Benin, Nigeria may
address Young’s concern.
In the context of museum learning today we can stress the changing accounts of
Europeans on African ‘others’ from the sixteenth century, since favourable images
of Black people exist in historical narratives and can be productively employed
in the museum. For example, the first impressions of Benin City in Nigeria by
the Dutchman Olfert Dapper in 1668 highlight the grandeur and sophistication of
the Oba’s (the ruler’s) kingdom, which he compared more than favourably with
the city of Amsterdam at the time (Golding Teachers’ Pack 1996: 3). Accounts
such as Dapper’s demonstrate a sophisticated society and early cultural production
in Africa to counter views of ‘primitive’ lack that was the ‘white man’s burden’
under colonialism. Similarly the Royal Courts and craft guilds of medieval Europe
mirror aspects seen in the City of Benin at the same historical period.
We can note in passing that intellectually Thomas Paine’s Rights of Man (1791-
1792) was equally applicable to woman and the enslaved, yet as the ‘other’ of man
and as the colonised ‘other’ of the European both were excluded. Annie Coombes
points to Benin as a typical case illustrating the contradictory attitudes and mindsets
in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries that underpin museum collecting and
exhibitionary practices and displays of artifacts of the period and she observes
how historical accounts of the period ‘tell us more about the speaking subject
than they do about the African’ (Coombes 1994: 22). To illustrate her remarks
with reference to Horniman we might cite R.H. Bacon, an intelligence officer to
the ‘punitive expedition’ and Richard Quick, curator of the Horniman Museum
in 1897. Bacon writes in contradictory terms about the Edo, who are ‘liars’ and
mentally ‘slow’, yet also ‘courageous’ in battle. The point about the Edo ‘courage’
transparently adds greater prestige to the British military victory in Benin. Quick’s
public writing on Benin in 1897 highlights the evidence of ‘civilisation’, at a time
when Benin objects are dismissed in the media as ‘hideous bronze heads’ or a
‘hideous Benin god’, and his later writing in 1899 shows a greater appreciation
of Benin culture. His words cherish the ‘fine deep carvings’ made by extremely
‘skilful craftsmen’ which proves for him ‘that artists of no mean talent were
formally attached to the King’s court’ (Quick 1899: 248, 251, 254).
At Horniman, teaching Benin across the curriculum for 5 to 11 year old
pupils and as part of the art curriculum for 11 to 16 year old pupils together with
teacher collaborators, Quick’s highlighting of Benin material culture as Art was
emphasised. This revaluing of material culture from Africa was vital to raising
pupil’s self-esteem and achievement as I have demonstrated elsewhere although the
notion of Benin as ‘art’ was contentious at the 1999 MEG (Museum Ethnographers
Group) conference hosted at Horniman (Golding 2000, 2007). I shall outline the
art/artifact debate as it remains contested today and since all my collaborative
practice challenged this binary opposition, not only during Benin projects but also
during the Horniman case studies discussed throughout this book.
The Art/artifact Debate and Learning Programmes at Horniman
One important factor during collaborative Benin project work, when funding
permitted, was engaging contemporary Black artists, storytellers, writers and
musicians to work alongside the class teacher and myself with the pupils.
Employing contemporary artists at the museum frontiers provides positive live
role models for the students and thwarts any fixing of Benin arts in an ‘extinct’ past
(Picton 1992). Additionally making new pieces of art and engaging imaginatively
with the personal meanings of the historical objects in the museum for each viewer
in the present day does not prevent giving careful attention to the original context
and contextual meaning of the museum objects, Benin plaques in this example,
and thoroughly interrogating the social world(s) in Africa and London during the
time of their original making, their life and use as well as their movement, too
often forced or resulting from ‘spoils of war’, into the museum collection and the
contemporary use there [1897] (Howell 1993: 215).
For example, the fact that the Benin plaques are made according to royal
patronage, to commemorate historic events, and for overriding religious purposes
does not irrevocably sever them from the world of western art at this time. On
the contrary, systems of religious and royal patronage are found throughout the
15th century art world. Historically workshops of artists and apprenticeship
systems existed in the west, that bear some similarities to the historic guilds of
brass-casters in Benin City. The Romantic notion of an individual artist working
in glorious isolation from any patronage is comparatively recent, and moreover a
largely imaginary conception. Artists in the west and in Africa remain dominated
by the demands of the Global art market.
John Picton also stoutly defends the notion of African art, but he deplores the
way this global market privileges the arts of ‘tribal’ or ‘auto-didact’ artists over
‘academic’ artists today (Picton 1998: 281). At Horniman, students sometimes
had the opportunity to work with a contemporary academic artist from Nigeria.
Chike Azuonye is one collaborator who highlights Picton’s proposition that, ‘The
academic artists are concerned to hold on to and explore their place within the
traditions of practice inherited from the past; it is they who use these traditions
as among the resources with which to explore current concerns’ (ibid. 284-5).
Collaboration with Azuonye was vital to the success of projects, which would
otherwise have been fixed onto distant historical aspects. Additionally Azuonye
shared the experiences of travelling across cultural horizons with the multicultural
multiracial student groups who came to recognise specific African art-skills,
within a framework of African knowledge and history, which had previously been
obscured or hidden from them.
Programming with contemporary artists such as Azyonye vitally adds the live
voice, the living human mind and body, to the interpretation of material culture
in exhibitions on display. Perhaps most importantly during Benin work with
Azuonye the participants all became active participants, re-forming and redefining
a relationship to the derogatory notion of a primitivised, colonised ‘other’, through
an empathetic engagement with historical and contemporary Benin arts (Hiller
1993: 285). We saw how collaboration during Benin projects might challenge the
notion of any childlike or ‘primitive other’ and help to combat the idea of the
museum as a site of white supremacism, since as Marlene Nourbese Philip notes:
For Africans the museum has always been a significant site of their racial
oppression. Within its walls reasons could be found for their being placed at the
foot of the hierarchical ladder of human evolution designed by the European.
Proof could also be found there of the “bizarre” nature and “primitive” anatomy
of the African. … The museum has been pivotal in the expansion of the west’s
knowledge base about the world, seminal in the founding of its disciplines and
indispensable in Europe’s attempt to measure, categorise and hierarchize the
world with the white male at the top. (Philip 1992: 104)
Philip is another Horinman collaborator who cites here the shameful and tragic
case of Saartje Baartman, the Khoi-San South African woman who was known in
early nineteenth century London as the ‘Hottentot Venus’ for her large backside,
and made a live ‘display’ (Bennett 1996: 202-203; Gilman 1994). Saartje suffered
an early death at the age of 24, when her genitalia was preserved, similarly
exhibited and then stored in the Musee de l’homme, close by the preserved brain
of the ‘advanced European’ craniologist Paul Broca. Saartje’s remains were
finally returned to the Khoi-San people in 2002 following considerable diplomatic
pressure from the new democratic government led by Nelson Mandela.
It is worth highlighting the 2007 exhibition, Between Worlds Voyagers to
Britain 1700-1850, at the National Portrait Gallery in London, which highlighted
the complexity of Saartje Baartman’s historical position. This exhibition celebrated
Saartje’s agency and highlighted her refusal to break her ‘contract’, which in
a certain sense implied she choose to be displayed, although I would question
the notion of choice in such circumstances of economic necessity. Whatever our
opinion on the matter of choice here, the Saartje case exposes ‘Primitivism’ as a
western notion about art in the nineteenth century. A time when Europe defined
itself against the ‘primitive’ as an essentially superior point, while in the twentieth
century Modernism saw in the notion of ‘primitivism’ aspects of a ‘noble savage’
a more natural self ‘lost’ by ‘us’ in our ‘rapid evolution at the centre’ (Hiller 1993:
285, 87).
Benin project work at the Horniman Museum addressed issues such as those
raised by the Saartje Baartman case in an attempt to ‘widen our aesthetic horizons
to include African sculptures’, without rendering ‘invisible the facts of historical
and cultural difference’, and ‘the brutal history of European colonialism’ (Bryson
1992: 96, 100).
Evaluation of the Benin programmes revealed an overwhelmingly favourable
response towards the idea of African Art as opposed to African Craft (Golding
2007a). The term art was felt to more fully celebrate and honour African human
achievement. In terms of pedagogy, teacher collaborators further argue that if
China has art and craft, India has art and craft but Africa lacks highly valued art
and has only the lesser-valued craft then this communicates a negative message
about Africa and African-heritage children, which the multicultural/antiracist
curriculum aimed to counter.
Art is one of the highest accolades in terms of western thought. I understand
the western term art as derived from the Greek word ‘techne’, which translates as
‘human skill’ in making an object (COD 1976: 52). Therefore, although there may
be no term denoting art in any African language, it seems preposterous to deny
Africa has any skilfully made objects of art (Vogel 1988). African material culture
is often superbly crafted and the makers obviously employ a sophisticated aesthetic
sense in their construction, since a serious attention to the formal relationship

between visual forms is displayed. My experience shows museum visitors can
better appreciate this aesthetic through engaging in creative activity.
My approach to Benin learning programmes in this respect is situated in my
own professional art training, which the contemporary artist Rasheed Araeen
shares. Araeen wants to praise the ‘extraordinary formal qualities’ of African
sculpture, without being accused of ‘reducing them’ to these aspects (Araeen 1993:
165). Araeen does not deny the ritual function of the African works, but sets this
function alongside sponsorship within market economies. Clearly art museums
abound with Western works of art, which have been produced for ritual purposes
and are similarly ripped from their original context in the church, by placing them
in the new location of the art museum.
These issues may be further clarified with reference to western exhibitionary
practice. I select three major exhibitions: from the USA, Canada and the UK to
interrogate the main points.
The Art/artifact Debate and a Seminal Exhibition in the USA
I consider Susan Vogel’s text on the seminal 1988 Art/artifact exhibition at the
Centre for African Art in New York, where she became executive director in 1984,
casts light on these points that remain pertinent today. Vogel’s paper refocuses the
lens of attention in museums towards a more reflexive stance about exhibitionary
practices, which challenges the taken for granted assumption of a ‘neutral’ museum
position. It does this not by presenting an exhibition ‘about African art or Africa’
nor more broadly one entirely about ‘art’, but rather about ‘the ways Western
outsiders have regarded African art and material culture over the past century …
(both literally and metaphorically) …’ (Vogel 1988: 11; 1991: 195). Vogel notes
the importance of the extent to which much of ‘our vision of Africa and African
art has been conditioned by our own culture’, or how the image of African art we
have made a place for in our world ‘has been shaped by us as much as by Africans’
(ibid.).
This ‘shaping’ is demonstrated in the Art/artifact exhibition by showing the
power of the museum’s exhibitionary practices to affect visitor perceptions through
the construction of different environments, such as the art space or the traditional
ethnographic space for the objects in their collections. Ivan Karp emphasises this
point with reference to Art/artifact, where viewers are ‘forced to question’ what
they see and how this is fundamentally affected by the framing of objects within
the museum settings that include the: cabinet of curiosities, natural history, art
museum and gallery (Karp 1991). Vogel herself reinforces Karp stating the aim of
Art/artifact was to ‘empower the visitor to look critically at works of African art
and at the same time to heighten awareness of the degree to which what we see in
African art is a reflection of ourselves’ with the ‘museum as the ‘subject’ (Vogel
1991: 193). Art/artifact is presented over five exhibition spaces or rooms, each
organised according to specific display styles. In one clean ‘white cube’ room a
‘Zande’ fishing net wrapped up for transport is displayed to privilege its formal
qualities with minimal labelling; in a second room of Mijikenda posts displayed
aesthetically as sculptural objects a video showed the installation of a Mijikenda
memorial post with a label pointing to the privileged original audience experience;
in a third ‘curiosity’ type room reconstructed from 1905 man-made and zoological
objects are mixed; a fourth room laid out in a natural history museum style includes
a diorama of the Mijikenda installation, and in the fifth room objects sit behind
plexi glass privileging their art status.
Just as the Art/artifact exhibition displays are clearly not neutral but
communicate values so, Vogel contends, does the whole institution. Not overtly
but in the programming and audiences it addresses, the size and emphasis of
respective staff departments, in object acquisition, selection and location of
objects for display or storage, as well as in lighting and labelling (Vogel 1991:
200). Elaine Heumann Gurian reinforces this point with reference to Stephen
Weil. Weil states that the museum is not ‘a clear and transparent medium through
which only objects transmit messages’ and urges museums not to attempt to
‘purge’ itself of values but to make their values ‘manifest’ and to bring them to the
consciousness of visitors (Heumann Gurian 1991: 189). To raise consciousness or
levels of learning in the visitor, Gurian argues for exhibition makers to embrace
‘theatricality’ and ‘playfulness’, and not to shy away from including the ‘sensual
and emotive’ alongside the ‘intellectual’ to prompt critical thinking in the viewer
(Heumann Gurian 1991: 182-3).
Art/artifact was vital in museum studies and practice for drawing attention
to the historical western gaze and its systems of classification. James Clifford
clarifies this when he speaks of non-western objects categorised by museums
into two major groups ‘as (scientific) cultural artifacts or as (aesthetic) works of
art’ (Clifford 1994: 262). This classification determined an absolute distinction
between what Stuart Hall terms ‘the west and the rest’ – ‘ourselves’ and ‘others’ –
that was made visible with reference to the display of material culture in different
museum displays over time. Clifford importantly points out the movement
between the ‘boundaries of art and science, the aesthetic and the anthropological’
that encompass western categories of ‘the beautiful, the cultural and the authentic’
and further notes the importance of increasing transparency in representing self
and otherness. In other words he calls for greater historical self-consciousness;
or the historical, economic and political processes underpinning the production
of exhibitions of other cultures, to be made a feature of museum display (Clifford
1994: 266). In the last decades of the twentieth century Art/artifact was a landmark
exhibition that went some way to achieving this end, importantly commenting on
the historical differentiation between self and other, ‘superior’ and ‘inferior’ races
(Hallam and Street 2000: 5).
Self and Other/s, Margin and Centre/s
Said’s work on Orientalism – a term describing a whole field of studies and accruing
to it a wide range of meanings and associations – casts light on this ‘self-other’
notion. For example notions of the depraved other in comparison to the European
rational, virtuous, mature, normal self emerged out of the racial clichés of Oriental
despotism and Oriental sensuality, within the academic field of Orientalism.
Museums, as a field of research similarly draw upon a huge body of written texts
including eyewitness accounts from missionaries, colonial administrators; traders
and travellers; anthropological writing; newspapers; novels; poems and films,
which underpin collecting and exhibitionary practices (Said 2003: 40, 203). While
some of these texts may acknowledge the greatness of the other – as a construct
created by the self – the majority of texts mark the other as essentially a sign of
difference and weakness. This served as a force to maintain Western superiority
against the inferior other, or as Pearce states, it ‘keeps the right and proper in place’
(Pearce 2003: 350).
The important point for our discussion of the art/artifact distinction in African
material culture here is the way prestige objects of western and certain Asian
cultures (including India, China and Japan) were designated fine art status and
housed in the art museum while the ethnographic museum housed the other
objects, including the craft or ritual objects of Africa. For educational purposes, if
Africa has no prestigious objects of art the underlying messages seem to be that
the African is a sub-human other, devalued by this limiting classification.
Clearly educators must be aware of regarding the formal properties – the
power of strong line, tone, form, and so on – of African art in isolation from
the rich cultural context past and present. The purely formal interpretation would
reduce the African work to a mere ‘footnote’ in the development of art in the
west and to neglect vital questions of content, such as iconography as well as
intentionality (Karp 1991: 376). It would also present a simple adding-on to the
centre, work from the margins, when a more fundamental reassessment of the
intellectual framework that marginalises and makes ‘other’ seems to be required,
if we are to present a thorough challenge to racism. What I am suggesting is that
human understanding necessarily occurs through our own conventions, our ways
of thinking and imagining that are based in part at least on ways of looking, which
is a circular infinite process. This is not to argue for a universalising notion of art
but rather to highlight points of contact between diverse cultures. As Ivan Karp
notes, to see the other negatively presented as exotic and lacking the rationality of
the west is also to present the other as in some sense the same. In other words, to
see difference we must also see similarity, and then differences that at first appear
great, can be seen as ‘only surface manifestations underlying similarities’ (Karp
1991: 375).
In today’s plural society this points to a vital task for museums – to help
to construct new ideas of ourselves as a nation by mediating the claims to the
representation of diverse groups. Yet it is by no means easy, since we need to
explore ‘this multicultural and intercultural terrain consciously and deliberately,

in spite of the snares that may await’ (Lavine and Karp 1991: 8). Controversy
is a particular snare for museums that aim to speak not only for those powerful
visitors, ones with a vested interest in telling the traditional stories to those who
are less powerful and who may only listen, but to widen participation on the notion
of who can speak, who can listen and why, as I shall demonstrate with an example
from Canada.
The Making of Controversial Exhibitions
In addition to the Primitivism and Art/artifact exhibits we have just considered, the
original proposals for the interpretation of the Enola Gay, which eventually opened
in 1994 at the Smithsonian saw World War II veterans and American-Japanese
heritage peoples clash. At the Royal Academy in London UK in 1997 and later in
New York Sensation also saw conflict between the sensibilities of the conservative
Catholic community and the right to artistic freedom of expression. I shall now
examine what makes an exhibition controversial and cultures clash through one
seminal case from Canada, Into the Heart of Africa curated by Jean Canizzo at
the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) in 1990, which illustrates some key issues.
In my discussion of this case I shall highlight Marlene Nourbese Philip, since
she has commented so pertinently on it from the perspective of the Black ‘other’,
with recommendations to museums striving to avoid future negative conflict. I
shall also refer to Henrietta Reigel’s perceptive remarks on exhibitionary practice,
which are relevant to Philip’s points.
In short a public outcry followed the opening of Into the Heart of Africa at the
ROM, which infamously juxtaposed negative images of Black people with ‘ironic
captions’ taken from missionaries and colonial administrators. The protesting public
considered the use of irony as an exhibitionary device served merely to reinforce
negative stereotypes that are racist, imperialist and thought to be obsolete.
Philip quotes John McNeill, acting director of the ROM at the time, who
deemed the controversy surrounding the exhibition, which led to a number of
museums cancelling the tour, to impinge ‘on the freedoms of all museums to
maintain intellectual honesty, scientific and historical integrity and academic
freedom’ (Philip 1992: 103). She further notes how McNeill’s remark’s are echoed
in the print and electronic media’s overwhelming portrayal of the protesters –
mostly African Canadians – as ‘irrational, emotional and unable to grasp the
irony’, which was the linchpin to a true rational and sophisticated understanding
of the exhibition. Accordingly, to the media and the museum, the protesters – the
Black Others – were at fault.
In contrast, at an individual curatorial and at a wider institutional ROM level,
Philip charges the ROM with a failure to perceive ‘how thoroughly racism permeates
the very underpinnings of Western thought’, despite Cannizzo’s stated wish for the
exhibition to ‘help all Canadians understand the historical roots of racism’, which
she declared in writing to the Toronto Star newspaper (5 June 1990), following
the controversy. Philip highlights how the African Canadians outside the museum
were an integral and indispensable part of the cultural text inside the museum,
since their knowledge of the history of colonialism is intimate and painful. Their
different historical location inevitably determined the alternative reading of the
artifacts ‘as the painful detritus of savage exploration and the attempted genocide
of their people’ by the Black audience. While the ROM viewed its exhibition as
an instance of self-reflexivity, holding up a mirror to its historical practice, the
audience perceived the museum as the cultural arm of the same powers that had
long exploited Africans historically.
Yet the hostile reception of Into the Heart of Africa marked a contrast with the
curator Jean Canizzo’s curatorial aims. Philip welcomed and understands Canizzo’s
aspirations: to study the museum as an artifact, to read curatorial collections
as cultural texts and to discover the life histories of objects, and understand
something of the complexity of cross cultural encounters. For Philip, these goals
highlight the possibility of an interpretive ‘framework’ that might have provoked
‘less adversarial’ responses (Philip 1992: 104). Unfortunately as Philip wryly
comments, Canizzo’s notion of a cross-cultural encounter was only acceptable to
the museum if it maintained the flow of power and knowledge from the museum
as subject centre, out to the object African Canadian peoples at the margins. She
strongly contends the Black Canadians brought different, but not inferior, ways of
knowing to the museum objects, which were linked for them with the ‘ongoing
struggle against white supremacy.’ For Philip, the ROM missed the opportunity to
recognise the oppressive history of the collection and failed to support the ongoing
Black struggle for equality. She regards the major failure in the making of this
exhibition was not working collaboratively, ‘with African Canadian involvement’
from the outset (Philip 1992: 107). It is unfortunate that the ROM did not grasp
the potential to find other ways of looking and settled for a traditional display, but
Philip ends her paper with some challenging suggestions for the ROM to respect
and celebrate Black achievements, in the spirit of Canizzo’s original aims. Firstly
she wonders if the ROM might ‘donate a portion of the proceeds of the gate’
to assist the formation of a permanent African collection, under the aegis of the
ROM but with African Canadian participation. Then she asks if the ROM might
also consider compensating the African Canadian community of Ontario for the
historical theft of their ‘cultural and spiritual patrimony’, by donating and storing
certain pieces on their behalf, to be displayed by the communities on appropriate
occasions (ibid.).
Henrietta Reigel reinforces some of Philip’s points. She also notes the public
objection marked a contrast with Canizzo’s aims: to draw attention to historical
collecting practices underpinning ethnography in Western museums and to
celebrate ‘the rich diversity of African cultural practices and artistic traditions’
(Reigel 1996: 91). For Riegel, a major problem for the ROM lay in a failure to
be specific and critically focused on the actual material on exhibition. Rather the
ROM material appeared to be presented in a neutral and distanced tone that served
to abnegate institutional responsibility. She notes how adopting a critical view

of historical collecting in general, but not ‘critical of the practice of collecting
these objects’, left many visitors with the impression that the Rom lacked self-
reflexivity on the socio-political processes and the constructs that underpinned the
display and were rooted in the history of the institution.
Overall Riegel seems to take a less radical position than Philip, one that might
maintain a hierarchical position for the curatorial authority of the museum over
a rather passive audience. Specifically, Riegel speaks of the exhibitor’s role to
mediate and translate objects in ethnographic collections – distanced geographically
and temporarily from originating communities and contemporary audiences – into
meaningful frameworks to promote visitor’s understanding in the present day and
notes this distance may be reproduced by the museum ‘through rhetorical, stylistic
and linguistic strategies’, as indeed we saw at ROM (Reigel 1996: 88). She draws
on the ROM case to ponder whether visitors will give the ‘same signifying weight
to images and written texts’ arguing that many visitors ‘read a very few of the text
panels and labels’, a point which visitor research calls into question (Reigel 1996:
93).
Visitors Reading Text and Image
Hirschi and Schriven in the USA demonstrated that question enhanced text panels,
well located, promote reading activity in family groups (Hirschi and Schriven
1996). They note the importance of active reading by visitors to inform them on
matters of difference and similarity, between Chinese and Japanese Asian peoples
for example. Their work reinforces Paulette Macmanus’s research in the Natural
History Museum UK that family groups tend to designate a ‘reader’ who addresses
the text conversationally, with the purpose of progressing social interaction as
much as to gain knowledge of the exhibit (Macmanus 1996).
Roger Simon and Lynn Teather cast light on this matter with respect to shocking
images of racially motivated torture and murder in the USA, specifically into
visitor reactions to the Without Sanctuary exhibition of James Allen’s collection
of photographs and postcards. Allen’s collection depicts the lynching of Black
people from the mid nineteenth century to the 1960s with some cards showing the
lynching as a spectacle being watched by white family groups, including children.
The images can be accessed at a dedicated website where Allen introduces them
with the following words.
Without Sanctuary is a photo document of proof, an unearthing of crimes, of

collective mass murder, of mass memory graves excavated from the American
conscience. Part postal cards, common as dirt, souvenirs skin-thin and
fresh-tatooed proud, the trade cards of those assisting at ritual racial killings
and other acts of a mad citizenry. The communities’ best citizens lurking
just outside the frame. Destined to decay, these few survivors of an original
photo population of many thousands, turn the living into pillars of salt. (Allen
<http://www.withoutsanctuary.org/> accessed on 11.12.2008)
Simon and Teather’s visitor research team are examining visitor responses at
two contrasting exhibitions: the Andy Warhol Museum where the terrible images
were largely permitted to ‘speak for themselves’ with little interpretive text and
the Chicago Historical Society where the stories of selected lynched individuals
were explained in detailed yet easy to read text panels. Their evaluation research
of the visitor comments books casts interesting light on the value of contextual
information. It shows the Warhol visitors would appear to be more emotionally
moved, according to their comments that were written in greater depth on this
feeling aspect, than the Chicago visitors. We await the publication of Simon
and Teather’s report findings, since a number of factors could account for these
different responses including socio-economic grouping, political persuasion, types
and levels of education. At present a definitive case cannot be made for or against
interpretive text colouring visitor perception and informing their understanding.
We will return to the active visitor reading and re-writing the museum text
and display in Chapter 2, but let me offer one final example in the discussion of
African art here. I return us to the UK.
Africa: Art of a Continent, UK
A major focus of the Africa: Art of a Continent exhibition at the Royal Academy
London was on ‘authentic’ objects of art deriving from pre-colonial times,
which had a tendency to ‘fix’ cultures in a ‘tribal’ timeless past. This approach
was premised on Vogel’s notion stated earlier that objects of art hold a power to
communicate ‘aesthetically’ across time and space. What is required is a sensitive
observer, skilled in visual literacy; one who is able to respond to the objects of art
emotionally and intuitively, irrespective of any prior knowledge of the cultural
context, which may actually impede such access to the work in her opinion (Vogel
1988: 136-7). Perhaps it may be questioned whether the emphasis on visual literacy
here is inclusive towards non-literate visitors, or whether this approach may serve
to exclude the less knowledgeable. For example, we might note that Africa does not
recognise the art/craft, high/low dichotomy that is central to western aesthetics, and
which has resulted in the neglect of objects such as ceramics, basketry, furniture
and textiles in the western art museum. Moreover this western distinction has
served to denigrate the status of the African maker in comparison with the western
one, ‘recognising their manual dexterity but implying that they lack the capacity
for creative, intellectual endeavour’ (Court 1999: 150).
Here we return again to the self-other binary and the argument that the high
status of the artist has too long been reserved for the western, usually male, genius,
as Philip contends (Philip 1992: 94-97). There is considerable support for Philip’s
questioning of Picasso’s ‘discovery’ of African art at the Trocadero in 1907 by
pointing to the clear links between the formal qualities of ‘Les demoiselles d’
Avignon’ and the Nok heads on display there. Court for one echoes Philip’s
observation that the notion of the ‘primitive’ sub-Saharan central and west African
arts as having more ‘direct’ and ‘elemental’ expressive qualities of fundamental
‘human emotions’, reinforces the link with African people and nature and the body
as opposed to the mind, which I shall examine with reference to a Royal Academy
(RA) exhibition in London UK (Court 1999: 152).
Africa: Art of a Continent at the RA was the major exhibition of ‘Africa 95’ –
a season of national events held in museums across the country showcasing
the extraordinary achievement of Africa and African heritage peoples past and
present. The RA exhibition was curated by Tom Philips who took a geographical
and temporal approach to the display of more than 800 exquisite objects, selected
for their merit as art according to western criteria and in a manner reflecting the
western artist-genius, which remains contentious. The range included an Egyptian
sculpture of a ‘female torso, probably Queen Nefertiti’ carved in quartzite c. 1352-
1345 BC (Russmann 1995: 84); Sudanese ‘Kardaru’ stem pots made from animal
dung, painted with earth pigments and air dried for a girl’s trousseau (Mack 1995:
135); ‘engraved ostrich eggshell flasks’ made by San peoples of South Africa
(Davidson 1995: 192-3); ‘Nkisi nkondi’ power nail figures from Kongo (Biebuyck
and Herreman 1995: 246-245); ‘Head of a queen mother from Benin’ Nigeria
(Picton 1995: 395) and ‘folios from a Quran manuscript’ Tunisia (Insoll et al.
1995: 561).
Objects were gathered for display under seven cultural groupings and the
visitor route led geographically from Ancient Egypt and Nubia, East, South,
Central, West and North Africa. Material culture from Central Africa was located
in a spacious gallery in the middle of the visitor route, which as Court observed
permitted reflection on the ‘canonical forms’ of art from Africa, including ‘power
figures (fetishes) and masks’ (Court 1999: 161). Throughout the galleries, not just
in the rooms displaying colourful textiles as conservation-minded visitors expect,
the rooms were subject to very low levels of light with key objects spot-lit, which
echoed late nineteenth century notions of the ‘dark continent’ for some critics,
including myself.
A question that arises here concerns the power and control of representation,
whether it may be possible to restructure the western aesthetic canon, which is
rooted in the visual as well as discredited racist ideas and values, to permit more
diverse pathways of connecting visitors with African art and African people,
perhaps through more multisensory engagement to promote embodied knowledge
that I consider in Section 3. Linked questions and criticism of Africa: Art of a
Continent concern the privileged referencing of named western modernist artists
against the nameless African makers. Kobena Mercer’s comment on a five-seated
stool from the Ngombe area of Zaire, which was displayed vertically to resemble
Brancusi’s Endless Column sculpture clarifies this objection to the museum
environment where African objects are appropriated for purely aesthetic qualities,
since this exhibitionary approach can erase the complex historical relationships of
power (Court 1999: 163; Biebuyck and Herreman 1996: 307).
Yet it is precisely the aesthetic approach – revaluing what is counted as
the beautiful – that other critics praise. Andrew Graham-Dixon celebrates the
exhibition for breaking with colonialist attitudes to demonstrate ‘that it will no
longer quite do to consign such art to the wunderkammer [cabinet of wonders or
curiosities] or marked ‘Primitive’ or ‘tribal’ (Court 1999: 163). Interestingly the
exhibition catalogue provides literate visitors with broader and deeper knowledge,
which notes how the original function of the Ngombe stool is unclear, but was
possibly used by the warrior society as a means of symbolically linking them to a
common case, or for judges to sit on and hear the pleas of the accused.
The catalogue accompanying the exhibition is visually striking and substantial
at 612 pages and has contributions from Africanists with many decades of
experience in the continent as well as a small number of African-heritage scholars.
Some commentators do not find this imbalance problematic. As Eki Gbinigie stated
‘The fact that you may not be from a particular culture does not mean that you
cannot understand and appreciate something as deeply as somebody who is from
that culture’ (quoted in Shelton 2000: 19). Furthermore the seemingly easy option
of assigning a member of a particular cultural group as spokesperson for the whole
community clearly presents an impossible task; one fraught with another set of
problems, not least those revolving around issues of tokenism. It is also noticeable
the extent to which African heritage and other scholars comment on colonialism
and the politics of display, including Cornel West and Patricia Davidson (West
1995: 9; Davidson 1995: 185).
I agree with Gbinigie’s point – we are not trapped in sealed worlds where
intercultural exchange and understanding would be impossible – yet as an
educator, I am aware of the need to bear in mind the oppressive colonial histories
and the continuing negative legacy. Additionally, it seems vital here, to recognise
Kwame Anthony Appiah’s emphasis on the overriding effect of global capitalism
and the art market. Appiah notes the power to speak, write and represent lies to
a large extent with the buyer located at the centre of the western economy. He
cites the wealthy David Rockefeller, purchaser of traditional and contemporary
African art, as illustration. Rockefeller is able to link ‘considerations of finance,
aesthetics, and décor’ in appraising his art on display; while his sponsored artist,
for example Lela Kouakou the economically ‘poor African’ maker, who ‘dwells
at the margins’ here is merely a silent commodity or informant for the powerful
purchaser (Appiah 1996: 56-57).
To sum up the criticism, Africa: Art of a Continent was felt to totalise Africa
representing it as a fixed and homogeneous entity, which was exacerbated by the
exclusively historical focus and failure to address the African and Diaspora artists
of today. This was felt to result in othering that was again amplified by a lack of
African curatorial voice (Court 1999: 170). While there is undoubted truth in these
views it must be admitted that it was the Africa 95 programme as a whole that was
intended to serve this wider remit and which did so effectively in certain respects.
For example at the Whitechapel Art Gallery Seven Stories about Modern Art
presented a challenge to the notion of African Art as forever fixed and traditional
by offering a series of diverse views informed by the concerns of contemporary
artists themselves. Taken as a whole there was some multivocality in this Africa 95
exhibition with 60 artists represented and 23,000 visitors, and my research team
of Horniman teacher-collaborators made some productive study trips with their
school pupils to challenge the equation of Blackness with ugliness and to revalue
western categories of the beautiful in the context of African art and in relation to
historico-political processes (Golding 2000).
I shall return to this self-other theme when I explore the potential of imaginative
learning communities for resistance, for subverting and inverting the traditional
museum narrative and the spatial politics of the museum in Chapter 2. First to
conclude this chapter, let us define the boundaries of Blackness as a political
category that might inspire unity in diversity.
Conclusion: Blackness, Science, Race and

Physical/Socio-political Boundaries
When Sander Gilman poses the question ‘are Jews white’ he traces the growth of
ethnological and ‘scientific’ literature of the mid nineteenth century highlighting
the ‘swarthy’ or ‘black yelllow’ skin, and the ‘Hawknose’ of the ‘bastard’ and
‘ugly’ Jewish race. Gilman provides us with some particularly horrid comments,
from the ‘liberal’ Bavarian writer Johan Pezzl, who wrote of Jewish ‘filth …
stench, disgust, poverty, dishonesty, pushiness’ and their status as ‘supposed human
beings’ who seemed ‘closer to the Orang-Utang’ in the 1780s (Gilman 2000: 231).
Gilman also cites Robert Knox who lists a ‘whole physiognomy of the Jew’ not
simply skin colour ‘which is like that of the black African’, effectively ‘removing
him from certain other races’ (Gilman 2000: 230-232). Knox’s 1850 Races of Man
fixed biologically distinct racial types in a hierarchical order and attached each
with corresponding moral and intellectual qualities, so that Anglo Saxons were
the most developed and highest, with Celts, Gypsies, Jews, African and finally
Aboriginal Australians at the lowest rungs of the evolutionary ladder (Solomos
and Back 1996: 43). Methods of measurement, external, moral and intellectual,
which were a key concern of nineteenth century ‘scientists’, return to prominence
a century later in the context of Nazi rule 1933-1945. Again the ‘racial’ nature of
the German nation state stemmed from a variety of imagined factors and shaped
the articulations of anti-Semitism and racism, such as the uprootedness of the
cosmopolitan Jews versus rootedness of the Volk.
This is a vast field of scholarship, which has been admirably addressed
elsewhere. Perhaps what needs to be stressed here is that Anti-Semitism in Nazi
Germany can be seen as part of an attempt to construct a racially pure society where
the stereotype outsiders, Jews, gypsies and blacks joined ‘others’, the ‘abnormal,
insane, homosexuals and criminals (Solomos and Back 1996; Young 2001). I want
to make two points here. Firstly to note for socially conscious museum studies and
museum learning the wide groupings of ‘others’, subsumed under the derogatory
label of ‘Blackness’ in the historical literature. This illuminates racism in the
world today where gypsies are widely referred to as ‘black’ in Eastern European
institutions including the museum.
Secondly, while ‘Blackness’ is a category that has been used historically to
oppress the ‘other’, contrariwise more recently it has been employed to unite
diverse groups politically in a struggle for equality and social justice during the
second half of the twentieth century. For example the Southall Black Sisters Co-
Operative in London UK, united Asian women with African Caribbean women
in social and political action. Perhaps most notably in the 1960s the Black Power
movement in the USA critically addressed overt and covert racism. Their attention
to the dynamics of language and meaning pointed to the possibilities of subverting
negative meanings, specifically by inverting the equation Blackness equals
ugliness in the slogan ‘Black is beautiful’. Similarly in the twenty-first century
Gobineau’s conception of humanity hierarchically ‘divided’ into three races white,
yellow and black is inverted in the Black Body Research network that I belong
to, notably our united publication I Am Black, White, Yellow (Anim-Addo and
Scafe (eds) 2007; <http://www.goldsmiths.ac.uk/blackbodyineurope/about.php>
accessed on 30.11.2007).
It is to collaborative programming with Anim-Addo and the Caribbean Women
Writers Alliance (CWWA) – an earlier research network – that I turn to in the next
chapter. Specifically in Chapter 2, I shall outline collaborative ways of working
with notions of spatial politics to challenge racism in the museum.
Chapter 2
Space: The Museum and the New Spatial
Politics of the Frontiers
Introduction
Marlene Nourbese Philip has written extensively on spatial politics. In the historical
context of the museum she comments:
As I wandered throughout this museum, I recognised many of the displays –

these silences were mine as much as they had belonged to the people they had
been taken from.
“Return them,” I demanded of the proprietors. “You must return these silences
to their owners. Without their silence these people are less than whole” … It
had been theft originally, I continued, now it was nothing but “intimidation!” …
It was mine – ours – I challenged, to do with as we pleased – to destroy if we
wanted. They told me the silences were best kept where they could be labelled,
annotated, dated and catalogued …
It was one of the world’s wonders, they told me, this Museum of Silence – never
had so much silence been gathered together under one roof, and they were proud
of it. (Philip 1998: 136-7)
In this chapter I shall outline my long-term collaborative research with the

Caribbean Women Writer’s Alliance (CWWA) at the frontiers of the Horniman
Museum in London. This alliance, which continues within the Black Body research
network, aimed to break the museum ‘silence’ CWWA member Philip alludes to
above (<http://www.goldsmiths.ac.uk/blackbodyineurope/about.php> accessed on
10.01.2009).
The collaboration I discuss here arises from what Fanon describes as ‘bottom
up’ impetus – my own, from a position (Head of Formal Education) outside of the
senior management team staff structure together with a small local community
group from outside of the museum – rather than the ‘top down’ approaches, which
characterised the exhibitions considered in Chapter 1. CWWA collaboration is
shared as an example of a European museum touching on issues of ownership and
cultural heritage, notably the raising of new voices and visibilities in the museum,
in ways that echo the concerns of indigenous communities in North America,
Canada, Australia and New Zealand, for example, that have positively impacted
on contemporary practice of ‘decolonisation’ around the world in the last decades

of the twentieth century. As Fanon states:
Decolonisation is always a violent phenomenon. … Its usual importance is that

it constitutes, from the very first day, the minimum demands of the colonized. To
tell the truth, the proof of success lies in a whole social structure being changed
from the bottom up. The extraordinary importance of this change is that it is
willed, called for, demanded. The need for this change exists in its crude state,
impetuous and compelling, in the consciousness and in the lives of the men
and women who are colonized. But the possibility of this change is equally
experienced in the form of a terrifying future in the consciousness of another
‘species’ of men and women: the colonisers. (Fanon 1990: 29)
I will draw on examples of CWWA collaboration to elucidate how museum

knowledge and professionalism, if respectfully and sensitively balanced with
migrant voices and narratives, can facilitate a new political space of enunciation,
which involves the museum in dealing with contentious issues, such as colonialism
and its negative legacy, yet positively (Hall 1994). To paraphrase Fanon, I shall
outline a ‘decolonisation’ of the traditional museum space, which is neither a
‘violent phenomenon’ nor points to a ‘terrifying future’ for the museum or the
community group but rather, to brighter and broader ‘horizons’ for both (Gadamer
1980). The opening poetic extract taken from a CWWA workshop organised by
the Canadian woman of African Caribbean heritage, Marlene Nourbese Philip
exemplifies this view and highlights the vital role of creativity in building new
feminist-hermeneutic theory.
In short I contend that while voices such as Philip’s are certainly challenging
for the traditional cultural authority of the museum, in my experience the benefits
of working within a ‘collaborative paradigm’ proves helpful to the museum
promoting intercultural exchange and ‘community cohesion’, which far outweigh
any disadvantages (Philips 2003; Home Office 2001). The chapter aims to
show that collaboration brings clarity of thought, especially in terms of ethical
considerations about power-knowledge relationships at the museum frontiers for
all parties at the local level, with repercussions that extend to the global.
The chapter is subdivided into sections. First I offer some background
information on CWWA. Then I expand theoretically upon the borderlands or
‘frontier’ methodology, informed by feminist-hermeneutics that was developed
together with CWWA. Next, two collaborative programmes: Re-writing the
Museum and Emancipation Day will serve to highlight the ways in which our
praxis resonates in the third or ‘liminal’ museum spaces of ‘enunciation’ within
diaspora and hybridity theory, as well as the social constructivism that is more
established in the context of museum learning (Bhabha 1994; Hall 1994, 1996;
Said 1985, 1993; Silverman 1995; Hein 1998; Falk and Dierking 2000). A most
important point of this programming lies in privileging new ‘standpoint’ texts and
‘situated’ knowledges from Black theorists, who may also be poets, to transform
Space: The Museum and the New Spatial Politics of the Frontiers 43
the museum space from temple of high cultural worship into a democratic forum
space of freedom (Hill-Collins 1991; Harraway 1991).
My argument draws attention to the complexity of the issues considered in
the UK context including the importance of museums: working with insider
and outsider readings or interpretations, prompting diverse multi-sensory ways
of knowing and seeing, and facilitating empathetic understandings in audiences.
This UK research flags up the interconnection between the individual and the
collective, as well as the dynamic nature of the boundaries of social group and this
is reinforced from a global perspective with collaborative examples from American
Plantation Museums in the USA (Eichstedt and Small 2002; Gable 1999).
Overall this chapter highlights the importance of museums addressing difficult
issues such as historical enslavement, dealing positively with the contemporary
legacy of racism and breaking out of limiting stereotypical moulds both the
‘dingy’ (Trevelyan 1991) museum and the Black woman as ‘sexual siren’ (Anim-
Addo 1998: 102) entrapping the white man in her ‘goatish embraces’ (Long 1774:
260). At the end of the chapter, I reflect on the nature of collaborative research
considered and draw some concluding remarks on the strengths and weaknesses
of this effort.
Let me begin by providing some brief notes on the CWWA community group –
their particular histories and experiences that directed collaborative museum work.
Then I shall outline the theoretical perspective, which directed our actual practice
at the museum frontiers.
CWWA: Background Information and Collaborative Theory-building
Dr Joan Anim-Addo, who was born in Grenada, is Director of the Centre for
Caribbean Studies (CCS), founder of CWWA, and a Senior Lecturer at Goldsmiths
College University of London. Anim-Addo’s extensive writing includes poetry,
history, literary criticism and drama (Anim-Addo 1998, 1999, 2007, 2008).
At the time of Horniman collaboration in the mid 1990s there were more than
160 international members of CWWA with ages ranging from teenagers to elders.
I was a founder member and a large proportion of our local members were teachers
or lecturers who subsequently attended, and/or collaborated with me on organising
museum In-service Training of Teachers (INSET), as well as on the organisation
of educational museum-school projects and museum visits for their pupils.
However, we should note here at the outset the multiple subject position of
CWWA members, which impacted upon collaborative practice. In addition to
their professional lives, CWWA members may be: sisters, mothers, grandmothers,
daughters, friends etc., with extended family members including those on holiday
from other countries visiting the museum at weekends. Additionally, perhaps most
importantly, class allegiances were vitally seen to overlap with gender and ethnic
loyalties for the group and indeed for myself – a disabled woman with dyslexia
(but not severe), of mixed race (but who usually ‘passes’ for white and whose
English speaking ability is often praised by strangers), born into and living for the
first 18 years of my life in economic poverty. It is also pertinent to note that the
features listed as defining CWWA members need not fix individuals essentially in
subject positions. From a feminist-hermeneutic perspective, deprived backgrounds
do not necessarily limit what Gadamer terms our ‘horizons’ as my own undeniably
middle-class position today exemplifies.
Let us listen to Gadamer on ‘tradition’ and the ‘nation state’, which are topics
that have been exercising the British government’s articulation of ‘Britishness’
following the bombings on the London transport system on 7 July 2005, by our
own ‘home grown’ terrorists from the north of the country (Brown 2006). Gadamer
states:
My thesis is … that the thing which hermeneutics teaches us is to see through

the dogmatism of asserting an opposition and separation between the ongoing,
natural “tradition” and the reflective appropriation of it. … the historian … is
so little separated from the ongoing traditions (for example, those of his nation)
that he is really himself engaged in … he belongs to the nation. (Gadamer [trans
Linge] 1977: 28)
It is important to state here that these words are not advocating a relativist notion of
truth. Gadamer vitally challenges the persistent dualism of Enlightenment thought
as well as contemporary relativism and a lazy ‘anything goes’ postmodernism. He
interestingly saves us from relativism with the ‘concept of play’, which refers to
the serious language games humans the world over engage in. He notes:
The way in which the weight of the things we encounter in understanding

disposes itself is itself a linguistic event, a game with words playing around
and about what is meant. … when we understand a text … we are drawn into an
event of truth. (Gadamer 1981: 446)
My research partner Joan Anim-Addo and members of CWWA have been inspired
by Gadamer’s concept of the ‘reflective appropriation’ of history and the ‘play’
of language, which is a ‘discipline of questioning and research … that guarantees
truth’ (Gadamer 1981: 447). On behalf of the museum I established an open and
trustful research dialogue with CWWA members from the earliest days of meeting,
which centred on sharing of personal histories and complex subject positionings
in dialogue or conversation, the ‘living speech’ of language (Gadamer 1981:
331, 432). The oral – the live voice – is vital to the success of the philosophical
hermeneutic dialogue, which respectfully engages one human with another or
with a work of art. This is an infinitely enriching process leading to renewed
knowledge and understanding on particular topics. The process in dealing with
complex human themes is never finally completed like a trivial chitchat exchange
at the shops, but rather adjourned for us to pick up reflexively again and again, like
deeper human conversations.
Now let us ground and clarify these ideas, which can appear rather abstract and
difficult, with reference to the politics of representation at Horniman. I turn to one
example of spatial politics considered with CWWA at Horniman, which proved
fruitful for praxis.
The Frontier or Borderline Museum Space and ‘The Races of Man’ Displays
While human societies are rarely static but rather marked by generations of
movement and mixing that mark CWWA membership, we may still observe a
fixing of the natural landscape and social organisation in traditional ethnographic
‘reconstructions’ or interpretive panels located in natural history museums around
the world today, as Monique Scott has recently demonstrated (Scott 2007). In the
North Hall housing the Horniman Natural History Collection, tucked away at one
edge of the gallery in a narrow space made corridor-like by the original mahogany
cases c. 1901, there are a series of displays including dogs’ heads showing diverse
canine types, and a collection of skeletons with physical characteristics showing
the ‘development’ from ape to human types over the ages. Near the skeletons
there is a panel entitled ‘The Races of Man’ [sic] which is reproduced at Plate 6
This panel shows a map of the world overlaid with a thick black cross and portrait
photographs representative of physical ‘types’, arising from specific regions.
Some types smile, some do not. No types are allowed a voice. They exemplify
the silent objects of western study. The ‘Races’ panel gives the impression of the
world without movement and mixture. It is a fantasy neutral grid. One that rigidly
divides the world space and peoples as fixed into four distinct quartiles where pure
origins remain, forever, just as the nearby cases of natural history specimen fix the
animal kingdom and demonstrate hierarchies of power and control.
The Horniman ‘Races’ panel and the skeletons that reinforced the ideas
underpinning the display that linger from the curatorship of Watkins and Haddon
in the early twentieth century are of interest for other museums with similarly
antiquated exhibitions and lack of funds. Exhibits like these can inspire creative
new voices, as evident in the extract from Marlene Nourbese Philip’s ‘Museum of
Silence’ that foregrounds this chapter and which arose out of a creative workshop
intervention into the North Hall Gallery space. Her imaginative text gives voice
to the silent ‘types’ on display that exemplify the silent objects of traditional
western museum study and authorship. Similarly, Philip’s poetic text raises the
visibilities of the originating communities whose material culture was part of a
‘concise display’ of anthropology, taking up one third of the floor space at the
end of the Natural History Gallery, at the time of collaboration. It was decided
that this temporary display arrangement – mixing Natural History and Material
Culture – was necessary while the Anthropology Gallery was being refurbished or
the entire collection would have been put in store, although the Museum struggled
long and hard with the underlying mixed messages that this exhibitionary practice
was reminiscent of. Namely, certain non-western peoples are ‘primitive’, closer to
nature and the lower animal kingdom, which is evident in the physical closeness
of the display cases. This point echoes our discussion of the art/artifact debate in
Chapter 1.
Plate 6 The ‘Races of Man’ display at the Horniman Museum, 2008

Source: Author.
Nevertheless working with Philip and CWWA in this, by no means ideal space, the
value of the edge and the border came to the surface. The notion of ‘borderlands’
was considered literally in the tight viewing space between the display cases as
well as the ‘Races’ panel, as a ‘narrow strip along steep edges’ (Anzaldua 1987: 3).
Physically space was extremely narrow in this part of the museum as the children’s
bodies crowded around their drawing boards at Plate 7 shows. Moreover this
compact visitor space was mirrored in the space of the display cases, packed
tightly with wonderful material culture in traditional ethnographic fashion, but
with little contextual information. The barest labels such as ‘Afo Maternity figure,
wood, Nigeria c. 1900’ stated the largely obvious and failed to account for CWWA
lives as intellectual border crossers (Giroux and McLaren 1994).
Plate 7 Drawing in the narrow space between cases in the

North Hall Gallery, 1999
Source: David Forster.
On the other hand, the border here became a bridge, a space of movement,
reinvention and re-articulation. As Fanon notes, helpfully for CWWA praxis,
museum frontier collaboration demands ‘introducing invention into existence
… going beyond the historical, instrumental hypothesis’ to initiate a ‘cycle of
freedom’, through negotiation of physical and metaphorical boundaries. Fanon
elucidates this freedom at the borderlands as new subjects rejecting ‘thingness’ to
assertively reinvent the self, through enunciation and re-articulation of selfhood
against the ‘primitive’ stereotype that lingers in the twenty-first century. Fanon
further illuminates the individual struggle for selfhood as a ‘battle for the creation
of a human world – that is, of a world of reciprocal recognitions’ – for the museum
and the community group (Fanon 1993: 218). Here Fanon articulates a human
project of negotiation in which the restrictive stereotypical boundaries – the
physical and metaphorical borders – can be traversed in a leap of invention and
travelling through a world, ‘endlessly creating’ the self (ibid. 229).
This optimistic stance is not to ignore the danger of the borderlands. The frontiers
may provoke a fear of contact with the ‘other’ – out there in the untamed territories –
for both Black and white people. I shall turn to address this issue next.
Fear and Travelling Theory
Black thought has illuminated ideas of racism in the white and the Black imagination,
where whiteness is equated with normality and goodness, while Blackness is
associated with abnormality and evil. Fanon hearing the words ‘Mama, see the
Negro! I’m frightened’ uttered by a small boy on the Paris train feels the weight
of racist history inside his body (Fanon 1993: 112). He is led to reject his skin, his
history and wears the white mask of normality to survive the othering of the gaze
that fixes him in a distant location, both geographically and socio-historically, the
land of the ‘tom-toms’ and ‘cannibalism’ as he comments.
Stuart Hall points out that simply reversing the equation and replacing the old
bad Black object with the new good Black subject will not suffice to remove the
fear of difference and bell hooks considers these issues from a Black woman’s
perspective. She notes the ‘deep emotional investment in the myth of ‘sameness’
that white people hold and further contends that on the contrary ‘whiteness’ is
‘often ‘connected with the mysterious, the strange, and the terrible’ in the Black
imagination’ (hooks 1992: 166-7). She connects this fear of whiteness with the
need to be ‘safe’ in white supremacist society, an important point we shall return to,
and as ‘a response to the traumatic pain and anguish that remains as a consequence
of white racist domination’ (hooks 1992: 169).
This focus on the lived experience of Black people in general and women
in particular has important lessons to teach us in terms of museum theory. It
points to the need for becoming sensitive to barriers for participation that prevent
inclusive learning in the museum. For example hooks counters Clifford’s notion
of travelling theory, which conjures up ‘rites of passage, immigration, forced
migration, relocation, enslavement and homelessness’ in the Black imagination
(Clifford 1997; hooks 1992). In the USA she further states:
Travel is not a word that can be easily evoked to talk about the Middle Passage,
the Trail of Tears, the landing of Chinese immigrants, the forced relocation
of Japanese-Americans, or the plight of the homeless. Theorising diverse
journeying is crucial to our understanding of any politics of location. … To

travel, I must always move through fear, confront terror. (hooks 1992: 173-174)
[my emphasis]
In the location of the museum, there is a responsibility to assist visitors in this

movement through fear, which involves the tasks of examination and deconstruction.
This is a task in language, of naming to ‘both name racism’s impact and help
break its hold’, which may ‘decolonise our minds and our imaginations’ (hooks
1992: 178). For museum practice this is also a spatial task, which interrogates
the frontier between similarity and difference that Charles Taylor has examined.
CWWA widely concur with his recent criticisms of supposedly neutral ‘difference-
blind’ principles, which are ‘in fact a reflection of one hegemonic culture’ (Taylor
1994: 43).
Taylor further argues that dominant cultures actually suppress differences in
the notion of ‘blindness’ and force minority groups to take an ‘alien’ form. He
calls for an active ‘politics’ which recognises and respects both the differences
and the similarities amongst all members. Ultimately Taylor recommends
Gadamer’s concept of the ‘fusion of horizons’ as a way of learning to live in a
broader framework and making ‘real judgments of worth’. He notes how we may
be ‘transformed by the study of the other, so that we are not simply judging by our
original familiar standards’ and he distinguishes this approach from condescending
and ethnocentric ‘favourable judgment made premature’ that ‘praise the other for
being like us (Taylor 1994: 70-71). Taylor’s complex and detailed essay highlights
Gadamer’s point that the individual is perpetually transformed through dialogical
experiences of ‘play’ with the ‘other’, and in the subsequent chapters this point is
emphasised. A view is taken which is averse to any ‘fixing’ images of the ‘other’
in opposition to ‘ourselves’ that ‘ethnographic encounters’ in traditional museums
present, and which the research teams’ collaborative work contests.
The important notion to stress at this point is that the museum frontier marks
a boundary that is also a site of transformation. As Homi Bhabha observes a
boundary is not the point at which something stops but ‘from which something
begins its presencing’ a space of ‘creative intervention’ (Bhabha 1994: 5, 9). It
is at the museum frontiers that fixed imperialist and colonialist notions of purity
seen in the ‘Races’ panel can give way and the museum space becomes a place
for diverse CWWA voices to speak from. Even here – at a site that appears full of
incommensurable contradictions – the notion of the museum frontiers can offer a
third space within which people inside and outside of the museum can speak of
survival, resistance, become ‘politically active and change’ our limited views of
each other, in coming to explore and challenge the traditional politics of display
(Bhabha 1995: 67).
There are clear similarities between our use of the term frontiers with James
Clifford and Mary Louise Pratt’s notion of museum ‘contact zones’, which it may
be helpful to consider here as it also highlights spatial politics. The contact zone
accounts for histories of colonial ‘encounter’ and ongoing relations ‘involving
conditions of coercion, radical inequality and intractable conflict … radically

asymmetrical relations of power’ and Clifford employs it to view the museum
space as an ongoing site of exclusion and struggle but also of political negotiation
(Pratt in Clifford 1999: 438). My own and CWWA preference is for the term
frontiers. Although both concepts privilege and foreground marginal in-between
spaces to disrupt the notion of the museum as established centre, we consider
frontiers more accurately describes the necessity of the ‘other’s’ agency, as well
as more fully accounting for the danger, risk and fear of otherness involved for
all parties in stepping outside of traditional comfort zones. It is to the notion of
agency that I turn to next with reference to one example of collaborative CWWA
project work.
Agency: Black Women Re-writing the Museum
Anim-Addo originally conceived the Alliance to embrace mainly, but not

exclusively, Black women, to facilitate a movement into agency – self-
representation and new forms of writing – by peoples whose voices were
regarded as misrepresented, marginalised or silenced by hierarchies of power in
the established academies, including the museum. As Toni Morrison points out
Playing in the Dark ‘is not about a particular author’s attitude toward race’ but a
project that marks ‘an effort to avert the critical gaze from the racial object to the
racial subject; from the described and imagined to the describers and imaginers;
from the serving to the served’ (Morrison 1992: 90). These words echo in the
history of the ethnography museum, and Anim-Addo organised a series of ‘re-
writing the museum’ workshops to raise Caribbean women’s voices, which after a
two-year period were satisfactorily marked by the publication, Another Doorway
Visible in the Museum (Anim-Addo 1999).
Anim-Addo concisely describes the purpose of the re-writing the museum
project, ‘to insert a hitherto largely absent presence, that of the Black woman’s,
into the museum context’ (Anim-Addo 1998a: 93). Anim-Addo also highlights
the multiple resistances and refusals to be mute objects of the western and male
gaze in the re-writing. In collaborative museum practice the women vitally
asserted themselves as subjects determined to break the historical silencing of
their voices.
As Donna Haraway observes a ‘special significance’ is attached to writing ‘for
all colonised groups’, since it ‘has been crucial to the Western myth of distinction
between oral and written cultures, primitive and civilised mentalities’ (Haraway
1991: 175). Harraway further notes from a feminist perspective the importance
of writing as a vital means of disrupting the notion of the traditional centre by,
‘attacking the phallogocentrism of the West, with its worship of the monotheistic,
phallic, authoritative, and singular work, the unique and perfect name’ (Haraway
1991: 175).
Another Doorway Visible in the Museum points to the UK today as vitally

pluralistic, composed of Diaspora cultures, which bring many centres of pluri-
vocality into the heart of western philosophy, to enrich thought and theoretically-
grounded museum praxis. Successful collaboration with CWWA was seen to
enhance the museum by resisting the demand or desire for ‘perfect communication’
in favour of ‘a powerful infidel heteroglossia’, which is more akin to ‘a feminist
speaking in tongues’ (Haraway 1991: 181). Anim-Addo explains how this might
be achieved by stressing she is not advocating ‘an either/or interpretive situation’ –
the Black women’s or the usually white male ethnographer’s – but rather posing
the exciting possibility of a museum audience accessing ‘alternative or even
competing interpretations’ (Anim-Addo 1999: 96). She also emphasises the
necessity of ironic reading of the museum as cultural text when confronted with
a collection in which the Black woman recognises aspects of herself despite the
exotic ‘othering’ of the traditional ethnographic framing and stereotyping.
Anim-Addo notes ‘One space where the Black woman is unquestionably
configured, is as a maternity figure’, so fecund she suckles one adult child at her
breast while nurturing two others at her back. The powerful maternity figures of
women, notably one simply labelled ‘Afo maternity figure, wood’ at the time of
the re-writing workshops and reproduced at Plate 8 served as an inspiration for
much creative re-writing. Further research in the Horniman Library informed
our CWWA group that men traditionally used the figure as part of a prayer ‘for
fertility in their wives’ and subsequent investigations suggest the figure is from
the Eloi and not the Afo peoples (Picton 1995: 368). I had previously regarded
this figure simply as a strong powerful woman with a rather innocuous label cited
earlier, but the object triggered more complex responses in Anim-Addo and the
terms ‘fertility’ and ‘maternity’ on the label held a tragic history of meaning for
many CWWA visitors to the museum. This particular history was inextricably
linked to their Diaspora experience of enslavement during the transatlantic trade,
when the bodies of enslaved Black women were primarily used as human vessels
for the production of more slaves. The relevance of these interpretations may be
illuminated through Anim-Addo’s poetic voice in ‘Was that Sethe or her sister?’
(overleaf).
In this poem Anim-Addo joins the history of an African museum object with
her own tragic community history in transatlantic enslavement and her admiration
for the creative writing of Toni Morrison in her Nobel prize-winning novel Beloved
(Morrison 1988). She takes pride in the human capacity for survival and her play
with language here is part of the ongoing ‘Black woman’s resistance’, to erasure
or misrepresentation in the context of the museum (Anim-Addo 1998a: 100). The
writing of this poem followed an object handling session that included musical
instruments and voice work, aspects of which echo here in the ‘bu-dum bu-dum
bu-dum’ of the imagined heartbeat and the heart-rending cry of ‘No-ooo!’ Perhaps
it is notable that the group meetings in the Education Centre of the museum and at
the Caribbean Centre included sharing food, the absence of which features in the
text ‘Was that Sethe’.
Plate 8 Eloi maternity figure in African Worlds at the Horniman Museum

Note: Photographed by H. Schnebeli.
Source: © Heini Schnebeli.
Was that Sethe or her Sister?
Maternity figure of woman

on Ashanti stool
suckling child
- wooden, still -
milk-breathed
and at one.
Maternity figure of a woman

another situation we know full well
no child to suckle. Child done gone.
Sold. Mother wooden - still -
too drained, too whiplashed.
A stone; no stool.
A stone is not a stool.

In this hard place no comfort; no rest
where body thieves
separate sister, husband, infant.
Even the wisdom of elders absent.
How to cook without a stool?

How to grind peppers for the pot
with earth spirit not knowing libation
and palm oil an acrid memory?
In this corner, the heart of man
is only stone
echo-ing a faint, faint

bu-dum, bu-dum, bu-dum.
So, infant body wooden now
stiff still. No to mothering
in this stone place.
No. No. No-oooh!
Howling into stone
On stone/through stone
Maternity figure of a woman
Wooden. Still.
Figure 2.1 Was that Sethe or her sister?

Note: After Toni Morrison’s Beloved.
Source: Anim-Addo 1998b: 39–40.
Anim-Addo contends it is a strong sense of absence that impels the Black woman
to ‘re-memory’ and ‘re-write’ a richer picture of herself into the museum, which
she has achieved in this homage to Beloved. She also notes how each re-writing of
a more three-dimensional woman character brings a ‘shock’ of recognition ‘that
before the invention there was a gaping absence, a concerted silence’ (Anim-Addo
1998a: 98). The space of this creative intervention, with all the weight of racist
representation that such a juxtapositioning of natural history and material culture
implies, is also notable here.
It may be objected that the CWWA re-writing devalues museum ‘scholarship’
and museum truth (Appleton 2007: 122). Let us address this question next.
Truth, Objectivity, ‘Situated Knowledges’ and ‘Standpoint Texts’
Poetic interpretations of museum objects are clearly subjective and do not claim
any scientific objectivity. Nevertheless, I argue that CWWA writing has a claim
to knowledge and truth. Perhaps the value of the poem is as a work of art and its
truth lies closer to the psychoanalytical space whereby difficult histories struggle
to speech? In the context of the traditional museum space, what Ricouer terms
the ‘saying true’ of psychoanalysis might account for the creative resistance to
relations of power (Ricouer 1982). The psychoanalytical notion of this movement
of troubled histories into speech also returns the discussion to the politics of
representation in the museum, within which CWWA were determined to speak
truth to power (Said 1993: 63-75).
Again Donna Haraway is helpful to museum praxis here. Haraway provides
a re-definition of ‘objectivity’ for feminist epistemology in her idea of ‘situated
knowledges’, which insist ‘on irreducible difference and a radical multiplicity of
local knowledges’. In addition her thesis most crucially repossesses ‘ethics and
politics’ (Haraway 1991: 187). At the museum frontiers her demand is to make the
community involved in presentation and perception responsible, accountable or
‘answerable for what we learn how to see’ (Haraway 1991: 190). Here Haraway
highlights Hill-Collins’s point outlined in the introduction on the political value of
working at spatial and intellectual borderlands, drawing on new voices – creative
and theoretical – to expand the notion of what counts as knowledge in the museum
context and progress ideas of how diverse theoretical perspectives might underpin
museum learning for new audiences (Hill-Collins 1991). My research partner
Anim-Addo makes a strong argument for breaking the frontiers between theory and
creativity that Hill-Collins recommends. She notes ‘our poets are also theorists’,
which is a necessary if unusual methodological stance since more established
theoretical views have tended to ignore or misrepresent Black positionings (Anim-
Addo 2007a: 25). Perhaps this point on creative agency and truth can be justified
with reference to the literature and its affect on collaborative museum practice.
Beloved as a Key ‘Standpoint Text’ for CWWA

‘Call and Response’ Collaboration
Anim-Addo’s poem ‘Was that Sethe’ took inspiration from observation of a

specific museum object, an Eloi sculpture, and Morrison’s novel Beloved. Morrison
dedicates this novel to the estimated ‘Sixty Million and more’, enslaved African
heritage people who died during the Atlantic Holocaust. The novel is an attempt
to access the interior lives of the enslaved, their emotions and thoughts, which
are unrecorded. In the plot of Beloved Morrison imaginatively reconstructs the
appalling history of enslavement in the USA, through the collaborative resistance
of people and events surrounding one enslaved woman, Sethe. Morrison based her
novel on historical evidence of a woman who murdered her baby rather than see
her enslaved.
A vital point I have learnt from reading Beloved as a museum educator, is that
all the subjugated Black and poor white characters – including Sethe, her Mother
Baby Suggs, and the white girl Amy Denver who aids the birth of Sethe’s baby
Beloved – come to their own voice and genuine dialogical exchange in the novel.
For me the collaboration Morrison outlines in her book contrasts with exhibitors
giving voice to ‘others’; and also to the slave testimonies recorded by white
abolitionists, where with the best intentions a ‘master narrative’ was constructed,
which ‘spoke for Africans and their descendants, or of them’ (Morrison 1992: 50).
Furthermore Morrison’s novel does not advocate separatism, which is vital
for developing collaborative museum pedagogy. Beloved importantly highlights
the possibility of movement and collaboration across gender and racial lines
and the new class allegiances that may be achieved. For example this is seen
the relationship that develops between the Black character Sethe and the white
character Amy Denver. It is also seen in the dialogue modelled on the African ‘call
and response’ musical tradition, which at one point in the novel moves both the
individual and the collective in the special forest Clearing space. Morrison notes
how a deep telling and listening there merges the personal and the political in a
distinctive space of freedom where Baby Suggs ‘called and the hearing heard’
(Morrison 1988: 209, 177; Golding 2005). It is in this space that Baby Suggs
expounds the sensuality of her vision predicated on love. She states:
And O my people they do not love your hands. Those they only use, tie, chop off
and leave empty. Love your hands! Raise them up and kiss them. Touch others
with them. (Morrison 1988: 88)
The call and response here is not merely concerned with voice but with the whole
human being, mind and body. CWWA storytellers worked with Horniman on call
and response that involved audiences in active learning. In African and Caribbean
storytelling the tale-tellers’ pose an initial question, by calling out ‘Crick’, which
means ‘do you want to hear a story?’ To hear the story the audience must then
respond by voicing, suitably loudly, the word ‘CRACK’, which means ‘YES’.
CWWA musicians also engaged audiences in call and response musical forms that
highlight the sophistication of African rhythms, which helps to re-value African
knowledge(s).
I shall return to the themes of storytelling and music making in Section 3.
Here the vital pedagogical points for the museum context that arise include firstly
drawing present-day connections between community histories and historical
collections, and secondly exploring more sensory ways of knowing the world
(Howes 2005). In other words the personal and political aspects of pedagogy
developed with CWWA overlap and demand an unlearning of the slave mentality –
object-hood, which is seen when Baby Suggs experiences the first moments of
freedom and recognition of her subject-hood; she re-imagines and feels the bodily
roots of this freedom when she simply states, ‘These my hands’ (Morrison 1988:
141). A point Freire echoes when he questions whether people who enter the
discourse as objects can later become subjects (Freire 1972: 101).
In addition for Morrison, when the enslaved come to voice and agency as well
as social and historical connection in the Clearing, this unsettles established social
orders and points to the possibility of transforming hierarchical positionings in
the future. Finally at the end of the novel Morrison describes another call and
response – a call for help from Sethe’s daughter, Denver, and a responsive action
in the socio-political world, a world of nurturing for Black women. Morrison
speaks of a gathering of the community of women raising their voices in a ‘cape
of sound’ outside Sethe and her daughter Dever’s house at 124 Bluestone Road,
which liberates the individuals inside from the ghost of their tragic history in
enslavement (Morrison 1988: 261).
Reading Beloved as part of early collaborative programming with members
of CWWA, the power of creative collective activity to liberate, psychologically,
the individual in the group, proved inspirational to subsequent museum praxis.
While the novel addressing the horrors of enslavement in the USA had no direct
connection with Horniman’s public exhibitions, in addition to call and response
it related directly to the history of museum collecting, where wealth built upon
enslavement financed collections such as the Tate Galleries in the UK that were
founded on the profits made from the family’s sugar empire, which proved an
intriguing theme for CWWA dialogue. The willingness of the museum to open
its space for consideration of these largely hidden histories was appreciated by
and resonated with the particular CWWA audience, who came to perceive the
enormous possibilities of collaboration for the benefit of their community, just as
the museum recognised the benefits of collaboration for widening audiences and
developing more inclusive creative practice.
It should be clear now that the notion of museum frontier space I have been
expounding refers to more than physical structures; it alludes to spatial practices –
experiences created through interaction between people in a spatial location where
they feel safe to explore creatively individual and collective histories. It is a ‘third
space’ where people can begin to feel at ease and engage with others in horizontal
relationships even if the participants do not share all aspects of histories in common
nor attachments to specific geographies and languages, as is the case with the
vastness of the Caribbean. Most importantly frontier space requires the museum to
facilitate relations of trust and solidarity (Lownsbrough and Beunderman 2007: 28).
Horniman built this relationship over time with CWWA by slowly dismantling the
barriers of ‘otherness’ and recognising concerns that humans share collaboratively.
This is distinct from the hierarchical provision of programmes by the museum as
if they were simple ‘goods’ that might be delivered without due regard to specific
circumstances and the dynamic relation of the individual within the collective over
time and space. Rather, re-writing their absence into the museum led CWWA to
collaborate on diverse programming. One particularly important programme was
Emancipation Day and I shall outline this next.
Emancipation Day and the Museum ‘Homeplace’
In contrast to Philip’s words of indictment on the ‘silencing’ role of museums above

Anim-Addo commends Horniman. She notes how on 1 August 1997 ‘a multiplicity
of voices’ were heard ‘side by side’ when ‘sixteen artists commemorating sixteen
decades since the passage of the British Emancipation Bill shared their work in the
Conservatory of the Horniman Museum’ for the first time (Anim-Addo 1999: 9).
Anim-Addo further observes how this event enabled a community of ‘two hundred
or so’ people, to come ‘together out of a shared need to remember an important
moment in African-Caribbean history’ (ibid.). Emancipation Day became an annual
collaborative event on the Horniman Calendar although the format took different
turns each year. Notably in the Conservatory of Horniman in the summer of 1999
Anim-Addo directed an extract of her Opera Imoinda with an original musical
score from the musician Juwon Ogungbe and with Horniman artifacts from the
handling collection of African objects (Anim-Addo 2008). Anim-Addo explains
how Imoinda re-writes Aphra Behn’s Oroonoko for several reasons, principally
because Imoinda is given no autonomous voice by Behn and because the subject
of slavery is a part of her history, which she has reclaimed in the writing of the
opera.
Imoinda points to the endless reality of enslavement for woman, whose body
laboured under appalling conditions during daylight hours and was the regular
object of the master’s sexual pleasure at night. Anim-Addo observes the emotional
complexity of this relation – miscegenation – for the enslaved woman Imoinda
feels love for her baby whose father is white. This focus of Imoinda, like the
poem ‘Was that Sethe’ cited earlier, on woman’s reproductive function, raises the
question of essentialising the Black woman as emotion against the white male
as reason. Anim-Addo replies there is no divide between her ‘scholarly’ concern
with motherhood and her personal concern that arises out of her own motherhood,
both are ‘grounded within a specific reality’, which she connects with re-memory.
Looking back to the African reality within the Diaspora she comments on a
historico-philosophical space where there was a strong sense of community. She
observes how even today a woman can be seen carring her child closely ‘wrapped
to her body for years … kind of swaddling with their children’ (Anim-Addo in
Guarracino 2007: 217-218). This is a warm situation that she contrasts to the
conditions under enslavement, where this vital human connection was severed.
Anim-Addo’s Imoinda articulates the history of enslavement and the long
resistance struggles around the world, which is marked by ‘people negotiating
their sense of freedom as a whole group’ within the context of Pan Africanism
(Anim-Addo in Guarracino 2007: 214). Imoinda also articulates the positive idea
of women working together, since at the end of Imoinda, it is a network of women
that survive and come to voice in the Chorus in ways that echo the ending of
Beloved noted earlier. In this creative Diaspora movement at the end of Imoinda,
empire ‘sings back’ and the museum experience is transformative as we come
to ‘change our point of view, or point of hearing’, which echoes in Constance
Classen’s sensory cultural theories that I consider in Section 3 (ibid. 219; Classen
1993).
The transformative museum experience was dependent at least in part on the
quality of the spatial environment at the Conservatory, which aided the process
of successful social interaction. The glass structure made the layout and routes
into the gardens clearly legible, its lack of an overarching dominant message
made it relevant to a range of community events such as parties and weddings –
celebratory events that became magical in the evening with the effect of lighting.
It was a ‘space of potential’ where people could come together to exchange ideas
and information on issues of common concerns for one-off creative events ‘in-
between’ the museum itself and the CWWA community venue (Lownsbrough and
Beunderman 2007: 18-19).
Anim-Addo illuminated the special nature of this transformative space. She
states. ‘No-one could have predicted that the Conservatory could so easily have
been transformed into a Caribbean homeplace, evoked through song, story, poetry,
prose, lest we forget’ (Anim-Addo 1999: 10). This feeling of being at home was
crucial to the success of Emancipation Day, where African Caribbean individuals
were reminded of their connections to ‘groups, the nation, the human family’,
and most importantly for CWWA, finding a way of healing a painful history
(Silverman 1995: 163). Homespace is a vital notion to collaborative practice that
I shall consider next.
Collaborative Reconstruction of Knowledge
For all participants, Emancipation Day performances reaffirmed lost, ‘discredited

knowledge’ to use Toni Morrison’s words (Morrison 1984). Morrison elucidates
the concept of African Caribbean knowledge from the ‘standpoint’ of CWWA
(Hill-Collins 1991). She speaks of ‘the way Black people looked at the world’,
which she imaginatively reconstructs in her novels as a, ‘blend’ and an,
acceptance of the supernatural and a profound rootedness in the real world at the
same time with neither taking precedence over the other. … And some of those
things were discredited only because Black people were discredited therefore
what they knew was discredited. (Morrison 1984: 342)
In the imagined world of books such as Morrison’s Beloved, and in the construction
of the museum as homeplace, there is a special overlapping of time and space.
This can jolt museum visitors out of taken-for-granted notions and behaviours,
towards more empathetic and active listening and thinking, in the process of
feminist-hermeneutic dialogue. On Emancipation Day, active listening enabled the
conscious remembering and articulation of the ‘unspeakable thoughts unspoken’,
which are the ghosts of the Middle Passage that loudly haunt the spaces of the
ethnographic museums, demanding to be ‘re-memoried’ in ways which are
‘painful’ but ‘not destructive’ (Morrison 1988: 199).
In addition to this global point, CWWA argue that their partnership work is
fulfilling an important national recommendation laid out in the UK Macpherson
Report, which followed the racist murder of Stephen Lawrence in the local area
close to the museum in south London. Macpherson state:
The importance of and the need for genuine multi-agency partnership and co-
operation to combat racism, and to bring together all sections of the community
with this aim. … there must be a ‘multi-stakeholder’ approach involving all
parts of the community. (Macpherson 1999: 45.18, 45.20) [my emphasis]
Collaboration with CWWA certainly seemed to promote a feeling that the museum
is sensitive, ‘not just to the experience of the majority but to minority experience
also’ (Macpherson 1999: 6.32). However, reading the Macpherson Report leads
me to question the UK museum as an institution, and specifically to examine
our ‘policies and methods’ for signs of ‘institutional racism’ (Macpherson 6.18).
Macpherson follows Stokely Carmichael in defining institutional racism, which
‘originates in the operation of anti-black attitudes and practice’ (Macpherson
1999: 6.22). In terms of the framing of ‘knowledge’ in the museum CWWA
contend that to an extent ‘a sense of superior group position’ prevailed during
our collaboration, since the traditional displays were constructed by a specialist
‘white’ middle-class profession (ibid.). Nevertheless, the museum hierarchy did
encourage the education department to collaborate with CWWA, and thereby
increased the construction of new ‘knowledge’ at the museum frontiers, if initially
only at a ‘tokensitic’ level of temporary project work.
My role as museum educator in this collaboration involved firstly doing what
Gayatri Spivak terms my ‘homework’, which importantly included re-reading
texts such as Beloved and listening to music that is important to the group (Spivak
1988). Re-reading such texts and museum objects as texts together, gradually
enabled us all ‘to construct and construe the contradictory texts that constitute
[our] lives’ (McCabe in Spivak 1988: xix). However, it may be argued that this
CWWA collaboration occurs ‘at the margins’ of the main museum discourse, which
left the centre of museum exhibition unchanged. Certainly CWWA programming
involved women joining together to subtly subvert the master narrative and yet
the influence of this intense, theoretically grounded collaborative practice was
far reaching and eventually radically transformed not only the wider Horniman
Museum space but also affected praxis in Europe as I shall explain in Section
2. CWWA group leaders maintaining a close relationship to the Anthropology
Department who were truly concerned to reform the outdated and indeed racist
display made this possible, in part at least; for example regularly engaging Shelton
and Levell in dialogue, sharing publications and mealtimes, which ensured warm
and stimulating relations throughout the building of the new exhibitions in the
South Hall Gallery and the old Lecture Theatre.
Before outlining the new exhibitions at Horniman and elsewhere, which draws
upon issues of power and control, let us briefly explore the themes of challenging
racism and the politics of space through programming outside of the UK. Next I
shall review programming at Plantation Museums in the USA.
Telling ‘Other’ Stories
Colonial Williamsburg is the largest outdoor museum in the USA and a middle-
sized corporation and resort (with two golf courses and three hotels). A for-
profits business side manages a 250 million dollar endowment and the museum
or education side manages events in a 175-acre complex of 100 gardens and
500 restored or reconstructed buildings replicating Williamsburg, the capital of
Virginia in the colonial era on the eve of the American Revolution. Fifty houses
are open to the public and attract one million visitors, spending 120 million dollars
a year in the 1990s (Gable 1996: 179-182).
In his seminal paper ‘Maintaining boundaries, or “mainstreaming” black
history in a white museum’, Eric Gable outlines his ethnographic research at the
Colonial Williamsburg museum spaces. Here approximately 500 mostly white
frontline staff, called interpreters, wore period costume and worked in the houses.
Plus, at the time of Gable’s research, 12 black interpreters from the Department
of African-American Interpretation and Presentation (AAIP), who led walking
tours in the grounds and in two kitchens, using role-play interpretation techniques.
Gable’s paper examines live interpretations with roots in the late 1980s ‘new social
history’ movement, which was interested in exposing class relations and conflict,
and had a desire to use history to effect positive political change in the present. At
Colonial Williamsburg the new social historians became interested in telling new
stories of slave-master relations and Gable’s research shows enduring notions of
racial ‘identity’ causing difficulties in telling stories about race relations. His focus
is on pedagogic practice among ‘frontline’ or guiding staff that ‘tell’ the Museum’s
stories, and on the question of miscegenation (Gable 1996: 177).
Gable argues that the history of laws against miscegenation, codified in

eighteenth century, coupled with their systematic violation, is at the root of the
invention of racial categories. To tell stories of miscegenous kinship denied at
the Williamsburg spaces would mean that a largely white audience and a largely
white frontline staff would have to rethink the category of race itself in ways
ostensibly more threatening to their identities than their Black peers. Gable’s
research uncovers white guiders’ resistance to the new stories of miscegenation,
which is revealed in their preferred ‘just-the-facts’ approach that distinguishes
white frontline staff from the Black guides, who they believed played ‘fast and
loose with the facts’ (Gable 1996: 179). In contradistinction the new historians
criticised white history as too clean and sanitised, primarily concerned with ‘silk
pants patriots rather than the 50 percent of the population who were enslaved.
The new historians were concerned to make the site more inclusive and tell more
critical stories of ‘the other half’, to ‘mainstream’ these other stories and make
them part of every ‘morally correct’ eighteenth century story told by the guides
at the main sites, which would result in less pedagogic space for the celebratory
narratives (ibid. 181).
The Foundation was committed to notions of melting-pot equality in the
1980s and hoped Williamsburg could participate in black enfranchisement and
assimilation. Perhaps cynically in financial terms they felt new audiences might be
attracted to this new storytelling and provide new sources of income.
Miscegenation at Wythe House: Instances from Field Research
Gable notes miscegenous unions have become a kind of archetype in museums; an

older white master takes a black mistress and aids the child of the union educationally
and financially. Society’s mistreatment of the mistress and disenfranchisement
of the child then become symbols for the fundamental inequalities of slavery
itself rather than the white master (Gable 1996: 182). At George Wythe’s House
new historians told an alternative story of the great white intellectual and liberal
thinker’s relationship with his cook Lydia Broadnax and her son, Michael Brown,
whom he educated and left property to in his will, which was repudiated by the
white interpreters who evaded this sensitive issue in their talks, arguing that there
was a lack of hard evidence for the alternative story (ibid. 183).
The notion of sufficient evidence is questionable. One house used posters
requesting information on runaway slaves but the interpreters still argued there
wasn’t enough material to discuss issues of slavery. The same white interpreters
used certain documents as evidence of Wythe’s liberalism – Lydia the cook chose
to stay with him as a paid employee after gaining her freedom, therefore Wythe is
surely a kind boss – while disregarding other documents as circumstantial such as
the runaway posters as evidence for poor treatment of slaves.
On the subject of runaway slaves one white guide told Gable, ‘I say I don’t
do that and I don’t do ghosts either. … I tell visitors if they are interested in that
they need to ask elsewhere’ (Gable 1996: 186). This guide thus portrays herself
as a disinterested defender of the truth and links stories of miscegenation with
ghost tales to further discredit them. Similarly towards the end of a two-day
training, a white guide asked about miscegenation and the trainer responded with
‘interesting’ material about the much clearer situation in the distant Caribbean
with white overseers who were probably responsible for miscegenation. These
double standards are seen in contrasting theatrical performances: ‘Christmas’ and
‘Affairs of the heart’.
‘Christmas’ documents a time when the black cooks were said to have important
roles. While the speeches of the enslaved in this narrative hint at a fear of dismissal,
and a view of Christmas as a time when they did more work for cheap presents,
the masters were portrayed as generous spirited in their speeches. For example one
master comments: ‘it will be a great long time before we can find a way to abolish
the system, meanwhile we must treat them as humanely as we can’ (Gable 1996:
192). ‘Affairs of the heart’ documents the story of a miscegenous union. A white
master’s marriage announcement allows his black mistress to express her fear that
his new white wife will ill-treat their son. Finally the master leaves the room,
undecided about how to deal with the situation. This performance was flagged as
a ‘composite’ tale whereas white interpreters flagged the ‘Christmas’ performance
as a ‘true’ tale of hard facts. Gable notes the epistemological sloppiness of this
distinction since although Christmas included biography it was also a theatrical
mixing of stories (Gable 1996: 194-5).
Gable concludes that groups in the centre (white here) appear to resist the
notion of ‘mainstreaming’ black stories, with a ‘just the facts’ policy, although he
contends they seem more naive than wilfully resistant. What a pity then that the
new historians were unable to instruct or guide the guides, which left the Black
employees as scapegoats in a fact/fiction debate and white Americans with an idea
of the fundamental impermeability of racial boundaries that other research has
identified at a level of tacit knowledge.
American Plantation Museums:

Live Interpretation and Symbolic Annihilation
Jennifer Eichstedt and Stephen Small’s recent research also highlights the power
struggles involved in live interpretation narratives at American Plantation Museums
(Eichstedt and Small 2002). They gathered data by attending the public tours on
offer at the museum sites, where the majority were white-centric, normalising
and valorising white ways of organising the world, specifically the system
underpinning enslavement. This is observed in the frequency of mentioning, for
example mahogany furniture in aesthetic neutral terms, without any reference
to the routes and the human suffering that the pieces are inextricably entangled
within. They regard this aesthetic tactic as one instance of ‘symbolic annihilation’,
which they saw employed as a primary strategy at 65 sites, with 3,250 mentions
(Eichstedt and Small 2002: 109).
Their concept of ‘symbolic annihilation’, which is defined as ‘a powerful
rhetorical and representational strategy for obscuring the institution of slavery’
and can be seen when certain groups are ‘absent, trivialised, or condemned for
taking non-steroetypical gender roles’, proves useful for analysing the preferred
narratives presented by live interpreters at the museums (Eichstedt and Small
2002: 106). Eichstedt and Small record symbolic annihilation in ‘cases where
slavery and the enslaved are either completely absent or where mention of them
is negligible, formalistic, or perfunctory’, for example when enslavement is
mentioned on three or fewer occasions. They found nearly 56 percent of all sites
employing the strategy of symbolic annihilation, with twenty-five percent of all
sites in three states failing to mention enslavement at all and thirty percent of sites
mentioning it less than three times (ibid. 108).
Eichstedt and Small further note the way certain sites employ strategies of
‘trivalisation and deflection’, which is defined as making absent or fleeting mention
of the enslaved with little or no detail or context, while focusing discussion on a
tiny elite population of the plantocracy. Instances of these strategies involve the
interpreters using language to make universalising ahistorical statements when
referring to the wealthy white experience, using the euphemisms ‘servants’ and
‘servitude’ rather than ‘slave’ as well as the use of the passive voice and neutral
pronouns to discuss the achievements and labour of enslaved African American
people.
However there were instances of ‘other’ African American stories being told. I
shall briefly review some of these next.
Eichstedt and Small’s ‘Other’ Stories
Professor Eichstedt took part in the ‘Other Half’ Tour at Colonial Williamsberg
with 22 other white and seven Black visitors. The group met their African
American costumed guide at the Lumber House, at the far end of Parson’s Green
from the Governor’s House. She told a complex story strongly informed by a
race and class analysis, explaining that slavery was ‘based on a class system plus
racism plus prejudice’ for example (Eichstedt and Small 2002: 180-181). Her
interpretation consistently drew historical connections between poor white and
poor black people who she declared were closer than rich and poor whites people,
although three poor whites were thought to be worth one Negro. She emphasised
that the poor included 80 percent of white people, who typically lived in a 12 x 15
foot, dirt floor shack.
This interpreter’s narrative ranged across diverse sources of material evidence
and the clever use of learning styles and multiple intelligences to make key points
(Cassels 1996; Gardner 1996). For instance, when speaking of the diaries written
by slave ship’s captains she used kinesthetic active learning to demonstrate how
slaves were packed ‘either lose or tight’ on slave ships. Visitors were asked to stand
side by side then face neighbour’s back and pack themselves ‘loosely or tightly’
as if their bodies were inanimate goods. This exercise highlighted her point that
25 to 30 percent of ‘tight packed’ Africans died during the crossing, while those
who survived were made to ‘dance’ two weeks before reaching their destination
to strengthen them (Eichstedt and Small 2002: 181). The horror of enslavement
was tempered with positive stories such as that of Alfonso Johnson, one of the
original 20 Africans brought to Jamestown in 1619 who gained his freedom to
own 250 acres and five indentured servants. In addition to kinaesthetic learning
she engaged the visitor’s interpersonal and intrapersonal intelligences during and
after the tour, since several visitors stayed behind to ask more questions.
We would argue that this interpreter has dialogical skills that echo in the
openness of feminist-hermeneutics. ‘Yes blacks owned slaves too’ she answered
when questioned by a white visitor. Then she related the story of John Punch the
African American descendant of enslaved people who ran away with two white
indentured friends. After they were captured the Court ordered them all to be
whipped thirty times, then the white friends were to serve a prison sentence for
two years, while John was to serve the rest of his ‘natural life’ (Eichstedt and
Small 2002: 180).
The complex issues involved in the best live interpretation tours demand not
only an excellent script but flexible actors who can move out of the first person
character and into a third person contemporary role with ease and often humour
to further learning. For example at Carter’s Grove an interpreter asked members
of the audience what the spectacles on a woman’s head were, whether the children
went to school and how happy the little Negro children were now that they
were allowed to read and write, while she told her moving tale ‘The Soul of a
Sharecroper’ (Eichstedt and Small 2002: 183). Out of character she explained how
the programme developed. She wanted to look at freedom, what it might mean in
Howard Gardner observes eight intelligences: logical-mathematical, spatial,

naturalistic intelligences, bodily kinaesthetic, musical, linguistic, intrapersonal and
interpersonal intelligences, which individuals hold in different combinations (Gardner
2000). His pluralistic view of mind importantly revalues the standard western concept of
intelligence as equated with mathematical-linguistics to the exclusion of other ways of
knowing and experiencing the world through more sensory means. The concept redresses
ideas of value attached to the limited western view that has disadvantaged Black and
working-class children in intelligence testing systems. However, it is culture bound as we
shall see in Section 3 since it excludes taste and smell for example as ways of knowing
(Howes 2005: 6).
First person interpreters keep to the language and manners of the period at all times,
while third person interpreters step in and out of past and contemporary roles to clarify
difficult points for visitors.
1862, and how fear can infect all people, black and white (Eichstedt and Small
2002: 186).
Half-truths or More Inclusive Stories?
A major problem identified with the ‘Other’ tours is that audiences were largely
self-selecting, attended by Black visitors and numbers were low at 10-20 percent
(Eichstedt and Small 2002: 199). While regular ‘white’ tours may distort or
obliterate the horror of slavery, in 1998 one tour ‘Enslaving Virginia’ at Colonial
Williamberg broke the segregation of knowledge by interspersing a Black
perspective mini drama, which involved ‘enslaved’ people plotting to run away,
running, and being chased by slave hunters in the regular tour. Visitors gasped
in shock and tears welled in their eyes as they were asked to act on behalf of
the runaways. This drama seemed to raise awareness of slavery in the general
population and brought more African American families into the site and one
wonders why it only ran for one season (Eichstedt and Small 2002: 201).
Small and Eichstedt recognise some African Americans want to avoid
exposing their children or themselves to difficult issues such as slavery, just as
many white people do. Yet they note the costs for Black people and white people
today when racialised hostility of different kinds is perpetuated, being told half
truths distorts and rewrites history with a narrow focus (Eichstedt and Small
2002: 256). In mainstream stories upholding the dominant social narrative of race,
where whiteness is constructed as moral, generous, democratic and hardworking,
lies are built that separates the imagined white self from Black others. White-
centric perspectives not only tend to erase links between history and contemporary
inequality but are transparently self-contradictory narratives. For example images
of ‘docile happy servants’ seem to be contradicted by stories of goods needing to
be locked away since the servants have a tendency to steal. Furthermore, we note
there is an added danger that these stories of Black theft connect Black people
with the contemporary stereotype of crime, as predominantly perpetrated by Black
people.
Conclusion
The best sites in the USA seem to avoid stereotype and show the individual human
dignity of Black agents in the face of oppression by linking Black histories to the
larger social, economic and political world, and to the racialised ideologies of the
historic time that also persist today. This leads Eichstedt and Small to argue that
it may be worth trying to engage more docents at sites to explore the possibility
of telling more inclusive stories, which was a motivation behind of the CWWA
examples I raised earlier in this chapter.
CWWA colleagues also echo Eichstedt and Small’s argument that moral
human beings would not want to work in spaces of social injustice, to perpetuate
dominance and oppression, to reinforce silence and stereotypes. Furthermore our
UK work has shown, like Eichstedt and Small’s in the USA, that the museum
unthinkingly legitimising racialised social forgetting can be transformed by
pedagogical attempts to create a socially just society. This requires recognising
the past injury afflicted, engaging in full and open discussion of this history and
relating it to contemporary inequalities. Then release from the oppressive weight
of the past might be experienced and healing permitted to occur. To paraphrase
Eichstedt and Small, in these cases museum collaborators and site interpreters can
become teachers for a just future (Eichstedt and Small 2002: 270).
Let us conclude on this optimistic note. In the next section I shall examine
the power and control issues that have arisen here with reference to case study
examples in South Africa, Sweden and the UK that also resonate with feminist-
hermeneutic praxis that has been outlined in this first section.
Section 2
Including New Voices and Forms of Practice
Including new voices in the museum can be achieved in terms of programming

as we have seen in Section 1. However, programming may not incorporate new
forms of practice and more fully address issues such as racism, within the museum
as a whole. Staffing structures are key here.
Staffing the Museum
Racism in the museum needs to be addressed in terms of staffing structure as

well as representation. In the UK as the Black academic Stephen Small noted at
the end of the twentieth century Black people will no longer satisfied if museums
open their doors ‘only slightly’, they want to be fundamentally involved in the
decision making processes, not only regarding access to but also control of
representation and resources, and furthermore they are not willing to permit ‘non-
blacks’ to ‘dictate what when and where’ this may be allowed (Small 1997: 62).
Small reinforces the view of my Horniman CWWA collaborators, in highlighting
the possibilities of using the museum as a ‘contact zone’, or social space where the
boundary lines of separation between the ‘self’ and the ‘other’ are ‘not fixed but
always shifting’, while emphasising the need for museums to address historical
hierarchies of power, which remain in the museum staffing structure (Clifford
1999; Loomba 2002: 71).
UK Readers may be asking themselves if it is significant that the loudest voices
to address racism in the UK museum are those of Black people and whether – to
invert the infamous phrase – racism here is the ‘Black man’s burden’? The answer
to this question must be no or at least, not entirely. For example, the Museums
Association has been working closely across racial and institutional lines, notably
since 1999 with Richard Sandell at the University of Leicester on ‘Diversify’
(<http://www.museumsassociation.org/diversify> accessed on 19.10.2007; Sandell
2002). Diversify is a positive action training programme to fund BME (Black
and Minority Ethnic) people or people of visible ethnicity minorities to undertake
Masters level courses at UK Universities and placements in the museum workforce.
In 2008 it is heartening that this project has seen some success, with more than 60
graduates now employed in the museum world, although the proportion does not
yet equal that in the UK population. For example, as Helen Denniston notes in our
capital city, while ‘27% of Londoners are black or minority ethnic’ (BME), the
London museum workforce comprises ‘less than 4%’ of individuals from BME
communities (Denniston 2003: 21).
At this point I should like to return to Horniman. In Section 1, I outlined

collaboration that it may be argued occurred at the margins of the main museum
discourse, inserting Black narratives into interpretive programming at Horniman
with CWWA, which left the centre of museum presentation, the stories told in
main programming and exhibition, unchanged. A similar point may be made for
the new live interpretation events at the Plantation Museums in the USA.
Certainly CWWA programming involved women joining together to subtly
subvert the master narrative and yet the influence of this intense, theoretically
grounded collaborative practice was far reaching. Most importantly the CWWA
group leaders maintained a close relationship to the Anthropology Department
who were truly concerned to transform the outdated and indeed racist display.
CWWA members, Golding, Shelton and Levell regularly engaged in dialogue,
shared publications and mealtimes, which ensured warm and stimulating relations
throughout the building of the new exhibitions in the South Hall Gallery and the
old Lecture Theatre.
At Horniman the redisplay of the South Hall and the Lecture Theatre galleries
were envisaged as working together, almost in conversation with each other. This
was seen as reinforcing Pearce’s point that the history of collecting and displays
shows we are always ‘collecting ourselves’, and it was hoped that if we ensure this
factor is made a transparent and visible aspect of an exhibition, as visitors we may
come to ‘learn as much about ourselves as about them’, the other cultures displayed
(Pearce 2003: 159-177; Ames 1995: 45; Shelton 1992). The old Lecture Theatre
space now houses the visually stunning, ‘three dimensional Mondrian’ designed
Centenary Gallery: A Hundred Years of Collecting, which opened in 2001 and
works as the sister gallery to African Worlds, which opened two years earlier in
the South Hall. The development of this gallery is intriguing. A major underlying
aim was to take account of account of the debates I outlined in Section 1, which
as Ruth Phillips notes is shared with three other notable western museums, who
engaged in the radical redisplay of African material culture in the last five years of
the twentieth century. In addition to Horniman’s African Worlds Phillips discusses
a 1995 reinstallation at the Michael C. Rockefeller Wing of the Metropolitan
Museum of Arts, the 1999 Africa Voices at the Smithsonian Institution’s US
Museum of Natural History, and the Sainsbury Galleries of African Art located
in the basement of the British Museum’s Great Court in 2000 (Phillips 2007).
Since African Worlds has been influential on the Swedish projects considered in
Chapter 3, as well as the focus of ‘Inspiration Africa!’ project work that I return to
in Section 3, a brief outline here will prove helpful.
Consultation: African Worlds
Anthony Shelton, Head of Anthropology at the Horniman, declares his role to be

‘curator as author’ or ‘producer/director’ of the, ‘ideas driven but object-centred’
exhibition African Worlds (Shelton 2000: 5). The focus on the second largest
Including New Voices and Forms of Practice 69
collection of 17,000 African objects in a dedicated permanent gallery space of

380m2, the South Hall, was unique in the UK at the time of opening in 1999
and the high quality of the material culture – part of the Horniman’s designated
national collection of ethnography – remains of international significance.
Additionally at a local level it was widely felt in the museum during the inception
of the project that this focus would resonate particularly well with the local African
Caribbean communities and schoolteachers, who had built up strong collaborative
relationships with the museum and were eager for a permanent site – not only
to showcase the historical achievements of African heritage peoples, but also to
affirm their continuing creative virtuosity in a ‘live artists’ area of the gallery that
would provide inspiration for youth; a subject I return to in Section 3.
African Worlds presented us as staff at all levels of Horniman with the
opportunity for considerable self-reflexivity on the direct museum culpability in the
‘long and tortuous history’ of ‘capitalistic colonialism’ and oppression, which was
to be uncovered, acknowledged and in a certain sense mark an apology, initially
through exhibitionary practice and in a sustainable sense through an ongoing
education department commitment to collaborative effort (Shelton 2000: 8). This
extremely ambitious and wide remit determined the direction and sponsorship of
field research and active collecting in areas of Africa that were under represented in
the existing collection, notably for the project discussed in Section 3 of this book:
a Haitian Voudou shrine, as well as a radical re-evaluation of how all the objects
might best be displayed and by whom. These questions and the persistent drive
for sensitivity and innovation in exhibitionary practices notably led to Horniman
commissioning an outstanding Ijele, the largest mask carried by one person in
the whole of Africa, from the Igbo area of Nigeria, which is shown at Plate 9.
In addition to the impressive pieces made in African communities who were
keeping their cultures alive, the rolling live artists project held in the balcony area
which encircles the South Hall effectively illustrated the hybrid nature of global
identities with the programme of artists trained in the contemporary art schools,
which combated any notion of African culture as fixed or stagnant. Osi Audu was
the first artist to exhibit in this space and Horniman was able to purchase one of
his pieces I have a Landscape In My Head.
Plate 9 The Igbo ijeli seen from the balcony in African Worlds at the
Horniman Museum with Benin displays in the distance, 2007
Source: Author.
In the early planning stages of African Worlds Shelton stated a major concern for
polyvocality – to raise many diverse new voices in the exhibition and towards this
end three advisory panels were formed: an international Anthropology Advisory
Panel (AAP), a local Community Consultative Forum (CCF) and a Voices group.
The AAP included two esteemed Nigerian curators Joseph Eboreime Director
of the National Museum of Benin, Nigeria and Emanual Erinze from Nigeria’s
National Commission for Museums and Monuments, the Caribbean artist Kathryn
Chan, and two other UK curators with deep knowledge of Africa, Keith Nicklin
and John Mack. The AAP worked most closely with the designer Michael
Cameron to develop the intellectual content and make the final decision on issues
of representation – negotiating creative answers to the what, why, by whom, for
whom and how questions. Additionally as educator and as trade union (GBM)
workplace representative I suggest that regular formal meetings of the whole staff
group to communicate the complex messages of African Worlds throughout the
museum staffing structure was key to the success of the project.
The AAP met in London twice a year. I was fortunate to have Dr Eboreime stay
in my family home with its constant stream of visitors. This arrangement naturally
meant the local CWWA and CCP members who were working on Benin benefited
from Eboreime’s ever generous sharing of expertise over and above his contractual
work. For example, readers can imagine how the children, from economically
disadvantaged backgrounds, were quite overwhelmed when the Director of the
National Museum of Benin Nigeria and I made a visit to their school in Brixton!
Design and Text
The AAP and CCP decided at the outset to bridge the, pernicious and mistaken in
our view ‘aesthetic’ – contextually light versus the ‘ethnographic’ – contextually
dense divide; by firstly developing series of themed narratives and also presenting
the material culture of Africa with an abundance of contextually enriching video
footage, both archival with contemporary voice over and footage from recent
fieldwork as well as ‘layered’ text panels. Text panels were designed at four levels
of density from large 16-point single sentence pithy quotations that were taken
from interviews at the main object text panels, which were designed to provide
a ‘kind of poetic hinge’ or connection point with the object, to the provision of
highly detailed booklets offering further information and made available in slots
to the sides of the object cases. Layered text was designed to cater for different
levels of audience interest and ability as well as supporting the object as ‘hero’
in aesthetically pleasing manners (Cameron quoted in Shelton 2000: 12). One
important feature of the original design for the object text panels to visually
break up the block of solid text, encourage reading and help to connect visitors
geographically, was a map of the world locating the object. Unfortunately the map
was lost in the final panels due to space, the overriding demands of readability and
maintaining reasonable point size.
Rejecting the chronological and geographical approach common in traditional
ethnographic museums, it was hoped that eight key themes: Patronage; different
natures; men/women; ancestors and morality; royalty and power; text, image,
history; cycles of life; parody and humour, might counter the persistent view of
the African as the ‘exotic primitive other’, as well as the media emphasis on the
‘problems’ of Africa today. African Worlds themes vitally draw out similarities
and differences between and within cultural groups. Most importantly, displaying
within these themes objects were not to be made subservient to and illustrative of
abstract concepts in the manner of traditional displays that ‘demonstrated’ higher
and lower races; rather the themes were employed to enhance and celebrate the
beauty of the objects on display, and the originating communities of makers and
users, in accordance with criteria from contemporary art museums that endow
high value and prestige through the selection as ‘art’ that we discussed earlier.
Alongside the AAP the education department formed a local Community
Consultative Forum (CCF) who included school children, teachers, Black
families, storytellers, musicians and artists. The CCP were able to offer a wider
range of perspectives as well as providing valuable advice on mock-up panels to
ensure the design concepts might be successfully imparted to audiences. Most
importantly they made a vital input into the displays through participation in the
Voices project led by Patti Peach. Peach worked hard to gather some extremely
rich oral material from almost thirty interviewees, drawn extensively from the
local African Caribbean population. Peach’s method was refreshingly simple – she
simply asked the interviewees to offer their immediate responses to the material
selected for display by the AAP.
The final text panels used original authored texts from 36 individuals: 12
from local people, 12 from people in African, the Caribbean and Brazil and 12
from professional writers. Plate 10 shows the text panel at the Midnight Robber
carnival mask display. The immediacy of the impressions given at interview
imparts a lively feel to the textual displays they were incorporated into and the
portrait photograph of the speaker further humanises the text. It is these features
that encourage reading of exhibition text and provoke empathetic understanding; I
expand upon audiences and readers in Section 2 but Ayan Ayan-dosou, one of the
drummers who had long worked with school groups at Horniman, illustrates this
point here. He noted at interview:
When I look back at all these masks in the museum, I feel sorry they are not
being used … To me a masquerader is like a musician. A musician cannot play
on his own. (Ayan Ayan-dosu 2001)
Ayan highlights the importance of the local social group in his text. Members
of the AAP, in addition to conducting some original academic research into the
objects such as uncovering names and histories of the previously anonymous chiefs
who figure on the Horniman Collection of Benin plaques by consulting elders
working today in the Oba’s Court, also made more personal and global political
observations. In their introductory text panel they highlight the problematic of
ownership, forcefully opining on the British army sacking of Benin in 1897 and
appealing ‘to the conscience of the world for a peaceful resolution of this shame of
history’, but not leaving the reader to dwell negatively on restitution, they further
note how the ‘Horniman Museum is working with Benin and with the Nigerian
Commission … developing joint projects to promote a better understanding of
Benin’s history’ (Eboreime 2001).
Plate 10 An example of a layered text panel showing the Midnight Robber
carnival mask with a family of visitors reading in the background at
the Horniman Museum, 2007
Source: Author.
One crucial ‘joint project’ that permitted a more equitable flowing of knowledge
between the Northern and Southern hemispheres was the installation of a
computer with internet access for visitors to use at the National Museum of
Benin. I understand from Dr Hassan Arero, the present Head of Anthropology at
Horniman, that the museum is continuing a lively exchange programme of skill
sharing with Museums in Nigeria. For example the Head of Conservation Louise
Bacon has shared her considerable knowledge of conserving the enormously
diverse materials that comprise Horniman’s anthropology collections, making
consultation and training field trips to Nigeria.
Emanuel Arinze locates African Worlds as a ‘success story’ offering a ‘glimpse
of Africa’ in the new context of the ‘post-colonial’ world (Arinze 2000: 1, 3). He
attributes the success of Horniman collaboration to seven factors: involvement
of collaborators from the very beginning; personal and institutional commitment
from the host museum; a trusting atmosphere; flexibility and acceptance of
different styles; open communication throughout the museum; shared interests
and a common vision; willingness to share influence and control of the decision
making process (ibid.). Arinze wryly notes the importance of active ‘listening’ for
genuine and effective collaboration – ‘for the collective good of all, for as the Igbo
say: Ada-akwu ofu ebe enene mmanwu’, which in English translates as ‘you do not
stand in one place and watch the mask dancing’ (Arinze 2000: 4).
Plate 11 The uplighting of the Nkisi Power sculpture

Plate 12 One entrance to African Worlds at the Horniman Museum,

showing the central walkway, 2007
Source: Author.
Shelton highlights the demands on design for the development of ‘a new visual
language’ that would vitally reinforce the political messages. He praises Cameron
for his ability to work allegorically: ‘to manipulate objects to evoke different
emotions and feelings’ and to treat objects as ‘embodied texts’ (Shelton 2000:
12). For example, through focused down-lighting at the almost closed eyes of
the Pende mbuye masks to enhance the melancholy feeling of ‘spirits at the point
of earthly death’, and as we see at Plate 11 through judicial up-lighting of the
Nkisi power nail sculptures from Kongo to increase the sense of their commanding
presence (ibid.). Plate 12 shows one entrance to the exhibition with the central
walkway. This rises up in the central section and down to displays of Ancient
Egypt or Khemet at one end, and a concrete lion sculpture at the other end. The
walkway is very strongly down-lit with lighting hanging from a ceiling gantry to
evoke the hotness of an African sun shining on an African road. The hot feeling is
reinforced through colour, with the red-sanded walls evoking adobe architecture.
Small children of course delight in whizzing up and down this central road, yet
they are also caught as shown at Plate 13 in what Greenblatt notes as ‘awe and
wonder’, for example at the vast scale of the Dogon masks on open display here as
no section of glass could be made big enough to contain them at almost 20 feet tall;
and enthralled by the video showing the strongest men dancing so gracefully with
the 40 kilo weight, moving so swiftly and even sweeping the ground with the very
tips like the antelope, in the fragment of masquerade shown (Greenblatt 1991).
Plate 13 Small visitors caught in awe and wonder with the Dogon masks in
African Worlds at the Horniman Museum, 2007
Source: Author.
Throughout, Cameron’s design employs cube and rectilinear elements and also
makes extensive use of non-parallel angles, which serve to disrupt our sense of
balance and jars with the softness and exquisite plaster details that marks the
original arts and crafts style of architecture of the South Hall. There is also a
resounding ‘modernism’ in terms of the prime materials used for the postcolonial
African Worlds exhibition space for so many objects collected in colonial times:
steel framed display cases fitted into the walls holding precious Benin plaques,
soaring cases of plate glass housing masks from Zaire. This is all expressly
intended ‘to convey a sense of alienation in the gallery’, to mirror the displacement
of the objects ‘far removed from conditions of usage and original signification’
and to highlight the partial perspectives of postmodernism; the fragmented nature
of the objects ‘masks without costume; figures without shrines; shrines without
sacrifices’ (Shelton 2000: 13).
The fragments of African material culture exhibited in African Worlds echo
in the absences and deliberate gaps left in the display, which were intended to
offer opportunities for new voices and viewpoints to be inserted alongside those
in the main text panels. The text panel introducing visitors to the exhibition
acknowledges the subjectivity of the selection panel and states the exhibition ‘does
not present one but the many different Africas in the minds and imaginations of
the people who have contributed to this gallery’ and further emphasises that ‘we’
the exhibition makers, ‘can never give more than the most fleeting impression of
these objects before they came to Europe.’ Overall the exhibition recognises that
representing cultural identities is never a neutral or a holistic process, and this
one privileges contemporary African Caribbean authorship within a strong post-
colonial narrative thread, which emphasises the dynamic nature of culture.
Perhaps African Worlds exemplifies what Ruth Philips terms a ‘collaborative
paradigm’ in the development of a public exhibition space, which aims to develop
a ‘space of coexistence for multiple perspectives’, acknowledging both the voices
of community members whose heritage is on display and Western interpretive
devices for understanding object ‘identities, functions, and meanings’, thereby
deconstructing ‘the singular, distanced, and depersonalised authority of the
modernist museum’ (Philips 2003: 164-165). The collaborative paradigm also
highlights the need for ‘visitors to consider their own historical position in relation
to colonial anthropology and the displacement of objects it achieved’, which is what
earlier CWWA collaboration managed albeit with specific targeted programming
(ibid.). Certainly the intense collaboration and sincere effort over the making of
the African Worlds exhibition demonstrates that an attitude of self-reflexivity can
expose the politics of knowledge construction, past and present, to bode well for
the future. Most importantly in addition to an exhibition, African Worlds with its
deliberate gaps for new textual material to be added for diverse audiences and
with its large open spaces, works particularly well as an intercultural forum space
of dialogical exchange – a democratic space, where members of different cultures
can ‘sit well with each other’ and learn to exist with the tension between diverse
points of view (Shelton 2000: 19; Ames 1995: 24).
Finally it is worth highlighting here that evaluation shows teachers welcome

the wide range of viewpoints in the exhibition. Most importantly for key stage 2
history teaching is the new displays of Ancient Egypt, Khemet, which is firmly
located at the heart of African culture and takes up a prominent position over
a whole wall of display at the entrance. This renews the historical trade routes
across the Sahara that united the continent and disrupts the notion of Ancient
Egypt as somehow attached to Europe and Ancient Greece, which Martin Bernal’s
linguistic research has uncovered (Bernal 1987). The Khemet display in African
Worlds counters Bernal’s account of Ancient Egypt as the birthplace and cradle of
western civilisation in the minds and imaginations of the west, which historically
demanded a distancing from the ‘primitives’ of sub-Saharan. This distance, albeit
unintentionally, is still evident in the spatial separation of Ancient Egypt from the
African Gallery in the British Museum.
In short African Worlds remains a special exhibition, with which I am proud
to be associated. Next I shall turn to explore an extension of these ideas – of
exemplary collaborative practice underpinning the powerful displays – at other
field sites outside of the UK.
Conclusion: Looking Beyond the UK
Much museum attention has recently been drawn to the examination of issues
surrounding the representation of image and identities, the aspects we hold in
common as human beings with specific rights and responsibilities as well as the
distinguishing factors such as religion, language and sexual orientation that are
safeguarded the UDHR (Universal Declaration of Human Rights 1948). I noted
the importance of Human Rights in my introduction now in Section 2, I shall
argue that new exhibitions and programming can address these concerns through
shifting traditional power relations and structures of control in the museum.
Over two chapters I shall now draw attention to the collaborative exhibition
of museum objects, the gathering and representation of human life histories, and
to the creative retelling of contested histories firstly in Sweden and then in South
Africa. Overall the chapters aim to demonstrate that museums sharing traditional
cultural authority, power and control, can aid community cohesion via explorations
of human unity in diversity, which profitably challenges stereotype and division to
an even greater degree than the African Worlds example I have outlined here.
Chapter 3
Power: Inserting New Visibilities
in the Museum Margins
Introduction
The Swedish citizen Abdullah Said traces his heritage to the Horn of Africa. He
powerfully makes diverse aspects of Horn identity visible in one piece of museum
text, noting:
I left my country albeit young, unwillingly and unprepared. I left everything

behind me, near and dear, brothers and sisters. I left my school, I left childhood
friends and I left all memories. I left the football made of old socks, the one
we used to shoot towards the goal made of stones. The porridge before sunrise
during Ramadan, the juice after sunset and the weekend candy – all this I left
together with the traditional games of my country. I left the lust and playfulness
of youth. I left mountains, valleys, hills and fields. I miss the sun and the moon
and the sea. I also miss the brown desert, the one I look like, the one that looks
like me. (Said, A. 2002: 49) [Abdellah from Rebirth – my land and life]
Said inserts feelings of loss and longing for home elsewhere in this text. He
highlights the way in which the personal overlaps with the socio-cultural past that
Stuart Hall has illuminated in terms of migration. Hall states.
We need to situate the debates about identity within all those historically specific
developments and practices which have disturbed the relatively settled character
of many populations and cultures, above all in relation to the processes of
globalization and the processes of forced and free migration which have become
a global phenomenon of the so-called postcolonial world. Actually identities are
about using the resources and history, language and culture, in the process of
becoming rather than being. (Hall 1996: 4)
In Chapter 3 I offer a detailed case study from Sweden Europe, where Said’s text
was constructed. This case study provides a critique from a position outside of the
exhibition planning process. It aims to examine instances where the hierarchical
lines of power remain in the museum management structure, but project-work, is
shown to displace the absolute curatorial authority in museum exhibitions, to a far
greater extent than the examples considered in Section 1 and in African Worlds
discussed earlier. My focus throughout the chapter is on the National Museum
of World Culture (MWC), in Göteborg Sweden, where I have been privileged

to contribute, since 2002, to the international MA course in Museum Studies at
Museion that is hosted there.
The galleries at MWC I shall consider, demonstrate the possibility of
imagination and collaborative effort permitting different interpretations to be
housed in the museum, and for people to come to recognise and value each other
beyond superficial factors, such as skin tone. Most importantly for this book there
is a shifting of activity at MWC to foreground the Black subject and MWC does
not shy away from thinking through the complexity of issues such as colonialism
and the legacy of racism and stereotype, which are made visible through different
media and in the object rich displays that aim to increase intellectual and physical
access to diverse cultures and widen participation in the museum.
I shall outline particular creative interventions with world-renowned: artists,
cultural theorists and migrant communities. In the main I shall concentrate on the
opening exhibitions including: Horizons: Voices from a Global Africa where a
multitude of voices, historical and contemporary were invited to be heard by the
exhibition team leaders alongside the museum’s own voice; No Name Fever on
the global HIV Aids epidemic and the artist installation Site Unseen: Dwelling
of the Demons completed by Fred Wilson. In these exhibitions issues of emotion
and reason in the politics and poetics of display come to the fore, which includes
notions of diaspora identities, the body and metaphor that progresses understanding
across borders in a fusion of horizons (Karp and Wilson 1999; Golding 2005;
Gadamer 1981).
Within this remit it is the Horizons exhibition that permit a detailed consideration
of these key themes and link with my Horniman discussion. African Worlds, with
its collaborative exhibition ethos and the notion of plurivocality that underpins
the ‘glimpses’ of Africa and the diaspora provided a ‘point of reference’ for
Horizons, developing these key themes and extending them specifically into the
areas of antiracism (Horizonter Brief 2001: 5, 8). For example we can hear Franz
Fanon, Sojourner Truth, Paul Gilroy and Bob Marley’s voices alongside many
others and together these voices break down the binary divides and essentialism
of Enlightenment thought that I have discussed, to feature ‘fusion, diaspora
and hybridity’ (ibid. 6). These voices offer a radical representation of historical
enslavement and resistance, urban and rural Africa, traditional and contemporary
perspectives, notably the ‘stories of routes and roots’ voiced by Swedish
communities who have migrated from the Horn of Africa, which movingly speak
of the impact of migration on the individual’s life today that is heard in Abdullah
Said’s identity poem above (ibid. 19).
First I shall begin with an overview of MWC from inception, its aims and
objectives as a National site before moving onto consider the new architectural
spaces. Then from a gendered perspective I consider the No Name Fever displays
and explore the controversy that exploded in the press at the time of widespread
‘Islamaphobia’ in Europe. Next I address the Voices exhibition and engage in a
critical discussion of identity politics, exploring political issues around class, race
Power: Inserting New Visibilities in the Museum Margins 81
and gender that intertwine there in a poetics of display (Karp and Lavine 1991).
Finally, I look at the artist intervention by Fred Wilson before drawing some
concluding remarks.
Developing the Museum of World Culture
It was a Swedish government idea in 1996, to connect the old Göteborg

Ethnographical Museum with three Stockholm museums (the Museum of
Ethnography, the Museum of Mediterranean and Near Eastern Antiquities and
the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities), and establish a consortium of museums
as The National Museums of World Culture (MWC). The left wing Swedish
government of the time is to be congratulated for recognising the potential of
the museum – specifically international and non-European collections – for
progressing intercultural understanding between diverse communities in Sweden,
which comprises 20 percent of the population. A government report of 1998
expresses this clearly:
The National Museums of World Culture shall create something new in the
world of museums … They will mirror similarities and differences in ways of
thinking, lifestyles and living conditions, as well as cultural change in Sweden
and in the world. The visitor shall be given an opportunity to reflect over her
own cultural identity and over other people’s identities. (Official Government
Report, SOU 1998: 125, 28; Lagerkvist 2007: 1)
The government required the consortium to develop new audiences that might
more fully reflect the diverse local population and advised originality in terms of
museum communication and collaboration with key stakeholders from outside of
the museum world to achieve these ends. Thus government initiatives heralded the
birth on 29 December 2004 of a new museum building in Göteborg, at a cost of 38
million euros from the architects Cécile Brisac and Edgar Gonzalez. The founding
Director Dr Jette Sandahl led the MWC project and adopted a collaborative
teamwork approach from the outset, to facilitate some innovative methods of
consultation and representation, which remain exceptional in the contemporary
museum world.
Dr Jette Sandahl highlights the key concepts that underpin the mission for the
MWC. She states:
In dialogue with the surrounding world and through emotional and intellectual
experiences the museum wants to be a meeting place that encourages people
to feel at home across borders, to trust and take responsibility for a shared
future in a world in constant change. (Sandahl <http://www.intercom.museum/
conferences/2002/sandahl.html> accessed on 01.02.2009)
MWC comprises a versatile series of spaces in steel, concrete and vast areas of
glass, nestling at the foot of the Liseberg. The architects have employed light –
natural and artificial – to full advantage, including a light box extending across
the entire length of the top fifth floor, which changes colour from misty green, to
white and vibrant pink at dusk. A glass wall also runs along almost the complete
length of the building at ground level, providing natural light to visitors inside the
Horizons: Voices of a Global Africa Gallery, where the objects are protected from
the direct glare of the sun by large banners with colourful photographic images
advertising the museum.
Once inside, the building opens into a expansive central atrium with a vast
staircase leading off to the café on the first floor, and the five exhibition galleries on
three other floors. Do ho Suh (1962-), A south Korean artist’s, screening zones the
café area and encloses the seminar rooms without losing the openness of the space.
Suh’s screens represent cultural difference within the global village, particularly
the emphasis on the individual in the USA where he lives, which contrasts with
the celebration of the collective in traditional Korean society. His screens work
with the repetition of elements, to comment on the negotiations necessary between
collective states of anonymity and individual identity. The screens take two forms.
His open fretwork screening consists of hundreds of plastic human figures, both
men and women – wearing trousers and tops – whose individuality only appears
on close inspection. Each figure in bright but not garish colours has spread legs,
raised and spread arms, which are pegged together so that they may stand on
and support each other to form a six feet high screen or mesh wall that seems to
emphasise the possibility of humanity working together as part of ‘one world’; a
‘rainbow nation’ effect as Plate 14 shows. A photographic image of this screen is
printed onto the plate glass walls of the seminar rooms, which effectively allows
extra light into the discussion spaces while obscuring the visitors passing by.
Coloured benches and the broad steps of the main staircase provide welcome
rest and conversation points for visitors in the atrium, which attracts audiences of
all ages in small groups or in larger audiences, for the regular public performances
that are held on the small stage area facing the stairs. MWC has operated a strong
programme of music, dance and theatre, seminars, lectures and public debates
on a theme related to the exhibitions or a current event since its inception. Input
from a high percentage of non-Europeans (60 percent of the artists and lecturers
and 50 percent of the international guests), whose cultures are represented in the
museum, enriches MWC programmes. Two comments, from visitors at a Teddy
Afro (Ethiopian pop) concert audience survey, are taken as typical evidence of
appropriate programming:
It is very rare to be able to see this kind of thing in the public sphere, not only
in private associations. This feels as if it is a public space. Wonderful that these
things get a place here.
For me it is of great importance. My daughter listens to his music. She has got to
know Ethiopia through Teddy Afro’s music. (Lagerkvist 2007)
These comments are reinforced by audience surveys showing programming can be

effective in reaching a youthful and ‘diverse’ target audience whose average age
‘is unusually young for a museum, with 60% of visitors being under the age of 30’
(<http://www.varldskulturmuseet.se/> accessed on 20.12.2008). All programming
is developed in consultation with target audiences, and with opening hours until
9pm Wednesday to Friday, the museum is able to host events such as world music
performances including ‘club nights’ with a DJ in response to the needs of diverse
local community groups. MWC also programme ‘Community Nights’, which
provide opportunities for diverse groups and organisations to ‘use the museum as
an arena for their own events’, although MWC takes responsibility for preventing
racist or anti-democratic opinions infiltrating the museum space by stipulating
all groups must respect the law and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
(UDHR) (Lagerkvist 2007).
Plate 14 Doh ho Suh’s sculptural screen at the Museum of World Culture,
Göteborg, Sweden, 2006
Source: Author.
Thus we see in programming, as with exhibition making, MWC has taken to

heart Richard Sandell’s call for museums to ‘radically rethink their purposes and
goals and to renegotiate their relationship to, and role within, society’ in order to
achieve a more equal representation (Sandell 2003: 45). It is an intense process
of ‘dialogue’ and ‘negotiation’ that marks the movement of MWC away from the
traditional role of the museum (Lagerkvist 2006: 57). Instead of highlighting the
hierarchies of power in society, the greatness of those who rule, usually male, his
wealth and his deeds, we see MWC fulfilling the aim of promoting a plural society,
with close to one million visitors since opening attending hundreds of activities,
600 school programmes and 250 conference events annually (Dubin 1999: 3).
MWC constructs more than five new exhibitions each year for visitors to
attend. Next I shall consider three exhibitions in the light of an underlying ethos,
which I recognise as political and poetical.
The Politics and Poetics of Design
Jette Sandahl illuminates the way the MWC mission translates into exhibition
policy. The MWC exhibition mission declares:
Through its exhibitions the museum will create dialogue with audiences that
are diverse relative to age, class, gender, education, ethnicity. The museum will
develop an experimental and questioning style for its exhibitions, so that many
different voices can be heard and also ambiguous and conflict filled subjects can
be articulated. Exhibitions will explore the unique understanding, poetry and
power embedded in museums objects. (Sandahl <http://www.intercom.museum/
conferences/2002/sandahl.html> accessed on 01.02.2009)
Here Sandahl emphasises the importance of ‘politics and poetics’ in museums.

Nearly two decades after Ivan Karp and Steven Lavine first highlighted these ideas
I agree with Jette Sandahl, Henrietta Lidchi and Julian Spalding in regarding the
concept as important and relevant today (Karp and Lavine 1991; Lidchi 2003:
151-222; Spalding 2002). The two notions inextricably work together, with the
poetics of display providing visitors with points of emotional contact with others. I
shall explain this point with reference to one of the earliest western sources, before
outlining how the overriding liberal political perspective at MWC is progressed
through poetics.
In the Poetics, Aristotle considers the nature and value of art or what we term
today aesthetics. Aristotle attempts to explain the way in which ‘great art’ or
tragedy in his text enriches the understanding of audiences not only in terms of
the play but also in terms of the human place in the wider world. To summarise, at
the risk of oversimplification, he attributes the power of the art on the spectator to
the circular relationship between the ‘parts’ and the ‘whole’ in artistic production.
This relationship in tragedy might provoke ‘empathy’ or ‘pity and fear’ as well as
a ‘catharsis of such affections’, but only in a viewer possessed of the codes to read
the work (Aristotle, Telford translation 1961).
From Aristotle’s time to the present day the poet is able to condense meaning,
to express some vital emotional elements of experiences that make us human,
into the poem. It is this emotional impact between the exhibition maker and the
visitor through a ‘kind of systematic order’ that museologists employ in their
discussions of poetics (Bann 2004: 67). Julian Spalding clarifies this when he
writes of a primary challenge for museums today, which lies in creating ‘displays
that express emotional, not just factual, content’ (Spalding 2002: 69). At MWC
museum poetics involves facilitating human experiences with objects in spaces
that are deeply moving – even earth shattering – in ways that more straightforward
presentations of information in a standard distanced ‘scientific’ or didactic fashion
do not so readily achieve. Spalding speaks about reaching the ‘hearts and the
minds’ of visitors and he prioritises their ‘seeing, feeling and comprehending’,
through the display of original objects. He stresses the importance of the awe and
wonder these experiences can evoke in an age of globalisation where the world of
the original object is close, at least for those with the finances to travel. Spalding,
who comes from a working class background as I do, contends this heritage
sensitises him to the ‘advantages that education, class, wealth, race and where we
live bring’ (Spalding 2002: 10).
Spalding offers many examples of museum exhibitions progressing poetics
and I highlight Jette Sandahl’s work on the ‘At Night’ (1993) exhibition, at the
Women’s Museum in Aarhus, here. This exhibition explored emotions such as
‘fear’ of being attacked, and the way in which ordinary objects such as a bunch
of keys, when imaginatively displayed with reference to their use as a defensive
weapon clutched in a fist, acquire great symbolic power. Additionally we may note
how such displays can overturn taken for granted notions in presenting possibilities
for woman as actor-subject and not the eternally passive-object or victim of crime.
Gaby Porter also observes how this exhibition explores feelings and associations
shared amongst many women ‘fear; desire and pleasure; dreaming; nursing the
very young and very old; working … in factories and theatres’ (Porter 1996: 121).
Porter’s writing on the representation of women in museums, although
commenting on the situation in the late 1990s, remains largely true today. She
highlights the relational role of women in museum displays as the ‘other’ of man –
‘relatively passive, shallow, undeveloped, muted and closed’ in contrast to men
who are seen as ‘relatively active, deep, highly developed and articulated, fully
pronounced and open’ (Porter 1996: 110). Women, she argues, are consistently the
passive background against which man acts and she also notes a relegation of the
feminine to the realms of the ‘irrational’ (Porter 1996: 110-111). We might further
argue that as woman’s passivity in museums reflects her place in the wider world,
where she is silenced and marginalised if not altogether excluded, the socially
responsible museum holds a moral and political duty to counter this inequality
and silence.
It is to the political notion of breaking such silencing that I turn next. First
I consider silencing and emotion with reference to the poetics of an opening
exhibition at MWC No Name Fever – Aids in the age of globalisation, which
began travelling in 2006.
Poetics and Politics in Exhibition Design and Intent at MWC
The MWC exhibition No Name Fever – AIDS in the Age of Globalization provides
an in-depth study, challenging the silence, the myths and the wider socio-economic
issues surrounding the HIV/AIDS pandemic. It aims to raise awareness of HIV/
AIDS, which forty million people across the globe are living with today. The
exhibition is interesting in imparting a broad and emotional understanding of the
disease to visitors.
Jette Sandahl notes that since the MWC mission was ‘to be an institution with
relevance to our contemporary age’, this necessitated tackling ‘themes that are
defined by contemporary problems. She notes HIV/AIDS as ‘a microcosm of our
eras unsolved economic and power-related relationships, encompassing all the
mechanisms, antagonisms and conflicts of globalisation’, and the determination
of her team to ‘take a stance’ on the issue, which is at once political and poetical
in museum terms (<http://www.actupny.org/reports/WorldCultureMuseum.html>
accessed on 02.01.2009). The exhibition title is derived from the refusal of the
Chinese authorities to acknowledge the disease when people first began presenting
symptoms, contracted from contaminated blood sold by poor farmers to illegal
collectors. Lu Guang’s photographic work uncovered this blood donor scandal in
Henan province and features amongst a large display of posters from ‘Act Up’, a
New York-based protest group.
The Danish company KHR Arkitekter, whose earlier design of mobile HIV
clinics won an international competition in New York, structured No Name Fever
around seven emotive themes based upon two decades of typical reactions to the
pandemic: Denial, Fear, Rage, Lust, Despair, Sorrow and Hope. In these themes
KHR take an apposite and uplifting approach to an emotionally charged subject.
As Sandahl observed from the museum perspective ‘in the midst of all the tragedy,
it has been a life-giving process to work with this theme’ since ‘ranged against the
sadness, the anger and the powerlessness is all the empathy and the determination
generated among people living in close proximity to the disease – expressing
solidarity without borders’. HIV/AIDS is a disease that respects no geographical,
social or economic boundaries; it carries extreme reactions in its wake and sufferers
across the globe are subject to enormous prejudice, indifference and taboos, from
the poorest rural regions of China in the East to the richest states of the USA in
the west.
Plate 15 HIV condom costume at the Museum of World Culture,

Source: Author.
The KHR design emphasises the indiscriminate disease, affecting gay, straight,
haemophiliac, young, old, women, men, poor and rich. Design considers each
of the seven emotions separately within a tall white polygon shape that refers
to the haemoglobin cells the virus attacks. The location of projectors within
each polygonal space, so that we cast our shadows as visitors, is affective and
prompts our reflection on the objects and the information. Key objects include
wonderful artwork made by established artists and ordinary citizens from around
the world. For example in the ‘Horizons of Hope’ section visitors can see part
of ‘Dressing Up For Aids’, two beautiful dresses in hot reds, pinks and oranges,
and a black suit, which is a project by the Brazilian artist Adriana Bertini who
uses hundreds of brightly coloured condoms to make elegant clothing that can be
seen at Plate 15. On the wall behind the clothing one short factual text in white
lettering states: ‘Youth at Risk. 58% of all adolescent AIDS cases in the United
States are young women’, which is a typical example of the way the exhibition
offers a deep intellectual experience by circling emotional messages and factual
information around the visual material culture. This intermingling of emotion,
object and information provides visitors with a comprehensive overview of the
topic and access to resources. Perhaps this mixture, coupled with a free choice of
multiple routes rather than a single fixed route and a linear historical sequencing
of the material also facilitates openness in the visitor to consider the subject anew
and from diverse perspectives.
Personal stories abound and tell the heartache caused by rejection. One email
from India speaks of a family even refusing contact with their son’s dead body.
Moving testimonies such as this, point beyond the medical problem to the social
economic and ethical issues of HIV/AIDS, the misunderstanding and the stigma.
Individual memorial quilts made by friends and family-members of deceased AIDS
sufferers from Sweden and the Philippines also have heart-rending messages: ‘No
one should die alone’, ‘Hurts inside, Discrimination outside, Peace in death’,
‘Take care of my kids and Mom’ which incorporates a favourite check shirt of the
dead Nick. Another set of personal objects that tell poignant stories are the display
of cheap cosmetics and jewellery belonging to Bangladesh sex workers.
Perhaps what is vital to this exhibition is the way emotions and politics cohere
in the museum media, the use of light, projection and colour in spaces that relate
emotionally to the human body and intellectually to the mind. For example
some of the contemporary art and craft refers to traditional techniques like the
‘family’ of beaded dolls, which include two life-sized figures from South Africa
as Plate 16 shows. The brief wall text at this polygon display speaks powerfully
of the disproportionate impact of the disease on women who suffer the ‘greatest
HIV risk factors’, especially the world’s poorest women. Since women are chief
caregivers the world over this is consequently a tragedy for children. Throughout
the exhibition there is a vibrant mix of factual information, films, examples of
political activism and campaign materials from around the world, music, a wide
range of fine art and craftwork, sculptures, photographs and personal testimony
that I have outlined.
Finally it is worth highlighting the use of light and shadow once more. Outside
of the polygons four large projection screens run along one wall and chronicle
information on the impact of the disease over the whole world since the 1980s,
with the red AIDS ribbon serving as bullet points. Two of these four screens show
images of people with the AIDS virus, which relieves the eye from solid text. The
shocking facts of deaths worldwide are counted at a clock in the top corner of this
section, which reached 20m in 1997, 24m in 2004. One more person dies every
tenth second and there are 14,000 new sufferers diagnosed every day.
This exhibition reached 230,000 people during the two years it was open in Göteborg
and proved attractive to a high proportion of the target audience of teenagers and young
adults. The exhibition is underpinned with substantial research by an interdisciplinary team
of academics, activists and policy makers. It was a collaborative project led by MWC and
Museion at Göteborg University and part of the knowledge gathered to support the displays
is available in an edited volume of 13 scholarly papers, which further demonstrates the
museums commitment to research (Foller and Thorn 2005).
Plate 16 HIV dolls at the Museum of World Culture, Göteborg, Sweden, 2004
Source: Author.
Diverse Perspectives: Controversy and Culture Clash
Many of the artworks, which present challenging and radical political perspectives
in No Name Fever, are controversial. I would argue the explicitly political stance
is necessary, to comment on the rightwing views expressed by successive Catholic
popes for example, which causes such hardship especially in poorer nations. Cajsa
Lagerkvist tells us that the most controversy arose from a rather quiet figurative
painting, one of two by Louzla Darabi, in the Desire section of the exhibition
(Lagerkvist 2006, 2007). MWC received approximately 600 emails from Swedish
Muslims that were mostly sad and polite requests to consider removing, Darabi’s
‘Scène d’Amour’, from display. This painting depicts a naked couple embracing
each other with a small inscription of Quranic verse, Surat Al-Fatiha at the bottom –
a combination that is odious to Muslims. Darabi, who is a Muslim of Algerian
heritage living in France, volunteered to remove her original painting and replace
it with a less offending image, to which the museum agreed. A number of the 600
emails praised the museum’s effort to collaborate with and welcome its Muslim
audience but a tiny proportion of the 600 emails, no more than a couple, were
rather aggressive in tone.
One email noted the fate of Theo van Gogh, the Dutch filmmaker who a
Muslim fundamentalist murdered in Amsterdam in 2004, as a part of jihad for
the film ‘Submission’ criticising the position of women under an oppressive
fundamentalist regime in Iran. A Göteborg newspaper reprinted this email in large
text that covered the whole of one edition, which provoked criticism from pro-free
speech and anti-Muslim groups, who equally strongly objected to the museum’s
replacement of the offending painting, with one woman protesting outside the
museum every weekend for more than a year. In this instance the museum was
able to act as open forum but in doing so exposed the difficulty of attempting
to maneuver a satisfactory position between opposing groups, which leaves us
with some questions. Is it not usually the older men in the protesting group who
wish to oppress younger women? We wonder how would the museum react if
Darabi refused to bow to the demands? Lagerkvist, who has documented this
incident thoughtfully, holds the view that controversy is not only inevitable but
also desirable if museums are to fulfil a new role as agents of social change in the
twenty-first century (Lagerkvist 2006, 2007).
Lagerkvist’s views here echo Timothy Luke. Luke notes the importance of
museum practice that ‘accept clash as civilizing’ since it ‘pushes received opinion
out of the ruts cut by empty, settled certainties’ (Luke 2006: 24). He further contends
that some of the museums ‘best work’ can be achieved by unleashing the civilizing
clash of community self-reflection, debate and revitalisation. These ideas echo in
Advantage Göteborg, which is located in a second opening exhibition – Horizons:
Voices from a Global Africa exhibition, to which I turn to next.
Horizons: Voices from a Global Africa
Each of the letters in the title of the word ‘Horizons’ are split horizontally with blue
ocean waves at the bottom and light blue sky at the top, presenting a meeting of the
sea with the sky and preparing the visitor for other meetings, meeting cultures and
returning to meet oneself at ever-new horizons (Gadamer 1981).
The introductory text panel notes the ‘diverse multitude of peoples, languages,
lifestyles, climates, landscapes and cultures’ that comprise the African continent.
In addition to the complexity within Africa the museum highlights ‘Africa’ as
a ‘political concept and the dream of a homeland’ held by millions of people,
who over the last five centuries, have left ‘as slaves, due to poverty or political
oppression, or of their own free will’, taking forms of ‘cultural expression’ that
have helped shape societies around the world. The exhibition promises ‘stories’
and ‘life histories of women and men, objects, art and music’ that will ‘testify to
ways of living and surviving, to the heartache and thrill of exile, to oppression,
violence and resistance, to love, joy and hope.’
Visitors turn from this panel into the exhibition hall, where a variety of
voices resound in the MWC narrative – a particularly challenging historio-
political story of imperialism and colonialism – the oppression of a white elite
over Black ‘others’ and the legacy of this in racism and inequality today. It is
the strong Black voices from the past and the present that permit this story to be
presented in an uplifting light with an optimistic view to making a brighter future
for global citizens of the world. The voices are organised spatially together with
historical and contemporary objects under seven key themes, which take us on a
historical journey from the ‘Past’ and ‘Resistance’, through ‘Power and Survival’
and ‘Gender’, to ‘Urban Voices and ‘Voices from the Horn of Africa in Sweden’,
while the voices of contemporary fine artists in the ‘Polyphonies’ theme provide
points of critical thought that comments throughout the other sections.
‘Voices from the Past’ highlights the richness and diversity of Africa – second
only to China with respect to population and land mass – from the ancient
Egyptian civilisations in the north, the mighty kingdoms of the east and west
coast, through the trade routes of the Sahara to the prosperous Great Zimbabwe
in the south. Here MWC selects 500 years of achievements, specifically focusing
on the migrations of people to other parts of the globe, where they have made
an extraordinary contribution to the cultural expression of their adopted societies
through their creativity. Jette Sandahl comments on ‘the enormous impact that
African culture has had on the rest of the world’, which ‘was never based on
military conquest or financial power, but on a fantastic innate quality and life
force!’ (<http://www.worldculture.se/smvk/jsp/polopoly.jsp?d=877&a=4533&p=0>
accessed on 16.03.2005) These are glorious and positive stories that need to be told
to counter the prevalent one-dimensional image of Africa in the world media as
simply impoverished.
Additionally MWC does not flinch from telling negative stories that might
account for present day suffering and inequality. For example, ‘The Atlantic
Slave Trade’ tells the horrific history of enslavement from the fifteenth to the
late nineteenth century, when ‘between 9 to … 20 million’ people were forced
to make a gruelling crossing as ‘chattel’ in ships across the Atlantic Ocean. Over
one whole wall of this display the visitor sees a projection of the blue-sky meeting
the horizon of the ocean and hears the crashing of waves against the shore. Just a
few well-chosen sentences of text are projected below the image, which takes us
through the history of ‘the slave trade’, ‘slaves in the new world’ and ‘the legacy
of colonialism and slavery’. Before this projection, set into transparent display
boxes at irregular intervals, raised from the floor like oblong coffins, visitors see
some of the appalling instruments of restraint – the terrible iron shackles used to
constrain bodies at the neck or the ankle – like animals. The display boxes are
strongly spotlit and clustered together at the centre of the projection with space for
visitors to walk around as Plate 17 shows.
Plate 17 Slavery projection at the Museum of World Culture,

Source: Author.
Beyond this space it is possible to sit at a computer terminal to look up at the

sea, down at the floor and use the touch screen user-friendly programmes to learn
more about the history of the slave trade and its legacy. At each computer screen
the visitor touches an active bar to select a slide, which is split vertically into
two, showing an image on the right and a brief text on the left; a mix of word
and image, which works well. Particularly successful for me were the personal
testimonies of Black freedom fighters. For example, Sojourner Truth (1979-1883)
who was born into a Dutch settlement in upstate New York, USA and given the
name of Isabella Baumfree. Sojourner Truth was sold from her family age 11 just
before slavery was abolished and eventually ran away with her infant son after her
master reneged on his promise to free her. She worked as a domestic for several
religious communes and had a spiritual revelation in 1843, when she began to
preach ‘God’s truth and plan for salvation’ up and down the country. Truth went
to live at a utopian community, ‘The Northampton Association for Education and
Industry’, where she met abolitionists and fighters for women’s suffrage, which
led her to add abolition and suffrage issues to her oratory. In 1851 she made her
most famous speech to a women’s convention in Akron, Ohio: ‘Ain’t I a woman?’
which draws powerfully on her awful personal experiences as an enslaved person.
Truth states:
That man over here say / a woman needs to be helped into carriages / and lifted
over ditches / and to have the best place everywhere. / Nobody ever helped me
over mud puddles/ or gives me the best place / And ain’t I a woman? / Look at
my arm! / I have plowed and planted / and gathered into barns / and no man
could head me / And ain’t I a woman? / I could work as much as a man / and eat
as much as a man / when I could get to it / and bear the lash as well /
And ain’t I a woman? / I have born 13 children and seen most all sold into
slavery / and when I cried out a mother’s grief / none but Jesus heard me … /
and ain’t I a woman? That little man in the back there say / a woman can’t have
as much rights as a / man/ cause Christ wasn’t a woman / Where did your Christ
come from? From God and a woman! / If the first woman God ever made / was
strong enough to turn the world / upside down, all alone / together women ought
to be able to turn it / rightside up again.
To see a photograph of Sojourner at the right slide of two consecutive split screen
slides humanises the life story that is told at the left of the slides. This portrait of
a ‘woman’ – looking so smart in immaculate white cap, white blouse and shawl
over a black dress – calmly fixing the viewer with a penetrating gaze adds to the
empathy visitors feel, when later reading the third slide that speaks of her life story
in the exceptionally powerful and moving poetic text ‘Ain’t I a woman’. Similarly
the portraits of Olaudah Equiano, Harriet Jacobs and Sarah Gudger that accompany
the selection of slides entitled ‘Slave narratives’, seems to increase the visitors’
capacity to respond with fellow human feeling and raises a stronger admiration
for the ways the enslaved ‘summoned the strength to withstand oppression’ than
text alone.
MWC not only brings the ‘invisible’ and ‘anonymous’ to voice in the slavery
exhibits but also presents a self-reflexive stance and accepts responsibility for
past wrongs. Sandahl notes: ‘It is essential for us Europeans to find a way of
relating to our shared and interwoven history with the African continent, even
when that history is at its most painful’ (<http://www.worldculture.se/smvk/jsp/
polopoly.jsp?d=877&a=4533&p=0> accessed on 16.03.2005). MWC offers an
impressive survey of this field. Particularly well represented, are examples of
those Black artists who speak of resistance through musical expression such as
Bookman Experience from Haiti and Bob Marley from Jamaica, whose work is
also available at computer stations and on the walls in the gallery, as well as in
the shop. These Caribbean artists at MWC share a positioning of being ‘nomads’
between cultures, who celebrate the capacity of human beings to resist persecution
and present a strong challenge to racism in their creative work.
Directly challenging racist perspectives is a persistent theme at MWC, quite

unique in my experience of European museums. At the outset of the computer
slide Racism and the Civil Rights Movement in the USA we read a statement in
plain language ‘Colonialism and slavery were based on a racist world view.’ We
further hear how despite emancipation in 1865 the ‘struggle for fair and equal
treatment is not over.’ These emancipatory movements in the USA thread back
to earlier, global Voices of Resistance at the computer consoles and on the walls
of the gallery. The thought of Aimé Cesairé (1913-2008) celebrating Blackness
to ‘counter to the lies and distortions of racism’ is heard here, alongside Franz
Fanon (1925-1961) highlighting the connection of racism with white people’s fear,
which leads to objectification and the ‘Negro’ viewed as ‘a symbol of sin’. These
thoughts have a dramatic affect on visitors in this space, well-designed by Opera
Ontwerpers, with projected waves and seashore on the far wall, we ponder the
power of racist perceptions throughout the world today.
Strong Black antiracist voices abound at every turn of the gallery as we walk
in a non-linear pathway between past and present. A reconstructed voudou shrine,
enclosed in a cylindrical space highlights Bookman the voudou priest who was
instrumental inspiring the Haitian revolution of 1791-1804. Bookman’s words of
resistance urge his followers to ‘Throw away the symbol of the god of the whites
who has so often caused us to weep, and listen to the voice of liberty, which speaks
in the hearts of us all’, a theme I shall return to in Chapter 5. These Black voices, do
not dwell in any sense of passive ‘victim-hood’ but rather consistently emphasise
active political resistance today, with for example Christiane Toubira-Delanon
asking if Atlantic slavery should be condemned as a ‘crime against humanity’ and
if ‘former slave trading nations’ should offer an apology for their involvement. It is
clever design that permits ‘high’ academic Black voices of contemporary theorists
such as Paul Gilroy’s, to mingle well with Black voices from ‘popular’ culture
such as Bob Marley’s, which I consider next.
Culture as Resistance: Music, Religion, Politics and Philosophy
In a text panel entitled ‘Resistance’ MWC emphasises the persistent active

resistance of Black people to the tyranny of the institution of slavery. The panel
notes Black peoples’ declaration of war on oppression in the fight for freedom and
this idea is echoed in Bob Marley song, ‘War’. Marley states:
Until there no longer are / First-class and second-class citizens of any nation /
Until the colour of a man’s skin / Is of no more significance than the colour of
his eyes / Me say war. (Marley 2004)
Marley’s ‘War’ can be heard at a computer console with commentary from Paul
Gilroy. Gilroy observes:
“War”, Marley’s uplifting rendering of a celebrated speech by Haile Selassie

1, remains a difficult piece for anyone who wants to contain or minimise the
depth of his philosophical challenge to the racial ordering of the world. The
song’s militant stance is not military in any way. There is no exaltation here,
only sadness, regret and sorrow at the damage done to all humankind by racism.
(Gilroy 2004)
Similarly at this console Gilroy regards ‘Burnin and Lootin’ as part of the long
struggle for civil and political rights. For Gilroy this song is a ‘post-modern’
successor to W.E.B. Dubois’s identification of oppressed peoples’ ‘righteous rage’
and ‘moralising their bleak choices’, which attentive listeners may come to see
differently as ‘responses to a divided world purged of hope and love alike’; while
‘Concrete Jungle’ highlights slavery as a key to the postcolonial present and the
agonies of what Gilroy terms the Black ‘ghetto life’.
Yet Gilroy points out that Marley’s work is not negative. He uses lyrics and
reggae rhythms to move listeners from looking at the horror of the past with
rage to act in the present, so that we may move forward to a brighter future. For
example Gilroy speaks of ‘So much trouble in the world’ as a force of oppositional
counter-power, where Marley communicates the possibilities of engaging in a new
‘political imagination’, which is ‘a cosmopolitan invitation to take responsibility
for the things that have to be changed if the whole world is to be healed.’ Again
‘Get Up, Stand Up’ speaks of ‘human rights’ and human freedom that respects no
national boundaries and can be easily translated into every language.
Plate 18 shows a collection of musical instruments, displayed behind a vast
glass wall that rises up towards the ceiling of the gallery and acts as a division,
between the displays dealing with slavery on one side and cinema projection of Bob
Marley’s life story at the other. Marley’s songs and words regularly echo around
the wall of instruments. Thus while the musical instruments, which are silent on
display and unlikely to be played again, may provoke melancholia, feelings of
sadness and loss in the visitor, the effect in MWC is quite different. Sound here
ensures the visitor’s senses are not reduced to the imperialism of the visual and the
use of contemporary music, with direct links to a rich African heritage, facilitates
points of contact between peoples of the world today. Non-African peoples, of
diverse ages during my MWC observations responded positively to the computer
consoles, sound, film and fine art representing lived experiences of contemporary
diaspora peoples.
It seems to be an open learning space, more attuned to the senses, which helps
braid together the new ‘knower with the known’ here (Stoller 1989: 154-6). Next I
shall consider how MWC imparts a sense of what it may be to ‘live in other times
and other spaces’, through the experience of migration (Bhabha. 1995: 256).
Plate 18 Musical instruments wall and the Bob Marley video at
the Museum of World Culture, Göteborg, Sweden, 2006
Source: Author.
Advantage Göteborg
One partnership project entitled Advantage Göteborg, the fruits of which are
displayed at the Horn section of the Horizons gallery, comprising a rich display of
objects, text panels and computer consoles with videos made by Horn people living
in Sweden, justly deserves critical acclaim from fellow museum professionals
(ICOM-ICME 2005). Cajsa Lagerkvist (from within the MWC staff) and Laurella
Rincon (an externally contracted consultant) are two of the MWC project team
who worked on the Horn project, which took place at the MWC for a period of
18 months from April 2003 to December 2004, immediately prior to opening
(Lagerkvist 2005, 2007; Rincon 2005). The project invited 24 Göteborgians –
Swedish citizens who have migrated from and retain contact with the Horn of
Africa (Somalia, Ethiopia and Eritrea) – to both document and to reinterpret the
Abyssinian collection through oral history.
The project is interesting for two reasons, firstly in demonstrating MWC’s
commitment to traditional museology, contextualising the collection through
documentation. This was to be achieved alongside progressing the museum’s social
role and commitment to raising social justice, tolerance and inclusion at a local
Göteborg level, through partnership project work with crucial international links
(Sandell 2003). Advantage Göteborg is also intriguing for exposing professional
power hierarchies that persist in the museum, despite the best conscious efforts
of a radically principled management stance, to hinder full or ‘Equal’ access for
groups who experience social exclusion (Rincon 2005; Lagerkvist 2005, 2007).
Two sources of funding sponsored the project: the Equal program of the
European Social Fund and the Swedish government via the MWC exhibitions
budget, which came with the express ‘social’ aim of breaking ‘down barriers
to accessing the labour market’ that this group suffered, by using the museum
collections and the exhibition process as a ‘tool of empowerment’ (Rincon 2005:
3; Lagerkvist 2005, 2007). For Lagerkvist, speaking from within the museum,
major factors of exclusion from the labour force were considered to lie within the
particular social group as low self-esteem, and also within the wider Swedish society
as stereotypical, restricted and underlying racist perceptions of the Göteborg/Horn
people by prospective employers. In Lagerkvist’s writing it is because of these
factors that the MWC team worked to increase a strong sense of identity and
pride in home cultures with the Horn group and to establish equitable working
relationships to present a more rounded picture to the future MWC visitor.
As a professional consultant, Rincon occupies a position at the borderlands
between the museum and the Göteborg/Horn community. She foregrounds
notions of struggles for power and control, over MWC ideas of self-esteem and
empowerment that Lagerkvist highlights, and draws on Ames and Clifford to support
her case. Rincon explores the metaphor of the glass box within a timely discourse
of intellectual property rights and the World Intellectual Property Organisation
(WIPO) and writes persuasively of MWC as ‘cannibalising’ or appropriating the
disadvantaged community voices within their glass boxes primarily for their own
study (WIPO; Ames 1992; Clifford 1997; Rincon 2005). Specifically she argues
that ‘the lack of relationships between people of different backgrounds outside
the museum was reproduced identically inside’, with MWC ‘expectations on the
sharing of intimate and personal experiences of displacement and discrimination’
leading to Göteborg/Horn consultants feeling ‘ethnologised’ with their life-force
reduced to ‘their voices’ that were ‘to be captured in the glass box’ (2005: 4).
The compromise solution for some consultants was agreeing their particular end
project ‘be shown in the museum for a two year period’ and further use ‘submitted
to their agreement’, while all raw materials remained in their safe keeping.
Rincon further emphasises the subtle terminology to reinforce her views. The
‘preferred term’ for the Göteborg/Horn consultants was ‘participants’ rather than
‘collaborators or consultants’, with ‘supervisors’ rather than ‘co-workers’ within
the MWC staff team. This terminology may be seen as condescending, pointing
to the perpetuation of the traditional one way relationship and flow of knowledge
from ‘source’ communities, or to use my preferred term ‘originating’ communities
at the museum periphery, to the more powerful mainstream (Peers 2004; Dudley
2005). While some readers may regard all of this as a matter of semantic quibbling
it highlights a set of underlying if unthinking assumptions made by those in power
at the museum site, which need to be thoroughly interrogated if the museum is to
relinquish some of its cultural authority and engage in genuine power sharing in
the museum as part of an emancipatory social programme in the wider world.
In Lagerkvist’s writing on the Horn project she foregrounds the value of
specific cultural identities. She notes the importance of facilitating ‘personally
defined projects’, which locate multiple subject positions for people in the local
Swedish Diaspora, with reminiscence and reference to home countries around the
globe. She hoped self-presentation and documentation might present richer views
of the Horn of Africa to challenge media images of famine and lack, and considers
the project broadly successful in fulfilling its dual aims of personal empowerment
and more diverse representation. From the MWC position she agrees the weakness
revolved around the questions of ownership and professionalism, over the
fundamental ‘rights’ of interpretation, and she admits MWC held ultimate power,
control and ownership.
Yet at the outset of the project Lagerkvist notes considerable discussion of what
a museum was, is and what it might be, which is seen as a positive aspect. While
these complex questions, give rise to responses that are dependent to a great extent
on the particular socio-historical juncture in which they are raised, perhaps an
appropriate definition of museum may be regarded as ‘signifying certain kinds of
cultural practice’ with constructed rather than natural or ‘contingent, not essential’
relationships to originating communities (Lidchi 2003: 162). Notably the field trip
to Hackney and Horniman Museums, where new exhibitions privileged African
and Caribbean voices as we have seen led the group to question its own role,
noticeable by its absence, in the Horizons steering committee, which included a
number of external consultants.
In short the group felt unwelcome at MWC generally and a strong sense of
exclusion to ‘professional’ areas. Lagerkvist admitted unintended exclusionary
practice and gives a typically professional line of reasoning for this – the pressures
of time, health and safety issues, as well as the difficulty in selecting a representative
of the group. One fear, surely justified, is that a diversity of views may be ‘filtered’
through lens of a single spokesperson, most probably an elder man within the
group. We may rightly question the ability of any single person to speak on behalf
of the whole group whereas regular group discussions might enable a better telling
of the different stories participants choose to present.
Yet, I discern a real desire for balancing museum professionalism with greater
inclusion and the development of a stronger social role at MWC. For example,
group dissatisfaction with the project room office was rapidly settled by MWC
agreeing to an office move from the initial site in the basement. A misreading
lay at the heart of group dissatisfaction with the original underground spatial
location, which symbolically echoed the social marginalisation of the group in the
wider world, yet was actually selected because of proximity to the object stores.
There is also a genuine feeling of sadness in her report of the group encountering
racism from MWC staff. A third of the staff had ethnicity outside of Sweden and
anthropology degrees, which we may agree denotes an abiding interest in cultural
diversity.
Overall Lagerkvist describes MWC ‘openness’ and the allocation of adequate

‘time for dialogue and reconsideration’ to characterise their new ways of working
and power sharing. From her position within the MWC staff structure she reinforces
the importance of embracing controversies, which we noted earlier in No Name
Fever. She considers dissent as an essential part of a mutual learning ‘process’ of
sharing ‘ownership’ that helps create a more inclusive institution. Yet she cautions
against regarding the MWC work as a universal model applicable to museums
and their communities the world over. She rather urges us to view the task as
essentially to ‘keep the dialogue alive, to negotiate and renegotiate and thereby
to find a balance and move positions forward in each separate case of community
involvement’ (Lagerkvist 2006: 60).
The Horn People’s Exhibition
The fruits of the dialogue Lagerkvist describes were available at the opening of
MWC. At the far end of the Horizons gallery from the Marley exhibition, visitors
could hear the authentic voices and see the faces of Göteborg citizens with roots
and links to the Horn, at a series of computer consoles. Here Horn participants
documented through video, aspects of ‘Identity’, ‘Religion’ and ‘Family’ in a
highly personal manner to compliment the museum text panels in this section.
While the labelling throughout MWC rarely minces words and is largely written
in an engaging conversational tone, these videos were especially riveting. Video
helps us to read the body language of the speakers, on subjects such as the veil
and marriage from the perspective of individuals within the Muslim community,
and we are thus transported to a position that is closer to them than a simple text
panel, however good that may be. Certainly during my research visits the videos
consistently attracted attention.
Overall the Horn exhibition makes a brave attempt to explore the Diaspora
experience from the perspectives of Horn people living in Sweden today. A series
of diverse Diaspora voices examine ‘what is it like to live in a country that is still
unable to integrate and make use of the expertise and wisdom that has arrived from
beyond its borders?’ (Lagerkvist 2004: 9). In this question Lagerkvist highlights
the vital social role embraced by MWC, bringing the Horn Swedes to voice and
their political position to visibility in the exhibition space.
Starting with ‘The Horn of Africa in the World’ text panel in the Horizons
gallery, visitors can learn about the Nation states of Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia,
Somalia and Sudan in the peninsula region known as the Horn of Africa, which
stretches geographically from the Gulf of Arden to the Indian Ocean, and is home
to a rich diversity of peoples, languages and religions. Once again MWC text notes
a vast area of Africa subjected to colonisation and the distinguished resistance of
Ethiopia to the power struggles between France, Britain and Italy in the colonial
period. Colonisation left internal political conflicts in its wake throughout the
twentieth century, which coupled with famine plaguing the region, led to several
millions of refugees and economic migrants moving to other parts of Africa,

Europe and the US, with 48,000 currently making their home in Sweden. These
Swedes with roots in the Horn keep contact through the internet, which helps link
a sense of identity positively to Africa, without bounding it there. As the museum
text panel states ‘No longer is a person’s sense of identity, kinship or citizenship
necessarily bound up with a single country or part of the world’ (MWC Horn text).
Yet affirmative images of the home country are vital to strengthen positive identity
construction, in the face of discrimination, prejudice and racism experienced in
Sweden, which can only have a negative impact on new immigrants who suffer
high levels of unemployment.
Said Abdullah’s personal reflection on identity noted at the outset of this chapter
and his subtle storytelling, which subtly highlights the political situation that
forced his ‘unwilling’ journey to Sweden, provides richer and more emotionally
valid images that provoke empathy in the viewer. Said’s words pay moving tribute
to the ways in which notions of identity are attached to childhood experiences
and homelands. As the text entitled ‘Identity’ here states: ‘A person’s identity is
the product of many factors: family gender, nationality, language, religion, sexual
orientation, physical and mental makeup, education, skills and experience.’ This
text further speaks of the alienating impact of ‘constantly having to face racism
and discrimination’ in contradistinction to the empowering ‘sense of identity and
belonging’, which arises from encountering ‘respect’ and feeling ‘at home in
more than one culture and social context’ (MWC 2004). We are reminded here
of Homi Bhabha’s notion, borrowed from Freud, of the ‘uncanny’ the unhomely
or umheimlich and the need to develop ‘homespaces’ in the museum that CWWA
recognised in Chapter 2 (Bhabha 1995).
The Horn voices also provided rich interpretation of material culture. One
item, an exquisitely beautiful beaded ‘Bag’, measuring 33 x 12.5 x 5.5cm and
originating from Mensa culture, North of Eritrea, is remarkable and speaks of
homespace. Collected in 1909, this bag ‘had served a ‘metaphorical purpose’ for a
new bride, who used it for the safekeeping of her dreams for the future, while today
its significance lies in the preservation of ‘family bonds’ through the matrilineal
line between grandmothers and granddaughters, as well as the ‘longing for and
the hope of return’ (Lagerkvist 2002: 47). Thus this object illuminates overlapping
notions of family, gendered and political identities past, present and future. It shows
the contemporary museum and community voices reinforcing the interpretive
possibilities of the historical objects from the ethnographic collection.
Next I shall examine a global voice whose art intervention expands the
interpretive potential of another historical collection and the MWC collectors in
South America. I turn to Fred Wilson.
Artist Interventions into Museum Space
In his installations the artist Fred Wilson consistently draws attention to the value
systems, the philosophy and politics underpinning western displays of the ‘other’,
through visual means. Echoing traditional ethnographic exhibition practice, and
reclaiming the human space of the ‘dehumanised’ other, he works primarily
though juxtaposition, such as the wrapping of French and British flags around
a collection of African masks, in the section The Colonial Encounter within his
installation The Other Museum. Thus Wilson shows the masks as ‘hostages’ of
the museum and dramatically raises questions of restitution to original owners or
retention by the holding museum. Similarly his label ‘stolen from the Zonge tribe,
1899. Private collection’ at this exhibition is considered more accurate than the
‘Acquired by Colonel So-and-so in 1898’, which was more commonly observed at
the time of the installation, in the early 1990s (Karp and Wilson 1996).
Wilson states ‘I like to place things side by side, because objects speak to one
another and speak to you about their relation to one another’ through placing.
Throughout his career, Wilson makes new juxtapositions to call into question the
older, hierarchical, and seemingly ‘natural’ orders of the world that traditional
displays of western museums speak of, and remain silent about. Notably, he
reveals the museum silences and the hidden histories of object that are relegated
to basement stores, by incorporating them into the public displays. In his 1992
seminal work, Mining the Museum, which was constructed at the Maryland
Historical Society, Baltimore, he plays on the word mining – digging up, blowing
up and making mine. Yet, like all play, Wilson’s wordplay is serious. In his
Maryland work he questions the very notions of ‘truth’ in the museum and points
to the question of ‘whose truth’ throughout. Right at the entrance he displays a
silver advertising globe from the 1870s with the word TRUTH inscribed. Also
at the entrance, by locating three empty plinths with the labels Harriet Tubman,
Benjamin Banneker and Frederick Douglas, who are all Black people with local
Baltimore connections; alongside the existing plinths with busts of Napoleon,
Henry Clay and Andrew Jackson, who have no connection with the area. Truth
in this context is related to hidden histories that resonate in Wilson’s personal
identity, which has complex roots, with his African-American father and Native
American mother as well as his training in the western art academy.
Wilson consistently poses a complexity of biographical questions to the
museum objects. In this questioning he asks audiences to consider issues
surrounding the objects such as: ‘how did these object get to be displayed here
thus and so, by whom were these objects collected and why?’ He attempts to
achieve a questioning stance in the viewer through juxtaposition, for example
his ‘Metalwork 1793-1880’ label eloquently emphasises the economic basis of
the silverware collection in slavery. By putting ‘horrific’ slave shackles from
the basement stores amongst the ‘beautiful’ silver he forcefully shows how the
production is determined by the subjugation of ‘others’. Other novel exhibitionary
techniques are used in the painting gallery. Wilson displays a damaged portrait
from the stores, of a mixed race person (Benjamin Banneker) and highlights the
physical damage – rape by the master to increase production, of chattel – inflicted
on Black women during the times of slavery. Similarly in this gallery he employs
exhibitionary devises to highlight those Black others marginalised in the picture
frame. Covering lithographs with glassine paper to expose the Black person in the
corner of the picture, or spotlighting the Black child in a painting when the visitor
enters the gallery space, marks an attempt to make the viewer aware of those who
existed in the shadows of the painting and in the wider society. Through such
media devices, the viewer is able to reflect on and empathise with the historical
pain of the subjugated and to re-experience this in the present (Corrin 2004).
Site Unseen: Dwellings of the Demons
A decade after the exhibition in the Maryland Historical Society, Baltimore, Wilson
created an installation Site Unseen: Dwellings of the Demons at MWC, which was
intended to probe that which lies hidden ‘under the surface’ of the museum institution’s
foundations, specifically ‘the pillars of colonial power, evolutionary assumptions,
racism and sexism’, according to Sandahl (<http://www.worldculture.se/smvk/jsp/
polopoly.jsp?d=877&a=4543&l=en_US> accessed on 14.01.2008). Wilson’s work
at Göteborg followed a similar path to his Maryland undertaking. He surveyed the
stores for silences and gaps in the museum narrative to take the visitor on a journey
through the museum, which is at once emotional and intellectual. First climbing the
stairs we see a large desk in a glass case with a label stating.
This desk is thought to have been used by the esteemed ethnographer and former
director of the museum. This desk has been saved as a memento, though its provenance
and true value as an artefact of museum history is unclear. (MWC 2006)
Thus his desk piece sets the scene for an imaginative engagement with history
at the Göteborg museum. As the visitor climbs the stairs the route leads off the
staircase into the installation and through a number of artistic interventions into
this museum history. The museum has a long history of archaeological work in
Argentina, notably Stig Ryden’s excavations in La Candelaria in the 1930s. In
the stores, Wilson found a collection made by Ryden in 1932 of huge burial urns,
the largest one of which he tells us was partly broken in order to be transported to
Sweden. Wilson addresses this find through juxtaposed labelling. He also offers
information in the more usual ‘museum voice’ at the sides of the open topped
glass case. The title here is ‘Burial Urns’, and the label informs the viewer how
the largest urn contained the ‘remains of three adults’, while ‘the skeletal remains
of a child were found in one of the smaller urns.’
Wilson’s response to this discovery goes further than the standard provision of
information in the dispassionate or scientifically distanced museum tone – to give
the silent and damaged urns a voice – literally. In his labels printed directly onto
the surface of the walls, the urns are permitted to speak of cultural power – of time
and place. For this viewer at least the urns really seem to speak – poetically. The
urns make statements:
You don’t know enough about me to forget me. … What I share with you I share
with many, but there are some things I share with no one … Don’t forget me. …
Some care about me, most do not. … I am out of place, but not out of time. … I
was broken, but still whole. … Remember me.
This is a direct quotation. It clearly highlights for me the keynotes of memory and
forgetting; an African ethics of care; a hermeneutics of part and whole, of time
and place. Yet, my writing gives little of the emotional power originally felt at
the site in 2004 and again, equally strongly in 2006. As Sandahl notes Wilson’s
‘interpretations serve as emotional bolts of lightning’, which have a lasting affect
by conveying ‘insights that forever remain a part of the recipient’s world view’
(<http://www.worldculture.se/smvk/jsp/polopoly.jsp?d=877&a=4543&l=en_
US> accessed on 14.01.2008).
Perhaps it is in part the graphic location of the labels – the concise and potent
sentences in white letters running across the creamy coloured wall, with ample
empty space between – the space between that performs the role of the silence,
the pause like the breadth in speech – perhaps the speech so vital to African
oral tradition (Stoller 1989). Wilson’s spacing also somehow seems to mirror
the shoreline with the waves crashing against land in the Slavery Gallery on the
ground floor below. For me it is certainly the spacing between the sentences that
add weight to the urn’s ‘speech’. In one section the urns state:
You have filled my emptiness with your expectations.

I am complete, though you know only parts.
Understand me and understand something of you.
I’m beautiful to those who know me well,
unimportant to others.
Though you only see parts, you imagine more.
As the visitor passes through this gallery where the floor disorientates walkers,
tilting 70cm in two directions, a case of many fragments of ancient pots and small
labels comes into view. These fragments, like the urns are likewise brought to speech
through the considered placing of word and objects spread out in shallow pits,
excavated objects are allowed to be ‘reburied’, rather than carefully positioned up
on shelves. Labels sit with the fragments and pose questions on breakage ‘Broken
by ethnographers … Broken by war … Broken for science … Broken on purpose
… Broken by looters … Broken in transit … Broken for transit’. Walking on we
see a splendid case in more traditional display style of Nazca pottery from Peru.
In this case Wilson shows his appreciation of pottery skills, which he experienced
in Ghana. He shows this pottery, which is extremely finely potted and painted in
earth coloured slips (liquid clays), very simply.
Next the installation draws attention to a ‘Collection of numbers’, which has
humorous overtones. A sea of tiny pots are displayed upside down all over the
floor of a glass case, all the better to see the museum numbering, the marks of
ownership and careful cataloguing. Nearby a selection of archive photographs are
re-labelled, one stating ‘one pot, four men’ and on the wall next to it another
stating ‘four pots, one man’, which comments on the status and roles of the men in
the picture, four diplomats and one security guard.
At the exit to the installation Wilson brings to the surface of display another
set of untold stories – the notebooks of Ruben Perez Kantule, a Kuna Indian from
Panama who made a visit to the old Museum of Ethnography in the 1930s. Wilson
displays pages from Perez’s notebooks, which contain remarkable drawings
depicting Kuna images of the supernatural world, including the ‘dwelling of the
demons’, which provide Wilson with part of the title for this installation. This
title echos, for Wilson, more than the world of the drawings themselves, it refers
to the ‘demons that dwell in the museum itself – the exhibition hall in particular’
(MWC 2004). For example, one set of six framed images shows a collection of
drawings and photographs under the title ‘How do you capture a Kantule hat?’,
which expresses this notion of collection/captivity inherent in museum practice
precisely.
Conclusion: Artistic Intervention and the Audience
Thus, and so it seems to me, Wilson presents the Museum with an opportunity
for reflexivity. However, this view is not universally shared, even among highly
museum literate people. There was a wide diversity of opinion on the success
of Wilson’s installation at Göteborg amongst my MA classes for the Museion,
Göteborg University cohorts of 2004 and 2006. The Swedish archaeologists in
the student group were particularly upset by Wilson’s ‘cavalier’ attitude to the
museum’s work with the Kuna, which they thought was exemplary for its time.
They argue forcefully that the archaeologists were working directly with the
Panama people in a highly charged political context where their very existence
was threatened. While this view may be reminiscent of the ethnographic quest to
‘save’ the last fragments of a dying ‘tribe’ it continues to be echoed in professional
circles at ICOM-ICME and perhaps raises the question once again of who may be
permitted to speak for whom.
Should the artist be viewed as the gifted ‘genius’ of western culture, with full
and inalienable rights of free and imaginative speech, since the creative view of
the artist genius casts a true light on reality? What if this free speech disparages the
real achievements, the gathering of knowledge and truth, by the archaeologists?
What does achievement for the archaeologist here entail from the perspective of
the present-day originating or source communities? For the Museion students
questions such as these give rise to notions of essentialism and progress a

questioning of the pernicious tendency of traditional ethnographic displays to fix
the ‘other’ culture securely behind the glass cases of the museum.
The installation proved popular and useful to starting a ‘dialogue on the theme
of memory, objects, identities, diaspora’, moving some visitors from ethnic groups
to tears as Sandhal notes. Head of education, Pernilla Luttropp, also recalls first-
time visitors sitting and talking ‘about memories and power structures and about
whose memories society thinks are worth talking about’ (cited in Gascoigne
2005).
To conclude this chapter, the notion of arbitrary movement, objects becoming
disconnected, or broken in transit offer the museum a potent metaphor for migration
and it is to the representation of forced migration in South Africa that I turn in
Chapter 4. Overall the degree to which MWC exhibitions have been constructed
in power-sharing collaborations with local and international communities is
commendable for a national institution and it is heartening to see new projects
maintaining the ‘political and poetic’ ethos that has proved so attractive to young
people. In the next chapter, I shall explore the greater control over representation
and staffing that a smaller community museum is able to achieve. In Chapter 6 we
shall observe the advantages and disadvantages of this position.
Chapter 4
Control: Shifting Relationships
in the Whole Museum
Introduction
The opening extract from Toni Morrison’s novel Sula alludes to the balcony areas
of white churches, cinemas, theatres and opera houses where Black people sat
during the time of segregation in the USA, which were referred to in the 1900s as
‘nigger heavens’, reflecting a spacio-cultural distance and the separate experiences
of Black and white communities. Morrison states:
In that place where they tore the nightshade and blackberry patches from
their roots to make room for the Medallion City Golf Course, there was once
a neighbourhood. … It is called the suburbs now but when black people lived
there it was called the Bottom. … [because of] A nigger joke. … the kind folks
tell themselves … when they’re looking for a little comfort somewhere. …
[originating from when] … The master said, “Oh, no! See those hills? That’s
bottom land, rich and fertile. … High up from us … but when God looks down,
it’s … the bottom of heaven-best land there is.” … So … The nigger got the hilly
land, where planting was backbreaking … white people lived on the rich valley
floor … blacks populated the hills above it, taking consolation in the fact that
every day they could literally look down on the white folk. (Morrison 1991: 3-5)
For me Morrison’s text also chillingly echoes the 1966 declaration of the ethnically
diverse District Six area of Cape Town in South Africa, stretching from Table
Mountain down towards the sea, as a ‘White Only’ area. In 2006 I witnessed
the warmth and generosity of the museum professionals throughout Cape Town
actively healing the traumatic memories of the apartheid years. As Ciraj Raassoul
and Sandra Prosalendis note, quoting the ‘Johnson family ex-re-residents
inscription on the memorial cloth’ at the District Six Museum (D6M):
Someone said memories are weapons. Let’s think of them as tools. (Rassool and
Prosalendis 2001: I)
While Sula is ‘fiction’, it reminds us here of the racism during the Apartheid years
of South Africa, which led to the complete destruction of a Black community
(Foucault 1980). Morrison’s Sula also highlights the power of words, language
and the imagination that we hold in common as human beings as well as power
of community united to withstand oppression, to grasp power and control over

their lives and the representation of their her/his/stories, which is evident in the
story of the District Six Museum (D6M). I select D6M for attention here as it
exemplifies how a determined body of people with a range of different skills can
come together with the wider community to develop a new museum paradigm, a
liberartory praxis, which while specific to the local history of the place has lessons
for progressing museum learning around the world.
The small, independent D6M, echoes aspects of the post-apartheid new
democratic narrative that is exemplified at the vast national Robben Island
Museum (RIM), site of imprisonment for Nelson Mandela and other freedom
fighters during the apartheid decades. Both museums, located at historic sites of
oppression, privilege the voices of the previously subjugated, but direct painful
recollection positively towards the future harmony of the whole country that
Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s optimistic metaphor the ‘Rainbow Nation’ so aptly
describes. Two examples will illustrate this. Firstly part of Ahmed Kathrada’s
speech made at the opening of the RIM, which is widely reproduced on postcards
and at the main walkway to board the ferry for Robben Island. Kathandra notes:
While we will not forget the brutality of apartheid, we will not want Robben
Island to be a monument of our hardship and suffering. We would want it to be a
triumph of the human spirit against the forces of evil. A triumph of wisdom and
largeness of spirit against small minds and pettiness; a triumph of courage and
determination over frailty and weakness; a triumph of the new south Africa over
the old. (Ahmed Kathrada was imprisoned for 26 years, prison no. 468/64)
These sentiments are mirrored throughout D6M. An introductory text panel

first locates the destruction of D6 within the context of other instances of forced
removal across South Africa and the need to ‘… Remember the racism. … which
sought to steal away our humanity’, while also recalling that ‘which marks us as
human beings: our generosity, our love of justice and our care for each other.’ The
text continues:
In remembering we do not want

To recreate District Six
But to work with its memory:
of hurts inflicted and received,
of loss, achievements and of shames.
We wish to remember
so that we can all,
together and by ourselves,
rebuild a city
which belongs to all of us,
in which all of us can live,
not as races but as people. (Memorial Text, Digging Deeper D6M 2006)
Control: Shifting Relationships in the Whole Museum 109
I focus on D6M rather than RIM in this chapter because it details the resistance
of a community, not well known heroes. I was also able to dwell there in longer
private reflection and social engagement.
I first outline the South African historical background to D6M. This section
is crucial to readers who will be unfamiliar with the ways in which racism can
permeate, utterly, the social fabric and divide communities; while fresh ways
of working in the museum setting can point to new unity in diversity. Next I
ponder the specific features that determine the success of the D6M. I highlight the
prompting of memory and narratives or the imaginative recollection processes,
which Peggy Delport’s aethetics-based curating facilitates. In the main I consider
two public exhibitions: ‘Streets’ which explores the visible exterior social lives of
the D6 community and ‘Digging Deeper’ which considers their interior private
worlds. I also engage with the notion of education for democracy and outline the
Ambassador’s youth programme. In addition to observation and dialogue with
D6M staff, my selection of creative curatorship premised on community dialogue is
drawn from published sources (Rassool and Prosalendis 2001; Goodnow 2006).
Finally in this chapter, I shall refer to UK and Japanese outreach projects that
similarly highlight the value of recollection and the notion of ‘mapping memory’,
still on a relatively small scale albeit in a different national context, which may
prove useful to the profession around the world. Specifically I note the work of
Age Exchange in London, Linda Sargent in Oxford and the Edo-Tokyo Museum
in Japan.
Brief Historical Background: The South African Population and the

Post-Apartheid Development of Iziko Museums of Cape Town
In 2007 the population is estimated at 46.9 million with 37 million Africans

constituting 79 percent of the whole, white Europeans 4.4 percent, coloured 4.1
percent and Indian/Asian 1.1 percent (<http://www.ststssa.gov.za/keyindicators/
mye.asp> accessed on 24.10.2007). The ‘Rainbow Nation’ metaphor describes
the diverse population of S Africa today and marks a creative attempt at healing,
linguistically, the centuries of colonial oppression and miscegenation that
culminated in the abominable Apartheid (literally the state of being apart) system
of Boer-dominated government in 1948. Under Apartheid people were strictly
segregated into four groups according to skin colour: white, black, coloured and
Asian. These old apartheid and racist terms linger and their roots require some
explanation for non-South Africans.
This was simply not possible at RIM – declared a World Heritage Site in 1999
– where coach loads of tourist visitors need to be efficiently moved through the fascinating
‘cell story’ displays to cater for the phenomenal demand. I refer interested readers to Deirdre
Prins’s excellent discussion of intergenerational work there as well as Annie Coombes’s
detailed overview (Prins 2005; Coombes 2003).
Briefly the indigenous peoples who have a 40,000 year history in southern
Africa, were semi-nomadic hunter-gatherers and pastoralists. Europeans knew
these people, the San and the Khoikhoi, as ‘Bushmen’ and ‘Hotentot’ respectively.
Crop-farming peoples with domesticated animals originating from West Africa,
including Xhosa and Zulu speaking groups, appear to have settled during the third
century. There are several hundred of these groups who are the ‘Black’ other of the
‘white’ European heritage settlers. Many of their languages have a common root
that the derogatory word ‘Bantu’ describes.
While there is evidence of Portuguese traders at the beginning of the sixteenth
century as well as British and French Huguenots in the seventeenth, it was a
group of approximately one-hundred and twenty traders from the Dutch East
India Company (VOC) who began settling the tip of the continent, the Cape, in
the seventeenth century, notably building a fort and the Botanical or Company’s
Gardens in 1652. In the mid eighteenth century the free Dutch ‘trekboers’ (trekking
farmers) gradually claimed the rich fertile lands and the mineral wealth of the
interior. The British gained control of Cape Town at the beginning of the nineteenth
century in 1814 and aided Britain during the Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902).
The UK Abolition Act of 1808 eventually brought some legal protection and
human rights in 1828 for the South Africans who were enslaved by the first VOC
settlers, although in practice new laws rapidly introduced exploitative labour
systems, curtailing the free movement and even the criminalisation of ‘Blacks’
without work and a pass. However along with the indigenous Khoi-San peoples
it was the VOC who first transported people from the colonies in Indonesia,
Madagascar, India, Ceylon and Malaysia, to work under conditions of slavery
and it is these forcibly removed groups who were classified under Apartheid
as the ‘Asian’, and the ‘Coloured’ peoples whose numbers were swelled by
miscegenation, the sexual exploitation of women and intermarriage.
From the outset of Apartheid in the 1940s people of all ‘colours’, creeds, ages
and gender, inside and outside of South Africa united in diverse anti-apartheid
movements of resistance, from international trade sanctions, the increasingly
violent battles in the Townships, to the legal battles in the Courts of Law. One
notable legal battle, following which Nelson Mandela was imprisoned in Robben
Island for ‘life’, is the Rivonia Trail of 1963. At one point, defending himself, the
lawyer Mandela made an impassioned statement, part of which is reproduced on a
postcard from Robben Island Museum. He declares:
I have fought against white domination and I have fought against black
domination. I have cherished the ideal of a democratic and free society in which
all persons live together in harmony and with equal opportunities. It is an ideal
which I hope to live for and to achieve. But if needs be, it is an ideal for which I
am prepared to die. (Mandela 2000: 438)
Mandela was imprisoned for 27 years. Imprisonment of the ANC (African

National Congress), PAC (Pan African Congress) and Communist leaders merely
served to strengthen Black resistance, such as the fierce Soweto student uprisings
in 1976 and throughout the 1980s. Eventually in 1990 President F.W. De Klerk
began to dismantle the discriminatory regime, repeal Apartheid laws and release
the political prisoners at Robben Island, including Nelson Mandela. The first
democratic elections took place over four days from 26 April 1994. Mandela was
elected president and the long march to democratic freedom continued through
government legislation.
Notable dates for the museum sector post-apartheid include firstly: 1996 when
the TRC (Truth and Reconciliation Commission) opened and the Department of
Arts, Culture, Science and Technology produced an important White Paper on arts
and cultural heritage, which set out government policy for funding institutions
involved in the creation, promotion and protection of South African Arts. Next the
1997 SAMA (South African Museums Association) conference The Way Forward:
Harnessing Cultural and Heritage Tourism in SA, which led to the ‘Tshwane
Declaration’ that highlighted the vital role of local communities in the museum
and other heritage industries. Then in 1998 The Cultural Institutions Act created
a flagship structure, for the Northern and Southern areas of the country, which
provided subsidy payments to selected cultural institutions under the Governing
Council that was established for all Museums in 1999. Thirteen museums were
included in the Southern Flagship area of Cape Town in 2000 and these became
IZIKO, Museums of Cape Town. Ciraj Raasool notes how D6M made a case for
inclusion in the Southern Flagship, which was rejected and it is to this history that
I now turn (Raasool 2006).
D6M History and the Notion of the Museum for Africa
The name District Six referred to one of the twelve areas of the municipality of
Cape Town, which was designated in 1840. District Six was located close to the
city at the time and linking Table Mountain with the sea and the Docks, attracted
migrants from all over Africa and the world. Generations of families had made
their homes in the area when The Population Registration Act classified the rigid
racial categories noted earlier and The Group Areas Act of 1950 imposed a spatial
system of Apartheid, segregating ‘White Only’ areas across the whole country,
which led to the forced removals for Black and coloured residents in District Six
and elsewhere where diverse populations, united in degrees of economic poverty,
had long intermingled peacefully. In 1966 District Six, along with many other
regions across South Africa, was classified as a white zone and over a fifteen year
period the area was completely razed to the ground. The streets were bulldozed
and between 55-65,000 people were forcibly removed to ‘Townships’ on the Cape
Flats. Their place was taken with just 3-4,000 state employees, Afrikaans speakers,
from the lower middle-classes.
The District Six Museum Foundation, which included academics, artists
and community activists, was established in 1989 from the Hands Off D6
campaign committee, which itself arose from the Friends of D6 protesters against
redevelopment in the late 1980s. Eventually in 1994 the D6M opened in the old
church of the Central Methodist Mission in Buitenkant Street (Raasool C 2006:
286, 314). At the time of opening the Museum the Mission had a 120 year history
of opposition to racism and in involvement in social justice issues. It continued
to offer a site where the local community could meet and to challenge the white
supremacism that deepened during the Apartheid years and which led to the total
destruction of a community from 1966 to the 1980s (Prosalendis 2001: 10).
Peggy Delport explains how the decision to employ the term ‘museum’
exercised the Foundation (Delport 2001: 12). There is a history of museums in
South Africa since the 1800s but the relevance and value of these institutions
built during Imperialism to contemporary Africa has been widely questioned and
contemporary academics have cast doubt on whether the traditional notion of the
museum and the museum philosophy of collecting and laying out of objects in
static sequences is universally appropriate (McLeod 2004; Corsane 2005; Pieterse
2005; <http://www.africom.org> accessed on 16.01.2007). Yet Malcolm McLeod
notes the case of the Manhiya Palace Museum, Kumasi Ghana, which opened
in 1995 as part of the celebrations for the king’s silver jubilee that holds ‘old
authentic’ and ‘new replica’ material, plus high quality ‘fiberglass effigies’ kings
and queen mothers authentic gold regalia treasure (McLeod 2004: 458-9). He
highlights the twin benefits of this modern museum – local and international – for
the African context. For local communities the objects resonate with significance
during regular ceremonial events outside of the museum walls and this mixed
approach – display and ceremony – holds unique appeal for paying visitors to
coastal towns.
McLeod’s example highlights a sense of ownership, mutual respect and
shared values as vital if visitors are to benefit from the museum experience. This
community ownership is a great strength of D6M, which supports Corsane’s
argument that ‘the traditional museum is a western concept’ that demands to be
‘redefined and situated in an African paradigm’ (Corsane 2005: 26). Mandela
reinforces this view on Heritage Day at the opening of Robben Island Museum in
1997, when he highlights museums as part of the national fight for ‘Democracy,
Tolerance and Human Rights.’ He further notes the need to transform museums
that were ‘often seen as alien spaces’ by the majority population, since they had
long ‘glorified mainly white and colonial history’, excluding and marginalising
most of the people and depicting them ‘as lesser human beings’ (<http://www.anc.
org.za/ancdocs/history/mandela/1997/sp0924a.html> accessed on 15.03.2008).
Visitor survey confirms Mandela, showing that in colonial times, right up
to the end of the apartheid era, museums were representative of and visited by
less than 5 percent of the population, the white minority (Mathers 1993: 17). In
contradistinction the National Museum at Robben Island and the independent
D6M have shown themselves to be relevant to the lives of all human beings, the
local South African people and the wider international community, an achievement
resulting from deep thought and dedicated action.
Delport illuminates how the notion of the museum that was originally
problematic for the D6M Foundation, with the static collections and displays, was
countered by an underlying vision and ethos of D6M as a ‘living space’ for working
with memory, on painful issues of displacement and loss, but also celebratory
themes of human survival. Furthermore, since museum also suggests ‘solidity, a
continuity and a permanence that could withstand even the force of the bulldozer
and the power of a regime committed to the erasure of a place and a community’,
the unique work of the D6M began (Delport 2001: 12).
Now I shall examine D6M in the light of this historical outline. First I shall
consider the notion of memory that lies at the centre of the museum work. Then,
with reference to the Truth and Reconciliation Committee, the ways in which
memory is facilitated through ‘aesthetics’ will be explored, through a consideration
of specific exhibitions and educational programming.
Memory: Contested Notions of Place and the Politics of Restitution
Mary Warnock’s thought illuminates the value of memory work at D6M, as I

shall briefly outline. In Warnock’s analysis of memory she highlights the term
‘person’, as a ‘reflective, self reflective human being’ whose humanity and identity
are interlocked and who has persistence over time (Warnock 1987: 59, 63). She
highlights both physical and metal aspects of memory – how the reflecting person
is essentially embodied and the body can trigger the reflective mental aspect
sensually – most famously perhaps by Proust’s taste of the Madeleine cake in
lime flower tea. For Warnock the value and pleasure in remembering is attributed
to human agency and ownership of the self or the part that survives through time,
which is seen in the way mind seems able to detach itself from the past, has the
freedom to reflect back on past experiences and to make plans to look forward into
possible futures. Warnock notes this reflective recollection process is one of story
telling, which involves creation or recreation of the fragments of a life linked into
a narrative structure. Memory then is like imagination, it has subjectivity but can
be shared in telling a story of the past and this telling and listening can lead to
understanding the lives of others, to empathy.
These notes on memory take us to the heart of D6M and indeed RIM’s success.
At both museums the memory is attached to place and the voices of the previously
subjugated are raised. D6M is a site of contested heritage and the museum space
reflects the complexity of this political tension in not presenting a singular, linear
narrative, but rather overlapping real and imaginary zones, articulated by diverse
people with attachments to the site, to offer what Tony Bennett regards as new
forms of civic self-fashioning (Bennett 1996, 1999). New conceptions of post-
apartheid citizenship are associated with retributive reallocation of land and
D6M has been involved in land restitution processes since its inception. Rassool
notes the ‘memory politics’ at the centre of the museum mission that aimed to
‘mobilize the masses of ex-residents and their descendants into a movement of
land restitution, community development, and political consciousness’ (Rassool

2006: 293-4). D6M has offered a political forum space, attempting to balance
land restitution claims and the desire for a ‘scorched earth’ memorial to the past.
Notably the land restitution process was finally launched at D6M in November
2000 when 40 hectares were restored to claimants to ensure the return of 17,000
ex-resident families (Rasool 2001: xi).
Truth and Reconciliation
Reality politics is vital to D6M, which the memory work supports and yet an equally
important aspect of the D6M mission is a notion of reconciliation highlighting the
imaginary. The artist curator Peggy Delport outlines the mission of D6 Museum
when it was first established, which was ‘To retrieve the scattered fragments of
evidence and to piece together the wider narrative about this and other instances
of forced removal in South Africa, not only to reclaim a hidden history, but to
facilitate processes of reconciliation’ (Delport 2001: 37). In Delport’s words on
the development of the D6M we discern echoes of the Truth and Reconciliation
Committee (TRC). She regards reconciliation as vital if survivors of atrocities are
to find healing and not remain fettered to the horrors of the past. In other words,
healing can afford some sense of closure, but this must begin with remembering
the painful past, then the wounds of loss can be made bearable.
At the TRC the healing of painful histories was connected with forgiveness,
which had different aspects, positive and negative, for victim and perpetrator.
Perpetrators were required to tell the Truth about past crimes, but not to apologise
to earn immunity from prosecution. For the perpetrator, forgiving was associated
with ‘forgetting which severs the remorseful tie fettering authors of evil to those
they have harmed, so that the latter no longer haunt the former’ (Holiday 1998:
44). A great deal seems to be expected of the individual victims and their families
here. However, Mandela notes the importance of the TRC remembering process
for the whole nation, who he contends was a ‘victim’ whose ‘dignity’ needed to
be restored, through a ‘healing process’ that might permit the nation ‘to redeem
and reconstruct itself’ (<http://www.anc.org.za/ancdocs/history/mandela/1996/
sp0213.html> accessed on 15.03.2008).
A major premise of the TRC was to redress the power of the perpetrator over
the victim, calling on the power of the court over the perpetrator and the power of
forgiveness to aid healing of victim and perpetrator. Yet there are tensions between
memory and forgetting that stand in the way of reconciliation. Memory can offer
a means of making loss survivable but closure may be difficult if not impossible
in the face of painful memories and the economic inequalities that are legacies
of racism. Outside of the national body, the TRC that dealt with major atrocities,
but still within the public domain, I would argue that the D6M can provide what
Barbara Misztel terms a ‘high-prestige’ location. D6M is a site where ‘mnemonic
communities’ of ‘the family, the ethnic group and the nation’ that ‘socialize us’ can
‘decide on what should be remembered and what should be forgotten’ and most
importantly we might add at D6M, ‘how’ (Misztel 2007: 381-384).
At D6M the site is imbued with the emotion of a traumatic past, the history
of enforced removal, not only from place but also from a deeper sense of self, of
humanity in the spatial system of apartheid that affects truth telling. The museum
is popularly regarded as a prime location of truth and authenticity, which is
important for the new democracy in South Africa. However D6M does not wish
to present the past totally through a lens of victim-hood and their commitment to
truth is again rooted in politics. Political commitment is seen in the desire to flatten
traditional hierarchies of curatorial power and control, to facilitate the expression
of individual and community voice in diverse ways, most importantly through
‘aesthetics’ or a poetics that underpins display (Delport 2001).
Next I shall explore the ways in which memory is prompted through aesthetics
at D6M. The richness of D6M exhibitions is extraordinary and I have selected just
two in an attempt to analyse the power of this place.
Collaborative Aesthetics and Interpretation:

‘Hands-on’ Methodology, ‘Streets’ and ‘Digging Deeper’
A unique ‘hands-on’ methodology has been developed at D6M. From my

perspective this is vitally ‘minds-on’ and characterised by a determined attention
to level power hierarchies that is expressed in the African terms ‘kanala’ or sharing
and ‘kanaldorp’ place of sharing from which the ‘aesthetics’ of D6M emerges (Hein
1999: 54). Most importantly I perceive an African ‘ethics of care’ that underpins
D6M as a museum appropriate to the context of South Africa and resonates in
my own work within a ‘feminist-hermeneutic’ framework (Hill-Collins 1991).
This ethics is seen in Delport’s idea of community dialogue as the ‘tap root’ of
the aesthetics, guiding the hands-on collaborative method to develop ‘interpretive
vehicles’ for the post-apartheid South African situation. Delport further highlights
this as an ongoing interpretive project whose aesthetic form acts as a ‘catalyst
or generator of meaning’, which is not simply ‘fixed by historians, curators or
artists’, nor by the diverse groups of local and international visitors, but is layered
and open to continual shift and subversion (Delport 2001: 32, 159).
Aesthetic forms at D6M developed in active partnership from the earliest
exhibition in 1992 of ex-resident’s photographs, which was also marked by a
direct craft-based approach when ‘a length of old calico curtain was pinned’ to an
office wall, felt tip pens were provided and visitors were invited to inscribe names
and messages (Delport 2001: 12). The calico became the 1.7 metre ‘Name Cloth’,
which is an on-going method of recording community voices that now contains
many thousands of penned messages embroidered over by Revina Gwayi in black
chain and blanket stitches. The Name Cloth hangs from the gallery in the main
hall and is one example of D6M’s human, dialogical, and craft basis of aesthetic
practice.
The aesthetic hands-on practice is evident in the initial discussion with ex-
residents over the making of ‘Streets’ in 1994, which D6ers (ex-residents)
decided ‘should not mourn’ but rather celebrate the ‘cultural diversity’ that once
characterised the area (Delport 2001: 38). A main feature of ‘Streets’ is a simple
but boldly painted map of the original D6 area before demolition in 1966. This
street map on a white tarpaulin, covering the entire central floor space, is painted
in warm earth and ochre tones that are reminiscent of an earlier community mural
on the front wall, where the aesthetic colour decisions emerged in discussion and
were inspired by D6er memories of the red clay earth that appeared to ‘bleed’
during bulldozing. Rather than designing a perfectly finished object of silent
passive worship hands-on aesthetics offered an open arena for active working with
the memory of ex-residents who were invited to write their names, addresses and
articulate their memories directly onto the transparent plastic surface layer, which
now contains many contributions including some from creative writers and artists
who number among the ex-resident community.
Ex-residents have been able to externalise their heartache at loss of community
on this map and it seems to be the street structure that acts as a powerful museum
vehicle to remember a painful past. For example Donald Parenzee’s poem ‘Oh
City’ ends ‘And you’ll not call your children back / to a void / where your heart /
used to be’. Other texts are taken from freedom fighters and poets in other parts of
the globe, which adds to the international, outward looking stance of the museum
and permits visitors around the world to approach the experiences and empathise
with the loss of other human beings, of humanity itself. Sorrow abounds. Yet D6ers
also remember the painful past in ways that look to the future as is evident in the
Black American Langston Hughes’s words that are inscribed at the corner opposite
Parenzee’s: ‘Hold fast / to dream / for if dreams die / life is a / broken-winged bird
/ that / cannot fly’. Thus the map would appear to heed Toni Morrison’s advice in
another context, on remembering enslavement she states:
There is a necessity for remembering the horror, but of course there’s a necessity
for remembering it in a manner in which it can be digested, in a manner in which
the memory is not destructive. … The collective sharing of that information
heals the individual and the collective. (Morrison 1992: 247-258)
The main focus of this map project, the individual and collective healing through
sharing, was on facilitating the everyday memories of ‘ordinary’ citizens, which
contrasts with the ‘Cell Stories’ at the Robben Island site where the great leaders of
the anti-apartheid struggle are commemorated. The D6 map has an extraordinary
dynamism that is seen in its widespread continuing use as a site for sitting, dancing,
meeting and sharing stories amongst the community today. There is a strong sense
that the process of including the local community audience in the processes of visual
construction results in a richer picture of the area than could be achieved by any
curatorial team alone, however experienced and sensitive. The living community
work marks a powerful reclamation of personal and community identities that the
spatial apartheid attempted to destroy along with the buildings and it is perhaps
this aspect of human resilience, local and international cooperation that continues
to touch visitors I observed, and certainly touched me profoundly.
In addition to the intangible memories that are made concrete on the map and
the embroidered name cloth that continues to grow, ‘Streets’ displays objects. At the
far end of the map a collection of historical street signs are scaffolded into a tower
that soars upwards in the church space, which Delport likens to tree of life. These
objects were salvaged from demolition and stored in the basement of a council
worker who disobeyed the order to ‘dump D6 in Table Bay’ during the demolition
and later donated them to the museum. Other donations include photographs some
of which are displayed as larger than life portraits of ex-residents, reproduced on
translucent paper and suspended from high up in the gallery space, where they
look and smile down on us. There are also archaeological finds now sited on the
balcony, fragments of daily life pottery and samples of the earth and stones from
D6 gathered during ‘healing memory’ programmes that are part of the educational
work.
Overall ‘Streets’ symbolises in diverse ways the exterior community life
of a place, of D6 prior to destruction. The highly creative curating of Delport
offers a site full of symbolism, receptive surfaces for recollection, connections
and interconnections, visual and textual pleasure, soft moving banners and hard
metal street signs, diverse elements that work together to reinforce an optimistic
message, one that points to the power of humanity to survive oppression, through
co-operation (Delport 2001: 154). Delport notes how the D6M space mirrors
the distinct topographical identity of D6 prior to destruction, where the district
connected Table Mountain to the inner city docks the harbour and the sea through
a series of slopes and different levels, which are echoed in the attention to high and
low spaces, the feeling of openness in the main gallery with the material traces of
the past that are linked by steps and passageways.
Visitors can move through ‘Streets’ in the main exhibition Hall to the community
café and reading room into the rebuilt Memorial Hall, another open space that
also offers an ideal site for meetings and workshops, where another mapping
project has been located, the ‘Writers Floor’ that was part of the ‘Digging Deeper’
exhibition. Delport describes ‘Digging Deeper’ as building on the ‘Streets’ work
of recollecting, which was largely concerned with the public spaces, to explore the
‘warm interior lives’ of ex-residents, the private world, the thoughts and feelings
of individuals in greater detail (Delport 2001: 4). The central map feature here
is constructed from durable ceramic tiling that is designed as an inner and outer
circle with lines radiating out from the centre, four of them pointing North, South,
East, and West. This ceramic map has large blank areas in warn honey and rust
coloured hues, with blocks of fragmented colourful patterns that are reminiscent
of the seventeen layers of linoleum excavated from a home in Horstley Street,
and close to sixty small white tiles with cobolt blue inscriptions permanently fired
onto their surfaces. The tiles act as ‘notes’ for the writer’s reflexivity, and self-
reflexive looking below surface appearances and public narratives to grapple with
the complexity of meaning and re-examine that, which appeared to be certain.
Overall ‘Streets’ and ‘Digging Deeper’ marks the possibilities of working
creatively with memory, providing a generative arena for historical retrieval,
re-interpretation and re-articulation of identities. Next I turn from the visual to
examine the oral testimonies more closely in this construction of new identities.
Narrative Truths: Emotion and Power
While D6M worked in tandem with land claimants Delport highlights Said’s
notion of imaginative return to, ‘restore ourselves to ourselves’, as of greater
significance than literal return (Delport 2001: 40). Here yearning for place is seen
as an act of freedom, of the imagination, to reaffirm and celebrate D6 communities,
and ‘making place for tolerance, for the otherness’ of different individuals and
groups, for seeking out and affirming our common humanity (Delport 2001:
41). However, perhaps the act of imagination that is vital to recollection can cast
doubt on the reality of the past events. Joan Sangster is helpful on this question of
autobiographical truth. She points out:
When people talk about their lives, people lie sometimes, forget a little,
exaggerate, become confused, get things wrong. Yet they are revealing truths
… all autobiographical memory is true: it is up to the interpreter to discover in
which sense, where, and for what purpose. (Passerini quoted in Sangster 2003: 87)
While the notion of imagination can, like memory, be regarded as standing in

the way of historical truth and the authenticity of the real thing that curatorial
authority safeguards in the traditional museum, D6M provides a prime example of
curators relinquishing absolute authorial control. Soudien and Meltzer elaborate
upon this when they speak of narrative rights that emphasise the importance of
ordinary D6ers taking control of their narratives, which are vital to the re-making
of the identities that were shattered at D6, along with the physical demolition of
the community spaces. They further justify their approach to value the people’s
or popular narratives and privilege their preferred ways of telling by questioning
the notion of ‘one true story’, the dry and homogenising ‘official’ narratives that
denigrate the D6 area of the 1960s as ‘a festering sore in danger of infecting the
moral fibre of the city’, a slum with ‘coloured’ residents who are regarded as
objects better relocated, elsewhere (Soudien and Meltzer 2001: 66).
In contradistinction the vivid ‘popular’ narratives ‘work with different
symbols and are motivated by the need to keep alive the meaning and memory
of ‘cosmopolitaness’ at D6. Admittedly D6ers popular narratives are open to
‘the power of invention and renewal’, but this is regarded as part of the D6er’s
claiming agency and their narrative right to speak for themselves and retell
their own stories. D6ers are empowered by D6M to ‘talk back’, to move from
the silent object of narrative to the speaking subject (Morrison 1993, bell hooks
1989). Speaking strengthens a sense of self, of identity since it transforms the way
individuals are able to reposition themselves in narratives of the past, which can
make it possible to move on. Thus speaking is integral to the reflective process of
knowledge construction, people come to know through telling, reflecting and most
importantly engaging with a listener.
Listening seems to be a key strength of the D6M mission to empower audiences
to speak of that which has lain in silence because it is too painful to articulate.
The act of talking has positive benefits for speakers and this is enhanced by the
knowledge that the prestigious institution of the museum is ‘listening’, thereby
adding value to the recording of their memories for future generations. Listening
and speaking are purposeful here. It is akin to the feminist-hermeneutic work of
respectful dialogical exchange. In reclaiming the power of voice, D6 narratives
permit some healing of a painful past, which they begin to repossess, in an
imaginative sense. In other words subjects writing their own histories, can come
to terms with their lack of historical power. They can find cause to celebrate their
resilience and regain their humanity, within the process of democratic recollection.
Such personal writing and telling inevitably has an ideological impetus, a tendency
to include, exclude and romanticise.
Another vital element of this work is the sensual remembering that is evoked.
Lalou Meltzer further describes the process of constructing narratives and
remembering at D6M as a ‘filtered and fine textured’ entangling of ‘then and
now’ to make an ‘old-new thing’ (Meltzer 2001: 22). She highlights the sensory
qualities or strong memory senses, the smell of watermelon permeating fresh cut
grass and remembering, not the actual ‘flesh’ of the past, but the ways the sensual
memories ‘hook thousands of tiny ‘fleshy’ acts in remembering. Toni Morrison
supports Meltzer when she describes ‘emotional memory – what the nerves and
the skin remember, as well as how it appears’ (Morrison quoted in White 2003:
179). Linda Fortune also highlights the emotional moments visitors experience at
D6M. She recalls one visitor feeling ‘too heart-sore’ and needing to return when
she felt composed, while another experienced opening memories that were ‘too
painful’ and the need to return when he felt better (Fortune 2001: 48).
The point I want to make here is that while emotions inevitably affect what is
recalled, which can discredit testimonies in the eyes of some historians, feeling
and thinking is inextricably part of human recall. To take an example from another
context, which Naomi Rosh White notes. A Jewish woman survivor, whose
testimony noted ‘four chimneys … exploding … people running … unbelievable’
event, contradicted the facts of the matter at the Auschwitz uprising where one
chimney was blown up (White 2003: 173). Yet as White argues, the reality of an
unimaginable event can require a survivor to understand and tell their stories of
their individual experiences differently. Furthermore what is crucial is that these
personal narratives are passed on, through listening and telling, for the sake of an
ethical or morally responsible society. As Elie Wiesel states:
A moral society must have the strength to [hear] these accounts, just as the
authors have the strength to [give] them. For a moral society must remember …
If we stop remembering, we stop being. (Wiesel quoted in White 2003: 181)
Next I turn to this notion of being, which as I note earlier is always becoming,
from the perspective of the younger generation. I consider how D6M engages in
the ‘passing on’ of histories.
Ambassadors
Dammon Rice writes on the contribution of the D6M Ambassadors programme to

the building of a new democratic nation, through widening access to community
heritage for the youth of the country, especially those from deprived economic
backgrounds. Rice speaks of the programme imparting a range of skills and
experiences to young people in a supportive, non-threatening and fun environment.
He tells us that enthusiasm and commitment, not proven intellectual ability, are
the only entry requirements to the programme, which trains Grade 11 teenager
volunteers to cascade knowledge amongst their peers, specifically to educate
school groups on the history of District Six using the museum collection.
Diverse teaching strategies are employed during the training programme
including: role-play, group discussion and workshops, which encourages
participants to draw comparisons between their own contemporary lives, the local
history and the situation in the wider world. All these learner-centred activities
help to impart ‘analytical, critical and creative thinking skills’, leadership skills
as well as techniques for peer teaching (Rice 2001: 62-3). Ambassadors gradually
learn to develop their language skills and to organise their thought until finally
they are ready to use their own words and ideas in the delivery of their talks to
school groups, with a more experienced teacher taking a position of support in the
background.
Rice celebrates the growth in Ambassador’s self-esteem and confidence. He
notes, one participant’s declaration that she would be the first member of her
family to finish school and another’s contention that ‘I can do anything that I put
myself to do.’ Overall the Ambassadors programme results in transforming the
participant’s limited perceptions of themselves and of museums, which were as
one young person remarked, ‘not dull and boring … not the elitist institutions I
thought they were’, but ‘for everyone’ (Rice 2001: 63). This positive attitude is
clearly reflected in the school sessions as one Grade 7 visitor told an Ambassador
he would bring parents he had so much fun (ibid. 2001: 65).
In addition to achievements learning and working in the museum, D6M
Ambassadors have succeeded through educational outreach activities. For
example, in the most economically deprived Mannenberg area where many
D6ers were forcibly removed to, an exhibition ‘Mannenberg: young ambassadors
exploring a creative future’ was held in the local library before touring the local
primary schools. This project enabled the Mannenberg youth to see and take pride
in their heritage, which promoted an expanded notion of their potential and a more
hopeful vision for their future lives. Noor Ebrahim’s work at D6M also promotes
an optimistic future. Let us turn to review this next.
Noor Ebrahim and Education for Democracy
Noor Ebrahim, was a former resident of D6 and is currently Education Officer at

the museum. Ebrahim is a gifted storyteller and employs his considerable skills
in the intergenerational work of education for democracy at D6M. I observed his
talks over a week in October 2006, which kept groups of secondary school aged
children transfixed during my visits, as Plates 19 and 20 demonstrate. He spoke
with animated passion about living in D6 during apartheid, the good times as a
young man with many friends as well as the terror of enforced removal. His talk
was interspersed with great good humour and an abiding sense of reconciliation,
which afforded relief to the audience, who were majority white. Ebrahim comments
on forgiving ‘But I always say, we don’t hate them, we forgive them for what they
did (Ebrahim 2001: 57).
There is a power to be derived in ‘forgiving and not forgetting’. Ebrahim in
forgiving has moved on from being defined solely, or primarily, as ‘victim’ and
so he breaks the shackles of the past rather than perpetuating the inequalities and
injustices of victim-hood. He has been able to recall the pain of the past removal
and displacement as well as the ordinary and amusing instances of daily life. At
one point he notes growing up and disobeying his parents, by performing in the
‘Coon Carnival’ with his friends. Although his band won this victory involved him
lying to his parents and in his jubilation returning home he forgot to wash off the
black minstrel makeup, which led to the uncovering of his lie (Ebrahim 2005: 42).
Instances such as this, telling fibs, lying to parents and covering up misbehaviour,
resonate today with children, and indeed adults, the world over.
The learning potential of D6M is phenomenal, with ‘education for liberation,
transformation and democracy’ pervading every nook and every programme.
Education and educators here stand in contradistinction to the ‘education for
oppression’ that Mandela amongst others fought against, notably the intellectual
‘baasskap, which is based on the ‘supremacy in all matters of the whites over the
nonwhites’, in the 1953 Bantu Education Act (September 2001: 23; <http://www.
africawithin.com/mandela/bantu_education_0657.htm> accessed on 17.06.2007).
Mandela deplored this Apartheid legislation that insulated ‘African people within
‘small tribal units’ and fostered ‘narrow outlooks and restricted opportunities
for the Black and Coloured population (ibid.). D6M rather opens ‘the doors of
learning’ not only locally but internationally. The Swedish government funded
exchange entitled ‘Balueka! Be Important Wes Belangrit!’, between young people
in Cape Town and Malmö is an example of one such initiative (D6M Newsletter,
Volume 8, No. 2: 1). In examples such as this, an educational aim in the 1956
Freedom Charter: ‘… to teach the youth to love their people and their culture, to
honour human brotherhood, liberty and peace’ is beginning to be realised at D6M
(<http://www.anc.org.za/ancdocs/history/charter.html> accessed on 17.06.2007).
Plate 19 Noor Ebrahim in dialogue with children on the map at

District Six Museum, Cape Town, South Africa, 2006
Source: Author.
Plate 20 Close up of young people on the floor map at District Six Museum,
Cape Town, South Africa, 2006
Source: Author.
The inclusiveness in the Freedom Charter is extended around the world by D6M.
I can attest to the willingness and generosity of D6M professionals, notably Benita
Bennett, Mandy Sanger, Noor Ebrahim, Tina Smith and Chrischené Julius to engage
in dialogue during my own visits. D6M exemplifies an inclusive approach as a founder
member of the International Coalition of Historic Site Museums of Conscience,
which is a global network spanning four continent. The common ideals and goals
are to commemorate past struggles for democracy and to develop diverse methods
for facilitating dialogue on contemporary social concerns. There is an emphasis
on taking action to address major human rights abuses, thereby transforming site
visitors from passive learners to active citizens and promoting democratic values
(<www.sitesofconscience.org/eng/d6_how.htm> accessed on 11.12.2007).
Next I shall relate this South African memory work to the UK. First I offer
some definition of key terms. Then I outline multisensory approaches that have
successfully prompted remembering and returned some control of lives to elders
during UK outreach with specific reference to intergenerational reminiscence
(IGR) outreach activities, which will help connect us to the focus on sensory ways
of knowing in Section 3.
Reminiscence, Oral history and Recollection: What’s in a Name?
Senior citizens, old age pensioners, old people, grey hairs, wrinklies and elders
are a few terms – derogatory and acceptable – describing people over 65 years
old, which is the legal age of retirement from paid work in the UK. Elders, is my
preferred term. This is taken from African Caribbean partners and is associated
with respect derived from greater life experience and knowledge, which views
elders as a resource rather than a burden. As one Horniman collaborator notes:
‘we say in Africa when an elder dies we loose a library’ (Kwappong 2006 pers.
comm.)
Research sights grandparents as ‘a precious resource for children’ (Predazzi
et al. 2000: 81). The valuable transmissive function and stabilising influences
grandparents play in the family has also been recognised in a UK Government
Green paper and the Dept of the Family (Home Office 1998, 2000). Yet in Britain,
while people are living longer family relationships have changed as a result of
increasing marital breakdowns (1 in 3) and the demographic movements caused by
economic migrations around the world (ibid. 2000: 81). These factors can conspire
and increase the risk of children becoming estranged from their grandparents and
consequentially divorced from their cultural heritage, which highlights a need for
intergenerational transmission in the wider social sphere. In other words there is a
social value from engaging elders in sharing their experiences in IGR as knowledge
bearers that extends their role within families to the school system.
Electing to take on a transmissive function as knowledge bearer is not
universally appealing, but the elders who do engage in IGR find it rewarding,
positive and life affirming. The keynotes for elders engaged in IGR with Age
Exchange London appear to be: sharing; commitment to truth telling; being a
bearer of special information and delivering a unique experience, value and self
value; reflexivity; authority and confidence; negating stereotypes and false images
(Schweitzer 1993: 7). Marwick’s research reinforces this in Edinburgh. She notes
children seeing beyond an impaired and frail body to glimpse something of the
whole life of a person, which led one 10 year old to comment ‘See these 2 old
ladies over there? – they’re great!’ (Marwick 1995: 143). As they sit and discuss
together people question: how were things then, how different are they now
and why? This brings common sense beliefs to consciousness, so they can be
consciously adopted, rejected or modified.
Tom Kitwood also observes there is a positive impact on the elder memory
bearer in IGR, who is viewed as a whole sentient being, a ‘unity’ of body and
mind, ‘thought and feeling’ and consequently a respectful process and value is
highlighted that benefits the one remembering (Kitwood 1990: 205-6). Gaynor
Kavanagh regards the focus on ‘process’ and value primarily to the memory
bearer in reminiscence as distinguishing it from oral history, where the emphasis
is on the ‘product’ and the sharing of knowledge to support historical research
and interpretation in the museum. She notes how in the past the gathering of oral
histories has led to memory bearers being regarded as a sort of filing cabinet or
a crop to be harvested. Certainly reminiscence may result in the production of

oral history or resource packs for schools and oral history involves the process of
reminiscence, yet the primary objective is regarded as ‘giving’ in reminiscence
and ‘taking’ in oral history (Kavanagh, 2000: 118). It is also worth highlighting
the term recollection, since it has positive connection with ideas of ‘action and
power’ and ‘success’, it denotes the authority of the elders and can be employed to
impart a sense of value to intergenerational reminiscence or remembering (COED
1976: 934). However the notion of writing history from below and stressing the
recovery of subjective experiences in a mutually respectful way is common to
reminiscence and oral history or life review and recollection, which are often used
interchangeably in the literature.
In my experience of IGR this respectful work crucially involves the elder and
younger person thinking critically together. For children, a change in the school
routine and meeting new people is exciting in itself, which can lead to closer
attention, to questioning and assimilating new ideas within the framework of prior
knowledge. Engagement with real people and relating their words with objects,
newspapers, documents and photos prompts pupils to gain new knowledge and
develop skills of comparing, contrasting and evaluating the truth of evidence.
Furthermore, the development of good new relationships ‘scaffolds’ an imaginative
consideration of world change and an appreciation of present by locating the
abstract past in reality.
IGR is motivating as children see elders in their multicultural communities
as ‘experts’ and come to value the diverse histories of ‘ordinary’ people like
themselves, which lie outside of the preferred narratives of British heroes and
royalty that dominate the national curriculum for history. Age Exchange and the East
Midlands Oral History Archive (EMOHA) worked in partnership with teachers to
develop a broader range of national curricula material, including citizenship, based
on reminiscence activities (Schweitzer 1993; <http//:www.emoha.org> accessed
on 24.11.2007). Such IGR work initially challenges stereotypical views of elders,
as the evidence of their eyes and their fruitful dialogical exchanges contradict any
negative preconceived ideas, then by extension IGR aims to challenge prejudice
generally. This is a large claim, which a brief outline of certain media tools such as
resource boxes and citizenship teachers’ packs employed during outreach activity
may help to justify.
Age Exchange has produced more than 20 Reminiscence Boxes, which are
carefully themed to structure dialogue and creative work around the interests of
Healy in Australia speaks of the interview process as a form of voyeurism, stalking

‘the old’ to ‘catch history in a net of tape which scoops up words before the last breath
expires. In its worst moments, the museum simply colonised and cannibalised the collective
memories of the western suburbs in order to reproduce itself as an institution’ (Healy 1991:
165 in Kavanagh 2000: 79). However in the best instances, such as in Liz Carnegie’s work
in Glasgow, Kavanagh suggests that greater empathy leads to richer records (Kavanagh,
2000: 75-78).
the group (<http://www.age-exchange.org.uk> accessed on 24.11.2007). Each box

contains up to 12 objects, such as the ‘Born in the Caribbean’ box containing: cane
sugar, bay rum, country chocolate, dominoes, charbolic soap herbs and spices,
sasparilla, paraffin candles, traditional songs and a map of the Caribbean. These
objects, or ‘props’ as Burnside calls them, act as ‘tangible reminders of the past’,
which stimulate a remembering process for the elders who originally selected and
work with them as ‘points of departure, not arrival’ (Burnside 1995: 155). At a
basic level the simple act of ‘holding’ then ‘passing’ on connects people in a group
and invites a sharing of opinions (Gibson 1994: 58).
The Living Memory in Education programmes in schools, involves elders
in schools demonstrating the objects and inspiring excellent writing, which is
valuable for elders and pupils (Schweitzer 1993). The elders who I have worked
with at Horniman are skilful storytellers, which enables pupils to gain imaginative
access to the past based on the personal and subjective meanings associated with
objects. In IGR elder storytellers also importantly encourage young writers to
express multiple perspectives such as ‘my point of view’ and ‘my nan’s point of
view’. The humorous ways in which the elders often tell their tales is extremely
motivating and is often reflected in the young peoples compositions. I offer one
example as typical. ‘You may think that Nigeria is just a radiator with sand but you
are absolutely wrong, wrong and even more wrong’ (<http://www.brockleyschool.
org> accessed on 05.03.2005).
I have begun to outline activities conducted during UK ‘outreach’. A note
defining this term will prove helpful.
Outreach: Developing the Social Role of the Museum in the UK
The term museum outreach provision is usually intended to support “hard to

reach” or “hidden” groups of people such as elders in residential homes and
“involves going out from a specific organization or centre to work in other
locations with sets of people who typically do not or cannot avail themselves of
the services of that centre”. (McGivney 2000: 16)
It was during the 1990s that professional museums, organisations and the new
Labour government bodies asserted the need for museums to adopt a social role,
which ‘outreach’ was a widely adopted means of fulfilling (Martin 1999; DCMS
Learning benefits, citizenship and identity issues, construction guidelines and

evaluations for UK loan boxes are outlined at <http://www.museumse.org.uk/making_the_
most_of_museums/benefits_of_using_museums/Loan_Boxes.html>; <http://www.museums
loansnetwork.org.uk/learning.htm>; <http://www.ucl.ac.uk/museums/loanboxes.html>; <http://
www.leics.gov.uk/moving_objects>; <http://www.objectdialoguebox.com/>; <http://www.
gem.org.uk/grassroots/GR%20Resources/makeloansbox.html>; <www.mlasouthwest.org.
uk/docs/Resource-Box-Report.pdf> accessed on 20.11.2008.
1999, 1996, 1999; DCMS 1999). David Martin provides a broad definition of
outreach, which suggests ‘an organizations involvement with or influence in, the
community, particularly in relation to social welfare’ that ‘involves work with
audiences which is related to museum subjects and collections but staged in non-
museum’ settings. He highlights typical venues including: ‘libraries, schools,
community halls, shopping centres, surgeries, old people homes and clubs, fairs
and festivals, hospitals and prisons’ (Martin 1999: 38). Martin regards outreach
as ‘fundamental to the process of changing the role of museums within their
communities’, since it can establish ‘relationships with new audiences, and turn
museums from inward facing to outward looking organizations’ (Martin 1999: 38).
However, Peter Davies problematises this position. He denounces outreach that
allows community access ‘on a limited basis … separated from that community’,
and he further notes the term ‘outreach or ‘outstation’ has etymological links to
‘outcast’, which reinforces this separation (Davies 1999: 32). Davis argues that
while outreach can have truly transformational possibilities – offering the potential
for flexible, plurivocal participation and responsive relationships and community
empowerment through facilitating open dialogical exchange – it may have limited
impact on the institution, its ethos and its wider priorities.
It is worth recalling that in the UK outreach seemed to instill a fear in some
staff that museums might be taken ‘beyond their natural physical and philosophical
boundaries’ (Anderson 1999: 69). The fear relates to museums engaging in areas
of social provision unconnected with their traditional work of ‘preservation,
display, interpretation and education’ as well as to their anxiety about public
spending and accountability (Sandell 2003: 6). Nevertheless the benefits of
outreach activity for both the museums and the participants can be considerable
as the increasing evidence from case studies, research publications and evaluation
reports demonstrate. Linda Sargent’s work is notable here.
The benefits to Sargent’s Oxfordshire project participants reinforce the D6M
Ambassadors findings, which include enhanced social confidence and improved
self-esteem as well as increased motivation and energy that is thought to arise from
opportunities for self-expression. Sargent’s outreach is notable in her emphasis on
creativity, and in drawing on ideas from outside the discipline of museum studies,
such as therapy as I shall outline next.
Building Bridges of Meaning: Mapping Our Place in a Safe Space
‘Mapping Our Place’ was one part of a larger reminiscence project entitled Drawn
from Memory, developed by Linda Sargent for a target audience of 7 women
aged between early 50s to early 80s who attended a weekly meeting during term
time at their local Health Centre in rural Oxfordshire (<http://www.mlasoutheast.
org.uk/assets/documents/1000033Cwordswings_last.pdf>; <http://lindasargent.
co.uk/html/resources.html> accessed on 17.12.2007). Sargent begins her mapping
sessions by showing and discussing her own sketch map of a ‘favourite childhood
place’, which she tells us should not be beautifully drawn as this can intimidate
participants. She explains the map details can range from a farm, a swing, a room,
a den or camp, but must include the journey to the place and usually takes about
20 minutes to complete.
Sargent describes recalling ‘the raw enthusiasm’ and feeling for a place special
to her in the Oxford session, and further notes how this personal sharing usually
promotes an inclusive sharing atmosphere. She also observes how the mapping
activity quickly absorbs people, it seems to touch ‘a core, some piece of childhood
recaptured’ and the resulting memories were formed into stories of emplacement
that were readily shared following the drawing exercise (Sargent 2002: 26). For
example one member of the group recalls a childhood in London (ibid. 2002: 28).
Her map represents her memories of 1934. She recalls feeding cart-horses ‘carrots
and sugar’ at a diary with a Norwegian friend, then feeding fish at ‘Golders Green
Crematorium … My friend went back to Norway before the war and I never heard
from her again’, she tells Sargent in conversation.
The success of this project as measured in evaluation seems to be due, in part at
least, to the map work with the accompanying text crucially ensuring individuals
had a personal textual space, which empowered them to extend the initial thoughts
associated with recollection. Releasing personal creativity in individual production
also appeared to be a vital source of pleasure and pride for all the women, while
taking turns in the oral sharing of the stories following drawing permitted intimate
connection amongst the group. The group leaders taking responsibility for setting
a truly compassionate framework for people to share their memories/thoughts and
feelings in ‘a safe setting’ was vital and this involved listening to the different
dynamics of each group, judging when to speak and remain silent, when to be
assertive and when restrained (Sargent 2002: 11-12).
Sargent points out that the work of recollection here has certain similarities
with ‘narrative therapy’, which is a technique that allow therapists and clients ‘to
be light-hearted, humorous, and creative and yet surprisingly effective in resolving
many of the problems that we face today’ (White and Epston 1990). Narrative
therapists recognise the ‘idea of hearing or telling stories may seem a trivial
pursuit’, yet they contend ‘conversations can shape new realities’ by building
‘bridges of meaning’ together with clients, which helps ‘healing developments
flourish instead of wither and be forgotten.’ In short, White and Epston note how
it is language and creativity that ‘can shape events into narratives of hope’ (ibid.).
It is worth noting here that orality and writing are not mutually exclusive
but may be complementary forms of recall. Furthermore, my own experience
of conducting creative workshop activities, has shown that ‘rationality’ and the
written word are not necessarily washed away, by some ‘uncontrollable mass of
fluid amorphous material’ that constitutes the work of recall (Portelli 1999: 64).
Next I shall consider museums building creative and sensual ‘bridges of
meaning’ in Japan. I briefly outline another mapping project.
Mapping for Health in Japan
In 2007 a team led by Yukiko Hashimoto at Edo-Tokyo Museum won a national

award for their innovative memory work with elders who had lived before the
second World War (WWII) in the area around the museum (<http://www.edo-tokyo-
museum.or.jp/english/index.html> accessed on 09.11.2007). ‘Genki’ [Health] was
the title of the twelve month project that was conducted in collaboration with the
University of Tokyo Dept of Gerontology, who issued each elder with a pedometer
at the outset to measure cardio-vascular rates monthly and recorded a scientifically
significant improvement at the end of the project.
The term ‘genki’ has a wider meaning than the translation suggests, including
a whole mind/body attitude that pervades daily life, seen in the widespread use of
‘O genki de?’ as a greeting. It is also indicative of a desire to promote a ‘healthy’
relation, a sense of belonging and place, between the individual, the community
and the land with its changing four seasons that is traditionally strong in Japan.
The Genki project aimed to bring a map archive held in the museum to life
together with elder members of the local community, to increase the knowledge of
the pre-WWII area and examine how the museum might contribute to improving
the health of the elders, both physically and mentally. Edo-Tokyo Museum’s maps
showed the geography of the area prior to the devastating bombing in WWII over a
period of many weeks that led to the complete destruction of many historical areas
and a death toll exceeding the more rapid destruction at Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
The museum recruited survivors, eight in total, to volunteer for work with
the map collection by issuing a small ‘call for help’ notice within the museum
and placing a small advert in the local newspaper. Following initial consultation
and negotiation in the museum of research themes the survivors choose specific
aspects of the local area around the museum, such as entertainment and shops.
The Genki project leaders encouraged engagement from a personal ‘reminiscence’
perspective to recall sensual and emotional knowledge, the smells, sounds and
tastes of the past as well as finding factual material in the libraries. Elders actively
researched every day, recording findings in notebooks and sharing them with each
other in the museum once a month, when new directions for the next month were
agreed. The traditional 1940s home, of wonderfully jointed wooden construction
with tatami [rice straw] matting, rice paper windows, ‘kotatsu’ [low table heated
with a sunken fire source and covered with a futon or quilt] ‘tokonami’ [alcove]
and a more modern (for the time) ticking clock on the wall, was selected as an
ideal site to promote sensual memory work during monthly meetings.
Japan has a tradition of holding the elders of the community in high esteem. For
example notable artists and craftspeople can become ‘National Living Treasures’, whose
knowledge gained over a rich lifetime is valued by the country as a whole and at the level of
everyday life the ‘ojiisan/obaasan’ [grandparents], ‘obasan’ [aunties] and ‘okasan’ [uncles]
are treated with considerable respect.
Next I shall make come concluding remarks. I shall outline the role of the
senses in promoting recall.
Conclusion: Coming to Our Senses
Just as at D6M objects such as the floor map were seen to stimulate recall, a
number of UK examples demonstrate objects working sensually in the process
of recollection with the aging body. Alison McMoreland Director Living Arts
Glasgow highlights the strong sensory component of museum object work. She
recalls one previously silent woman in a care home, who had sung songs but not
talked during earlier workshops becoming animated at the sight of a bobbin; her
fingers ‘remembering’ the complicated ‘weavers knot’ from her days in the Jute
Mill. Alison also notes taking Highland pipes for Angus, a piper and composer
nearly ninety years old, who was partially deaf and totally blind. Angus, placing the
reedless chanter to his lips and discovering the absence of sound, began vocalising
‘diddle’ while fingering one of his compositions ‘dignity and authority.’ When
asked how he composed tunes; if he heard them in his head? He instantly replied,
without stopping to think, ‘I hear them in my heart’ (McMoreland 1997: 112).
Eilean Taylor also speaks of sensory routes to recall. She explains how a bag
of sweets can provide a complete multi-sensory experience to provoke memory
through the five senses we usually count in the west. In touching the bag and
selecting one sweet; looking closely at the chosen sweet; listening to the rustle of
the paper bag and the crunching sound of eating; smelling the aroma; tasting the
sweet past times can be re-imagined and communication of childhood, siblings
and corner shops facilitated (Eilean Taylor 1997: 140-141).
The creative reminiscence workshops I have conducted along Sargent’s and
Taylor’s lines have proved affective in building ‘bridges of meaning’ with MA
students in Leicester as well museum professionals in Cape Town (2006) and
Japan (2005, 2006) (<http://icom.org/ictop/2006> accessed on 11.11.2006). In the
next Section I shall investigate the interrelationship between hearts and minds,
embodied and sensual ways of knowing that I found exemplified at D6M, in Japan
and in my UK examples. Specifically I shall consider these issues with reference
to my own work with young visitors to Horniman Museum.
Section 3
Critical Collaborative Museum Pedagogy
New forms of museum practice centre on notions of collaboration and alliance.

Audre Lorde is helpful here. She states:
Change means growth and growth can be painful. But we sharpen the self-
definition by exposing the self in work and struggle together with those whom
we define as different from ourselves, although sharing the same goals. For
Black and white, old and young, lesbian and heterosexual women alike, this can
mean new paths to our survival. (Lorde 1996c: 170) [my emphasis]
In the last two chapters, I shall outline a creative research partnership entitled
‘Inspiration Africa!’, which aimed to progress the critical thinking and learning
of London school children, to challenge racism through museum objects and to
promote intercultural understanding. The collaboration I outlined with the adult
members of CWWA earlier echoes in this section with young people in promoting
a feeling that the museum is a responsive institution, one that listens and acts
collaboratively.
In terms of facilitating opportunities for creativity and learning in the museum
this section highlights the need for partners to fight against issues that arose in
Section 2. Specifically collaborative practice during ‘Inspiration Africa!’ was alert
to signs of ‘institutional racism’, which was addressed from the outset of the project
by attention to the ethnic composition of the team-leaders. Additionally any ‘sense
of superior [white] group position’ was brought into the ongoing open dialogue,
which was maintained throughout collaboration (Macpherson 1999: 6.18/22).
I open this introductory section with Audre Lorde, whose voice has informed
the feminist-hermeneutic praxis that underpins the ‘Inspiration Africa!’ projects I
shall outline in Chapters 5 and 6. In addition to feminist thought the collaborative
action underpinning these two chapters is reliant on broader frameworks such as
Macpherson, which are crucial to the nurturing of children’s budding identities
and to the protection of their human rights that I shall briefly consider next.
Universal Human Rights and the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC)
In the context of the museum, the tenets of Universal Human Rights may
be expounded alongside a study of objects. Museum objects have complex
biographies and if educators draw attention for example to: the construction;
indigenous meanings and use; travel to the museum, and the subsequent uses and
meanings visitors may make there, work with objects can profitably draw attention
to Human Rights issues today. Such object work, with a human rights focus, may
be enhanced with reference to contemporary voices. I shall offer one instance to
illustrate this point. Reflection on a Shona headrest c. nineteenth century that is
said to inspire dreams, prompted one school group of autistic children to consider
their own dreams, and also to look at the ‘dream speech’ of Dr Martin Luther
King Jr., who raised his voice in resistance to tyranny for an optimistic future, as I
have shown elsewhere. (King 1963; <http://www.usconstitution.net/dream.html>
accessed on 30.11 2008; Golding 2009).
In Chapter 5 I shall expand upon this notion of pupil’s writing object biographies
during ‘Inspiration Africa!’ First let us consider the Horniman Museum’s response to
the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), which underpins
the multicultural-antiracist praxis I shall outline in Section 3 (<www.un.org>;
<http;//www.unicef.org/crc/> accessed on 30.11.2008). The Horniman Museum
Education Department looked to the CRC, since it offers an ethical framework
that we hoped might impart a sense of social responsibility to all children or young
people, who are recognised as citizens. In addition to the outline provided in my
Introduction, I emphasise the CRC applies to every child regardless of nationality,
family background, gender, social status or racial or ethnic group as stated in
Article 2. The right to education is noted in Article 28 and Article 29 declares the
educational entitlement includes the advancement and respect for human rights
and fundamental freedoms. In short children, who are defined as under 18 years
old have rights of ‘provision’ including education and health, rights of ‘protection’
from harm and exploitation, and rights of ‘participation’ as seen in Article 12 that
states their right to have their opinions given due regard when decisions will affect
them. One example of practice illustrating these points occurred prior to ‘Inspiration
Africa!’ and the construction of The Hands on our World Discovery Gallery for
children at Horniman, when the Education Department worked intensely with a
Children’s Panel and independent consultants to ensure the exhibition themes and
programming activities would be appropriately engaging.
At a practical level the UDHR and CRC Articles resonate with the radical
feminist-hermeneutic pedagogy I shall detail presently as well the Songhay Peoples
of Niger’s advice that we ‘must learn to sit with people … to sit and listen’, which
collaborative praxis during the ‘Inspiration Africa!’ project profitably took to heart
(Stoller 1989: 128). It will be helpful here at the outset to outline certain features
of this collaborative project work, which applies to both chapters.
I shall start with a demographic outline of the fieldsite. Next I shall consider
the key team leaders. Then I offer an overview of the project. Following this
brief account of ‘Inspiration Africa!’ I will be in a better position to highlight the
structure of each subsequent chapter and the particular aspects to be covered.
Critical Collaborative Museum Pedagogy 133
‘Inspiration Africa!’ Field-site, Team-leaders and Outreach Work
The ‘Inspiration Africa!’ field-site I consider in the final two chapters is a frontier
location between the Horniman Museum and local schools in the London Borough
of Lewisham. The notion of a frontier field-site importantly dislodges hierarchical
notions of museum as vital centre reaching out to promote creativity and learning
in a subservient community at the periphery, which might be implied in ‘outreach’
activity, which we have considered. During ‘Inspiration Africa!’ outreach involved
taking handling objects into school field-sites. Outreach was important prior to
beginning the multifaceted ‘Inspiration Africa!’ projects to negotiate the most
appropriate theme and activities across the curriculum together with teachers and
pupils and to maintain momentum during the project with Lewisham schools,
which were situated in geographical areas of ‘deprivation’ (Ofsted 1999). A brief
outline of the demographics of Lewisham will illuminate this point.
Lewisham is a multicultural area of south London, which is disadvantaged by
poverty. In 2002 the Index of Multiple Deprivation (IMD) shows that 16 percent
of the population of Lewisham live in ‘wards in the top 10 percent most deprived
wards in England’ (Lewisham Strategic Plan 2002: 19). This statement is based
on ‘six domain indices: Income, Employment, Health Deprivation and Disability,
Education Skills and Training, Housing, and Geographical Access to Services’,
which are combined to form an overall score on the Index (ibid.). The Office
for standards in education (Ofsted) made a report in 1999, which highlights the
combined effect that these factors of economic deprivation have on creativity and
learning in the borough. The report notes states that Lewisham is:
… the third largest London Borough and one of the most diverse. It is home to
a vibrant mix of communities. In schools 50% of the population is black or from
another minority ethnic group and 121 different languages are spoken. Between
January 1998 and January 1999, 583 pupils new to English were admitted to
Lewisham schools as casual admissions. Most of these were refugees. Though
thus culturally rich it is economically poor, the 14th most deprived district in
England according to the Department of the Environment, Transport, and the
Regions index. 32.7% of its primary pupils and 39.1% of its secondary pupils are
entitled to free school meals, there is a high proportion of lone parent families,
youth unemployment is high, 30% of young people past school leaving age have
no experience of work, and there is a high level of youth crime. Levels of literacy
and numeracy amongst many of the population are low. (Ofsted 1999:4) [my
emphasis]
The ‘Inspiration Africa!’ research team were able to build on the Horniman
Museum’s six years of collaborative experience dealing with the two contrasting
factors of cultural wealth and economic poverty at the Lewisham field-site, which
Ofsted highlights. Similarly the Cloth of Gold Arts Company and the visiting artists,
musician and storytellers came to the project with an impressive track record of
successful collaborative work in developing pupil’s literacy and art skills, which
in part at least determined the focus of work during ‘Inspiration Africa!’
‘Inspiration Africa!’ Project Aims, Activities and Team-leaders
In September 1999 the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) approved 80
Museums and Galleries Education Projects (MGEPs) to encourage collaboration
across institutions and across traditional subject boundaries. The DfES awarded
Horniman Museum £72,000 to fund an innovative Museums and Galleries
Education Project (MGEP) entitled ‘Inspiration Africa!’, which had four main
aims to: explore and expand pupils responses to African Objects; encourage and
stimulate creativity; develop skills in ICT (Information and Computer Technology)
Art and language, and increase respect for African culture.
The DfES funding permitted twelve schools from south London to participate
in ‘Inspiration Africa!’ and each school choose one class and one a key object
from the African Worlds exhibition to base their project work on. Six of the
twelve schools were located in the borough of Lewisham and six in the borough
of Bromley, with two special, two primary and two secondary schools selected
from each borough.
At each school the ‘Inspiration Africa!’ team-leaders comprised four people:
Tony Minion as Cloth of Gold Artist/project co-ordinator; Jacqui Callis as website
developer/artist; myself as Horniman outreach worker and Olusola Oyelele as
Writer/director. Three other African Caribbean professionals were employed
for some projects: Amoafi Kwappong as storyteller/musician, Ayo Thomas as
musician/storyteller and Andrew Ward as rap poet/musician. Because the Cloth of
Gold workers were white, a policy decision was taken at the outset of the project,
before the funding application, that the poet, storyteller or musician should be
of African or Caribbean heritage. In this way it was hoped that the people who
delivered the curriculum would positively reflect the museum objects that formed
the inspiration for the curriculum content, which research shows positively to
impact on achievement (Gilborn 1995). It may be important to state here that
the ‘Inspiration Africa!’ team leaders were not arguing that only African heritage
people could adequately teach African themed museum projects. We believe that
interest and commitment are more important than accidents of birth. Furthermore,
the possibility of intercultural understanding determines a view that cultures are not
fixed or hermetically sealed from each other. However, working in a multicultural
society with African objects, and with an overriding concern for equality and
social justice, it simply seemed logical to recruit team members with different
skills and interests.
A non-hierarchical teamwork approach was adopted from the beginning of the
‘Inspiration Africa!’ partnership. At each school the teams of four always worked
alongside the class teacher and the classroom assistants, pooling their knowledge
and expertise to promote pupil learning through creative effort. The four person
strong ‘Inspiration Africa!’ team took the role of project leaders and held regular
meetings to ensure that everyone was clear about their particular responsibilities
during the project, took ownership of the project work and felt committed to its
success. These team leader meetings were held at the beginning, middle and end
of each project. At the outset of each project a half-day brainstorming session
was organised at the museum, where Jacqui Callis and I provided information
on the particular artifact that served as the key object and the special cultural
context that surrounded this artifact. These meetings were creative sessions where
the team felt at complete ease in each other’s company, sharing food and ideas for
an appropriate key word and a sentence web that might inspire imaginative effort
and raise the literacy levels in the particular pupil group. Perhaps it may be said
that theoretically grounded practice was built around the kitchen table where the
project activities were developed (Hill-Collins 1991).
The broad ‘Inspiration Africa!’ aims were achieved through a variety of project
activities. The activities included: an In service Training for Teachers (INSET) with
participating educators; an introductory visit to school – handling and discussing
museum objects, story telling, working on Information and Computer Technology
(ICT) and textile screen printing; a visit to the African Worlds exhibition with
museum workshops; five days of workshops at school with a poet/storyteller/
musician, an artist and myself as Horniman educator – producing creative writing,
music and artwork, investigating and contributing to the dedicated website and
finally adding their own images to the virtual banner with the ‘cogprog’ media
tool.
As well as the vital face-to-face interaction with each other and objects,
experiences were virtually shared between participants via the website by
creatively interacting and exploring the use of e-mail and the world-wide-web.
In a sense the dedicated ‘Inspiration Africa!’ website provided a vital ‘contact
zone’, for example to extend the discussion that artifacts prompted during the
museum visit, by providing each participating school with an individual school
space as well as a series of communal ‘chat’ spaces (Clifford 1999). In this way
pupils from different schools could take pride in each other’s achievements, which
were professionally displayed on the school site promptly at the end of each
‘Inspiration Africa!’ session. This immediacy made each stage of the project work
more meaningful to the students and aided reflection on the days activities by
means of the visual, textual and aural prompts on the website. Seeing photographs
of themselves with the unfamiliar objects and playfully engaged with each other
also proved a motivating factor.
While pupils from the different schools were engaged in separate projects
they could exchange ideas and discuss the progress of their creative efforts by
leaving messages on the bulletin board. Callis notes how the web provided a ‘safe’
location complementing the museum visit and poetry composition. On the web
pupils were able to express their ‘very caring’ self and share their more private
feelings outside of face-to-face interaction (Callis 2002: 28). However while the
pupils were impressed with the new technological aspects of the project, which
provided a useful connection to their daily lives as twentieth century citizens and
the museum objects from both ancient and contemporary Africa, it was the ‘real
thing’, objects, which added the ‘wonder and resonance’ factors that lay at the
heart of the project work (Pearce 1994; Greenblatt 1991).
Objects, ideas and issues from the African Worlds exhibition in the South
Hall Gallery of Horniman (then only permanent UK gallery dedicated to African
related Cultures) as well as the contemporary concerns of young visitors inspired
the ambitious ‘Inspiration Africa!’ partnership project. An object-based route to
affective learning was privileged during the project alongside the more traditional
cognitive routes to knowledge, which the UK school curriculum must focus upon.
That all of the project work was designed to spring from a close attention to
museum objects and also the socio-cultural and political background from whence
the objects sprang facilitated border crossing and creative linking of the curriculum
areas – the new technologies of Internet/web-based learning with established
textile printing processes, literacy, performance and music. This enabled pupils to
produce an exciting, vibrant and diverse array of expressive outcomes stimulated
by the 12 key objects from the African Worlds exhibition, which they were able to
show off at the end of project exhibition.
The pupil’s achievements were displayed for three months in the ‘Inspiration
Africa!’ exhibition, which was hosted on the Balcony Gallery overlooking the
African Worlds Exhibition in the South Hall of Horniman. At the well-attended
launch some of the pupils performed some of their poetry to critical acclaim,
which included members of the local advisory services. Additionally the public
evaluation was overwhelmingly positive, importantly showing previously negative
perceptions of a single stereotyped African identity might be challenged while the
museum as a static boring space could be transformed (<http://www.clothofgold.
org.uk/inafrica> accessed on 03.12 2008). A brief outline of research into the value
of countering stereotype will illuminate this aspect of ‘Inspiration Africa!’
Challenging Racist Stereotype to Promote New Identities

and a Sense of Belonging
David Milner’s seminal study into racial preference explored the preferences
of 300 Black and white children for Black or white dolls and images, in which
children were asked which dolls or image they preferred and which dolls most
resembled themselves (Milner 1983). Maureen Stone has criticised this research
as pure victim theory overemphasising self-hate and racial misidentification, while
oversimplifying social factors including the stereotyping of Black dolls as the
naughty ‘golliwogs who no-one wanted to play with’ in the literature of the time
because they ‘didn’t like their black faces’ (Stone 1985: 55-6).
Iram Siraj-Blatchford however has recently built on Milner and her research
into Nursery children – under five years old – demonstrates that racist attitudes
exist in some very young Black and white children. She cites a number of examples
including white children who refused to put their boots into a bag with ‘Packi’ (a
short-hand derogatory term for Pakistan) writing on it, which was upsetting for the
children of Pakistan heritage in the class, but also she argues detrimental to the white
children. Siraj-Blatchford notes Kutner’s evidence in support of this claim, which
demonstrates, ‘young white children who are racist have a distorted perception of
reality’, and further that, ‘their ability to judge and reason is also affected’ (Siraj-
Blatchford 1994: 8). She emphasises ‘the need to offer all children guidance and
support in developing positive attitudes to all people, and in particular black
people’ (Siraj-Blatchford 1994: 5). Following Milner, Siraj-Blatchford argues that
some Black children and some white children can be severely damaged by the
racist views, which surround them and strongly recommends teachers develop an
antiracist-multicultural curriculum, to provide all children with the tools necessary
to challenge racism in society.
Conclusion
Against a limiting historical background that tended to rather unthinkingly

essentialise and fix very young children within a single ethnic identity, Horniman
Museum has worked hard to represent a more complex picture of identities,
of similarities and differences within as well as between socio-cultural groups
(Golding 2007a). Next I shall examine the new theory-based practice at Horniman
with reference to some success stories during ‘Inspiration Africa!’
First in Chapter 5 I show ‘Inspiration Africa!’ tackling Black underachievement
in school through holistic mind and body museum approaches including drama and
language activities, which helped pupils construct more positive and essentially
hybrid identities (Hall 1996). The project work here that prompts motivation and
‘flow’ learning is based on dialogical exchange with a Haitian Shrine and an Igbo
ijele housed in Horniman (Csikszentmihalyi 1995).
Then in Chapter 6 I shall critically consider creative work with an Ashante
stool housed in Horniman. The major themes of this chapter include the concept
of active learning, which I address with reference to a feminist ‘both and’ notion
of the ‘power to’ see, hear, move, and speak (Foucault 1980). These powers are
linked in the chapter to embodied knowledge gained through handling that is most
beneficial to the group of children with special learning needs.
Chapter 5
Identity: Motivation and Self-esteem
Introduction
Stuart Hall connects identity with active enunciation. He states.
Or is quite a different practice entailed – not the rediscovery but the production
of identity. Not an identity grounded in the archaeology, but in the re-telling of
the past? (Hall 1996: 111) [my emphasis]
The museum frontiers provide an excellent location for the articulation of identity,
which can be motivating for non-traditional audiences and especially for pupils
in danger of disaffection. Young people of 13 and 14 years old who teachers note
as troubled with hormonal changes that further de-motivates their classroom
learning, can find it especially helpful to reflect on and write about the complex
feelings that contribute to the production of identity. Let us look at one example of
a pupil expressing her state of inner turmoil, which the teacher thought may have
led to bad behaviour at school, and subsequently periods of exclusion.
All I want is my independence. / Free speech, free spirit, free my whole life. / If
that were to happen where would I be? … I have a normal life but deep down its
terrible. / I’m like a Gemini. / There are two sides to a story. / I’m happy on the
outside. / And hurting on the inside. / For me to feel this way. / There must be
something wrong. / … What the hell is going on? (Year 9 pupil, Telegraph Hill
School) [My emphasis]
This poem was produced during a museum/school curriculum that was informed
by antiracist-multiculturalism and in this chapter I shall first consider the notions of
multiculturalism and antiracism as well as the newer term interculturalism, which
the UK government has recently been concerned with, and which is the subject of a
2008 Council of Europe White Paper (<http://www.coe.int/t/dg4/intercultural/Source/
White%20Paper_final_revised_EN.pdf> accessed on 03.01.2009). I point to the
distinguishing features of these concepts while arguing for the underlying value that
lies at the heart of them all, with reference to recent government policy and research
into the underachievement of Black pupils (Cantle 2002; Gilborn and Mirza 2000).
I protect the identities of the poets throughout for ethical reasons. I feel privileged
that the poets have shared a deal of private and painful information with me, but this sharing
was situated and not for wider publication.
Then I briefly outline elements of my theoretical positioning, feminist-

hermeneutics, which grew out of antiracist-multiculturalism and determined the
practical approach taken with museum objects during ‘Inspiration Africa!’ Next,
I justify the rather large claims made for my particular theoretical perspective by
demonstrating how the theory works in practice with personal reference to the
Haitian Voudou shrine, which was the key object for creative effort around the
key word ‘spirit’ for Year 9 pupils at Telegraph Hill Secondary School during their
‘Inspiration Africa!’ project. Following this I shall offer further justification by
investigating the imaginative work produced by Telegraph Hill pupils. Then I shall
expand upon the method which echoes in Freirian critical pedagogy with reference
to work by Year 6 pupils at Christchurch Primary School whose key ‘Inspiration
Africa!’ object was the Igbo ijele and whose key word was ‘pride’.
Overall, my focus on the Telegraph Hill and Christchurch projects will highlight
the use or value of a theory, which is derived from a feminist-hermeneutic process,
to interpretive educational work at the museum/school frontiers. I aim to show
that such praxis can result not only in a wealth of creative outcomes, but also
a more positive attitude to life for this museum audience. I further argue that
theoretically informed collaborative praxis helped promote community cohesion
by aiding pupils’ critical thought and communication. In short I claim that feminist-
hermeneutics brings to the centre of critical dialogical exchange, possible roots of
inclusion and exclusion in social, economic, political and cultural systems, as well
as the necessary actions to counter injustice. This is rather a large claim and some
background information may prove helpful before proceeding.
Multiculturalism, Antiracism and Interculturalism
In the 1980s and 1990s ‘race riots’ according to much media reporting, or
‘uprisings’ in the words of some political analysis, was seen in UK cities including:
my home Brixton, London (1981, 1985 and 1995); Liverpool (1981, 1985, 1995);
Birmingham (1981, 1985); Bristol (1980) and Bradford (1995). These disturbing
events occurred in multicultural and multiracial areas and involved large numbers
of young people including African Caribbean youth.
These UK school year groups may need clarification for international readers. In the
UK Year 6 pupils are aged between ten and eleven years old. Year 6 pupils are in the final year
of Primary School and at the end of Key Stage 2, which starts for children aged between eight
and nine years old. Year 9 pupils are aged between thirteen and fourteen years of age. Year 9 is
the last year of Key Stage 3, which is of three years duration and starts at Year 7. These are key
years for pupils. Year 6 is the year before pupils leave for Year 7 at a secondary school, which
is determined by their progress in Year 6. Year 9 is the year before Key Stage 4 when UK pupils
begin the two-year General Certificate of Education (GCSE) examination courses, upon which
their future job prospects depend. The Qualification and Curriculum Authority (QCA) provide
information online (<http://curriculum.qca.org.uk/> accessed on 22.08.2007).
Identity: Motivation and Self-esteem 141
In the first decade of the twenty-first century violent unrest continued to

occur in parts of England, notably Bradford, Oldham, Leeds and Burnley (2001),
where large communities of South Asian (Indian, Pakistani and Bangladeshi)
heritage people lived. Ted Cantle’s Report following these troubles notes extreme
separation between communities as a major factor in the disturbances. He observes
the ‘physical segregation in our towns and cities and the depths of polarisation to
which this led between communities’, and goes on to state:
Whether in respect of separate educational arrangements, community and

voluntary bodies, employment, places of worship, language, social and cultural
networks, many communities were operating on the basis of a series of parallel
lives. Often, these lives did not seem to touch at any point, let alone overlap
or promote meaningful interchanges. (Report of the Independent Review Team
<http://www.oldham.gov.uk/cantle-review-final-report.pdfpage11> accessed on
12.12.2008) [my emphasis]
To address the culture clash arising when communities emerge from their ‘parallel
lives’, the concept of ‘interculturalism’ was developed in line with the new labour
government agenda on community cohesion. This highlighted the importance
of nurturing a sense of ‘belonging’ to a wider national community and sharing
‘common values’, alongside the need for people to ‘treat each other with courtesy
and respect’, so that communities are not ‘disfigured by racism or other forms of
prejudice’ (Cantle 2002: 14). Interculturalism was heralded as a new idea, distinct
from the older multiculturalism and antiracism. In the context of education Jagdish
Gundara highlights the key issue of interculturalism as the promotion of a sense
of ‘belonging’ and ‘inclusion’ rather than marginalisation, which is seen as crucial
for the future of the wider community as a cohesive whole rather than a number of
isolated social groups (Gundara 2000).
I take Gundara’s remarks on school education to include museums and agree
that museums cannot solve all the problems of the world alone but need to adopt a
‘multi-agency’ approach as Macpherson advised, as well as meaningful museum-
community links, so that chauvinistic and fundamentalist parents do not undo
interculturalist work (Macpherson 1999: 45.18, 45.20). Specifically museums
need to value multilingualism; develop cross-cultural peer-group solidarities to
help replace negative aspects with more constructive value systems; deal with
xenophobic and racist behaviour; organise spaces and develop programmes so
that children with different competencies can learn about each other and levels
of cultural distance can be bridged, for example through clothing style, sport and
music; develop a non-nationalistic curriculum or programme of studies respectful
of diversity, welcoming of questions and criticisms to enable a negotiation of core
values that must be held in common, which will recognise the dynamic hybridised
culture of the UK that has for so long been enriched by outside (Gundara 2000:
65-81).
In this list we can observe considerable overlap between these interculturalist

principles and ‘antiracist multiculturalism’, which the UK museum recognised in
the last decades of the twentieth century. A brief background to the multicultural
and antiracist debates may help readers plot the seemingly shifting terrain.
‘Antiracists’ criticised ‘multiculturalists’ during the late 1970s and 1980s for
taking shallow and tokenistic approaches to diversity, which was exemplified by
a single ‘Diwali Celebration Day’ or isolated events restricted to Black History
Month in October. Antiracists argued against looking at surface details of ‘exotic-
other’ cultures at set times on the margins of the curriculum and urged for extended
and central attention to the historico-political framing and institutional structures
of power within which racism functions. The debate was long and vociferous.
Margaret Thatcher was our right-wing prime minister and her ‘swamping’ speech
of January 1978 a year after Enoch Powers ‘rivers of blood’ speech made attempts
to unite multiculturalism and antiracism urgent.
The fused notion of an ‘antiracist multicultural strategy’ that might potently
reflect ‘the diversity of cultures throughout the curriculum’, so that ‘insistent
questions about justice and equality’ remain ‘in students’ minds’, was one attempt
to heal the divide (Grinter 1985: 8-9). The hope was that ‘sympathetic teaching
of other value systems will weaken the hold of prejudices’ and ‘act as a form of
inoculation against the future development of racist attitudes’ (ibid. 7). Grinter
echoed Stuart Hall’s idea of, ‘a kind of wager or bet that if we understand things
better we might be able to unlock or shift them’ (Hall 1980: 5). This optimistic
view was widely mirrored by teachers working collaboratively with Horniman,
‘understanding of other cultures is a challenge to racism, which feeds on ignorance
and complacency’, is a typical comment taken from a survey (Golding 2000: 157).
Understanding takes time. My ‘Inspiration Africa!’ colleagues distinguished
‘antiracist multiculturalism’ from racist ‘tokenism’ in museum education by:
expanding the duration and content of the curriculum. Most importantly in museum
school INSET locating similarity and difference at the heart of the learning process
was deemed vital. Finding points of contact between the cultural lives of people
and their objects at home and in the museum through dialogical exchange is the
key here. In the museum we can draw attention to the human lives we lead: the
clothes we wear and the foods we eat in different weather; our families and our
friends in this place and around the world; the games we play; the music we listen
to; the way we celebrate important events like birthdays, weddings, and mourn
our dead; how we select our leaders; why we fight our wars; what kind actions are
to be praised; what cruelties should be punished and how. All this is indicative of
thorough and detailed museum/school teaching strategies, to challenge bias and
racism by facilitating ‘human empathy’ and noting human similarities through
differences, which I shall now outline with reference to methodology (Gilroy
1994b: 57).
Ethnographic Research at the Museum/School Frontiers, London
The 12 ‘Inspiration Africa!’ projects resulted from the endeavour over two years
of a small four-person research team, who drew on elements of contemporary
anthropology to inform their method. As practitioners we operated from a self-
reflective and feminist stance, which aimed to understand individual meaning
or sense-making within particular social worlds, and most importantly to stand
in a political position with the peopled field of research (Clifford 1994, 1997;
Clifford and Marcus 1989; Bell et al. 1993). As researchers we were ‘not satisfied
with exposing power relations’ but actively worked ‘to overcome these relations’
through facilitating an expression of deepening thought processes about museum
objects, ‘other’ cultures and ourselves (Mascia-Lees 1989: 33).
Towards this end as team leaders we occupied subject positions that shifted
between speaking and listening, teaching and learning that overturned the
traditional power and voice relationships between museum and audience, teacher
and pupil. The multiple voiced text at the website highlights the possibilities for
a reflective ‘thinking together’ that was achieved during research listening to the
peopled field of research (<http://www.clothofgold.org.uk/inafrica> accessed on
18.08.2008).
Feminist-hermeneutics entered into ‘Inspiration Africa!’ essentially to contest
silences and invisibilities from the position of the pupils, who were multiply
‘disadvantaged’ according to the local government statistics cited earlier, largely
through imaginative means: story telling, creative writing, music and art. Clifford
contends, the methodological technique of writing a ‘poetic collage’ of various
‘key informant’ voices from the field-site, does not require abandoning ‘facts
and accurate accounting for the supposed free play of poetry’, since ‘poetry is
not limited to romantic or modernist subjectivism: it can be historical, precise,
objective’ (Clifford 1986: 25-6).
Clifford’s statement echoes the feminist-hermeneutic concept of new verstehen
or understanding, which is premised on feminist ethics an, ‘ethics of care’ that
prioritises notions of striving to achieve equality between researcher and researched
(Hill-Collins 1991). In contrast with the distanced and hierarchical ‘objectivity’
of much traditional social science, feminist ethics strives for non-hierarchical
collaboration in the construction of a ‘poetic collage’, and as far as possible joint
ownership of the research study (Roberts 1981). This concept is distinct from
the simplistic idea of an anonymous researcher ‘giving voice’ to the researched.
The poetic Year 9 voices in this chapter arise from a theoretical perspective that
demands and facilitates openness from the researcher and the researched. I shall
emphasise this point with reference to a key object of ‘Inspiration Africa!’ project
work, the Haitian Voudou shrine.
Plate 21 Haitian Voudou Shrine, African Worlds at the Horniman Museum, 2004
Feminist-hermeneutic Dialogue Informed by Mindful Emotional Exchange
The Haitian Voudou shrine, which is on display in the African Worlds exhibition
can be seen at Plate 21. Horniman Museum’s voudou shrine houses a wealth of
powerful artifacts, the strongest alcohols, the most pungent perfumes and the
richest most vibrantly coloured objects. There is a fertile synthesis of elements
from traditional West African and Christian religions as well as contemporary
images from popular television and film culture such as Fred Flintstone and Darth
Vader. Extreme levels of economic poverty, 70-80 percent of the population lives
below the absolute poverty level, necessitate a highly creative approach to the
construction of sacred objects for the voudou altars, which are often recycled from
discarded rubbish by Haitian artists (Cope 1999).
This combination of objects hold multiple and complex meanings for visitors
to this anthropology display as two examples will illustrate. There is a large
construction in the centre of the shrine embedded with a collection of broken
dolls that were initially read as aborted foetus by some visiting teachers during
INSET, rather than the symbols of special children intended by the originating
communities. To the right of this art work there is a small wooden cigar box that
once contained the strongest Cuban Havana’s and inside there are photographs of
Reg Jones, my first love and myself, taken in 1971 when we were beginning life
as art students at Goldsmiths College London and escaping our parent’s working
class expectations of secure but dull ‘jobs for life.’ The photos are wrapped in two
sheets of poems written to Reg 12 years later by some children in his art class who
were writing as part of a mechanism to cope with the shock of his sudden death in
a mountaineering accident.
The cigar box stores a personal story of death and connection. It points to a
way of gaining personal relevance from an anthropology collection whose history
and meaning is remote from the lives of most people in the western world of the
twenty-first century and my research partners asked me to share it with the Year
9 children beginning their ‘Inspiration Africa!’ project. I was inspired to share
this part of my history by Renato Rosaldo’s moving account of his feelings –
grief and rage – following his wife Michelle’s accidental death, which powerfully
illuminates the way emotional life can positively permeate intellectual explanations
and cross-cultural understandings. It was through acknowledging the range of his
own terrible grieving emotions that Renato Rosaldo came closer to the Ilonglot
men’s headhunting ways of dealing with grief, through feeling.
Michelle and Renato Rosaldo’s accounts of the headhunters shame and rage
are interesting from the perspective of embodied knowledge. Michelle Rosaldo’s
account of the headhunter’s shame casts light on the notion of seeing as widely
equated with understanding in the West (Rosaldo 2005). In her text we understand
thinking as connected with weighing and knowledge as gained through looking,
smelling and holding. She speaks of the ‘hearts of Ilonglot men ‘burdened with
the ‘weight’ of insult, envy, pain and grief’ being afforded some relief by tossing
a newly severed head to the ground. Rosaldo notes how when on occasion an
Ilongot appears paralysed with the ‘heaviness’ of the ‘smell of blood’, an older
Ilinglot cuts a lock of the afflicted’s hair and calls loudly for ‘lightness’ to affect
relief. She points out that the feelings and emotions, notably shame that are evoked
in describing this weight that enters the body freezing and sickening ‘the heart’
have socio-cultural roots, which are not to be equated with the English metaphor
‘frozen with fear’ but rather associated with the role of the individual men within,
or most usually as bachelors outside of, the social family group.
The importance of this account for me lies in clarifying the ways emotion
impacts on intellect and behaviour in the West just as in Ilonglot culture, where we
see ‘emotion is the fluid, motile part of an individual’s conscious life, identity’ and
has an affect on ‘decision making’ (Rosaldo 2005: 206). I retell the voudou shrine,
the Ilonglot and my narratives of grief here because they illustrate a vital part of
the research team’s theoretical location in feminist-hermeneutics, a determined
breaking down of the either or inherent in dualist thought such as emotion or
intellect, life or death. These stories indicate a rupturing of the hierarchies of
power and control separating the lofty researchers simply gathering stories from
the researched, through the opening up of a new truly respectful dialogical space
between equal partners where both question and both answer. As I opened a
distressing aspect of my personal life and showed a creative way of dealing with
this – finding a place to put my grief – this presented pupils with the possibility
of employing a similar coping mechanism. It certainly seemed to facilitate an
exploration of difficult personal issues through the creative media of poetry, drama
and art at Telegraph Hill.
The Telegraph Hill research team follow Paulo Freire’s pedagogy here, which
aims to promote pupils’ critical thought. Towards this end we do not behave as
teacher subjects simply imparting knowledge or sets of skills to students, who
are treated as objects – empty bank vaults waiting to be filled with deposits of
knowledge. We rather strive to turn the power relations inherent in teaching and
research around and respect our pupils as equal subjects by listening and learning
about their life-world, since it is only from this position of mutuality that research
and teaching might increase understanding, by opening a space of dialogical
exchange that is central to feminist-hermeneutics, as I shall outline (Freire 1996:
30).
Entering Dialogue and Combating Prejudice
Most importantly, feminist-hermeneutic dialogue in the museum describes

a mutually respectful process of interpretation and understanding, in which
each partner in the conversation exhibits openness and kindness, towards the
interlocutor and the self. However it is not a simple matter for people from
disadvantaged backgrounds to enter such dialogical exchange and so there is a
‘pedagogical responsibility’ here to ‘ensure that the other person is with us’ and
gains a ‘productive attitude’, through gentle ‘questioning responsiveness’ to
aspects of lived experience which arise (Gadamer 1981: 264, 330; Gadamer 1980:
46). Such questioning can shatter what appears to be negative ‘fixed criterion’
and make us aware that possibilities are ‘fluid’ (Gadamer 1981: 107, 330). In this
Gadamer’s position is not one of extreme relativism as dialogical work aims to
reach understanding in language that we share in common. He states.
Hence the meaning of a text is not to be compared with an immovably and

obstinately fixed point of view which suggests only one question to the person
who is trying to understand it … We can see that this is the full realisation
of conversation, in which something is expressed that is not only mine or the

author’s, but common. (Gadamer 1981: 350)
However for Gadamer interpretation and understanding in dialogical exchange

can be hampered by ‘prejudices’ that are also known as preconceptions or fore-
knowledge, which comprise part of our lived-experience in a social world and
are inescapably part of the language through which they are expressed. In the
museum the ‘will of our knowledge must be directed towards escaping their
thrall’ in language, which marks ‘a central point’ of convergence where ‘I-Thou’
and world meet (Gadamer 1981: 431, 446). Prejudices are only detrimental to
the hermeneutic task of understanding objects and other people if they remain
‘imperceptible habits of thought’, alternatively they can assist the hermeneutical
process if the interpreter uses ‘one’s own preconceptions so that the meaning of
a text can really be made to speak for us’, which is possible if we are prepared to
truly ‘listen’ (Gadamer 1981: 236, 358). As Gadamer poetically elucidates.
A person who does not accept that he is dominated by prejudices will fail to
experience the “Thou” truly as a “Thou”, i.e. not to overlook his claim and to
listen to what he has to say to us. To this end openness is necessary. … anyone
who listens is fundamentally open. … Belonging together always also means
being able to listen to one another. (Gadamer 1981: 324)
The process whereby ‘foreconceptions are replaced by more suitable ones’ is

clarified with reference to the concept of the ‘hermeneutic circle’, which describes
a structural movement of understanding; a state of perpetual motion between ‘the
whole and the parts and back to the whole’ (Gadamer 1981: 236, 259). With the
Haitian shrine our eyes focus in on Fred Flintstone, move to Darth Vader onto the
cigar box with Viv’s secrets. There is also a switching where our eyes move across
the parts to take in the relationships in the whole display. This is a dynamic ‘circle
of understanding’ and ‘positive possibility … of knowing’ rather than a ‘vicious
circle’, which applied to museum learning promises change and transformation of
limited prejudiced views on voudou (ibid. 235-6).
Prejudices inevitably arise out of the traditions and belief systems into which
we are born and for Gadamer it is ‘the tyranny of hidden prejudices’ which deafens
us to the knowledge and broader understanding of ourselves, in relation to the
traditions of others. Tradition here represents both the present-day ‘horizon’ of
the interpreter in London, and the distant ‘horizon’ from which the object of
interpretation originates in Haiti. The Telegraph Hill interpreters who aim to gain
understanding of the other tradition, connect with its contemporaneity, its meaning
‘for us’, which I emphasised in my story of Reg’s death. Understanding then is a
creative process characterised by putting the beliefs of one’s tradition ‘at risk’, in a
‘fusion of horizons’ with another tradition (ibid. 239). Furthermore the relationship
of fused horizons involves a special recognition ‘which does not leave him who
has it unchanged’ (Gadamer 1981: 89).
Tradition then is not ‘something alien’ but ‘a part of us … a recognition of

ourselves’, who are not fixed but capable of growth through dialogical engagement
and understanding that is continuous (Gadamer 1981: 250). In the broad context
of museum learning the lack of fixity in the face of tradition implies an increased
faculty for self-development, a capacity for resistance and creative departure, as
I shall outline in this chapter with reference to the pupils’ creative writing. Thus
philosophical hermeneutics as a discipline of radical museum education can bring
interpretors to a ‘state of new intellectual freedom’ in the hermeneutic circle of
understanding where ‘horizons fuse’ in an ‘I-Thou’ dialogue (ibid. 231). This is a
borderland, an in-between location.
The place between strangeness and familiarity that a transmitted text has for
us is that intermediate place between being an historically intended separate
object and being part of a tradition. The true home of hermeneutics is in this
intermediate area. (Gadamer 1981: 262-3) [my emphasis]
To clarify the process of feminist-hermeneutic dialogue I have drawn the elements

of a feminist-hermeneutic circle of understanding at Figure 5.1, which describes
the circular process of increasing understanding. In short the circle shows all
understanding is predicated on a notion of respectful dialogue with another: a
speaker, or an object of art. For successful communication and understanding
participants need an open reflexive attitude, to reflect upon prejudices, which
inevitably arise out of particular world-views or personal histories and the wider
traditions from whence these emerge.
The figure shows this process of understanding can never be completed, but
only adjourned when participants decide to halt discussion, for there is always the
possibility of resuming dialogue again on another occasion. It is in this sense that
the present moment of understanding must draw elements of the past histories,
including lived experience [erlebnis in German], and project elements of future
perspectives or horizons into this circular location of understanding.
This viewpoint helps to increase opportunities for creativity, learning and
intercultural understanding in a museum and community context because it
does not elide and erase diversity but facilitates understanding in and through
the complexities of difference. Furthermore Figure 5.1 shows how feminist-
hermeneutics in the museum also requires us to pay careful attention to artifacts
from our contemporary position in dialogical exchange, which ultimately involves
self-reflection, a transformation of our prejudiced opinions in the light of continuing
new knowledge and ultimately a perpetual growth of the self.
Figure 5.1 Feminist-hermeneutic circle of understanding
The feminist-hermeneutic circle of understanding is thus vitally empowering

because it facilitates a re-construction of what counts as knowledge in the
museum and extends this understanding to the wider world, which permits new
identities to be formed and extended possibilities for future lives to be realised.
Feminist-hermeneutic praxis shows the museum frontiers can be locations where
individuals might risk their prejudices or comfortable notions of themselves and
change their traditional group allegiances. For example, the nature of feminist-
hermeneutic work at the frontiers between the museum and the school requires
a more flexible approach, which may necessitate a movement from traditional
groups that are established either by ability levels or by friendship sets. In these
new positions individuals come face-to-face with the taken for granted prejudices
inherent in their cultural traditions, which opens them to a transformation that
is liberating because it constitutes a ‘demolition and shattering of the familiar’
way of perceiving the world and the peoples of the world. The new view widens
individual horizons, by pointing to new aspects of the self in declaring ‘this art
thou’ and also demanding that ‘Thou must alter thy life!’ (Gadamer 1977: 104).
A close examination of first Telegraph Hill pupils’ creative activity and
outcomes during ‘Inspiration Africa!’ will illustrate these points. Then an outline
of the Christchurch pupils’ work will reinforce this position.
Dis-ease and Denial
A poem can condense intense feeling and express complex emotions concisely. As
one poet at Telegraph Hill wrote:
My heart, mind, body and soul are crying out for love and compassion. / … My
life is like a big room with nothing inside of it, just empty. / It’s like a waste of
space. It’s like an empty cup, waiting for the milk to pour. (Year 9 pupil) [my
emphasis]
This poet was able to convey strong feelings of dread, being ‘nothing … empty …
a waste of space’ towards the end of ‘Inspiration Africa!’ The project team leaders
consider feelings of dread and low self-esteem, which were permitted to emerge
gradually in Year 9 creative writing, point to one source of the pupils’ negative
school attitude and the subsequent poor performance that Ofsted highlighted.
The local council were employing drastic measures such as exclusion alongside
a series of cosmetic modifications to tackle the outward manifestations of pupil
difficulties in concentration and learning, such as changing the school name from
Hatchem Woods to Telegraph Hill in September 2001, during project work. In
contradistinction the Inspiration Africa feminist-hermeneutic approach was
premised on mutual questioning, listening and developing positive action.
At the beginning of ‘Inspiration Africa!’ Year 9 had little experience of using
complex language and finding a range of words to express themselves. Their
project keyword spirit conveys abstract ideas that can be difficult to discuss with
the most articulate young people and Olusola Oyelele (Sola) began the first drama
As the underlying economic problems remained and were disregarded, it is not
surprising that the pupil’s unruly behaviour and low achievement largely continued,
with the exception of the ‘Inspiration Africa!’ group although it must be admitted that
the ‘Inspiration Africa!’ pupils did not always behave impeccably and act in a uniformly
appreciative manner towards the team leaders, which resulted in Viv shouting ‘BE QUIET
AND LISTEN’ for the first time in the research team’s presence and Sola loudly exclaiming
‘I AM ASHAMED OF YOU, I SEE ALL THESE BLACK FACES AND MY BLACK
FACE IS ASHAMED’ on one occasion. Yet over the course of the project work Year 9
exhibited extremely high degrees of motivation and produced exceptional work. The school
was closed at the end of the academic year in July 2001.
session on the theme of spirit by reciting one of her poems, LOOK AT ME I’M
SOMEBODY. This sharing of her work, in the open spirit of feminist-hermeneutic
dialogue, rapidly established a respectful bond and strong rapport with the pupils.
Sola’s poem is based around the twice-repeated rhythmic phrase ‘You see me, I’m
somebody, I have S.P.I.R.I.T. You see me. I’m somebody. I have S.P.I.R.I.T.’ The
different elements that constitute a source of pride and selfhood for Sola are then
inserted into the repeated phrase to build her individuality such as, ‘You see my
SMILE. I’m somebody. I have S.P.I.R.I.T.’
After Sola’s dramatic recital the whole class had a brainstorming session around
being somebody. They employed the ‘frame sentence’ technique, which provides a
framework or scaffold for pupils to develop their thoughts and is useful for pupils
who struggle to articulate in verbal language. Using the frames ‘I am somebody
because of … (pupils complete the sentence)’ and then ‘We are somebody because
of …’, they were able to produce this list of the determining factors that composed
their individual and group identity that was linked to the key word spirit.
We are somebody because of: the way we dress and the way we speak; our
attitude towards people and the way we act and react; our different personalities;
our religion and colour; the way we think and the way we believe in ourselves.
The last thing is the way we are built, our spirit. Spirit means alcohol and it
means somebody’s soul.
The pupils found this frame poetry work a source of pleasure because in
Csikszentmihalyi and Hermanson’s terms it provided a rapidly achievable ‘task
that matched’ and extended their existing ‘skills’, which involved some thought and
gathering a group consensus of opinion through feminist-hermeneutic discussion
(Csikszentmihalyi and Hermanson 1995). Sola also employed the form of acrostic
poetry to provide another achievable expressive task for Year 9. Writing a word
lengthways down the page begins the composition of an acrostic poem. The first
letter of the word is then used to inspire the first word of each subsequent line of
poetry. A spirit acrostic poem will illustrate this.
Soul is your inner beauty or darkness

Personality makes you what you are
Intelligence, integrity, that’s what makes you human
Respect yourself, others and mother earth
Identity is a cultural thing it represents who you are
Trust yourself and life, you don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone
Following this introductory work at school, Year 9 made a visit to African

Worlds and a museum talk, which included my personal story about the shrine
holding photographs that helped me deal with issues surrounding death. Pupils
were then encouraged to brainstorm words to express feelings and to play with
rhythm words, using specially designed worksheets asking them to look at the
Haitian shrine and write down how it made them feel without worrying about
spelling, grammar or correct answers. Here the museum/school pedagogy vitally
counters the prevalent notions of value and absolute truth to include new Diaspora
understandings especially the creative play with the rhythm of language at which
African and Creole speakers can excel. Remembering that their keyword was
spirit one worksheet required them to write rhyming words against their feeling
words, which prompted the following pairs: strife/still life, amazing/aging,
soothing/moving, jealous/fellows, potential/essential, relaxation/situation, sad/
mad, complete/beat, crying/buying, fate/plate.
This playful activity was vital to maintain a balance between openly confronting
sensitive issues like personal loss but not stagnating by excessive dwelling on this
absence. It illustrates part of the ‘to and fro’ of feminist-hermeneutic conversation,
much as the worksheets were intended to. For example one worksheet asked
pupils ‘what would you put in the Haitian shrine? Give your reasons why’, which
prompted the following remarks.
A photo album because it would make me remember my family when they are
dead.
Something to represent every culture.
My baby cousin’s ashes.
I would put a picture of my family and friends because without them I wouldn’t
know where I’d be, they are a real inspiration to me and I care about them a
lot.
Family, friends and culture for this group were in London and around the world,
predominantly in Africa and the Caribbean. Diaspora identities, especially a sense
of ‘doubling’ were explored in performance activities that I turn to next (Du Bois
1999; Gilroy 1997).
Telling, Truth, Performance and the Body
At the third stage of the project back at school the class was split into two groups
who swapped activities and team-leaders at lunchtime, so that everyone experienced
a drama session with Sola and ICT work with Jacqui. In the Drama session pupils
were asked to make tableau vivant or still picture sculptures with their bodies
for the words SOUL, SPIRIT and POWER. This silent work with the expressive
powers of the body proved helpful to expanding the notion of articulation. The
body sculptures focused attention on body language and the extreme difficulties
of enunciation when dealing with sensitive issues. Students were alerted to the
suffering inscribed in certain positions that the body takes under duress as well as
the fake bravado postures that they admitted to adopting when feeling fearful of
‘getting shown up, looking stupid or making mistakes’.
Two scenarios were particularly helpful to pupils building an improvisation on
the tableau vivant. In Guardian Angel (GA) pupils worked in pairs or trios with
one student taking the part of the guardian angel to reflect on their lives. Sola gave
a framework for the drama. She stated.
Your guardian angel has come to tell you something about your life. To warn you
about the way you are living your life. What does he/she say to you? What were
you doing when this event happened?
In one pair GA was invisible but warned her subject to think with her mind and
not only with her heart. She identified three areas of life needing improvement:
going out with older boys, experimenting with drugs and staying out late on the
streets ‘looking for men’ or ‘fit boys’. GA asked her ‘to think hard’ and ‘to change
her ways’. The subject asks the guardian angel ‘is this a joke?’ as she watches TV,
but the guardian angel answers her it is not. Another pair took the theme of trying
to work in a rowdy environment. Trying to stay focused when there is disruption
around and how hard it is not to join the crowd. GA encouraged the girl to stick
to her principles, although hard, she would gain ‘benefits later with better life
prospects’. A third male and female student pair, a couple in real life, dealt with
relationships in school and how they can be both enriching but also distracting
regarding schoolwork. Here the female GA talked to the young man who was in
love and unable to concentrate on anything but the girl. All the scenarios provided
a vital focus for bringing the internal thoughts of young people and their perceived
challenges in life to a verbal level and more objective consideration.
This drama session ended with a sit-down name game, re-establishing the
dynamics of the individual students and giving them a dramatic opportunity to ‘cut
some style’, as Sola observed. The name game lightly builds on the intense tableau
vivant to extend the idea of body language as a potent means of communication.
Pupils stand in a circle and everyone makes two loud handclaps and two silent
handclaps in the air to a steady rhythm. In the gap or the silent handclaps the
student must rapidly make a movement with their body to describe an aspect of
themselves. Sola led this circle game calling out instructions ‘in the gap’ to the
student response ‘clap clap’. Sola’s words and actions described how pupils could
fill the short two silent claps of time ‘say your name’ and claim their space in
the museum with their bodies. She emphasised the importance of making simple
precise movements to articulate clearly rather than just wiggling all over and
overstepping the two-clap time limit. Pupils joined in with the team leaders and
revealed parts of their personality with a star jump, a thumb up or a cool shrug of
the shoulder and head.
In the ICT sessions Jacqui and the team leaders moved the pupils’ truth-
telling aural work into writing, where new technology provided a potent means
of sharpening thought and ideas. Jacqui also utilised a previous incident with a
student to consider questions of truth and representation. Showing part of the
website with a blurred out image of a student who had asked to be taken out of
the picture she replaced this female pupils’ image with another male pupil who
volunteered to pose for the shot. This rapid and dramatic transformation from
female to male student on the website demonstrated the possibility of adapting
images or fabricating images and pertinently illustrated Jacqui’s warning, ‘don’t
believe all that you see’.
Technical ICT activities, like handling museum objects, provided essential
playful release and maintained concentration for increasingly deep self-analysis.
Such activity illustrates the diverse opportunities to examine underlying factors,
or ‘thoughts that lie hidden … unsaid’, often a complex mix of tragic life events
resulting in emotional upheaval. Many pupils articulated feelings ‘deep down’, a
‘happy outside’ persona presented to the world, but concealing a ‘hurting inside’,
as the poet noted at the outset of this chapter.
Year 9 pupils’ suppressed anxieties varied. One poet was finally able to inscribe
his feelings of intense love and gratitude to his father who he admires because,
‘when my mum went he was there for me’. His poem acquaints us with a precise
event that shatters the protected world all our children deserve. Another poet admits
extreme loneliness stating ‘I crave for some attention, for someone to notice me.’
Confronting her dis-ease in creative writing and in feminist-hermeneutic dialogue
she comes to realise that her attention-seeking ‘bad-girl’ behaviour is counter-
productive and only serves to isolate her further. A more productive political
attention is highlighted in some poems, as this example exemplifies.
… How to speak, my thoughts are hidden, so much left unsaid. / People say
that colour counts but I think that it shouldn’t. / Because everyone is equal. /
Everyone has a right to an opinion and to defend their case. / Some people get
into their minds that white should stick to white, black to black and all other
colours to their own. / But this is a multicultural society./ Some people say this
is a white persons country. / It may be run by white people, but other people still
have a right to say what they want done. / People still constantly ignoring us /
but they’ll know we are speaking the truth. (Year 9 pupil) [my emphasis]
This poem shows the value of bringing the root causes of pupil ‘failure’ and all
the emotional baggage or feelings of worthlessness that accompanies this label to
the political attention of the group. The young poet articulates an optimistic belief
in multiculturalism and the importance of claiming equality through speaking the
truth.
Next I shall expand upon these ideas with reference to Year 6 pupils at
Christchurch Primary School. In the main I shall examine Christchurch work with
reference to the critical pedagogy of Paulo Freire.
Christchurch School: Pride and the Horniman Ijele Mask
The Christchurch pupils engaged with the Igbo ijele as a key object and the key
word ‘pride’ (see Plate 9, p. 70). I offer the first acrostic poem they composed as a
group here at the outset, which highlights their initial ideas on the theme of pride,
as part of their language work.
Pride comes before a fall

Race doesn’t matter, it’s what you are inside that counts
If you run before you can walk, you might end up falling
Don’t throw stones if you live in a glass house
Everyone’s proud of something
Connections, Disconnections, Inversions and Subversions in Dialogue
At Horniman Christchurch pupils heard about the Igbo people of Nigeria’s rich
tradition of expressive culture, notably the masquerade where the ijele mask, the
largest in all of Africa carried by one person, features in the central performance.
Ijele carries with it the authority of Igbo elders and ancestors who feature
prominently in the lives of the whole community and to celebrate the opening
of African Worlds in 1998 Horniman specially commissioned an ijele from Ichie
Ezennaya of Achalla, Nigeria, which he constructed in brightly coloured appliquéd
fabric and foam around a cane and bamboo frame, and assembled the following
year at the museum.
Christchurch pupils were interested to hear of Ezennaya’s long family history
building the highly complex ijele, often taking a year to complete and involving
contributions from the whole community in marking an important social and
historic event. Thus community-owned ijele fosters a sense of collective ownership
and community ‘pride’, the key word and focus for their project work. This theme
held exciting possibilities for connecting with Igbo culture through cross-curricular
work, for example pupils thought the idea of the ijele dancing to the ‘music of
kings’ played on flutes and drums and taking regal steps in keeping with kings
and elders, might be employed in a musical performance for the whole school,
utilising the ijele they were going to make. There were however disagreements. In
the to and fro of dialogue cognitive dissonance was strongly felt between certain
of the beliefs and practices inherent in the Nigerian ijele and those of Christchurch.
These revolved around what was perceived, as sexism. I shall explain this feeling
that arose from two instances.
The pupils heard how in Igbo land a man carries the ijele mask by balancing it
on his head and shoulders and performs dance movements in an open clearing in
the centre of a town or village. The masquerade, which is likened to an elephant
with its huge size and slow movements, occurs in rounds of only ten or twenty
minutes at a time, since despite the lightweight materials its great size means it is
extremely heavy. After listening with interest to the background information on

the Horniman ijele and the tradition in Nigeria, Christchurch pupils commented:
‘But why is it only a man that carries the ijele? Is that fair? I don’t think so! I do!
Can a girl carry our ijele? No! Yes!’ While we called a halt to this heated, although
important and highly interesting debate, we voiced our pleasure as team-leaders
with the respectful way the comments were considered by the class and promised
that we would all ponder this issue further over the next few days. Freire is helpful
to pedagogy here. He states:
I would recommend … each day be open to the world, be ready to think, … do

not accept what is said just because it is said … reread what is read … investigate,
question and doubt. (Freire 1985: 181)
It was eventually decided, by majority group decision, that in line with Freieian
critical thinking – a girl would indeed perform Christchurch ijele – to break the
‘glass ceiling’, which the pupils had been discussing, at least in this local area
of community life. The second instance where questions of prejudice and justice
arose was during the first storytelling session at school, when a new storyteller-
musician Ayo Thomas came to perform some traditional tales at the school with
some of Horniman’s handling collection. Ayo had been highly recommended by
Sola Oyelele, who we had worked with on many projects, and he had performed
extremely well at interview. However when Ayo travelled to the faith school with
Jacqui it emerged that Ayo, a committed Christian newly arrived from Africa, held
deeply homophobic views, which as team leader Jacqui strongly stressed were not
acceptable to the project.
Ayo began his session at school by talking about the importance of names in
Nigeria. He explained that his own name meant ‘Joy comes to me’ and why he
was called this, without any homophobic references. Then he told the story of
the ‘Tortoise and the Elephant’, which he performed with gusto and enthralled
the pupils, especially when he – the elephant – comically wriggled his bottom at
them to emphasise his pride! Ayo’s story recalled how, one day, tortoise left his
wife at home to save the village from a troublesome, rampaging elephant. His
cunning trick to pander to elephant’s pride and trap him in a pit was successful,
whereupon he was able to marry the king’s beautiful young daughter and inherit
the kingdom. Pupils cried out ‘Hooray! … But … wait … what of tortoise’s first
wife?’ Again sexism reared its ugly head in conflict with the anti-racist aim of
‘Inspiration Africa!
Discussion followed. Stories in Nigeria can be used to teach pupils about life
and each story has many meanings. Year 5 pondered the meaning of the ‘Tortoise
and Elephant’ story: ‘Don’t pay too much attention to strangers’, ‘Even if you are
very small you can achieve great things’ and ‘Pride comes before a fall’, which led
to a general discussion about ‘pride’ and how it can have both negative and positive
aspects. There was much concern for ‘poor Mrs Tortoise, left at home alone’ and so
discussion turned to different endings, new beginnings, to what extent traditional
tales might be creatively re-made in the telling and if this conflicted with the
value of preserving an original – an authentic script. Questions immediately arise
here. Who has the power of voice and should they retain this for all time? If a
situation is unjust – leaving your old wife for a new one – should it be challenged
as detrimental to the oppressed one, even if it was part of the traditional value
system? Can we, in London, object to practices and beliefs in other countries?
Surely some Africans, perhaps most especially older women, might object to
sexist laws? Didn’t many, many people around the world join Nelson Mandela’s
battle to challenge the old Apartheid laws of South Africa? Should good citizens
the world over work together for social justice and human rights?
Freire is helpful in directing pedagogy here and as team-leaders in this
dialogical exchange we adopted a position that was ‘not impartial or objective’,
but ‘rigorously ethical’ (Freire 1998: 22). Educators aiming to promote critical
consciousness cannot be ‘neutral’ since it is ‘part of our human duty to struggle
against discrimination’, which ‘transgresses our essential humanity and is
immoral’ (ibid. 60). However, the dialogical method demands team-leaders ‘listen
connectedly … democratically … with the other as a subject’ (ibid. 107, 110-
111). In the context of museum learning, this requires pupils unpacking taken for
granted ideas and demystifying ideologies, including those of their teachers.
Imaginative Object Biographies and Dramatic Dialogical Pathways to Literacy
With all of the pupils questions resounding in our heads we worked on the idea of
object biographies, as a way of empowering pupils through imaginative re-telling,
re-naming and re-newing culture. The idea behind this interpretive exercise was
to ‘bring out both what is in the object and what is in ourselves’, which as Pearce
notes is ‘a dynamic complex movement’ (Pearce 1994: 27). This notion echoed in
the feminist-hermeneutic concept of the respectful ‘I-Thou’ relationship and led
us to introduce a session where the pupils worked in pairs and engaged in creative
writing exercises to develop stories around particular objects from the handling
collection. Using their imaginations they re-named the object and wrote about its
birth, social life and subsequent journeying to England, from a feeling perspective,
as the object, considering how the object might have been made for example,
did it feel pain, joy, anxiety, exhilaration? In their creative writing these feelings
were connected with wider issues discussed during the project. For example, ‘The
Greedy King’ story featured the topic of human rights and royal responsibilities,
enforced marriage and the power of the well-crafted object to become ‘dull’ or
become ‘completely golden and represent happiness and peace’, which had been
raised by Ayo’s story. The ‘Upside Down Drum’ raised the question of value,
specifically the financial issues underpinning the movement of objects in the global
art market, as well as contested ownership that the ‘museum’ can best be entrusted
to handle, as this extract of the object’s imaginary biography shows.
In Benin City there was a family that was quite poor. … One day a bowl fell out
of the sky and the family used it as a kitchen bowl but it wasn’t very useful so
they put an ornament and shells on it and sold it to another family … their baby
played it as an upside down drum, music filled the air and everyone started to
dance. The king of Benin heard about this splendid drum and was willing to pay
a million pounds for it. But the England king was on tour in Benin and … both
kings were arguing – they were pulling it hard and they let go – they fell back
and it dropped out of the window. It dropped into the stream and … in London, a
fisherman picked it up when getting some shrimps with his net. … the fisherman
went to the king and said ‘For one thousand pounds the magic drum can be
yours.’ So the king paid the money and thought: ‘If I keep it around the king of
Benin City will come and take it, so I shall hand it to the most trusted Museum –
the Horniman Museum.
The creative use of the handling object here permitted the pupils to play with the idea
of knowledge as socially constructed and bound in ideological relationships, which
‘show us a picture of ourselves’ (Pearce 1994: 202). It is important to emphasise
that in this exercise pupils were fully aware they were writing imaginatively, not
employing museum documentation. Sparking imagination was vital to motivate the
development of literacy skills in general throughout the museum/school project.
For example in writing their musical drama, the writer director Sola Oyelele talked
about scripting and the use of adverbs to increase the richness and range of the
pupils’s expressive powers for the school production. To show the difference
dramatically between what people say and feel, body language proved helpful, for
instance: ‘Hello Sola’, Tony said gloomily with a deflated hunched over stance,
‘Hello Tony’ Sola ‘replied happily’ beaming and bouncing about.
Pupils were split into groups and worked with an adult, either their teacher,
classroom assistant, Ayo or two educators from the museum, to write scenes for
the script re-telling the ‘Tortoise and the Elephant’ story, which were typed up and
edited into the final script ready for the rehearsals. The quality of the final piece
reinforces Vygotsky’s notion of the ZPD (zone of proximal development) that
children can be assisted to achieve a higher level of understanding together with a
more experienced adult (Vygotsky 1996). At the ZPD the groups of writers were
able to strongly reference African call and response in the script. For example at
Scene 1, The Temple, Narrator states: ‘Once upon a time’ and the group calls out
‘Time, time’ in Response. Again, towards the end of the play, following on from
the discussion of sexism, the class had elected for a split between boys and girls,
with Sola leading the girls group and Ayo leading the boys group in the dance
procession scene. To reflect a real village life the words and melody of Nigerian
call and response songs and movements – one for the male procession, one for the
female procession and a Coronation call and response song was enacted.
An extract from the end of the play will highlight the high quality of the
drama writing. This section clearly shows the rewriting of a traditional tale from a
humorous feminist perspective.
Table 5.1 The ‘Elephant and the Tortoise’: Script of the final scene of the play
Narrator: The Elephant wriggled proudly towards his throne. As he

began to seat his enormous rear, the floor gave way and he
fell immediately into the pit.
The Elephant falls into the pit.
The Tortoise steps up and takes the hand of the Princess.
King: You may now lift the veil and kiss your new wife.
The Tortoise lifts the veil and shouts in surprise.
Tortoise: What? My wife! How can this be? AH! I’m meant to be
marrying the Princess – NOT YOU!
Tortoise’s Wife: Hah! It serves you right. Yes, I am the Princess and you were
the King’s in-law all along.
Tortoise (flabbergasted): But, but, but …
Tortoise’s Wife: It serves you right.
Tortoise: How?
Tortoise’s Wife: You shouldn’t have got all excited about marrying a Princess
when you were married to a wonderful Princess all along.
You, Tortoise, should have appreciated what you had.
THE END
The ‘Inspiration Africa!’ team-leaders saw that working with the professional
writer/director Sola Oyelele, storyteller/musician Ayo Thomas and artist Tony
Minion raised the quality of the pupils’ own art, creative writing and literacy. The
class teacher considered it was the professional contact and the way all creative
effort was predicated on respectful dialogical exchange and provoking the pupils’
critical thinking, which was motivating; a point that can be clarified with reference
to the ijele art-work.
The Christchurch Ijele
Christchurch pupils worked with Tony to create their own brilliant ijele, which
can be seen at Plate 22. The many motifs adorning Horniman’s ijele including
hands, elephants, police and eagle feathers, all hold symbolic meaning and were of
contemporary interest for the pupils. For example, the python represents a powerful
animal, a reptile that can swallow a human being, while the figure on a horse at
the top of the ijele represents a human with power, a colonial District Officer or
an Igbo king. The notion of power prompted discussion around members of the
pupils’ local community who held power and reflected aspects of their community
life that they were proud of.
Plate 22 Christchurch Ijele, African Worlds at the Horniman Museum, 2004
Source: David Fortser.
Deciding what ‘pride’ images to place on the Christchurch’s ijele, which was
created in three main sections, was difficult. Eventually after discussion it was
decided that the lower section would depict local characters and professions that
were valued – ‘people that make a difference’ as one pupil said. Sola helped the
pupils to think of people doing jobs they were proud of and these included: ‘My
mum, Teachers; Lolly-pop people; Police; Actors; Shop-keepers; Writers; Pilots;
Mechanics; Cooks; Ambulance-workers; Builders; Priests; Nurses; Doctors;
Caretakers; Security Guards; Parents; Firefighters and Lifeguards’. Each child
took responsibility to draw up one of the figures cut it out and screen-print it onto
a fabric panel.
The centre section featured animals from proverbs and followed on from work
carried out with Sola and Ayo around proverbs from Nigeria and the follow-up
encouraging pupils to ask about proverbs from their own culture back at home.
All this work informed the middle section of the mask with shapes standing out as
bright, colourful images that feature animal proverbs such as: brave as a lion and
wise as an owl.
The roof of the mask was made from fabric that the pupils had painted with
patterns and marks that they had sketched from various objects at the African
Worlds exhibition. Since Christchurch is a faith school the fact that Ijele motifs
represent the interconnection and harmony between animal, spiritual and physical
worlds that prevails in Igbo communities was also of primary interest and abstract
representations of spiritual beliefs, intangible feelings of connection, wholeness
and well-being according to the pupils, featured prominently at the apex of the
school ijele. Finally four figures representing children from different cultural
backgrounds – two boys and two girls – were drawn, printed, cut out and stuffed
with wadding to go on the top of the piece. These figures were chosen by the pupils
in the class to reflect the pride that they shared in their differences and were linked
together to show the friendship that they all share.
As a whole ‘Inspiration Africa!’ at Christchurch draws on pupils’ lived
experience, while calling them ‘out of and beyond’ themselves and their community
to make contact with another. Specifically the pupils’ stories, their musical drama
and their ijele demonstrates an ethics that is essentially ‘relational to the world and
others’ (Freire 1998: 25). I shall examine this idea in a little more detail before
drawing some conclusions
Christchurch and Telegraph Hill: Partial Connection in Metaphor and Story
This language and story work reinforces Alfred Gell’s note on being ‘partially
connected’, pointing to the possibility of communication and understanding
across cultures, through an appreciation of objects (Gell 2006: 230). Seeing in
He stresses the importance of context and acknowledges ‘partially connected’ as

Marylin Strathern’s (1991) term.
the Igbo ijele a metaphor of personal and social ‘pride’, which while rooted in
the world and building on elements of daily life was motivating and acted as an
inspiration to excel. Similarly seeing in the voudou shrine a metaphor of ‘spirit’
was empowering for Telegraph Hill pupils, permitting them to soar above the
trappings of the everyday to wider realms where they might fulfil their potential.
The ijele and voudou shrine as Gell asserts of the art object, acted as, ‘thought
traps’, holding the viewer for a time in suspension, to give them pause for thought
by halting them in their hurried passage through daily life. In this chapter I have
attempted to confirm Gell and focused on showing that looking closely at art,
listening, speaking and thinking about it deeply through making art and engaging
in creative writing can induce pupils to take ownership, of their own stories and
their own lives.
Margaret Meek emphasises the universal importance of storytelling that she
regards as ‘part of our common humanity’ since ‘as far as we know all cultures
have forms of narratives’. She further notes the value of stories and narratives
that form part of human conversations, enabling us to better express our ‘hopes,
fears, actions, feelings and motives’, which is so vital for the pupils (Meek 1991:
102). Bruno Bettleheim reinforces this point when he speaks of traditional stories
providing a safe route to imaginatively work with deep feelings, fears and anxieties
of loss and abandonment, which we saw in the Telegraph Hill poems (Bettleheim
1991: 117).
There seems to be a sense of safety in the imaginative story space that
collaborative team leadership can build on by establishing an open framework
for dialogue and sharing stories. Furthermore encouraging pupils to actively
focus and contribute ideas helped to render ‘otherwise shapeless, chaotic events
into a coherent whole, saturated with meaning’, which proved pleasurable and
motivating (Rosen, H. in Rosen, B. 1988: 164).
Conclusion: Multisensory Motivation with Artifacts
The tactile exploration of objects appeared to offer an especially rich set of

opportunities for learning through the senses, which are not limited to an
individual’s skills with the written word, although as team-leaders we directed
considerable attention to developing these language skills, which was the focus
of this chapter. Artifacts, especially handling objects, which included textiles
and costume, sculpture, musical instruments, masks and toys during ‘Inspiration
Africa!’ seemed to loosen the imaginative faculties of the participants by providing
a unique sensory threshold that the ‘whole body … whole brain’ can engage
with (Falk and Dierking 2000: 10). Handling allowed all pupils, including less
assured ones, to participate and make a contribution to the learning environment,
which provided increased access to the arts and humanities curriculum and was
an especially important tool to increase the confidence of children who were
considered ‘failing’ or ‘weak’ academically. This provision of direct experiential
learning was vital for all students, especially those who prefer a kinaesthetic
approach to knowledge and struggle with the more traditional routes of reading,
writing and mathematics that are prioritised in the National Curriculum.
The handling element of the project work was not regarded as a simple end in
itself, but was essentially connected to individual interests and concerns. Handling
artifacts while engaging in feminist-hermeneutic dialogue about them and their
relationship to the lived experiences of the pupils was crucial. In feminist-
hermeneutic terms handling was viewed as one part of a whole journey towards
a greater understanding of the unique self and its potential, which constitutes the
rich frontier experience. Figure 5.2 describes this part/whole concept as it relates
to creativity and learning through handling during issues-based work.
Artifact
Handling
Relation to Past
Time/Space
Part Part
Creative ICT
Writing Relation to
Relation to Present-day
Present-day Growth Interests
Interests of Self
Future
Artifact
Listening & Artifact
Speaking Looking
Relation to Past Relation to Past
Part Time/Space
Time/Space Art
Relation to
Present-day
Interests
Figure 5.2 Part/whole concept describing the

‘Inspiration Africa!’ curriculum
Figure 5.2 highlights the importance of the tactile provision, which offered an
immediate ‘hands on’ encounter that the team leaders ensured was also a vitally
‘minds on’ discursive involvement to facilitate learning and growth (Hein 1993:
31). The figure shows how the pupils’ minds were engaged by the questioning
approach of feminist-hermeneutics governing the project work, which made clear
at the outset that there was no single right answer to be found, as in maths lessons,
but rather a whole complex range of new individual interpretations that should be
examined in detail, in relation to the past time and space that the artifact sprang
from and the contemporary world of the visit.
In other words, ‘Inspiration Africa!’ participants were expected to look for
connections between individual interpretations, beliefs and opinions in the social
circumstances from whence they arose. This approach demanded a weighing of
evidence from different cultural contexts as well as an evaluation of what counts
as evidence or fact in different cultures. In this way the project work was intended
to promote intercultural respect and understanding. The questioning approach
also enabled the project teams to present a powerful challenge to stereotypical or
racist views, which media coverage of poor, starving Africans in war torn lands
continues to promote.
These ideas will be developed in Chapter 6. In particular I shall further explore
the sensory routes to meaning, including touch, which is key to progressing the
disabled pupils’ learning that I consider in the next chapter.
Chapter 6
Towards a New Museum Pedagogy:
Learning, Teaching and Impact
Introduction
I have drawn extensively on Black feminist thought to theoretically ground more

inclusive learning practice at the museum frontiers. The educator bell hooks speaks
of such work as ‘liberatory pedagogy’. She notes:
… as a black woman, I have always been acutely aware of the presence of my

body in those settings that, in fact, invite us to invest so deeply in a mind/body
split … you’ve got … to remember yourself … see yourself as a body in a system
that has not become accustomed to your presence or to your physicality. … one
of the unspoken discomforts surrounding [how] a discourse of race and gender,
class and sexual practice has disrupted the academy is precisely the challenge
to the mind/body split. Once we start talking in the classroom [museum] about
the body and about how we live in our bodies, we’re automatically challenging
the way power has orchestrated itself in that particular institutionalized space. …
Liberatory pedagogy really demands that … one work with the limits of the body.
… Both with and through and against those limits … move out beyond the desk …
walking towards the students, standing close to them, maybe even touching them
… Acknowledging that we are bodies … disrupt[s] the notion of the professor as
omnipotent, all-knowing mind. (hooks 1994a: 135-138) [my emphasis]
Chapter 6 further examines the possibilities of teaching and learning within a

framework of critical or liberatory pedagogy, which was outlined with reference
to feminist-hermeneutic praxis and Paulo Freire in Chapter 5. Here I want to mine
the roots of my theoretically grounded work, which I hope may point to other
ways of developing new museum pedagogy. In other words I am not trying to sell
a ready made product – feminist-hermeneutics – for universal museum education,
but rather aiming to inspire critical thought in readers of this book, which might
lead to a myriad of new pathways to learning mutual respect and intercultural
understanding at the museum frontiers.
Colleagues around the world have recently been considering the body and in
Chapter 6 I draw on bell hooks’s notion that addressing the ‘mind/body split’ is
crucially important for Black people – professors and students, museum curators
and visitors alike. Additionally, I contend this problem of Western thought needs
to be considered not just for Black people, but to develop new, more inclusive
museum pedagogy for all. Towards this end, some temporal and geographical
perspectives of the mind/body problem, specifically more holistic cross-cultural
views of knowledge construction as these apply to the context of the museum, will
briefly be explored first (Classen 1993).
Then learning as importantly an active ‘power to’ in the Foucauldian sense
will be examined. In short Foucault’s ‘power/knowledge’ couplet is employed
to expose the ‘cracks and gaps’ in the museum discourse for ways in which
individuals might insert new knowledge(s), which I shall argue can be profitably
based on multisensory ways of knowing (Foucault 1980). In this initial mapping
of the power/knowledge terrain, I shall interrogate the museum as a site where
more than one sense might be employed together with mind, to produce embodied
knowledge. Following this critique of the hierarchically classified five senses and
the overriding visualism of the traditional western museum I shall begin to outline
new relationships between embodiment, experience and perception across culture
and time, arguing for a more multisensual museum learning experience that is
vitally embodied and promotes an enhanced apprehension of unusual objects in a
space beyond pure spectacle.
Next the culturally naïve view of learning in the western museum is considered
from a cross-cultural perspective; specifically the complexities of an African,
Anlo-Ewe perspective is addressed, to enhance learning possibilities about
material culture from Ghana. These Anlo-Ewe concepts are related to collaborative
work that I carried out during a particular ‘Inspiration Africa!’ project with a
‘difficult’ audience, children aged between five and eleven years old, with special
educational needs attending New Woodlands School, London, who were engaged
with an Ashante stool as their key object and ‘respect’ as their key word (<http://
clothofgold.org.uk/inafrica>; <http://www.newwoodlands.lewisham.sch.uk/> accessed
on 12.12.2008).
Here I demonstrate how the experience of the body in space can be enhanced
through touch, which can affect the relationship between proprioception and the
construction of meaning. For example, balancing the body on an Ashante stool
exaggerates an awareness of the body in relation to the ground, which presents
new challenges and makes new demands on a body more used to upright chairs
or sofas. Furthermore voicing these feelings in the social space heightens a sense
of conviviality and aids meaningful communication among pupils, since aural and
tactile encounters seem to open the participants to deeper emotional engagement.
The museum audience considered in this chapter had Educational Behavioural
Difficulties (EBD) and some socio-historical context to these specific learning
needs is provided. The particular audience, who as Cole notes might historically
have been regarded as ‘feeble minded’, comprise largely Black boys, and the
‘Inspiration Africa!’ team leaders were acutely aware of a setting that invests
deeply in a mind/body split and finds them ‘lacking’ mind (Cole 1989; Cole et al.
1998). In contrast I show how intensive work with this group opens feeling routes
to knowledge construction – listening, imagining, creating art, making music –
Towards a New Museum Pedagogy: Learning, Teaching and Impact 167
inspires pupils’ sense of wonder, joy and the desire to repeat the successful
embodied engagements that are initiated by African objects.
Overall the chapter demonstrates the value of considering knowledge from a
global perspective as essentially embodied and makes an argument for embodied
learning, in the widest sense, as a broadening of the museum-school space and a
global curriculum. Promoting embodied knowledge will be shown to represent
a state of wellbeing and wholeness, which, as I shall argue, characterises human
knowing, understanding, and meaning-making in the museum and in the wider
world.
Viewpoints and Worlds of Sense
At the risk of oversimplification it may be helpful here at the outset to outline the
roots of the mind/body split in western thought, which we can trace to the Ancient
Greek philosophers, who demonstrated that our senses are not to be trusted. Vision
offers a prime example of sense deceiving rational mind. A great artist such as
Parrhasius produced such a lifelike image of a curtain that he was able to fool even
the trained artistic eye of Zeuxis – whose painting of grapes deceived only the
birds (Gombrich 1968: 119, 173, 346). For Plato it is reasoning through questions
in dialogical exchange – the to and fro of living spoken language – that human
beings can access Truth. It might be argued that the 2,000 year history of western
philosophy since the Greeks has increasingly esteemed mind and reason with a
consequent devaluing of the body and the senses, resulting in the linear reductive
reasoning behind Descartes’s famous statement ‘cogito ego sum’ in the seventeenth
century, emphasising reason coupled with an extreme mistrust of the senses.
The rise of visualism has been said to characterise the birth of the age of
Enlightenment in the eighteenth century and in the nineteenth century museum,
when the ‘visualising scientific paradigm’ prohibited museum visitors to touch, eat
or even speak loudly, and imperialist power and domination was reinforced with
every visitors’ gaze. (Edwards, Gosden and Philips 2006: 208). In the late twentieth
and early twenty-first centuries we have witnessed a reaction in the museum to the
hypervisualism of contemporary culture, with adult exhibitions such as Touch Me
and Shhh at the V&A, encouraging haptic interaction and sound long recognised
as vital in children’s museums around the world and at the Horniman Museum
(Pearce 1998; <http://www.vam.ac.uk> accessed on 24.03.2008).
Furthermore, it is worth noting here that while we have traditionally counted
just five senses in the west, they have been ordered and combined differently
Today, since linguistic philosophy and the philosophy of mind recognise Descartes’
ultra-sceptical statement ‘I think therefore I am’ presumes an, ‘I’ that thinks and fails to
reach the logically limiting statement ‘there is thinking’, we might assume the poverty
of this position is exposed, or do we detect some aspect of this doubt still lingering in a
pessimistic hermeneutics of suspicion.
through the ages. As Classen observes to hear is based on a root meaning to look,
to see on a root meaning to see and say, taste originally meant touch, while the
meaning of the Latin terms sapient and sagacious are derived from sapere to know
and sagacis keen-scented (Classen 1993: 56). What remains constant is that we
apprehend the world through the body, the senses. Additionally our relationship
with the tangible world of objects, including museum objects, is intimately bound
up with and affected by intangible factors, by emotion and memory, as we noted
in the last chapter (Wulff 2005).
Working with ‘Inspiration Africa!’ participants visiting the African Worlds
exhibition at Horniman we wanted to highlight the unique ways of valuing,
combining and ordering the senses that different African cultures have, which is
embodied in their material culture. Our aim was to introduce visitors to different
‘worlds of sense’, contending that the senses need to be re-valued cross-culturally
to enhance museum learning (Classen 1993; Classen and Howes 2006; Stoller
1989). We considered a richer embodied learning environment might prove
particularly profitable for the EBD pupils at New Woodlands, facilitating them
with new ‘power to’ access knowledge(s).
Embodied Knowledge and a New ‘Power to’
To begin explaining how the key concept of embodied knowledge might nurture
a new ‘power to’ at the museum frontiers I shall present a view of the mind and
the bodily senses acting in a socio-political world. In short, embodied knowledge
is viewed as a necessary mixture, of intellectual activity inevitably arising out of
bodily experiences in a relational world of objects and others (Braidotti 1994a,
1994b; Lennon and Whitford 1994).
The importance of this idea to the museum lies in developing pedagogy, which
understands learning to be predicated on the properties and limitations of the
body, or as proceeding in sensual and intellectual ways. To achieve embodied
knowledge at the museum frontiers a certain sort of activity is essential and the
Foucauldian discourse proves pertinent here. Foucault centrally distinguishes
active and passive bodies in his histories of the prison and asylum (Foucault 1991,
1995). He notes how the ‘capacities and forces’ of the body are severely curtailed
in the classical age when techniques of power over the body make totally ‘docile
bodies’ (Foucault 1991: 137-8). We are reminded of the private museum spaces
where knowledge is actively produced and framed in the glass cases of the public
galleries, and passively consumed by docile visitors under constant surveillance.
Yet Christopher Falzon’s recent reading of Foucault on the disciplinary society
highlights the power of active human beings who have the capacity to transform
their world, to revolt and ‘transgress existing limits’, which is useful to museum
pedagogy (Falzon 1998: 52). He notes how relationships of power are not passively
reproduced from generation to generation but, surface within particular historical
communities and can be subjected to change. Falzon also notes how changes
in particular relationships of power can occur by opening up concrete spaces of
embodied freedom, of corporeal capacities and forces where a human power to
act can be facilitated. This power to activity is essentially creative and involves
experimental processes of play with different possibilities, it is not an elitist thesis
of the artist genius or super-hero but one which emphasises the ‘creativity present
in all active humans’ (ibid. 55).
Facilitating this new power to activity demands an imaginative reconstruction
of museum knowledge and priorities. It demands a change in focus: from the
static display of museum knowledge about the material objects in the glass cases
of our public galleries; to a continual cycle of creative investigations into how
new embodied knowledge(s) might be constructed with the museum audience. To
clarify these ideas I shall consider specific human capacities and corporeal forces,
or the role of individual senses in the construction of knowledge.
Power to See
Ludmilla Jordonova has examined the assumption that looking at objects can offer
knowledge, not merely about the object itself but also about the wider processes
in which it is embedded. As she further observes ‘objects are triggers of chains of
ideas and images that go far beyond their initial starting-point’ (Jordanova 1993:
23). Jordonova’s notion begins to offer a corrective to the eye that masters, and
sight that predominates over the other ‘lower’ senses of touch, hearing, smell and
taste. This is not to dismiss vision. But to regard it as a vital component of a
mixed discourse, a poetry and politics, which constitutes learning and enables
museum visitors to construct their own knowledge(s). The important point for
museum education is to distinguish an active power to see from a passive looking
or ‘mindless gawping’ (Vergo 1993: 58) [my emphasis]. A new power to see is
mindful, it requires students at the museum frontiers to take account not simply of
the visible features of objects displayed in a linear way, but of the socio-historical
world, the more complex narratives and the broader philosophical context, the
discourses or ‘articulatory practices’ from which the objects emerge (Hooper-
Greenhill 1990: 60).
A history of vision can be illuminated from a Foucauldian perspective, within
a socio-historical framework of shifting ‘epistemes’. In short Foucault notes
Renaissance notions ‘intersect, overlap, reinforce, or limit one another on the
surface of thought’, recognising similarities in neighbouring things in the world,
which seem to be joined like links in a chain for Renaissance thinkers (Foucault
1994: 17, 19). This view shifts during the Classical age when observation is linked
to knowledge that guarantees Truth but excludes ‘hearsay, taste, smell and touch’
The term episteme refers to the socio-cultural construction of knowledge in different

historical eras.
(ibid. 132). Such scientific understanding persists until the nineteenth century when
the corporeality vision and a more abstract optical experience are conceived.
Foucault regards the nineteenth century optical experience, which is
characterised by a new regard for human temporality and finitude, as a movement
towards modern thought, where we come to appreciate the anatomical,
physiological, historical, social and economic conditions of knowledge that is
formed in the ‘relations woven between’ people (Foucault 1994: 319). In other
words, vision emerges as an, irreducible complex of factors that belong both to
the observing body and the information received from the exterior socio-political
world (Crary 1995: 70-71).
Contemporary feminist thought on vision elaborates the relevance of Foucault’s
analysis to contemporary museum education, by arguing for a new postmodern
and post-colonial movement of knowledge construction to take account of the
difference and similarity between knowers. Specifically ‘Nomadic’ travel beyond
the Modern episteme and a lingering Classical concern for prioritising the visible
enables a more fluid reconstruction of knowledge at the museum borderlands
(Braidotti 1994a).
A Feminist Analysis of Vision Applied to the Museum
Rosi Braidotti counteracts the ancient dualism of mind and body, with the concept of
thought as essentially embodied active experience (Braidotti 1994b). Her nomadic
movement acknowledges ‘the corporeal roots of subjectivity’ while denouncing
the equation of the visible with truth as a male fantasy (ibid. 18). She elucidates
this fantasy that renders woman’s bodies intelligible by the technology of camera
and microscope, pointing to contemporary pornography and anatomical studies
in medicine as areas where men reign powerfully in domination over women’s
bodies that are treated as fragments, almost dismembered parts of a whole object.
For Braidotti it is through an intense focus on the visible under patriarchy that a
hierarchy of power is maintained, with the active subject behind the lens observing
and controlling the passive woman as mere flesh.
Perhaps the security cameras in our museums can similarly be viewed as
instruments for rendering the male and female visitor a passive object, of the distant
but dominant gaze (Hooper-Greenhill 1989: 63). Such rendering passive can be
read as a ‘feminisation’ in psychoanalytic terms since women under patriarchy are
subordinated. This notion reaches a climax in Foucault’s account of male prisoners
in Bentham’s panoptican, where men are feminised by the state of extreme passivity
and observation to which they are subjected. Braidotti sees psychoanalysis as
providing a positive revaluation of subordinate positioning and she cites Freudian
psychoanalysis as adequately addressing this problematic of knowledge and the
body within a political space for women. She states ‘psychoanalysis has developed
into a philosophy of desire and a theory of the body as libidinal surface, a site of
multiple coding, of inscription – a living text’ (Braidotti 1994b: 18).
The contribution of psychoanalysis for Braidotti lies in a re-theorisation of
the body to admit the bodily roots of all knowledge claims. Her psychoanalytical
focus usefully suggests a space and a technique to assert alternative knowledge,
truth and representation on an affective and corporeal ground, which is denied
in strict logical terms. In the museum Braidotti’s analysis reinforces more
attentive ‘listening’ and truly cooperative action with audiences to construct
‘three-dimensional, philosophical links between the objects’, or in other words to
facilitate a new power to see.
The thought of Donna Haraway also clarifies museum educators facilitating a
new power to see in the museum. Haraway has explored the ‘cyborg’ as a ‘political
myth’ that points to imaginative possibilities or ‘potent fusions’ (Haraway 1991a:
149, 154). Her postmodernist reading of cyborg technology permits vision to
be reemployed for the feminist discourse. Additionally envisaging new cyborg
relationships between mind and body offers creative ways for subjugated people
to explore and gain greater visibility in the museum, which furthers the political
work of increasing equality.
Haraway also offers an important redefinition of objectivity for feminist
epistemology in her idea of ‘situated’ knowledges. This notion repossesses ethics
and politics by acknowledging ‘irreducible differences’ and a ‘radical multiplicity
of local knowledges’ (Haraway 1991b: 187). The ethical and political achievement
of ‘situated knowledge’ lies in making the museum community involved in the
presentation and perception of this knowledge responsible, accountable or
‘answerable for what we learn how to see’ (Haraway 1991b: 190). For museum
learning a new power to see would regard knowledge as a process of ‘passionate
construction’, radically opposing the ‘cannibal eye’, of single-point perspective
(Haraway 1991b: 191, 189). In contradistinction, partial perspectives would permit
the constant unfolding of multiple and complex viewpoints by pupils and teachers,
who would be presented with limitless possibilities to learn from museum objects
without reaching a climactic or final end point.
We have begun to consider personal and political knowledge informed
by feminism in the museum context. Next we will explore the relationship of
knowledge with the sense of touch, which will help to illuminate these ideas.
Embodied Knowledge as a New ‘Power to’ Touch
Luce Irigaray has contributed to the theory of embodied knowledge as essentially

including feeling and emotion. Irigaray speaks of ‘the passional foundations of
In this sense Haraway echoes the Hill-Collins’s ‘standpoint’ theory as well as Falk
and Dierking and Hein’s constructivism, which prioritises the visitor’s personal viewpoint
or construction of knowledge.
reason’ (Whitford 1991: 10). The ‘double gesture’ in Irigaray refuses the binary
oppositions of western logic and insists on the linkage of ‘both at once’, which
prefers a ‘creative fertile partnership’ and rejects the elevation of either male
or female readings. Irigaray also emphasises the importance of acknowledging
differences within woman as well as between women, and locates relationships
between the ‘global’ and the ‘specific’ by drawing connections between theoretical
positions (ibid. 24-25). Most importantly Irigaray emphasises the power of the
sense of ‘touch’ in opposition to the power of the gaze. She argues for the concave
surface of the speculum to counter the flat reductive model of the human psyche
seen in Lacan’s image of the mirror that is his ‘other’, woman. Women, she states,
need a surface that will reflect and validate them as autonomous subjects ‘for-
themselves and not just in their exteriority, for others’ (ibid. 142) [my emphasis].
I have employed Irigaray’s work alongside museum objects with groups of
adult women to reflect on this ‘exteriority’. The beautiful image taken from the
body of woman, which Irigaray offered to us in ‘the sex which is not one’, has
been the source of some creative response in feminist discourse at Horniman
(Irigaray 1981). In this seminal text Irigaray speaks of a womans’ vulva as one set
of her ‘two lips’, and perhaps it is the poetic structuring of her semiotic here that
seems to assist a high degree of clarity, for the feminist semiotic to be envisioned
and felt, which feeling objects further progresses. For example cowry shells are
traditionally seen as mirroring woman’s distinctive anatomy, her vulva, and I have
employed headwear and musical instruments that have cowries as decoration as
well as the units of cowries historically used as currency in parts of West Africa,
to reflect on the body of woman with groups of adult feminists and inspire creative
writing. In creative writing workshops Irigaray’s thought was seen to proceed in a
sensually theoretical way, and feminist speculation imaginatively achieved at the
margins of discourse, which thereby evades the dominant phallogocentric world-
view. There are repetitions, circling and refusing any closure of meaning in her
work, which opens up a semantic space for ‘active’ readers to discern a plurality
of meanings. Her writing also constitutes a ‘healing text’ since it marks out such
a range of alternative possibilities without the violent forcing of the psyche into a
position where it must choose ‘one’ (ibid. 172). I quote her here:
A woman “touches herself” constantly without anyone being able to forbid her
to do so, for her sex is composed of two lips which embrace continually. … The
one of form, the individual sex, proper name, literal meaning – supersedes by
spreading apart and dividing, this touching of at least two [lips] which keeps
woman in contact with herself, although it would be impossible to distinguish
exactly what ‘parts’ are touching each other. (Irigaray 1981: 100-101) [my
emphasis]
Irigaray, highlighting the sensual and intellectual link with the sexual, points to the
sense of touch as extended over the whole surface of the body. If Irigaray’s ideas
are translated to the world of the museum; to be touched by a museum object is
to be moved psychically and physically. The experience of active touching in the

museum does not leave the museum visitor ‘unchanged’ to recall an aspect of the
Gadamerian discourse. Using the ‘handling collection’ is an important part of a
successful museum visit during which students are facilitated to construct their
own knowledge, as teacher’ testimonies demonstrate (Golding 2000). Teachers
highlight the importance of this direct physical contact with the materiality
of museum objects to expand pupils’ horizons; their views of others and the
possibilities for their future lives.
School pupils visit the Horniman Museum to ‘look and learn ‘from ‘other’
cultures, but my research team of teachers argue that knowledge cannot easily be
constructed by looking in isolation from other human senses (Bennett 1996: 98).
Perhaps an important lesson to be ‘learnt’ from the focus on ‘looking’ in many
western museums is one of ‘civics’ to ‘respect property and behave gently’, since
the British school system is rooted in a western politico-philosophical tradition a
museum-visit seems to provide us with as much ‘knowledge’ about this tradition
as the one displayed (Bennett 1999; 1996: 49, 102). We contend that wider lessons
of ‘respect’ and ‘care’ for ‘other’ cultures can be learnt from touching or handling
sessions, which the New Woodlands ‘Inspiration Africa!’ project I shall outline
presently will furnish evidence for.
In western cultural forms touch has long been considered an important vehicle
for proving and transforming reality: Pygmalion animates his statue through
touch; Carravagio’s Doubting Thomas sticks his finger in the wounds of Christ;
Michelangelo’s God creates Adam with the gentlest brush of a finger. Today, only a
tiny hierarchy of museum professionals can share these powerful sense impressions
with the original makers and users of museum artefacts. The sensual pleasure
of touch and its role in the construction of knowledge by museum curators, is a
factor rarely acknowledged in the exhibition texts for visual public consumption,
although Mr Frederick John Horniman permitted visitors to touch and keep pieces
of cartonage from one of his Ancient Egyptian mummies following a public lecture
(Horniman Museum Report 1898).
Today the admonition ‘Don’t Touch’ in our public spaces denotes a rigid
segregation, which removes this important category of affective responses from
ordinary visitors, who are expected to rely almost entirely on the visual. The
touch and care afforded to the object by the makers is reduced in the framing of
the glass case, but democratically restored in an educational handling session at
the Horniman Museum, alongside the ‘power to’ speak and listen, which we will
examine next.
Power to Listen and Speak in the Museum
Audre Lorde developed a notion of genuine communication, which is predicated

on the possibility of really ‘listening’, that is central to the notion of ‘dialogue’
in philosophical hermeneutics (Lorde 1996; Gadamer 1981). Listening for Lorde
does not entail passivity but is rather an active opening up of one’s ‘subjectivity’
to another so that further questioning of each subject can occur. Listening also
imposes the responsibility of increasing self-awareness and ultimately self-
knowledge. In a reference to Paulo Freire, Lorde notes how it essentially requires
recognition of an outer world, where the real conditions of lived experiences can
be investigated as that internalised ‘piece of the oppressor planted deep inside
each of us’ (Lorde 1996c: 170).
Thus Lorde’s ‘listener’ makes a movement towards ‘realism’ in her vital
connection of personal ‘knowledge’ and ethical responsibility to the external
world. She is not condemned to a passive wallowing in mysterious internal
processes but moved to take action against the horrors of ‘racism and homophobia’
for example. This manner of listening for Lorde points to ways in which ‘the
personal as the political can begin to illuminate all our choices’ (Lorde 1996b:
161). Listening to Lorde and Freire as an education worker in the museum, a
professional responsibility is highlighted; to listen closely to the ‘piece of the
oppressor’ lodged deep in the museum discourse, a discourse of extreme realism
and rationality which silences unreason. Perhaps a short outline of Freudian and
Foucauldian thought will begin to clarify this idea.
Listening to the languages of reason and unreason is central to Freudian
psychoanalysis, as Foucault and Derrida both emphasise. Foucault notes in
Madness and Civilisation, that Freud began ‘once again to listen to this language
[of unreason]’ (Foucault 1995: 262). The language of madness was condemned
to silence during the enlightenment, where it occupied a position of banishment
outside of discourse. Foucault in his ‘archaeology of that silence’ discusses earlier
times when unreason was at least able to occupy a place in the margins of discourse
(ibid. 1995: xiii).
For example in the middle ages the insane were not totally suppressed but ‘kept
at a sacred distance’, in the way that lepers were living with a certain freedom within
the lazar house just outside of town (Foucault 1995: 6). Neither was exclusion
from the wider community considered detrimental to their ultimate achievement
of ‘salvation’, a form of ‘divine knowledge’ according to the thought of the time.
Foucault rapidly moves his discussion to consider the ‘Ship of Fools,’ during the
‘imaginary landscape of the Renaissance’ where it seemed to ‘occupy a privileged
place’. The ships also had an existence in real or historical time when madmen,
‘led an easy wandering existence’ (ibid. 1995: 7-8). ‘Listening’ would appear to
grant a corporeal ‘power’ of some movement for the insane at this time.
It is not until the Enlightenment that ‘rational’ thought becomes totalising
and suppressed difference and otherness. In the absolute rule of reason thoughts
were ordered in a perfect symmetry of ‘either or’, and ‘madness was torn from
that imaginary freedom’ which previously allowed it to flourish and flounder in
‘broad daylight’ (Foucault 1995: 64). In short, the dichotomous thinking that post-
modernism argues against, reduces madness solely to its inscription on the body,
to a visible ‘spectacle’. Foucault tells us:
As late as 1815, if a report presented to the House of Commons is to be believed,

the hospital of Bethlehem [the present day Imperial War Museum in London,
UK] exhibited lunatics for a penny, every Sunday. … the madmen at Bicentre
were shown “like curious animals, to the first simpleton willing to pay a coin” …
One went to see a keeper display the madmen the way the trainer at the Fair of
Saint-Germain put the monkeys through their tricks. (Foucault 1995: 68)
This passage has resonance for the museum whose business revolves around
display. In Foucault’s historical analysis the insane becomes the absolute ‘other’,
and their consequent distancing from sane humanity to a closer proximity with
animals is redolent of a historical, racist organisation of museum knowledge. The
idea of relegating as ‘other’ or to a category of sub-humanity: mad; poor; disabled
and Black people for example, was reinforced by a morality which equated such
‘others’ with ‘beasts’ in the discourses of the asylum and the museum (Foucault
1995: 63; Bennett 1996; Coombes 1993) Movement between categories, from
insane beast to rational being and from savage slave to saved Christian was later
deemed to be possible, but only by the imposition of a new totalising order of
rationality which overtook the old. This was not achieved by ‘active listening.’ The
meanings of insanity were unheard as were the traditional African belief systems
of the displaced slaves whose material culture continues to be housed in western
museums of anthropology. It will be profitable to consider the contribution of
contemporary anthropology next.
Anthropology and the ‘Sensual Revolution’
In the Empire of the Senses, David Howes has gathered together an astonishing
collection of interdisciplinary essays on the ‘sensual revolution’, which elucidate
human thought and ways of knowing that centre on the body (Howes 2005).
Howes and his contributors examine a vast range of sensory experiences across
diverse cultures, geographies and times that contrast strongly with the hierarchy
of the five senses in the West. Constance Classen for example, describes the high
valuation attached to the sense of smell amongst the Ongee. She states.
In a little Andaman Island in the Bay of Bengal live the Ongee, a hunting and
gathering people who have little contact with the outside world. For the Ongee
smell is the fundamental cosmic principle. Odor is the source of personal identity
and the reason for communal life, a system of medicine and communication, it
determines temporal and spatial movements, it produces life and causes death.
(Classen 2005: 153)
Classen’s richly detailed account of embodiment is intimately connected to

location, emplacement, which emphasises the social nature of knowledge
construction. In other words the different spaces in which people live and gain
embodied knowledge are social spaces where individuals communicate through

performance or utterance in social groups. I offer one more illustration from
Howes of this point.
Kathryn Linn Guerts demonstrates the culture-bound Western perspective with
reference to the Anlo-Ewe group of people, who originate from the land around the
Volta coast and the Keta Lagoon, although they also live in other parts of Ghana,
Europe and the USA today. In ‘Consciousness as ‘Feeling in the Body’’ Guerts
contrasts the privileging of individual sight and the use of cinematic metaphors
in the West, with the Anlo-Ewe theory of consciousness, which is intersubjective,
phenomenological and processual in character. Specifically one Anlo-Ewe concept,
Seselelame, which translates as a generalised ‘feeling in the body’, links emotion,
sensation, perception, cognition etcetera without distinction, including internal
senses (i.e. balance, proprioception) and external senses as well as other perceptual,
emotional and intuitive dimensions of experience (Ameka 2002 quoted in Guerts
2005: 165). Seselelame describes ‘hearing or feeling emotions’ such as happiness
and sorrow, physical sensations such as heat and cold, and the embodied presence
with others in cultural settings (Csordas 1993: 139 quoted in Guerts 2005).
It may help to clarify this point if we consider the cross-cultural significance
of the clothed body in a social ritual in the context of a museum handling session
with textiles, which the New Woodlands pupils I discuss presently experienced.
For example, the diversity of attire we observe mourners wear at funerals around
the world: black in the west, white in China and Adinkra cloth (a bright orange/
red background with black stamped designs that have auspicious meanings) in
traditional Ashante society Ghana, might imply different emotions are attached
to the experience of death. Yet a closer examination reveals similarities. In the
west, while black is worn to express sadness and loss of the mourner, we may
understand the feelings attached to white in China if we think of the iconography
surrounding the lily, a symbol of purity, as well as the associations of vibrancy, life
and death with red in Africa. The point here is that we can teach pupils to read the
African adinkra symbols as any sign system, it is a matter of learning the codes.
Individual and social balance/equilibruim and adaptability is emphasised in
the Anlo-Ewe account of consciousness. The idea of supple, balanced and flexible
persons in a physical, emotional and moral sense is seen in the image of the baby
in the womb as sitting, poised and balanced on a stool. As the New Woodlands
boys saw stools seem to invite the body to balance in a certain way, to centre
the body physically on the earth, at one with the forces of gravity, which is quite
different from the western chair with a backrest that almost seems to encourage
fidgeting. In other words, the sense of balance I am considering here connects the
individual physical body and the individual character, with concern for the balance
or harmony of the wider social group.
New Woodlands pupils who experienced difficulties in society found complex
notions such as these could be more easily accessed through objects, for wrapping
themselves in the range of kente, adinkra and other printed cloths, balancing on the
stools and headrest while, most importantly verbalising their feelings about these
experiences. The Anlo-Ewe regard speech as a sense and emphasise similarities

and relationships in the experiences of eating, speaking, drinking, breathing,
kissing and so on. They consider spoken words to convey information and meaning
through the physical force of sound that operates not just in the ear but through
whole body. Therefore speaking is viewed as ‘feeling in the mouth’ and speakers
must take care as children can absorb animosity through the power of adult words.
There is a richness in the Anlo-Ewe philosophy of the senses, which are rooted in
shared feelings and shared ways of life that challenges the culturally naïve Western
view of ‘one body, one self’ that echoes ‘one person one vote’.
These points will be illuminated with reference to New Woodlands pupil’s
reflexive work on their key word ‘respect’ presently. First since this final case study
in the book concerns children, deemed to have Educational Behavioural Difficulties
(EBD) at the time (2000) I shall first offer a little background information.
Educational Behavioural Difficulties (EBD) History and Definitions
In the first year of the new millennium, educators in the UK saw the term
Educational Behavioural Difficulties (EBD) widen with the revision of the special
educational needs (SEN) Code of Practice, to include the term ‘social’, and to place
an emphasis on ‘development’ as opposed to difficulties. Social development is
one of four areas of ‘needs and requirements’ laid out in the 2001 Code, alongside
three others, which are ‘communication and interaction’, ‘cognition and learning’
and ‘sensory and/or physical’ (DfES 2001: 87, para 7.60). However, at the time
of writing in 2006, this extended definition is not in universal use and EBD often
remains as a descriptor. Since our precise use of language and taking power for
naming the world has proved critical throughout this book, it will be valuable for
future museum collaboration to define terminology in a socio-political context
before proceeding.
Children have presented challenging behaviour to the educational setting since
Victorian times, when a ‘medical model’ was in operation. The medical model
firmly locates ‘problems’ requiring medical-leaning ‘treatment’ at an individual
level ‘within-child.’ This model is evident in the imprecise term ‘maladjustment’,
which was a ‘catch-all for children showing a wide range of behavioural and
learning difficulties’, and legally enshrined in the category of ‘maladjusted
children’ with the 1945 Regulations following the Education Act 1944 (Cole
1989; Cole et al. 1998). In the UK the individual or medical model, with its false
notion of ‘normality’ and its deterministic emphasis on biology, was prevalent
throughout the spectrum of education for special needs until the 1960s, when
the ‘social’ model entered the literature, via the pioneering theoretical work of
disabled people, most notably Oliver and Barnes (Oliver 1996; Barnes et al. 2002).
This social model highlights the wider social context in which terminology reflects
prejudices within the minds of non-disabled people, influencing human interaction
and professional practice, too often with the effect of disabling individuals. The
newer social model is more appropriate for progressing inclusive learning agendas
in the museum/school context since it recognises many difficulties or barriers to
learning individuals face may, in part at least, be reactions to social barriers and
environmental factors.
The UK struggle over appropriate definition reverberates in the USA, where
a similar social perspective seems to be predominant in contemporary disability
discourse, although theorists tend to speak of ‘disorders’ rather than ‘difficulties.’
In Kaufman’s seminal work he states. ‘An emotional or behavioural disorder is
not a thing that exists outside a social context but a label assigned according to
cultural rules’. Kaufman further highlights the subjective nature, ‘at least in part’,
of defining terms when he notes that ‘typically’ a ‘disorder is whatever a culture’s
chosen authority figures designate as intolerable’, because it ‘is perceived to
threaten the stability, security, or values of that society’ (Kauffman, 2001: 22-23).
This point was underlined for me following work on INSET at Horniman with
the Ghanaian musician/storyteller Amoafi Kwappong during the 1990s. Her input
into the ‘Multicultural Musical Traditions’ INSET courses helped to sensitise all
the participants, myself included, to culturally diverse behaviour in one role-play.
She recalled a teaching assistant to a class of 25 children aged between seven and
eight year-olds, angrily shouting at a small boy who had misbehaved, ‘look at
me by when I’m talking to you!’ while the lad’s gaze seemed to bore ever lower
down into the ground. In Ghana children who recognise they have behaved badly
with an elder demonstrate their apology with their body, casting their eyes down
in a sign of respect to the elder person. If this situation occurred in the museum,
educators could draw attention away from the child and defuse the situation. They
might beat a drum at great speed, moving towards the teaching assistant and child
smiling broadly. Then, briefly explain the polite practice concerning adult-child eye
contact in Ghana. Finally the whole group might begin to discuss and to construct:
angry sounds, happy sounds and sad sounds as well as the silent expressions of
anger, happiness and sadness, which we can actively make with our bodies.
The best way of tackling problematic pupil attitudes is to adopt a more
positive presentation of appropriate behaviour, a non-threatening and ultimately
more instructive manner (Mayor’s conference 2002). What needs to be drawn out
here is the importance of creating ‘an atmosphere’, in which our ‘own position’
as museum/school educators is allowed to ‘emerge without people feeling over-
At Horniman we organised INSET sessions for teachers in service almost every
week. The themes would be related to the collections, allow the teachers to be creative and
may result in a qualification. For example, teachers following a ten week ‘multicultural
musical traditions’ course could be awarded a certificate from the Trinity College of Music
on completion. INSET would be held during the ‘twilight’ time 4.30-6.30pm so that teachers
could attend after they had completed their days work and the school did not need to find
money for agency teachers to cover their work. A nominal £5 fee was charged, to pay for
the services of a professional musician, writer, storyteller or artist.
weighted by its authority’ (Hall 1980: 3-4). Hall does not ask us to deny our
opinions, or prejudices to use Gadamer’s terminology, but he does highlight the
importance of open and reflexive dialogue that enables vital connections with the
wider socio-political world to be made. This as he says, ‘becomes a great deal more
complex because it requires putting together explanations from different areas of
knowledge’, and it is here that a great strength of museum/school collaboration
lies (Hall 1980: 4).
Although just one example has been sketched here my experience indicates
that a range of educational partnerships can be forged in the museum, which most
importantly increases the number of ‘significant others’ that research suggests is
vital to effective learning, or ‘joined up’ practice for pupils with EBD (Ofsted
1999; Cole et al. 1998). Ethos is critical. Educators who take joint responsibility
for providing a ‘flexible’ teaching and learning space, a ‘safe and supportive
environment’, who listen to and clearly value all the pupils’ contributions engender
appropriate role models for ‘positive interaction’ amongst pupils and behaviour
that is conducive to learning (DfES 2001: 87). In short we strongly advocate a
collaborative approach to teaching at the museum/school frontiers. Collaboration
can assist us in helping EBD pupils to break out of negative cycles of pessimistic
thinking in which they may be locked. This requires us developing our teaching
skills, maintaining high expectations of our pupils, and providing a variety of
activities, which build upon the individual capabilities rather than highlighting
weaknesses (Ofsted 1999a; Cole et al. 1998). In other words, project team leaders
at the museum/school frontiers should work in ‘effective partnership’ to facilitate
activities disabled pupils might ‘do with support’, rather than focus on ‘what they
can’t do’ (Valuing People 2004: 14).
A number of large claims and rather abstract points have now been made,
which I shall attempt to justify with reference to 2 case studies. I shall detail work
with New Woodlands School (labelled EBD at the time of collaboration and now
simply SEN), London. At this school, the museum team leaders who included Sola
Oyelele (writer/storyteller), Tony Minion (artist), Jacqui Callis (ICT specialist),
and myself (museum educator), worked alongside the class teachers to develop
educational programmes, which recognised that while disabled pupils may take
longer to learn new skills and grasp complex information, as much ‘choice and
independence’ over their project work as possible should be enabled (Valuing
People 2004: 14).
New Woodlands School: Year 6 Boys Learning Respect with an Ashante Stool
I shall introduce this section with an acrostic poem on ‘respect’, which was the key
word for the Ashante stool project:
Running about
Exhausting my body
Started my life over again
Perfection that’s what I am
Excellent that’s me!
Courteous – very respectful
To my elders I’m very respectful
This poem expresses a power of the body, a possibility of changing lives for
the better through transforming negative attitudes, a belief that excellence can
be attained and the importance of respect. The poem was written by a group of
boys attending New Woodlands School during six weeks of museum/school
collaboration. It represents a huge achievement.
New Woodlands School is a primary age school (for pupils of four to eleven
years old), catering for fifty-two boys with special educational needs (SEN),
including those with ‘behavioural, emotional and social difficulties’ (<http://www.
lewisham.gov.uk> accessed on 21.04.2006). The attractive single-story school
building is newly built (1998) and nestles in secluded grounds surrounded with
mature trees that gives almost a countryside feeling; a small haven located within
a densely built up area of old and rundown council housing stock, in Downham,
the London borough of Lewisham.
The multiple levels of economic deprivation noted at the introduction to Section
3, which clearly impact on the learning opportunities of children in the borough,
are compounded at New Woodlands by the special educational needs of the pupils.
The teaching staff strove to provide the children with full access to the National
Curriculum for England at Key Stage 1 and 2, and welcomed the opportunity to
work in partnership with the ‘Inspiration Africa!’ team. After three initial meetings
and some intensive discussion over the telephone, at the school and at the museum,
the specific needs of the pupils emerged and we selected an ‘Ashante Stool’ from
Ghana as the key object and ‘respect’ as the key word to focus project work. The
respect theme was designed to aid the pupils who experienced difficulties learning
in the core curriculum areas of English and Maths, which was frustrating and led
to further difficulties in terms of behaviour, to approach the curriculum in new
and more creative ways through a range of holistic multi-sensory experiences, as I
shall detail. Specifically the New Woodlands project will help to demonstrate the
thesis of gaining embodied knowledge and cross-cultural understanding, which I
have been exploring, in action.
Introducing the Respect Project at School
Due to the small size and unique nature of the school it was appropriate to involve
all the pupils in some part of the introductory project day at school. This ensured
that everyone, pupils and staff, got to know the team of artists and educators and
understood what they were going to be doing in their school over the next few
weeks. The introduction day started with an outline of the project, some warm
up games and a handling session for the two Year 6 classes, totalling thirteen
boys. While New Woodlands pupils clearly enjoyed playing some of the musical
instruments, listening to a tape of African drumming and trying on some of the
African garments from the Horniman Museum’s handling collection, it may be
helpful to examine their learning here at the outset of the project. I shall argue that
handling assisted these very disadvantaged pupils to begin to engage in aesthetic
education – in the mystery of perception.
When we engage pupil’s imaginations in the particular West African patterns
by asking them to ‘describe this shape’ and ‘imagine, what does it remind you of’,
we are employing Wittgenstein’s concept of ‘seeing as’. In this idea Wittgenstein
refers to the way a certain combination of lines on a paper can denote a duck at
‘this’ moment and a rabbit at ‘that’ (Wittgenstein 1974: 194). The related concept
of ‘hearing as’ is also highly relevant to the context of the museum frontiers, if we
consider the idea as essentially referring to the cultural context within which aural
perception holds meaning and value. In terms of Western classical music, ‘hearing
a melody’ from Mozart, in all its complicated nuances rather than a dissonant
series of sounds, requires extensive work, both teaching and learning. Similarly, in
my experience, with time and effort some appreciation of world music – ‘hearing
as’ musical relationships from ‘Other’ cultural traditions – can be achieved.
In the New Woodlands case, practising a simple dance, a drumming rhythm and
a call and response song uses the voice and the whole body, which helps provide
a more fully embodied deep learning experience that is both more pleasurable
and more memorable than a simpler observation exercise. Of course it should be
emphasised that mimicry alone is of no value in furthering understanding. It is the
special context of the teaching and learning situation, which permits ‘hearing as’
enduring knowledge and understanding of the particular Ghanaian musical forms
and this new embodied knowledge of another cultural form can only be provided
by active human beings open to learning at the site of the museum frontiers. I shall
now turn to briefly consider the theme of music.
Musical Engagement
On day one of musical engagement at New Woodlands School pupils played an

active song-game about caring grandmas from Ghana. The first verse states:
Grandma, grandma, sick in bed. She called for the doctor, the doctor said
“Grandma, grandma, you ain’t sick, all you need is a walking stick.”
Chorus: Hands up, shake, shake, shakedy shake. Hands down, shake, shake,
shakedy shake. To the back, to the front, to the si-si-side.
The pupils found it quite easy to repeat each line after Sola and I and clearly
enjoyed using their bodies for ‘shakedy shaking’, although sensory engagement
was enhanced when they held small shakers to mark out the space ‘to the back,
to the front and to the sides’ around them in space. Singing also helped the pupils
with timing when to take a breadth, since the rhythm of song and speech as
Classen notes, is dependent on the rhythm of breathing, the breadth of life itself
(Classen 1993: 107). Paying attention to the breath and shaking the body while
singing was seen to connect the inside of the body with the external world in
an amusing manner. Furthermore singing the grandma song, which was active
embodied fun for all the pupils permitted those who were linguistically less able
to reinforce literacy work on upper and lower case letters in the alphabet, as they
were motivated to note ‘G’ and ‘g’ are for grandma at the beginning, middle and
end of sentences respectively.
Following the song activity pupils had a quiet period of resting their bodies
while listening to tapes of African music. This aimed to impart a sense of
intention, of musical form as distinct from simple sound and to introduce the
musical instruments from the handling collection. At the outset of this relaxation
hearing gentle tracts of music played on the thumb piano or mbira, the xylophone,
the antelope horn, bells and a range of drums also appeared to provide a sense
of emotional freedom, which seemed to visibly relax the pupils further. Whether
this freedom occurred by virtue of music’s transitory existence in time and space,
or is due to the power of the musical sounds to enter the body and deeply move
or ‘touch’ emotionally but without the physical human contact that many pupils
found difficult is unclear, but the emotional affect was strongly seen in the body.
It seemed the pupils could not be ‘unaffected’ by the power of musical sound to
penetrate and promote positive emotion (Stoller 1989: 109).
Perhaps there is a certain sense in which the pupils experienced a ‘sensual
wraparound of sound’, as well as smell, touch and the visual delight in the colourful
African textiles here, which helped to promote bodily feelings of ‘togetherness’
and ease in the social space that may be similar to the forest dwelling Kaluli
people of New Guinea’s ways of knowing that Steven Feld describes (Feld 2005:
184). What was clearly a major contributing factor to the pupil’s increased calm
and embodied receptivity according to the teachers was the power of the objects
and Sola’s professional direction, her pace and timing. Sola helped to promote
embodied knowledge by working sensually with and through the body – engaging
the embodied mind and emotions – and bringing special objects to life through
her musical skill and her sensitivity, which heightened the emotional appreciation
and communicative skills of the pupils. Sola dressed in traditional costume and
dramatically employed her own powerful live voice alongside the instruments
in the musical activities she developed for the pupils. This seemed to provide a
new key to unlocking positive emotions and a compelling sensory route to the
communication of ideas, moods and feelings, of self and of others in the school
group, as well as those represented in the musical forms.
These communicative aspects of music are of special significance for its

connection with bodily sensory interest. Just as timing is key to music so pace and
rhythm are vital to progress museum/school learning, and after the morning break
the boys were introduced to screen-printing. By lunchtime they constructed one
half of the introductory day banner on the theme of chairs and seats to mirror the
key object, the Ashante stool. They created a variety of shapes including benches,
stools and upright chairs, seats from the dentist, the barbers and an impressive
looking electric chair! At the end of the day the pupils posed for a photo with the
completed ‘Chair Banner.’
Working on Respect at the Museum
New Woodlands School visited the Horniman Museum on day two of their project.
Seated around their selected key object in the African Worlds exhibition, the day
started with a review of their introduction day, which had taken place at the start of
that week. It is important to reinforce learning for all pupils and especially so for
this group of pupils with special educational needs. Holding up their ‘Chair Banner’
in front of their selected key object the Ashante stool permitted connection with
prior knowledge and provoked exclamations of pride in their creative abilities.
This positive feeling was attached to the subsequent days work.
While New Woodland boys worked with the key object ‘Ashante Stool
Museum number: 34.136’, which is intricately carved from wood by an, ‘unknown’
maker, they were also able to observe a large range of material culture, as well
as historical and contemporary video material on display in Horniman’s African
Worlds exhibition. As team-leaders we were able to work with the richness of
the exhibition, which helped prevent any tendency to ‘fix’ African peoples and
their knowledge, in a timeless past behind the glass cases. We also all adopted
a feminist-hermeneutic or respectful dialogical approach with the boys, which
permitted us to draw connections between people and processes, past and present
times, the distant and local practices that sustain human lives and culture within
specific socio-political contexts.
Additionally, while walking around to observe, talk about and draw the beautiful
aesthetic displays of museum objects certainly inspired awe and wonder, use of
the handling objects permitted greater understanding for this group. Handling
objects, including a specially carved Ashante stool and two plainer stools made
for Ghanaians with less finances helped the boys to see how in addition to royalty,
individual stools were specially commissioned to relate to personality and spiritual
states as well as social position – for use by many different types of people –
people like us. This is a crucial point, educators must be alert to the complexity of
difference and similarity within and between cultures to counter the racism that
paints the ‘other’ as an undifferentiated mass.
To illustrate this point, in conversation the Ashante handling stool as a symbol
of power, authority and respect in Africa could be pertinently compared with the
Royal Throne representing power in the UK. The boys could really experience
these feelings of power and respect in their bodies, since sitting on a stool without
a conventional chair-back demands good balance as we saw in the examination of
Anlo-Ewe thought. Sitting in a certain posture, gracefully, appropriately dressed
in kente cloths, and respectfully attended by classmates, the boys seemed to be
transformed into kings. The pupils took turns to sit on the handling stool and then
Sola facilitated the expression of their feelings in poetic form using the writing
frames ‘This chair is for …’, ‘When I sit on this chair’ I feel … and ‘I must have
…’. Some of the pupil responses include:
This chair is for (a king/ sitting/ a royal person/ a rich person)

When I sit on this chair I feel (respect/ happy/ important/ special/ comfortable)
I must have (respect/ a crown/ drinks/ authority/ protection/ food/ happiness)
Following this activity the boys were asked to find and draw one of the key objects
they had looked at on the Internet with Jacqui previously. Their favourite objects
included the Egyptian Coffin and Mummy, the Midnight Robber’s Headdress and
symbols from the Voudou Shrine. In addition to seeing the actual objects, ‘the
real thing’, the boys welcomed the opportunity to form new relationships with
volunteer guides during this tour. The male guides were popular. According to
the teachers this was probably because a number of the boys felt the lack of male
figures in their home lives, and consequently the names Ben and David featured
alongside the artefacts in subsequent recollection of the museum visit, including
some of the poetic expression. Making a new relationship with a male figure in the
museum and reflecting ‘together with’ with this new figure permitted ‘scaffolding’
of knowledge in the ZPD that we noted in Chapter 5. In partnership with a more
experienced adult the pupils were asked to find two different shapes or patterns, to
draw them and to write about what they might represent. There were symbols of
strength, the sun and God. With adult help, one young boy was able to compose
an elegy, to express a sense of loss for a beloved member of his family beneath his
symbols. He commented:
A grandfather passes on
To another relation in his family
I will always love you.
The pupils also had an opportunity to work with their adult guides on writing
down some feelings about the stools in the exhibition. Some stools have intricate
carvings of leopards and elephants, which are understood to represent the greatness
and fierce nature of a King and prompted the following remarks:
The leopard is kind.

He doesn’t bite.
The leopard thinks it is a King
This stool looks like a face.

This stool helps me think of home.
I feel happy about my stool.
Next Sola told the boys the myth of the ‘first stool’, covered in gold, reputedly sent
from heaven to the first Ashante King and passed from generation to generation,
which was believed to contain the soul of the Ashante nation. Even the king
never sat on this sacred stool. It was so precious that on state occasions it was
placed on another chair during the ceremonies and protected from the sun by a
large umbrella, called a kyrinie. Following this story the boys were better able to
appreciate how differing stool designs show levels of social power and authority,
such as the addition of silver and gold to denote royal use, the carvings of leopards
and elephants to represent the greatness and fierce nature of a King, as well as the
various support shapes, which distinguished male or female use in past times. This
led to some disgruntled expressions that our special handling stool had none of
these distinguishing gold or silver features, and the familiar questions about the
price of this object arose.
To the question ‘how much does it cost’ I could honestly answer ‘it’s priceless
to us in the museum.’ In this instance not because of the materials, it is not golden,
but because it was a gift from a dear friend who has since died. Knowing the
owners of the handling stools provided useful human prompts to ground the pupils’
talk. My Ghanian friend who died wanted the pupils who visited Horniman to use
his stool and we remembered him warmly with each new use. Clearly I could not
replace this stool with any amount of money, as I could the Pokeman that the boys
were agitatedly collecting at the time. Then we contrasted the museum handling
collection with the boy’s own collecting practice and the idea that certain objects
are connected with prestige at different times and in different places emerged.
Next Sola was inspired to narrate two short stories – a myth of origin and
the historical story of Ya the great queen ruler of Ghana, which connected talk
with women as power figures in our lives today, mothers, grandmothers and aunts
(important primary carers for a number of the pupils), teachers and head teacher at
New Woodlands, as well as a return to the theme of respect, offering equal respect
for all: men and women, elders and youth, Black and white people.
Stories permitted discussion of the key concept, respect, and in the to and fro
of conversation some critical thinking on the associated notions of power and
authority in contemporary and historical societies emerged. In Ghanaian society
today the Ashante King maintains prestige as an important symbolic figure, escorted
by chiefs during ceremonies. Historically the king’s own stool was a symbol of
his power, his authority and commanded respect, but this was provisional. Royal
authority, inherent in the stool, was dependent on maintaining the respect of the
people during the ruler’s lifetime. The stool of a respected ruler could be placed in a
shrine after death and subject to acts of commemoration and remembrance. On the
other hand the people could withdraw the stool from a king who lost their respect.
This point prompted us to the related ideas of losing or gaining privileges at school
through good behaviour and how many individual extra points the museum visit
might lead to, since a trip to eat burgers at MacDonalds was the much desired
reward at the end of each month.
Additionally the storytelling process provided an opportunity for the pupils to
calm down and to rest, which was essential for a number of this group who suffered
from Attention Deficit Syndrome (ADS). A moment of stillness importantly
‘balances’ the child in Anlo-Ewe terms, which permits focused thought and is not
an antithesis to the active subjectivity that characterises learning at the museum
frontiers.
Creative Work Back at School
During the four days of subsequent project work at school each of the two Year 6
classes screen-printed two ceremonial deck-chairs and a large ceremonial umbrella
representing those used in some West African state ceremonies, which can be seen
at Plate 23. The seats were specially made to denote respect for their teachers and
for their use in the playground area.
In addition to the artwork the project started each day with a brainstorming
session, looking for keywords around respect, power and authority and referring
back to the frame poems the pupils had written with Sola and during their Horniman
Museum visit. First of all the boys wrote acrostic poems using their names and
indicating their special interests. Two examples from Luke and Anton are typical
in revealing the ‘inner mind’ lying ‘underneath tough skin’.
Likes Maths and English

Underneath his tough skin he’s lovely
Keeps playing football
Even when I am sleepy I still play football
Anton likes flowers on a summer’s day, flowers in his mind

Now he thinks he’s going wild
To and fro he sniffs the rose
Only on his birthday
Now he must go home
The boys worked very hard on their writing and considered what power and
respect might mean to individuals and how respect is gained. Brainstorming for
ideas and words prompted ‘respect’ and ‘power’ acrostic group poems. I offer just
one example:
Respect makes people feel nice and loved. Respectful people listen and pay attention
Education is fun. I like Maths and making my own choices
Silly people do not gain respect. Sensible people do not butt in on a conversation
Power to the people!! Affection to the people!! Kindness to the people!!
Energy gives you life and adds strength to your body – body power
Calm voices, command and control, showing our brain education, showing our
leadership to the world
Taking turns, giving everyone the ability to move, we don’t make anyone feel
worse because it is disrespectful.
They also composed individual lines of poetry using the frames ‘respect/power is
…’ and ‘respect/power is not …’. Here are some of their ideas:
Power is what makes you strong

Respect is what you give and do
Respect is sharing
Power gives you ENERGY
Respect is when you help people
Respect is not making someone feel worse about something. Feelings.
Respect makes people feel NICE AND LOVED
Power means leadership, body power and BRAIN power
You get respect by being nice.
Based on their initial responses two phrases were discussed further and completed
individually. One pupil wrote:
I command respect by:

being good
helping someone
being kind
saying please and thank you
my inner feelings
I demand respect because:
I helped you
I listened to you
I did as you wished
I helped you when you were sick
I took you out
I made you food
Plate 23 New Woodlands Respect Stool and Kyrinie

Source: David Forster.
Conclusion
In this chapter I have drawn on diverse theories to argue that thought expresses
itself in and through the body, the sensory body, in embodied action, and further
that our very sense of identity is not based on disembodied thought, but rather the
feeling we have of our body and the way it connects us to the social world and
to our relationships with others in this world. Thus the concept of embodiment is
understood in terms of emplacement, since the different spaces in which people
live are essentially social spaces, where communication can be achieved through
performance or utterance.
This point was highlighted by the Anlo-Ewe example, which also demonstrated
the way in which the symbolic is connected to the material in society and how
it is not possible to separate or to fuse these spheres. In the museum the New
Woodlands case study leant on the Anlo-Ewe experience of being embodied
as mediated through cultural representations, focusing on the stool. The New
Woodlands work pointed to the importance of the expanded museum/school space,
not only to benefit cross-cultural understanding and knowledge construction, but
also to empower the economically disadvantaged boys with EBD through a new
sense of being embodied.
Next in my concluding chapter I shall offer some concise reflection on what
has been achieved in Learning at the Museum Frontiers. I shall highlight the key
relationships between the three sections and suggest areas for future research in
my concluding remarks.
Conclusion:
Pedagogy in Museums
Voicing Human Rights and Making Meaning through Storytelling
Let me open this concluding section with a story that draws together some critical
threads of Learning at the Museum Frontiers. I outline one story, taken from a
museum programme that was designed to hold appeal for an adult audience by
successfully drawing together a range of ideas and collections, which later served
as inspiration for creative writing exercises with a range of new audiences.
Imagine! Sister Goose swimming at dead of night in a huge pond shimmering

under the moonlight, observed by Bra (Brer/Brother) Fox from the waters edge.
As Sister Goose swims closer Brother Fox can no longer contain his appetite for
her and communicates his intention to ‘eat you up bones an’ all for me dinner.’
Sister Goose protests her freedom and contests his right to eat her. She invokes
the law that she understands is a means of protecting her right to swim in her own
environment, free from fear of being eaten by anyone passing by, and asserts her
right to take her case against him to the Court.
Admirably reasonable, Bra Fox agrees to follow her project in the Court, after
which he intends to accomplish his own project of eating her up. Sister Goose
is permitted entry to the court by the officials, who are all foxes. Ushers, court
scribes, jury, lawyers and judge, indeed the entire apparatus of the system is
composed of foxes. The court verdict is given in favour of Bra Fox, who after
waiting for Sister Goose to see the legal process in action, promptly eats her up
for his dinner! (Adapted from Anim-Addo 2007: 88)
This tale clearly highlights human rights and the nature of trust, which is vital to
collaborative praxis. At Horniman I have seen it provoke much dialogue on justice
within an adult ‘Tales from Around the World’ programme. Indeed storytelling
has been found to be a key interpretive strategy for adults visiting museums and
generally a way of making meaning or sense of lives, all over the globe (Roberts
1997; Falk and Dierking 2000). As Lois Silverman states:
Visitors “make meaning” through a constant process of remembering and

connecting. … visitors’ needs affect the memories and connections that become
salient during a visit. Humans share a basic need to express the meanings we
make by telling them, often in the form of stories, to ourselves and to others. The
museum setting lends itself well to this storytelling, not only by curators and
educators, but by visitors as well. (Silverman 1995: 162) [my emphasis]
Here Silverman contends that storytelling provides a means of making and sharing
meanings in the museum, which satisfies a basic human ‘need’, to communicate
or ‘express’ personal meaning making. In this book I have I examined the ways in
which museums, notably Horniman in UK, the Museum of World Culture in Sweden
and District Six Museum in South Africa, have given support to this meaning
making process through facilitating the representation of personal and community
stories, herstories for CWWA. I aimed to show that working in partnership
through such storytelling projects provides a powerful way of museums to engage
in a dynamic dialogue with new audiences, which can enable collections and the
ideas we attach to them to gain in relevance for diverse local and global audiences
beyond the story-givers. This is a strong claim, which detailed examples attempted
to justify throughout. At this point I should like to examine some questions that
have emerged.
It is becoming a commonplace statement in the museum profession that ‘objects
can tell many stories’ and that these stories are only limited by our imaginations.
Yet perhaps an important question that arises here concerns truth and interpretation.
Are all objects open to interpretation by any visitor at any time? Are all ‘stories’
equally valid? Should some visitors be permitted to tell stories with mildly sexist
or racist undertones, perhaps inherent in traditional tales? Does the museum have
the authority or responsibility to expunge such undesirable elements from their
interpretation? Should certain voices, such as those of CWWA considered in
Section 1 or voices from originating communities take precedence, due to their
silencing in a colonial past for example? How do these questions of contested
histories impact on the national story and the need to build socially cohesive local
communities in the twenty-first century where we see division at local and global
levels?
These are large questions. In short I have argued throughout this book for
museums to promote democracy and citizenship through the critical pedagogy,
informed by feminist-hermeneutics, which I have outlined with reference to
museum examples. Such pedagogy is based on collaboration and the telling of
more diverse stories, which does not imply passivity on the part of either partner,
but rather an active dialogical exchange imbued with mutual respect, which can
ultimately lead to ‘intercultural’ understanding and more cohesive communities
through highlighting a common sense of belonging. In this respect the book
reinforces the Council of Europe’s 2008 White Paper, which states:
Museums and heritage sites have the potential to challenge, in the name of
common humanity, selective narratives reflecting the historical dominance
of members of one or other ethnic or national community, and to offer scope
for mutual recognition by individuals from diverse backgrounds. (Council of

Europe, White Paper 2008: 33 <http://www.coe.int/t/dg4/intercultural/Source/
White%20Paper_final_revised_EN.pdf> accessed on 07.02.2009)
The concept of the frontiers and the privileging of the arts as a route to embodied
knowledge(s) that thread through this book also resonate in the 2008 Paper. The
Paper specifically highlights the ‘arts’ as a powerful means of ‘allowing for
individual expression, critical self-reflection and mediation’, since they ‘naturally
cross borders and connect and speak directly to people’s emotions’ (ibid.). I
have outlined a number of museums that have engaged in successful artist and
community collaborations to further intercultural understanding in Learning
at the Museum Frontiers, such as Horniman with CWWA and the Museum of
World Culture (MWC) with Fred Wilson. Yet collaboration may provoke dissent
along the way as we saw for example at MWC. However as Lagerkvist and Luke
observe, museum controversy is not to be feared but welcomed as prompting a
meeting ground between belief systems (Lagerkvist 2006; Luke 2006).
Gadamer also notes the value of misunderstanding that is helpful here in taking
a first step towards the horizon of the other. He states:
It is generally true that even when one misunderstands something, if one has
been listening carefully, more has probably been understood than if the most
exact knowledge had been applied without listening to the poem as a whole.
(Gadamer 1997: 186)
Stories and creative writing are helpful to museum collaboration since they
challenge the notion of one true view. Gadamer further notes on this: ‘I am
convinced that it is a serious mistake for one to think it is an advantage to have
in mind what is ‘correct’ (Gadamer 1997: 133). For Gadamer in interpretation
‘correct’ is always relative, since in terms of poetry, ‘the poet himself reads it
differently each time’ (ibid. 183). Learning at the Museum Frontiers has attempted
to show that opening up the museum to a range of diverse voices can enliven the
museum and promote social inclusion in the wider world.
On the other hand this inclusive praxis does not argue for an anything goes
approach and Gadamer is not a relativist. He declares that human beings share
common bonds, such as language, which presents us with the possibility of
understanding. While aligning myself with certain elements of ‘postmodernism’
such as the raising of new voices, I have defended the right to say certain
discourses, for instance racism, sexism and homophobia, is always and everywhere
wrong. In this sense I hold fast to specific tenets of modernism and highlighted
The International Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) as particularly
important.
I write here on the 60th anniversary of The Universal Declaration of Human
Rights (UDHR) in 2008. The UDHR condemns all discrimination and it is to the
importance of this document for the museum context that I shall turn to next.
Values: National and Universal Declarations
British museums in the twenty-first century are working within a national

framework that is increasingly insular, fearful of ‘otherness’ and protective of
‘us’ standing firm for civilised values against ‘them’ and it is to these ideas that I
now turn. The Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, defines British values as ‘liberty,
responsibility and fairness’, while his predecessor Tony Blair highlighted British
values as a ‘belief in democracy, the rule of law, tolerance, equal treatment for all’
(Brown 2006; Blair 2006).
One may wonder, in the wider world of European museums and in post-Apartheid
South Africa for example that I have considered, whether these are peculiarly
British values, or whether they are more aligned with the international principles
of human rights and the expressed values of modern democracy in Nation States
the world over. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) adopted by
the United Nations General Assembly in 1948, is a foundational document posing
the notion of all human beings as members of a human ‘family’, with consequent
entitlement to equality in dignity and rights, from which global justice and peace
ensues. At the outset The Declaration asserts the need for:
[R]ecognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of
all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace
in the world. (United Nations Organization, 1948 Preface; UNESCO, 2002)
Widening this notion of the ‘family’ is important in the context of feminist-

hermeneutics museum work since it highlights the African ‘ethics of care’ within
the social group, respect for the rights of others and reciprocity (Hill-Collins
1991). As Doctor Martin Luther King, wrote from his prison cell in Birmingham
Alabama, ‘an inescapable network of mutuality’ binds our futures ‘in a single
garment of destiny, since ‘whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly’
(King 1962: 77 in Banks et al. 2005: 7).
At Horniman we long considered how we might work with an understanding
of the universality of human rights, a moral and legal framework, to include as
human beings all those in need even if they do not hold national citizenship. In this
we observed the UDHR, requirement of member nations to ‘disseminate the text
and expound the principles’ widely throughout ‘educational institutions’, which
tacitly includes the museum (<http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/> accessed
on 29.04.2008). We saw the UDHR as a vital document that offered an ethical
framework to promote dialogical exchange and the recognition of every voice
at the museum frontiers. Specifically: Article 2 declaring no-one shall be subject
to unfair discrimination; Article 5 that prohibits treating anyone in a degrading
manner; Article 10 stating a fair hearing should be vouchsafed to all; Articles 12
and 18 highlighting respect for privacy and diverse religious beliefs; Article 19
demanding people listen to alternative views even those with which they disagree
and Article 20 valuing peaceful association and the right to protest.
It is worth emphasising that Horniman is not alone in anti-discriminatory

activity and observance of the UDHR. To briefly highlight UK museums that are
countering the British National Party’s (BNP) false representation of Black and
Minority Ethnic (BME) peoples through exhibition, ‘Sanctuary’ (2003) at the
Gallery of Modern Art in Glasgow (GoMA) and ‘Belonging’ (2006) at the Museum
of London (MoL) are notable in the work with refugee communities. Museum
learning here has been seen to work with visitors’ curiosity and human empathy,
whether they are members of the dominant majority or of a minority group, to
welcome diversity and reinforce human rights as normative values within the local
nation state and in the wider world.
Within this brief discussion of Universal Human Rights I would like to
advocate a notion of ‘nation’ that is fluid and has been characterised as comprising
‘imagined communities’ (Anderson, 1991). In Learning at the Museum Frontiers
I have suggested that the museum of the twenty-first century has a vital role in
developing the imagined community of the nation-state, which I recommend
might profitably be viewed as a global ‘community of communities’, through
creative exhibitions and programming (Parekh 2000). Now let us turn to examine
this notion of communities, which has wider implications for other parts of the
globe.
Nation as a Community of Communities
The Future of Multiethnic Britain or The Parekh Report is an important document

offering guidelines for public institutions, including the museum (Parekh 2000).
Parekh’s remit was to ‘analyse the current state of multiethnic Britain’ and
‘propose ways of countering racial discrimination and disadvantage’ to ‘make
Britain a confident and vibrant multicultural society at ease with its rich diversity.
The preface to the Report is especially valuable, providing six ‘fundamental
beliefs’ or values around which British people may unite and develop a sense
of community cohesion. Parekh’s first principle recognises the difficult notion of
promoting ‘equal worth’ within economic or social inequalities. Secondly Parekh
envisions Britain as a ‘community of communities’ who may need to reconcile,
if not resolve, conflict. For the purpose of the museum Parekh’s third, fourth and
fifth principles may be summed up as encompassing the need to nurture a mutual
respect for differences within a cohesive sense of belonging and shared identity
that affirms the values of tolerance and dialogue; while the final principle is to
tackle the ‘subtle and complex phenomenon’ of ‘racism’ (ibid. iix). These points
have resonance for museums located in the port cites of the newly democratic
South Africa and Sweden, as I have attempted to demonstrate in Section 2.
The BNP is a far right political group in the UK who gained some power in recent
local government elections.
Parekh notes that museums located in Britain’s ports are sites where the self/
other dichotomy and issues of racism may be productively explored. For example
he writes of the 1999 NMM (National Maritime Museum) exhibition that showed a
‘Jane Austin-like figure sipping tea with a sugar bowl on the table beside her’, while
from under the ‘floor beneath her feet a manacled black arm reached out as if from
the hold of a slave ship’ (Parekh 2000: 159). This exhibition is notable for drawing
attention to the historical roots of the wealth gained during the Transatlantic Slave
Trade that lies at the hearts of many British Museums but it can be criticised in
postcolonial theory. Specifically in presenting the ‘silent native’ as a poor object,
reduced to an identity as ‘oppressed victim’, and so reinforcing the dominant
European self as subject at the centre of representation (Chow 1996: 123-5, 132).
It has also been argued that in terms of the visitor’s meaning making perhaps an
excessively challenging display may merely serve to position the shocked visitor
at a greater distance’ from the displayed ‘other’, to reject or contest complicity
in histories of atrocity as oppressor and prevent an appeal to the notion of shared
humanity as Riegel notes (Riegel 1996: 88).
Diverse Stories of Nation to Challenge Racism
The NMM exhibition certainly made uncomfortable viewing for many visitors,
demonstrating in stark visual terms the white female ‘self’ sitting in such ‘civilised’
surroundings at the expense of the Black ‘other’ who is regarded literally as beneath
the human and may therefore be subjected to appalling cruelty. In the British media
reports criticised the exhibit for ‘depriving the British people of any aspect of their
history in which they can take justifiable pride’ to which the director replied that
museums are ‘not just there to perpetuate the old view. We want galleries to be
challenging’ (Parekh 2000: 159). Yet while Parekh emphasises the need to address
the causes of ‘racist violence’ and how perpetrators attempt to justify it, in reality
the NMM, like all museums with a national and international responsibility, treads
a fine line between alienating its traditional customer base – the white middle-
classes – and may shy away from involvement in the more challenging aspects
of antiracism. For example, as Ratan Vaswani of the UK Museums Association
points out, the NMM ‘ignored the racist murder of the teenager Stephen Lawrence
in Eltham, a few miles from the NMM, despite the families high profile campaign
that led to the Macpherson Report’ (Vaswani MJ 5, 2000: 19).
I have referred to Macpherson in Learning at the Museum Frontier, but here
I want to note the importance of museums addressing ‘othering’ in their displays
and programmes. I emphasise that new approaches do not aim to erase dominant
histories of the powerful historical oppressor – an impossible task – but simply
to tell different stories and provide fuller, deeper histories, which might facilitate
points of contact between viewers. My case study museum examples have
attempted to show this is beneficial for the whole ‘community of communities’
not just for the Black communities whose histories have been suppressed within
the museum walls. Parekh quotes the novelist Ben Okri on this point. Okri states
Nations and peoples are largely the stories they feed themselves. If they tell
themselves stories that are lies, they will suffer the consequences. If they tell
themselves stories that face their own truths, they will allow us all to free
histories for future flowerings. (Okri quoted in Parekh 2000: 103)
What The Parekh Report highlights for the museum here and elsewhere is the
possibility to involve the many different contributions of diverse communities
to the national story, which is essentially an intertwined history between Black
and white citizens. A major value for the museum context, is the opportunities
presented by museums for exhibitions to show historical events ‘through more
than one pair of eyes, and narrated within more than one story, which calls for
a ‘democratising approach’ (Parakh 2000: 163). In this regard Parekh highlights
the ‘Liverpool Museum on the Slave Trade’ as a courageous exception to the
selective amnesia about Britain’s former empire. In 2007 the International Slavery
Museum (ISM) opened on the third floor of the Maritime Museum in Liverpool
and replaced the older gallery. ISM dedicated a gallery to the memory of a local
student Anthony Walker who was murdered by racists in the summer of 2005. In
this way Liverpool helps to give what Vaswani at the UK Museum Association,
called for, ‘a responsible history of slavery’, which ‘cannot help but raise the issue
of how to treat the wounds of racism’ (Vaswani MJ 5, 2000: 17).
Racism does not disappear if museums ignore it and perpetuate old colonial
stories. As I noted earlier more diverse stories need not be told in a simple
hectoring manner in the museum, which would be counterproductive, nevertheless
institutions such as ours should be ‘reflexive, serious and sustained’ in our thought
on ‘change as a consequence of cultural diversity’ (Hall 1980, 2000: 51). I find the
notion of playful approaches to objects helpful in this task.
Play, Story and the Impact of the Museum Experience
In this book I have emphasised the value of material culture and the biographies
that surround it. I have also made a case for extending the right to creatively tell
different stories of material culture, with due regard for raising diverse voices on
what has been unthinkingly taken as the one ‘truth’, eternally and universally. In
Section 1 Anim-Addo highlighted the importance of playing with language and
telling personal her/stories for members of CWWA with African objects, noting
Gadamer’s influence in this regard (Gadamer 1981). Section 2 also emphasised the
values of such storytelling for previously oppressed and marginalised communities
at the Museum of World Culture (MWC) in Sweden, which at the District Six
Museum (D6M) in South Africa seemed to provide some healing of the painful
memories that were evoked (Morrison 1988, 1991; 1994b). Then in Section 3 the
idea of playful storytelling was examined with respect to young peoples’ learning,
where storytelling and creative writing based on African objects offered a pathway
towards literacy, through the enunciation of new identities.
A recent study of the way young children interpret various types of exhibition
environment including a: traditional art gallery, interactive science centre, natural
history museum and a social history museum, supports the idea of play and story
being important elements of the exhibition experience for the child. It seems to be
through the familiar socio-cultural context and the familiar learning modes of play
and story that childrens’ learning is best facilitated, since the child is able to link
the new exhibits and knowledge to the prior understandings embedded in their
everyday world (Anderson et al. 2002: 213).
The evidence for Anderson et al.’s assertion rests on the significant impact
of play and story on the children’s memory of their visits. For example, the
experience of climbing on large-scale outdoor sculptures at the art gallery proved
to be particularly memorable and the study concluded that since playing on
climbing apparatus outdoors was a highly familiar context in which the children
had previously explored and learnt in their everyday lives, this accounted for the
children being able to easily recall the new experience in detail (Anderson et al.
2002: 222). Similarly, the children in the study clearly remembered the stories
they had been asked to develop while sitting and looking closely at particular
artworks in the gallery. This storytelling experience with the art helped to provide
conducive learning environments by building upon the frequent occurrences of
story in the children’s lives and the familiar context in which children learn (ibid.
223). In contrast the interactive science centre where the exhibits were not related
to everyday experiences, was less well-remembered and mentioned at interview.
Clifford casts light on the idea of play for adults. He speaks of ‘intimate
encounters’ with artifacts in anthropology collections, which gives us permission
to become ‘adult-children’, exploring ‘territories of danger and desire’ (Clifford
1994: 216). At Horniman collaborative research teams have found that these
territories are ‘tabooed’ zones because they reveal the complexity of individual
identities and a common humanity; our differences and our similarities; our past
and our present. Similarly in Sweden and South Africa I observed objects providing
points of human contact across time and space and illuminating a brighter future
for all. Roger Simon illuminates this point. The museums I have considered offer
spaces for a public narrative, a ‘story space’, where we may come to recognise
ethical relationships between self and others ‘lives lived in times and places other
than our own’ (Simon 2006: 190). Simon defines this as an interhuman, ‘holding
the present’, to open up broader future possibilities (Simon 2006: 203).
In Learning at the Museum Frontiers the notions of diaspora identities and
hybridity were considered vital to museum education projects, which presented
audiences with the more optimistic futures Simon highlights. It may be helpful to
briefly recap the key points here.
Diaspora Hybrid Identities and Points of Suture
Stuart Hall defines the Black experience as a ‘Diaspora experience’, which carries
with it a ‘process of unsettling, recombination, hybridization and “cut and mix”’
(Hall 1994: 258). Hall further elucidates this experience as ‘profoundly fed and
nourished by … rich cultural roots’, which encompass ‘the African experience;
the reconnection with Afro-Caribbean experience’ (ibid.). He also emphasises the
complexity of the Diaspora experience, which demands ‘creative enunciation’
through ‘the categories of the present’ (Hall 1994: 258).
‘Diaspora identities’ are seen in terms of a vital mixture and movement of
historical and contemporary elements, across temporal and spatial borderlands
from Africa, the Caribbean and the west. Hall’s thesis on identity opposes
the either-or of dualist thought and he rejects any simple reversing of binary
oppositions. For example he denies a ‘new essentially good black subject’ as well
as the old stereotype of the lazy degenerate. His primary concern is with political
transformation and he aims to build ‘forms of solidarity and identification which
make common struggle possible but without suppressing real heterogeneity of
interests and identities’ (Hall 1994: 254-5).
This profoundly anti-essentialist and anti-dualist thought stands in contrast to
racism and sexism, which fixes people into rigid categories. Paul Gilroy cites the
‘ubiquitous theme’ of racism as an ‘absolutist view of black and white cultures, as
fixed, mutually impermeable expressions of racial and national identity’ (Gilroy
1996: 263). This view fears ‘contamination’ and harbours a fantasy of Imagined
Communities, of ‘return’ to ‘pure origins’ (Anderson 1983).
The collaborative praxis at the museum frontiers I have expounded in this
book highlights the dynamic nature of identity construction today. Movement and
change is recognised as positive forces for creating new forms of art, writing, and
ways of being in the world. Identity is not seen as predetermined or fixed by racial
characteristics, nor as one continuous entity, but as a process of active hybrid
construction from disparate fragments of similarity and difference. I have argued
that the museum proves an ideal site for such construction and re-construction.
It provides a discursive space of ‘suture’ or connection between the local and
the global; past and present; individual and group (Hall 1997: 5-6). In this book
feminist-hermeneutics has been shown to affect various points of temporary suture,
or joining of subjects in different structures of meaning. Suture roots identity in
complex political structures: of temporary affiliation, attachment, and ways of
belonging. It also involves a perpetual re-conceptualisation of ‘subjectivity’ to
permit a variety of fruitful new positionings.
Writing Subjects Remapping Identities in the Museum
At Horniman I have found that Hall and Gilroy’s re-writing of dominant or

‘colonial’ discourse(s) and their Diaspora scholarship can help to bring vibrant
new voices from out of the ‘shadow’ to illuminate traditional debates, in ways that
are useful to museum praxis, as I showed with reference to CWWA in Section 1
(Spivak 1984: 83). Diaspora theory marks a fragile space of alternative voice and
visibility, which permits the objects of colonial discourse to reconstruct themselves
as subjects. Trinh T. Minh-ha emphasises this point. She says.
Writing the body’ is that abstract-concrete, personal-political realm of excess not

fully contained by writing’s unifying structural forces. … It is a way of making
theory in gender, of making theory a politics of everyday life, thereby re-writing
the ethnic female subject as a site of differences. (Trinh 1989: 44, 59)
Throughout this book I have highlighted the importance of agency, of all ‘subjects’
actively claiming identity, and for the museum to engage in the ongoing process
of hermeneutic ‘listening’ to the identities claimed in the ‘uprising’ textualities
of diverse communities. In Section 2 the book attempted to show how a radical
consciousness of the possibilities for creative ‘re-mapping’ of identities might
be developed at the museum frontiers, at (D6M) in South Africa , Edo-Tokyo
Museum in Japan, in Oxford during outreach, as well as in the MWC in Sweden
and at Horniman London. Furthermore feminist-hermeneutics was presented as a
useful method to facilitate such re-mapping (Boyce-Davis 1994: 108-9).
Remapping has been seen here to address the issues of misrecognition that
Taylor warns is harmful to identities. He states:
… our identity is partly shaped by recognition or its absence, often by the

misrecognition of others, and so a person or group of people can suffer real
damage, real distortion, if the people or society around them mirror back to them
a confining or demeaning or contemptible picture of themselves. Nonrecognition
or misrecognition can inflict harm, can be a form of oppression, imprisoning
someone in a false, distorted, and reduced mode of being. (Taylor 1994: 26)
Taylor also emphasises commonalities alongside differences, helpfully highlighting

for the museum context the way individual identities and community identities
overlap. Human identity, he notes is negotiated and constructed in dialogical
exchange with significant others who include family, friends, teachers as well as
the institutions such as the museum they operate within, and since this negotiation
continues throughout life museums offer opportunities to progress lifelong and
life wide learning. As I have been considering African collection in this book it is
worth highlighting the African concept of ‘umbuntu’, which roughly translates as
‘I am because you are’, which similarly emphasises an African ethics of care for
the wider community group that individuals can progress through dialogue in the
museum (Hill-Collins 1991).
Similarly Amy Gutman notes the human capacity of individuals to ‘integrate,
reflect upon, and modify their own cultural heritage and that of other people
with whom they come into contact’, which the museums I have discussed are
ideally placed to facilitate in the museum as forum space (Gutman 1994: 7). She
agrees Taylor’s view that human identity is constructed dialogically in human
relationships and asserts the need for a politics that enables public recognition of
and debate on ‘those aspects of our identities that we share, or potentially share,
with other citizens’ (ibid.).
Music, like language and art, is a widespread characteristic of human society.
Music and musical instruments have featured and proved highly motivating in the
museums and programmes I have considered in this book and it is to this aspect
that I shall turn next.
Motivation, Music and the Senses
Briefly, musical instruments act as vital ‘hooks’ to capture young peoples attention,
which if museums are able to connect with the long-term interest in music that
is such a widespread phenomena amongst young people around the world, can
promote ‘flow’ learning (Csikszentmihalyi and Hermanson 1995). In Section 3
I suggested pupils were engaged in flow learning, intrinsically motivated in the
object-based activities for their own sake, and not the extrinsic reward of an exam
for example. With respect to musical engagement the state of flow was seen to
be deeply pleasurable, inspiring the desire to repeat the musical experience and
revisit the museum.
At Horniman, in the pupil’s musical engagement we observed all four
dimensions of the ‘aesthetic’ experience: perceptual, emotional, intellectual and
communicative, which Csikszentmihalyi and Robinson highlight with reference
to elite employees in Western museums of the visual and decorative arts.
Csikszentmihalyi and Robinson note perceptual qualities extending beyond the
visual to embrace other senses, notably touch, which reveals the balance, weight,
temperature and mechanisms – the precise way a clasp fastens a gold necklace
for example (Csikszentmihalyi and Robinson 1990: 32). In Section 3 I considered
how through touch pupils were able to have an impact on the world and affect
change. For example, pupils found musical instruments could be made to issue
sounds and the sense of power this imparted was enhanced by wearing textiles
that transformed the bodies they adorned, which served to lift and lighten mood
(Tuan 2005: 75-78).
We observed music, like Csikszentmihalyi and Robinson’s visual aesthetic
experience, to be a ‘thrilling’ sensual, emotional and intellectual communicative
media (Csikszentmihalyi and Robinson 1990: 36). Pupils found the sensual bodily
contact with the objects enriching emotionally and intellectually and this holistic
experience was enhanced when the object provided communication routes with
the past era when the objects were made. In this sense the pupils were moved or
‘touched’ figuratively by the culture of others. Being touched figuratively speaking
also means to be concerned. Since touch can arouse sympathy and empathetic
feelings for the distant world of others, the sensual embodied experience of
pleasure in touch is said to be ‘self-affirming and self-transcending’ (Classen
1993: 69, 76).
Communication here is seen as a multidimensional experience of bridging a
time space gap by integrating perceptual, emotional and intellectual aspects. The
metaphor of ‘transport’ can describe something of this communicative quality for
individuals – a unifying of the senses and a releasing of the self in communication
with the other – to more fully recognise the self (Csikszentmihalyi and Robinson
1990: 68). Transport requires active and creative work of decoding over time. To
be transported in this way implies a positive way to focus on the wider world, to
share the dreams, emotions and ideas of others from different times and places that
are encoded in the work. In the words of Homi Bhabha:
What is crucial to such a vision is that we must not merely change the narratives
of our histories, but transform our sense of what it means to live, to be, in other
times and different spaces, both human and historical. (Bhabha. 1995: 256)
In 2008, when the African American Barack Obama has been elected President
of the USA, museums and their visitors may feel justly optimistic that Bhabha’s
words may come to fruition, despite Trevor Philip’s contention that this could not
happen in the UK (Philips 2008). I conclude this book in a spirit of hope and look
forward to ‘listening’ museums working collaboratively for the sake of the future
millennium, by embracing their role in progressing democracy and citizenship
(Parekh 2000: 151; Osler and Starkey 2005).
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Index
abolitionists, 55, 92 Seselelame 176

master narrative of 55 theory of consciousness 176
Africa 95 37-39 Anthropology 175-177
Africa: Art of a Continent, Royal Academy, collections 3
London (1995) 36-39 contemporary 175-177
catalogue of exhibition 38 antiracism 5, 6, 80, 137, 139, 140-142; see
criticism of 37 also racism
praise for aesthetic approach 38 theory of 18
Africa; see also African art; Artists, Appiah, Kwame Anthony 38
African; Diaspora, African; Araeen, Rashed 30
exhibitions of African art; ethics, Art/artifact (Center for African Art, New
African; identity(-ies), African; York, 1988) 30-31, 33
knowledge, African; material Art/artifact debate 27-31, 32, 46
culture, African; museum object(s), artist interventions 17
African; stereotypes of Africans; artists, African 133; see also African art
voice(s), African and Caribbean contemporary 38
contemporary 112 Diaspora 38
sub-Saharan 3, 78 Ashante stool 19, 137, 166, 176, 179-180,
African art 29-31, 32, 36-37, 38-39 183-185
‘art’ versus ‘craft’ 29-30, 36 Attention Deficit Syndrome (ADS) 186
African-Canadians 34 Audu, Osi 69
African-Caribbean I Have a Landscape in My Head 69
pupils and under-achievement 5 Azuonye, Chike 28
youth 140
Afro, Teddy 82-83 Baartman, Saartje (‘Hottentot Venus’) 29
Age Exchange London 109, 124-126 preservation and display of genitalia 29
reminiscence boxes 125-126 return of remains to Khoi-San 29
agency 50-54 Balueka! Be Important Wes Belangrit!
Ancient Egypt 78 exchange programme 121-122
Anim-Addo, Joan 40, 43-44, 50-54, 55, 57, Benin bronzes/plaques 16, 27-30, 72-73,
197; see also Caribbean Women 77; see also Benin City
Writers Alliance (CWWA) Benin City 26-28, 158
Another Doorway Visible in the Edo, representations of the 27
Museum (1999) 50-51 material culture 27; see also Benin
Imoinda 57-58 bronzes/plaques
‘Re-writing the Museum’ 50-54 sack of Benin (1897) 72-73
objections to 54 Between Worlds Voyagers to Britain
Was that Sethe 51-54, 55, 57 1700-1850 (exhibition at National
inspiration for 55 Portrait Gallery, London, 2007) 29
Anlo-Ewe people, Ghana 166, 176-177, Bhabha, Homi 49, 202
184, 186, 189 the uncanny 100
Black and Minority Ethnic (BME) peoples with special educational needs 19, 166,
67, 195 177-178
Black artists 27, 93 Christchurch Primary School 140, 150,
Black Body Research Network 40, 41 154, 155-162
I Am Black, White, Yellow (Anim-Addo Clifford, James 48, 143, 198
and Scarfe (eds) 2007) 40; see ‘contact zones’ 7, 49, 67
also Anim-Addo, Joan; Caribbean travelling theory 48-50
Women Writers Alliance (CWWA) Cloth of Gold Arts Company 133, 134
Black feminist theory 7; see also feminism; colonial discourse 199-200; see also
feminist-hermeneutics colonialisation; colonialism
Black histories 60 Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia, USA
Mainstreaming 62, 65 60-61
Black learners/pupils 18 black interpreters 60, 63-64
underachievement of 19, 137, 139 slave-master relationships 60
Black Power movement 40 miscegenation 60-62
Black subject, the 22 ‘Other half’ 63-65
foregrounding 80 white history 61, 62
Black theorists 42 Wythe House 61-62
Black woman/women 50-54, 57, 102 colonialisation 99; see also colonial
as maternity figures 51 discourse; colonialism
resistance of 51 colonialism 1, 4, 23, 24-25, 34,38, 42, 80,
‘Blackness’ 48, 94 91, 94
Blair, Tony 194 resistance to 99
body, the 80, 152-155, 165, 166, 175-177, community cohesion 2, 42, 141
180, 182, 184, 189, 170-171, 172, ‘contact zones’ 135; see also Clifford,
174, 201-202; see also knowledge, James
embodied contested histories 78, 113, 192
borderlands, museum 3, 47-48, 54, 97, 170 Coombes, Annie 27
British National Party (BNP) 195, 195fn creative writing 157, 172, 191, 193
‘Britishness’ 44, 194
Bromley, London 134 death 151
Brown, Gordon 194 emotional experience of 145-146
Delport, Peggy 109, 112, 115, 117, 118;
call and response 55-57, 158, 181 see also District 6 Museum
Callis, Jacqui 179 dialogical exchange 2, 6, 17, 55, 77, 119,
Canada 23, 33-35 127, 137, 140, 142, 146, 159, 192,
Canizzo, Jean 33, 34; see also ‘Into the 194; see also dialogue
Heart of Africa’ dialogue 44, 105, 109, 115, 123, 125, 146-
Caribbean Women Writers Alliance 150, 151, 155-159, 173-174, 178,
(CWWA) 7, 16, 40, 41-45, 47, 49- 200; see also dialogical exchange
51, 54, 55-57, 58, 59-60, 65-66, 67, Diaspora 42, 51, 80, 98, 99, 152, 199-200;
68, 71, 77, 100, 131, 192, 193, 197 see also identity(-ies), Diaspora
Cesairé, Aimé 94 African 57, 58
Children display
Black 1, 5 poetics of 84-89
Ghanaian 178 politics of 38, 49, 84-89
with disabilities 19 District Six, Cape Town, South Africa 107,
111
Index 225
District Six Museum (D6M), 17, 107, exhibitions

108-109, 111-123, 130, 192, 197, of African art 23, 30-31, 36-39, 90-96
200 curatorial authority 79
Ambassadors Programme 120-121 reflexivity 30, 104, 117-118
Digging Deeper (D6M) 109, 117- Experience, Bookman 93, 94
118 Ezennaya, Ichie 155
District Six Museum Foundation
111, 112, 113 Fanon, Frantz 1, 2, 26, 42, 47-48, 80, 94
‘Hands Off D6’ campaign ‘authentic communication’ 2
111-112 fear 85, 94
educational programming 113 feminism 19, 23, 143, 170
‘healing memory’ 117 feminist discourse 131, 137, 171
methodology, ‘hands on’ 115-118 Black thought 22, 23, 48, 165
Streets (D6M) 109, 116-117 feminist-hermeneutics 2, 6, 7, 17, 19, 42,
diversity 4, 141 44, 59, 64, 115, 119, 132, 140, 143,
144-151, 157, 163-164, 165, 183,
East Midlands Oral History Archive 192, 199, 200
(EMOHA) 125 verstehen (understanding) 143
Ebrahim, Noor 121-123 flow 19, 137, 201
Edo-Tokyo Museum, Japan 109, 129 Csikszentmihalyi 137, 151, 201
‘genki’ project 129 Foucault, Michel 166, 169-170, 174-175
Educational Behavioural Difficulties Foucauldian discourse 7, 19, 168-169
(EBD) 19, 166, 168, 177-179, 189 Power/knowledge 166, 168
definitions of 177-179 Freedom Charter (1956) 122-123
history of 177-179 Freire, Paulo 4, 140, 154, 156, 157, 165,
role of educators 179 174
Eichstedt, Jennifer and Stephen Small Freudian psychoanalysis 170-171, 174
62-66 ‘frontiers’ 3, 48, 163; see also borderlands
‘symbolic annihilation’ 62-63 of the museum, 2, 4, 6-7, 19, 27, 41-43,
eighteenth century 22, 23, 25-26 49, 54, 56-57, 59, 133, 139, 140,
elders 18, 123, 124-126, 129, 185; see also 143, 149, 165, 168, 169, 179, 181,
grandparents 186, 193, 194, 199, 200
as ‘experts’ Future of Multiethnic Britain (aka The
health of 129 Parekh Report) 195-197
embodied knowledge 37, 137, 167, 171- ‘community of communities’ 195, 196
173, 180, 189
emotion 31, 36, 87-88, 118-120, 150, 153, Gadamer, Hans Georg 2, 6, 17, 23, 44, 49,
157, 162, 168, 171, 176, 182, 193, 146-147, 173, 178, 193, 197
202 Gell, Alfred 161, 162
Enlightenment, Age of 22, 23, 24-26, 44, General Certificate of Education (GCSE)
80, 167, 174 140fn
Enola Gay, Smithsonian Institution (1994) Ghana 166, 176, 178, 180, 185
33 material culture 166
enslavement 17, 51, 55-56, 58, 91; see also Gibinigie, Eki 38
slavery Gilroy, Paul 18, 22, 80, 94-95, 199-200
historical 43 grandparents 124, 129fn, 181-182; see also
ethics, African 103, 115, 194, 200 elders
exhibitionary practice 45 grief 145-146; see also death; loss
Haddon, Dr Alfred Cort 14, 45 history of 9-15

Hall, Stuart 48, 139, 142, 179, 199 ‘Races of Man’ 45-48
haptic interaction 16 Horniman, Frederick John (1835-1906)
Haraway, Donna 50, 54, 171 9-12, 173
situated knowledges 54, 171 collection of curiosities 9-11
Harrison, Dr Herbert Spencer 14 human rights 6, 26, 95, 110, 123, 131-132,
hidden histories 56 101 157, 191, 195; see also Universal
Hill-Collins, Patricia 2, 16-17 Human Rights
‘homeplace’ 58, 59
homophobia 193 ICT (Informational and Computer
hooks, bell 2, 48, 165 Technology) 134, 135, 152, 153-
‘liberatory pedagogy’ 165 154, 179
mind/body split 165, 166, 167-168, Identity(-ies) 100, 119, 131, 139, 189,
170-171 199-201
Horn of Africa 18, 79, 80, 96, 99-100 African 136
Horniman Museum, London 3, 19, 41, 43, Diaspora 80, 152, 198, 199
45, 55, 56, 57, 67, 68, 72-73, 80, global 69
98,124, 126, 130, 132, 133-137, hybrid 137, 198, 199
143-164, 167, 173, 178, 181, 183, new 118, 198
185, 186, 191-195, 198-201 Igbo, Nigeria 155, 158, 159, 161, 162
Anthropology Department 60, 68 ijele 19, 69-70, 137, 140, 155-157,
educational/learning programmes 15, 159, 161, 162
27-30, 39 imperialism 23, 24-25, 91, 112
Education Centre 15 inclusion/inclusivity 5, 18, 193
Education Department 59, 132 In-service Training for Teachers (INSET)
Emancipation Day (1997) 42, 57, 58, 43, 135, 142, 145
59 intercultural
engagement with local (African- exchange 42
Caribbean) community 69, 72 relationships 18
Exhibitions 60 understanding 2, 18, 131, 165, 193
African Worlds 15-16, 68-70, 74- interculturalism 139, 140-142, 164, 192
76, 79, 80, 135, 136, 144, 151, Council of Europe White Paper (2008)
155, 161, 168, 183 192-193
An A-Z of Collectors 15 in school education 141
Centenary Gallery: A Hundred intergenerational reminiscence (IGR) 123,
Years of Collecting (2001) 68 124-126
consultation 68-69, 72 International Slavery Museum (ISM),
design and text 71-78 Liverpool 197
themes 71-72 Into the Heart of Africa, Royal Ontario
Hands on Our World Discovery Museum (ROM) 4, 33-35; see also
Gallery 132 Canizzo, Jean
Inspiration Africa! 7, 18, 19, 68, irony, as exhibitionary device 33
131, 132, 133-137, 140, 142, public outcry 33
143, 145-146, 150, 156-157, Irigaray,Luce 171-173
159, 162, 164, 166, 168, 173, ‘double gesture’ 172
180 ‘exteriority’ 172
‘Voices’ project 72 ‘Islamophobia’, European 80
handling collection 156, 181, 183 IZIKO, Museums of Cape Town 111
Index 227
Japan 129, 130 Get Up, Stand Up 95

Jordonova, Ludmilla 169 War 94-95
masquerade 155-156
Kathrada, Ahmed 108 material culture 16, 19, 45, 47, 69
King Jr., Dr Martin Luther 132, 194 African 29-31, 37, 71, 77, 100, 175
Knowledge 169, 170-171, 174, 175-176, redisplay of 68
184 Asian 32
African 28 Meek, Margaret 162
African-Caribbean 58 memory(-ies) 109, 113-114, 116, 118, 119.
embodied 145, 168-169, 176, 181, 193 124-126, 128, 168, 198
emotional 129 and forgetting 103, 115
indigenous 3 intangible 117
museum (constructed by the) 23, 42, sensual/sensory 129, 130
59, 149, 166-167, 169, 173, 189 traumatic/painful 115, 119, 197
new 125, 148 Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York 68
sensual/sensory 56, 123, 129 Migration 95, 105
sharing of 124 experience of 95
Kwappong, Amoafi 178 metaphors for 105
Mijikenda memorial posts 31
language 22, 24, 44, 49, 51, 107, 146, 155, Minion, Tony 158, 159, 179
162 miscegenation 57, 60-62, 109
Lawrence, Stephen 5, 196 anti-miscegenation laws 61
racist murder of 5, 196 modernism 22, 29, 77, 193
learning 3, 4, 166, 181, 186, 198; see also Morrison, Toni 2, 16-17, 21-22, 55, 58,
museum education 107, 116, 119
active learning 55 Beloved (1988) 51, 54, 55-57, 59
experiential 162-163 Playing in the Dark 50
Lewisham, London 133, 134 Sula 107
lifelong learning 2 The Bluest Eye 1
live interpretation 60, 62-64, 68 multiculturalism 139, 140-142, 154
lived experience 48, 161 Museion, MA Museum Studies 80, 104-
Lorde, Audre 2, 131 105
listening 173-174 Museology (museum studies) 3, 31, 40,
loss 79, 152, 184; see also death; grief 96, 127
museum audiences/visitors, 30, 35-36, 51,
MacManus, Paulette 35 59, 140, 169, 173
Macpherson Report 5, 6, 59, 131, 141, 196 empowering 119
Mandela, Nelson 108, 110, 111, 112, 114, family groups 35
121, 157 new 4, 19, 22, 54, 61, 81, 191, 192
Manhiya Palace Museum, Kumasi, Ghana non-traditional 139
112 visiting as a transformative experience
mapping 127-128, 129, 166 58
‘Mapping Our Place’ 127-128 widening 56
memory 109 young 18, 136
remapping 199-200 museum education 4, 18, 121-123, 140,
Marley, Bob 18, 80, 93, 94-95 170, 179, 198
Burnin’ and Lootin’ 95 educators 4,5, 32, 38, 59, 121, 135,
Concrete Jungle 95 157, 158, 178, 183
learning 4, 6, 18, 22, 26, 40, 42, 54, Museums and Galleries Education Projects
108, 120-121, 131, 136, 148, 157, (MGEPs) 134
166, 183, 195 Museums Association, UK 67, 196-197
barriers to 48 ‘Diversify’ 67
definitions of 5 music making 56, 155, 181-183, 201
museum object(s) 6, 51, 78, 101, 130, Ghanaian 181
131-132, 134, 136, 140, 143, 162, musical instruments 182, 201
168, 169, 171, 172, 184, 185, 192, musicians 27, 56, 133
197, 198
African 167, 197, 198 ‘narrative therapy’ 128
biographies of 101, 131, 157-161, 197 narratives 118-120, 162
contemporary use of 28 official 118
handling/tactile exploration 57 135, of the past 119
154, 158, 162, 163-164, 176 personal 119
movement of 105, 157 popular 118-119
playful approaches to public 198
poetic interpretation of 54 subverting the master narrative 60
museum professionals 2, 173 nation 195-197
role in combating racism 2, 24 National Curriculum; see school
staffing 67-68 curriculum
museum representation 7, 23, 32, 37, 78, ‘National Living Treasures’ 129fn
105 National Maritime Museum (NMM) 196
of Black Africans 26 National Museum of Benin, Nigeria 71, 74
of women 85 National Museum of World Culture
museum(s) (MWC), Göteborg, Sweden 17-18,
art gallery 2 80-100, 102-104, 192, 193, 197,
art museum 2, 30, 32 200
children’s 167 architecture/building design 82
and communities 19 development of 81-82
contemporary museum 2, 24 Horizons: Voices from a Global Africa
controversy/controversial exhibitions MWC 17-18, 80, 82, 90-96
23, 33-35, 89-90, 193, 196 Advantage Göteborg 90, 96-99;
cultural authority of 35, 42 design; Atlantic Slave Trade
as cultural text 51 Abyssinian collection, 96
ethnographic 32 Group dissatisfaction/dissent
natural history 45 98-99
pedagogy 165-166 exhibition design 90-91
programming 1 Horn People’s exhibition 99-100
role in challenging racism 2, 4, 60 No Name Fever, MWC (2006) 80,
as site of transformation 58 86-90, 99
social role of 126 controversy 89-90
spatial politics of the 41, 45, 49 exhibition design 86-88
to challenge racism 40, 60 programming 82-84
as the ‘subject’ 30-31, 34 audience surveys 83
text 79 Natural History Museum, London 35
text and image, active reading of 35-36 New Labour 23, 126, 141; see also UK
traditional exclusion of Black women 8
Index 229
New Woodlands School, Lewisham, anti-Semitism 39

London 166, 168, 173, 176-177, challenging/challenges to 32, 93-94,
179-188, 189 183, 195, 196
Nigeria 69, 126, 155, 156, 161 in childhood 136-137
Art 47 history of 33, 48
contemporary artists 28 institutional/ised 5, 59, 131
Nigerian curators 71 legacy of 80
nineteenth century 170 recollection 124-126, 128
reflexivity 124, 143, 177, 179
Obama, Barack 21, 202 Reigel, Henrietta 33, 34-35
oral history 118, 124-126 exhibitionary practice 33
‘Other’, the 2, 28, 32, 40, 49, 55, 60-61, re-labelling 104
101-102, 142, 175, 181, 183, 196 reminiscence 124-126, 129, 130
Black 1, 21, 33, 91, 196 resistance 22, 109
fear of 48-50, 194 Black 111
women 85, 172 ‘respect’ 19, 179-181, 183-188
outreach 126-127,133 Re-writing the Museum 42
Oyelele, Olusola (Sola) 150-153, 158, 159, Robben Island 110, 111
161, 179, 182, 184, 186 Robben Island Museum (RIM) 108,
112, 116
Pan Africanism 58
Parenzee, Donald 116 Said, Abdullah 79, 80, 100
Oh City 116 Said, Edward 26, 32
performance(s) 152-154, 155, 176 Orientalism 32
Philip, Marlene Nourbese 17, 28-29, 33- Sainsbury Galleries of African Art, British
34, 36-37, 41-42, 45 Museum 68
Plantation Museums, USA 17, 43, 60, Sandell, Richard 67, 84
62-63, 68 Sandhal, Dr Jette 81, 84, 85, 86, 91, 93,
play 197-198 105
plurivocality 51, 80 Sargent, Linda 109, 127-128, 130, 200
poetry 136, 143, 150-152, 154, 184, 186- school children 18
187, 193; see also creative writing African heritage 29
acrostic poems 151, 155, 180, 186-187 Black 166
politics of representation 45, 54 school curriculum 6, 7, 27, 141, 142, 162,
polyvocality 70 163, 180
postcolonialism 6, 22, 77, 170 Key Stage 1 (KS1) 27, 180
postmodernism 22-23, 44, 170, 174, 193 Key Stage 2 (KS2) 27, 78, 140fn, 180
‘pride’ 155-157, 161 Key Stage 3 (KS3) 27, 140fn
Key Stage 4 140fn
Race 3, 5-6, 16, 21, 23 seeing 169-170
definitions of 24-25, 32, 39 self 148, 150
‘Blackness’ 39-40 and other 31-33, 36, 39, 67, 143, 196,
stereotypes of 43, 65 198, 202
‘race riots’ in the UK 21, 140-141 sense of 119
racial preference 136-137 self-reflexivity 34, 69, 77, 93, 113, 143
racism 1 21, 23, 24-26, 40, 43, 48, 67, 91, Sensation (1997), Royal Academy London
97, 98, 100, 107-109, 112, 131, 141, 33
164, 183, 192, 193, 196, 197, 199
senses 31, 167-168, 173, 175-177, 182, Spirit of Islam: Experiencing Islam
189, 201-202 Through Calligraphy, Museum of
Seven Stories about Modern Art (1995), Anthropology, Vancouver, Canada
Whitechapel Art Gallery, London 7
39 Spivak, Gayatri 59
sexism 155-156, 192, 193, 199 ‘homework’ 59
challenging 2 ‘standpoint texts’ 42, 54, 55-57
Shelton, Anthony 68-70 stereotypes 164, 199
silences 101, 102 of Africans 25
silencing 85-86 challenging/countering 136
sites of oppression 108 negation of 124
‘situated knowledge’ 42, 54 storytelling 56, 121-123, 135, 156, 162,
slavery 22, 51, 57, 61-63, 64, 65, 91,92-93, 191-193, 198
94, 197 storytellers 27, 126, 133
Atlantic holocaust 22 Suh, Do Ho 82
euphemisms for Sweden 78, 79, 80, 198
resistance to 94-96
transatlantic 22, 196 Telegraph Hill Secondary School 140, 146,
Smithsonian Institution 147, 150, 161-162
African Voices 68, Thatcher, Margaret 142
Enola Gay 4 third space 49
social cohesion 18 Thomas, Ayo 156, 157, 159, 161
Social Darwinism 24 touch 171-174, 201-202
social justice 96, 112, 157 Towards a Vision of Excellence: London
Source/originating communities 45, 98 schools and the Black Child (2002)
South Africa 18, 78, 105, 108, 114, 115, (conference) 5
130, 198 truth 169-170, 197
Apartheid 18, 107, 109-111, 112, 116- questioning 101
117, 157 ‘Truth and reconciliation’ 114-115
post-Apartheid 108, 113, 194 Truth, Sojourner (Isabella Baumfree) 80,
development of museums 109-111 92-93
‘Rainbow Nation’ 108, 109 Tutu, Archbishop Desmond 108
role of museums 112-113
Truth and Reconciliation UK 5, 17, 23, 43, 67, 123-128, 130, 177-
Committee (TRC) 111, 113, 179, 184, 194
114-115 government policy 139
South African Museums Association new Conservatism 23
(SAMA) 111 pluralism of 51
The Way Forward: Harnessing umbuntu 200
Cultural and Heritage Tourism in UNESCO (United Nations Educational,
SA (1997) 111 Scientific and Cultural
‘Tshwane Declaration’ 111 Organisation) 3
Southall Black Sisters Co-operative, UNICEF, The International Rights of the
London 40 Child 6
Special Educational Needs (SEN) 137, United Nations Convention on the Rights
177, 179, 180 of the Child (CRC) 131-132, 193
speech 103
Index 231
Universal Declaration of Human Rights of objects 102-103

(UDHR) (1948) 83, 193, 194-195 Voudou shrine, Haitian 19, 69, 137, 140,
Universal Human Rights 131-132, 194-195 143, 144-155, 162, 184
University of Leicester 67
MA Museum Studies students 130 Walker, Anthony, racist murder of 197
USA 23, 178, 202 White Paper on Intercultural Dialogue
lynchings 35 (2008), Council of Europe,
Strasbourg 2
Van Gogh, Theo 90 Wilson, Fred 80, 81, 100, 101-104, 193
Jihad and murder 90 juxtapositions 101, 102
Submission 90 Mining the Museum (1992), Maryland
Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A) 4, 167 Historical Society, Baltimore 101
Shhh 167 Site Unseen: Dwellings of the Demons,
Touch Me 167 MWC 17, 80, 102-104
vision 170-171 The Other Museum 101
Vogel, Susan 30-31 Without Sanctuary (Andy Warhol Museum
voice(s) 44, 55, 80, 193, 197 and Chicago Historical Society)
African and Caribbean 98 35-36
Black 91, 94 audience reaction to 36
Black women’s 50 women 127, 185
Diaspora 99 enslavement of 57
from Horn of Africa 100 suffrage 92
including 67 Women’s Museum, Aarhus Denmark 85
migrant 42 At Night (1993) 85
new 45, 193, 200 writers, Black 2, 27

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Learning at the Museum Frontiers

Identity, Race and Power

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

List of Figures and Plates vii

Section 1 Introduction: The Spatial Politics of the Museum Frontiers  1

1 Race: Repositioning and Revaluing Cultural Heritage  21

Section 2 Including New Voices and Forms of Practice  67

3 Power: Inserting New Visibilities in the Museum Margins  79

4 Control: Shifting Relationships in the Whole Museum  107

Section 3 Critical Collaborative Museum Pedagogy  131

5 Identity: Motivation and Self-esteem  139

6 Towards a New Museum Pedagogy: Learning, Teaching and Impact 165

Conclusion: Pedagogy in Museums  191

I.1 Feminist-hermeneutic research circle of

2.1 Was that Sethe or her sister?  53

5.1 Feminist-hermeneutic circle of understanding  149

1 Tea traits: Hornimania. Media cartoon of Fred Horniman dressed

Eilean Hooper-Greenhill, Langtree

Leicester in 2005. At Leicester I was able to engage in periods of further fieldwork

I must thank a number of individuals and institutions for permission to reproduce

Plates 1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 11 and 21 are reproduced with thanks to my colleagues at

Council of Europe in Strasborg (<http://www.coe.int/t/dg4/intercultural/Source/

In today’s age of globalisation, museums around the world retain the

Learning is a process of active engagement with experience; it is what people

It is almost 30 years since Rampton first highlighted the ‘under-achievement’

‘visibly committed to antiracism’, to both develop and deliver the museum/school

the dogmatic ‘scientific’ objective ‘opposition and separation’ from histories, he

Figure I.1 Feminist-hermeneutic research circle of

A Brief History of Education at the Horniman Museum

Plate 1 Tea traits: Hornimania. Media cartoon of Fred Horniman dressed

Plate 2 Ethnographical saloon of the Surrey House Museum c. 1982 showing

Plate 3 Curator Richard Quick’s children, Richard and Louise,

Plate 4 Entrance to the Horniman Museum c. 1901, showing the original

Plate 5 Comparative displays of material culture c. 1901

at Section 2 (Macdonald and Basu 2006). Before proceeding, it will be helpful to

Structure and Themes

Introduction: Racism and ‘Post’ Thought in the Museum Today

From a woman’s point of view, in terms of confronting the problems of where

useful framework for progressing museum learning, since it marks a questioning

Defining ‘Race’: Biology versus Language and Socio-political Change

Imperialism, Colonialism, Humanism and the Enlightenment

Benin City, Nigeria: 1668 to Today

In offering a concise overview there is a danger of over simplifying the issues,

The Art/artifact Debate and Learning Programmes at Horniman

sense in their construction, since a serious attention to the formal relationship

The Art/artifact Debate and a Seminal Exhibition in the USA

Self and Other/s, Margin and Centre/s

explore ‘this multicultural and intercultural terrain consciously and deliberately,

The Making of Controversial Exhibitions

to abnegate institutional responsibility. She notes how adopting a critical view

Visitors Reading Text and Image

Without Sanctuary is a photo document of proof, an unearthing of crimes, of

Africa: Art of a Continent, UK

Conclusion: Blackness, Science, Race and

As I wandered throughout this museum, I recognised many of the displays –

In this chapter I shall outline my long-term collaborative research with the

on contemporary practice of ‘decolonisation’ around the world in the last decades

Decolonisation is always a violent phenomenon. … Its usual importance is that

List of Figures and Plates vii

Section 1 Introduction: The Spatial Politics of the Museum Frontiers 1

1 Race: Repositioning and Revaluing Cultural Heritage 21

Section 2 Including New Voices and Forms of Practice 67

3 Power: Inserting New Visibilities in the Museum Margins 79

4 Control: Shifting Relationships in the Whole Museum 107

Section 3 Critical Collaborative Museum Pedagogy 131

5 Identity: Motivation and Self-esteem 139

6 Towards a New Museum Pedagogy: Learning, Teaching and Impact 165

Conclusion: Pedagogy in Museums 191

2.1 Was that Sethe or her sister? 53

5.1 Feminist-hermeneutic circle of understanding 149