Related Papers
The role of national museums in South Africa: A critical investigation into Iziko Museums of South Africa focusing on the representation of slavery
Carlyn Strydom
This thesis is concerned with the ways in which museums have been used as vehicles to convey notions of the nation. It looks specifically at the Iziko Museums of South Africa’s social history sites that deal with the subject of slavery. It is concerned with the absence of a narrative of slavery at Iziko museums before the demise of Apartheid and looks the historical and socio-political changes that lead to its emergence in South African historical consciousness. It is a study of the history of museums as well as the ways in which history has been used in museums. It looks at the ways Iziko, as a national museum, has guarded and promoted ideas of the nation as decided by the state. The thesis examines with the ways in which the museum has transformed since its inception in the colonial period up to the present day. The time period investigated is 1855 to 2016. Guiding questions for the thesis are: for what purpose were museums created in South Africa; what are the implications of colonial practice on the ways in which they functioned; why has the history of slavery has been disavowed in South African historical consciousness; what led to the rise of the study of slavery in South Africa; what has the emergence of the new museology meant for museum practice; how have heritage studies transformed the South African historical landscape. The thesis begins with a theoretical literature overview of museums more generally and its links with power and representation and the colonial regime. It then moves on to investigate the origin and history of Iziko museums by working through published literature on the subject, unpublished materials, other institutional materials found in the Iziko archive and interviews conducted with past and current employees. It then looks takes an historical survey of South African historiography and its exclusion of the history of slavery and later the emergence of such a narrative. Lastly it looks at how the nation has been narrated by the state after Apartheid and how the museum responded to the new dispensation. The thesis concludes that Iziko museums have transformed over the last two centuries in terms of the subject matter it studies. Museological activity has been diversified to include a range of subjects hitherto ignored in South African public consciousness due to the legacy of both colonialism and Apartheid. Most importantly it shows that the museum has continually responded to concepts of the South African nation and that national museums are inextricably tied to the nation-state.
Facilitating Inclusivity: The Politics of Access and Digitisation in a South African Museum
Hannah Turner
This paper draws on current themes of digitisation and access in two specific museum contexts—the Reciprocal Research Network in Vancouver, Canada and the Luthuli Museum in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. As museums and cultural heritage projects engage with new digital environments, issues around access for wider communities are raised. We ask what the possibilities of open access permitted by the digital world are, and how can ideas about open access through technology be complicated by existing power structures and geographical limitations in marginalised communities. This paper draws attention to the fact that when online access is implemented, other associated issues are raised. Open access databases and catalogues do not in themselves provide inherent access to knowledge since access to them is mediated by social, economic and historical circ*mstances. We frame this discussion specifically within issues of the digital divide and technological infrastructure, ownership issues in an open access environment, and the subsequent challenges concerning multiple interpretations.
Identities, memories, histories and representation : the role of museums in twentieth century KwaZulu-Natal
2003 •
Mxolisi Dlamuka
Facilitating Inclusivity: The Politics of Access and Digitisation in a South African and Canadian Museum
Laura K Gibson
This paper draws on current themes of digitisation and access in two specific museum contexts—the Reciprocal Research Network in Vancouver, Canada and the Luthuli Museum in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa. As museums and cultural heritage projects engage with new digital environments, issues around access for wider communities are raised. We ask what the possibilities of open access permitted by the digital world are, and how can ideas about open access through technology be complicated by existing power structures and geographical limitations in marginalised communities. This paper draws attention to the fact that when online access is implemented, other associated issues are raised. Open access databases and catalogues do not in themselves provide inherent access to knowledge since access to them is mediated by social, economic and historical circ*mstances. We frame this discussion specifically within issues of the digital divide and technological infrastructure, ownership issues in an open access environment, and the subsequent challenges concerning multiple interpretations.
'Using museums to explore the legacies of slavery in South Africa', Iziko 1 December Emancipation Day, December 2015
Samuel North
DECONSTRUCTING MUSEUMS AND MEMORIALS IN PRE- AND POST-APARTHEID SOUTH AFRICA
Tamara Meents-Mizroch
This study examines the ways in which museums and memorials within South African society commemorate events of the past. Various examples of museums and memorials are chosen and identified according to the ways in which they embody postmodern or modern thought. Postmodern and modern museums are deconstructed according to various post-structural tenets so as to arrive at a broader understanding on how they are able to remain a continuously relevant and vital part of contemporary society.
Decolonising the Museum: The Case of Zimbabwe Military Museum in Gweru
forget chaterera
The Zimbabwe Military Museum in Gweru seems to be struggling to come out of the colonial shell in which it was established. The permanent collection on display represents the kind of legacy which elevates the white settler ideologies. Through objects on display, supported with English text panels, the Zimbabwe Military Museum documents and memorialises in a seemingly celebratory manner, the colonial dominance. The task of this paper is to advocate for a national museum that claims both the past and the present to construct a decolonised future for the local indigenous people. As public institutions whose purpose in life is to serve the public, museums in Zimbabwe need to seriously consider offering services that are meaningful and relevant to the local indigenous communities. For that noble obligation to be fulfilled, the local indigenous communities should be actively involved in museums' programmes and activities. Using the qualitative and quantitative methodologies the paper examines the Zimbabwe Military Museum's exhibitions, analysed the literature that goes with it and interviewed users and officials of the Zimbabwe Military Museum.
Museum Management & Curatorship
Museum Management and Curatorship Community museums and rethinking the colonial frame of national museums in Zimbabwe
2019 •
Njabulo Chipangura, Patricia Magodyo-Chipangura
In this paper we present the Marange Community Museum as an empirical example of how decoloniality can be approached within the museum practice. We argue that the Marange community made use of indigenous ontologies and epistemologies in establishing their museum where rituals and cultural objects are connected in use and in an ongoing dialogue. Ritual processes associated with burials of chiefs and rain petitioning ceremonies are discussed in this paper as inseparable from the physical fabric of cultural objects on display in the Marange Community Museum. We also posit that the way in which this museum was formed is as an empirical illustration of how the museum practice can be decolonised because it embraces collaborations with community members. Hence, a decolonial perspective represented by a community museum acknowledges that objects are not mundane but rather represent the coming together of a multiplicity of factors and it also questions the binary division between tangible and intangible heritage knowledge production.
Museum Management and Curatorship
Community museums and rethinking the colonial frame of national museums in Zimbabwe
2019 •
Njabulo Chipangura
Lost in Transformation. A critical study of two South African museums
Cecilia Rodéhn
