Still Tangled in Contradiction After All These Years "Ethnography Museums and World Cultures"...

Anne-Marie Bouttiaux Musée Royal de l’Afrique Centrale - “RIME” Project Leader, Tervuren

Still Tangled in Contradiction After All These Years. “Ethnography Museums and World Cultures” European Project

I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain.

(Baldwin)

Another use of history: the systematic dissocia-tion of our identity. Because this identity is rather weak on its own, even if we attempt to re-inforce it and assemble it under a mask, it’s in it-self only a parody: plurality inhabits it; innu-merable souls quarrel under its guise; systems intersect and compete for dominance. When one studies history, one feels “happy, unlike the metaphysicians, to possess in oneself not an im-mortal soul but many mortal ones.

(Foucault 2000: 1022 - quoting Nietzsche 1902: 28)

C2Still Tangled in Contradiction After All These Years

As its name suggests, the Ethnography Museums and World Cultures project (RIME) connects certain kinds of museums and institutions responsible for ethnographic collections with the world cultures from which those collections originate. It is useful to begin by clarifying terminology. A museum housing ethnographic collections is no more an ethnographic mu-seum, than a museum of art is an artistic museum, nor is a museum concerned with Africa (such as the museum in Tervuren), an African museum1. A museum could, of course, be con-sidered ethnographic, insofar as it becomes the object of ethnographic analysis, and it is clear that within the framework of this project, an ethnography museum, which is to say an institution that holds ethnographic collections, is itself, to some extent, “ethnographied” just as a population might be. Acknowledging this difference, there is no reason to apply the prefix ethno-, from the Greek ethnos, meaning people – although we could consider a muse-um’s position personified as a moral entity. In addition, there is a term from academia for studies in which museums are the subject: “museology”, known in the Anglo-Saxon world by the phrase, “museum studies” (Mairesse & Desvallées 2005: 149).

It is equally important to note that the term “ethnography” no longer satisfies many pro-fessionals today, but is used in this project to simply encompass the entire range of institu-tions holding ethnographic material. “Ethnography” is a term that can seem pejorative, es-pecially when applied to populations that are considered as “other” – meaning generally, those not originating in the West. Once we accept that any human population can be the subject of ethnographic study, there is clearly no problem with calling a population an eth-nic group and subjecting it to descriptive analysis. Like “fetish”2, the expression “ethnic group” must either be used globally or abandoned altogether3. Both could and should be used in the context of researching Western societies, but by a strange phenomenon, perhaps stemming from a form of blind arrogance, or even a superiority complex, many use these ex-pressions only in describing non-Western communities or individuals and, of course, this limited use is no longer acceptable.

1 Thecollections,however,areindeedAfrican.2 AsoutlinedintheFetish Modernityexhibit(Bouttiaux&Seiderer2011)andasdescribedinthat

context(Bouttiaux2011:155-156).TheexhibitwasoneofthecollaborativecreationsoftheEthnography Museums and World Culturesproject.Eachofthepartnerinstitutionscontribut-edsomethingfromtheircollections(objects,archives,images,videos,etc.)andtheexhibit,originatinginTervuren,travelledtoPrague,Vienna,Leiden,andStockholm.Basedonthesesameitinerantcollections,theMuseo de AmericaofMadridofferedtheiraudienceapersonal-isedversion,adaptedfrom,butdifferentthan,theonedevelopedcommunally.

3 Liketheconceptoffetish(deSurgy1987,1993;Latour2009;Pietz,2005;Tobia-Chadeisson2000),thatofethnicity(Amselle&M’Bokolo1999;Amselle2010;Bermanet al.2004;Chrét-ien&Prunier2003;Storr2009)hasgivenrisetoanumberoftextsexploringwhyitissome-timesproblematic.

C3 Anne-Marie Bouttiaux

I won’t examine the term “museum” that, within the framework of observations, analy-ses, and solutions we decided to concentrate on in the European project, sometimes proves difficult to vindicate because it powerfully alludes to an institution corresponding strictly to a Western environment, and as such, to a certain form of elitism4.

During the project Ethnography Museums and World Cultures, the primary working themes were modernity, first encounters, and diasporas. Discussions on diasporas were in-tended to provide a cross-referential theme during all workshops and be the specific subject of meetings such as the one that occurred in Stuttgart in 20115. This theme is also focused on in another European project, “Read-Me”, a European network of diasporas’ associations and museums of ethnography, initiated in Tervuren and presently continued by the Pigorini Museum in Rome. Despite our best intentions, diasporas as a meaningful cross-referential theme still appears not to receive enough of our collective attention. At this point, I would like to revisit this important discussion, well before the launch of RIME, as a viable network in itself. Perhaps it would serve our purposes to once again return to the notion of “contact zone” initiated by James Clifford more than ten years ago (1997). Is it true, as Robin Boast stated in 2011, that this contact zone couldn’t be other than a failure due to the intrinsic neo-colonial nature of the museum itself?

There are dozens of ways of re-thinking the vital role of public and private ethnography museums and other institutions that house ethnographic collections.

- One may consider these collections from the heritage point of view with all that con-cerns its collecting, preservation, display, storage, restoration, loaning, de-accession-ing, repatriation, etc.

- It is instructive to analyse the public’s point of view with its various needs, attractions, and opinions, especially when perceptions and cultural assumptions tend to perpetuate stereotypes while simultaneously expecting new information about the populations who created the objects on display and being appreciated6. The audience is increasingly hard to please, often requiring interactive games, extravagant spectacles, and other gimmicky entertainment to hold their attention. Museums must take these expecta-

4 SeeBourdieu1979:254,593.5 An “Inside” View: Participation in Ethnographic Museum Projects and Exhibitions in Europe Seen

from an Indigenous Perspective.ThematicworkshopoftheEthnography Museums and World CulturesEuropeanprojectheldinStuttgart,October24-26,2011.

6 SeetheexampleofChiefly Feasts: The Enduring Kwakiutl Potlatchexhibitin1991attheAmer-icanMuseumofNaturalHistory,whichretainedthenameKwakiutltosatisfy“publicfamiliar-ity”(Masco1996:840).CanadianKwakwaka’wakwIndianshadbeeninvitedtoparticipate.TheyexplicitlydemonstratedtheiroppositiontotheobsoletenameusingasignthatreadWho Are We?,attheexhibitentrance,explainingtheywerecertainlynotKwakiutl,anamegiventothemby“whitepeople”(Mascoid.:839).Therewasneverthelessapositiveinformativeout-comeinthiscase,insofarasthemuseumoptedtomaketheargumentpublic.


tions into account, if only for political and economic reasons. It’s therefore not uncom-mon for the contrivance staged to quench the thirst for appealing images, to verge on the histrionic. The museum as “amusement park” is in itself problematic, but it becomes especially troubling when it must incorporate living cultures, which is by definition the task of institutions possessing ethnographic collections.

- Much can also be gained by dissecting scientific research perspectives that are inextri-cably linked to the collections and to the political climate within the museum institution itself.As we’ve experienced during our previous meetings, what is learned through these ob-

servations provides essential fuel for healthy debate, however, a continuation of these dis-cussions, rehashing what has already been analysed many times before, may not at this juncture advance our cause. Perhaps you will have surmised by reading the summary of this presentation for the Rome colloquium, that instead of offering a general reflective overview of previous discussions (as may have been expected from me as head of this project), I have chosen for the moment, to focus on another more pressing concern.

Considering that we still have 12 months of work and reflections to reap the benefit of, it seemed more useful to return to thoughts on members of the “diasporas” – constituents that most of our institutions have difficulty integrating and that often initiate what seems to shift from denial to paternalist incorporation into a museological system, without ever really coalescing into a situation that encourages mutual benefit and respect.

Often, this well-intentioned, yet forced situation reveals a palpable discomfort that I would like to explore here.

I propose that the origin of the problem stems from the conflation made between citi-zens (what we usually call, in Europe, people from the civil society), and people from the sci-entific community, as if when we are speaking of diasporas, both could be merged. For this reason, people from the diasporas often fulfil functions on both sides with a legitimization awarded by the fact that they belong to a source population (which, without further muse-um studies, couldn’t be enough to participate at all levels of involvement in the museum’s activities).

This conflation is only made when speaking of diasporas. Indeed, the confusion doesn’t operate when applied to a Western public – that is, museum visitors who might have opin-ions to express concerning their experience of exhibitions (temporary or permanent) being presented for their viewing pleasure. That audience retains its position as citizens. Their opinions are taken into account, subjected to statistical analysis, and used as the basis for re-considering those tasks undertaken for the public’s interest. Beyond this passive input, the general public does not confer any sudden right to intervene directly in the museum’s pro-


ductions or research7. For that right, one must follow a specific path, which leads from a kind of apprenticeship and familiarisation with the disciplines involved (as concerning pub-lic displays), to a formal position in one of the museum’s scientific departments (as concern-ing scholarship).

All museums involved in this European project made notable efforts to incorporate, on various levels, foreign nationals belonging to what we call now, source communities. It’s not my intention here to criticise these efforts: they all have honourably extended good will and addressed a sincere desire to engage with these communities. These are certainly necessary steps to install a collaborative system that achieves our objectives. I would prefer to explore the factors that so often plague this kind of project, threatening to derail them into the per-nicious environment of good intentions.

In assessing the relative successes and failures of planned interactions with source com-munities from the diaspora and elsewhere, one observes – whether we like to hear it or not – whiffs of condescension, of guilt, of paternalism, and neo-colonialism. Suddenly, the old and dangerous notions about categorization based on physical anthropology reappear. Not that which concerns any human body studied from the angle of this discipline, but rather the miasma that gave rise to racist theories, and which it is claimed, no one wants to broach any more (Fassin 2008, 2010). Indeed, isn’t it enough to come face-to-face with a dark com-plexion to catapult this person into an African or Oceanic universe? Without taking into ac-count facial features, skin colours, or hair textures, which we hasten to associate with spe-cific continents or regions (Ndiaye, P. 2008: 217), sometimes only an outfit, or an accessory seen in a specific context, gives rise to abusive and reductive amalgams. As if the reflection we are supposed to have as reasonable beings doesn’t allow us to imagine meeting a person of African origin (because objectively black-skinned) without being aware that he might never have set foot on that continent, and might share more with another culture (one which he has lived and grown up in) than any found in Africa. Inversely, a white person met in an African country will be immediately linked with non-African origins even if his background, and that of his forebears, is set in Dakar or Cape Town. However brutal it might seem, the vast majority of inhabitants on this planet continue to make such unsubstantiated and in-appropriate projections (Barlet & Chalaye 2010; Ndiaye, P. 2012: 205-228). Furthermore, al-most every human being does it automatically, as demonstrated by the experience reported by N. Stanley, reacting to the sight of someone who might be Asmat or Dani, attending an Indonesian performance at the Field Museum in Chicago in 1991 (Stanley 1998: 12-15).

7 Formuseumswhichalsoincorporatedivisionsofscientificresearch.


My account of the Asmat and Dani performance up to this point makes a tacit

assumption, that they are strangers in Chicago. They are, at best, exotic visi-

tors whose presence is the result of the largesse of some benefactor. Such an

assumption is odd in at least two ways. Firstly, one only has to consider the ge-

ographic origins of the population in this Midwestern capital to recognize that

many people from the Pacific already live here. Secondly, Melanesians live

with contemporary expectations of the modern world in Irian Jaya as much as

anywhere else. (Stanley 1998: 14)

What is interesting about these phenomena is that they sometimes give people who have pre-viously been wrongfully categorised for various reasons, a sense of entitlement in speaking of a culture of origin that they have, in certain cases, hardly known, if at all. There appears several reasons for this impulse – justifiable or not – including the good will all anthropolo-gists will recognise from their field work, which consists of not wanting to let someone down, or of having (admittedly honourable) pride in belonging, or having belonged, or having par-ents who belonged, to the population under discussion. Certainly these affects are analysed by cognitive sciences, but shouldn’t be given a value that wouldn’t, otherwise, exist.

We have reached a point in which “pure” identity is no longer reasonably observable (if it ever was). The term identity is so problematic that some people suggest replacing it with “identification”, which has wider potential. This term allows individuals to present them-selves (and be received) with the nuances suited to their own perception (Brubaker & Cooper 2000: 14-17). They are no longer trapped in an identity or difference that classifies them in a sterile category. This is exactly what François Jullien denounces (2012) in identities stigma-tised as otherness. He emphasises the gap rather than the difference. This gap produces a “be-tween”, putting it in tension to permit a fruitful reflection rather than a morbid fixation on difference that tends to categorise without subtlety8. It is nevertheless legitimate and desira-ble for some to claim an identity (whatever it is and for whatever reason), even if it involves the danger of valorisation and thus exclusion. Valorisation and exclusion are always at stake, for example, in the United States when measuring the percentage of Indian (cf. Native American Indians)9 or African10 blood to allow or prohibit a certain kind of belonging to a group. A strik-

8 SeealsoBancel,Bernaultet al. 2010:32;Storr2009.9 SeeQuantum Leap: Does “Indian Blood” Still Matter?;asymposiumorganisedinWashingtonat

theNationalMuseumoftheAmericanIndianonSeptember16,2011,inthecontextofanex-hibitiontitled,RACE: Are We So Different? atWashington’sNationalMuseumofNaturalHisto-ryfromJune18,2011-January8,2012.AlsoseeGaroutte2003;Gonzales&Kertész&Tayac2007;Hagan1985.

10 PhilipRoth’snovel,The Human Stain(2000)describesthis.SeealsoDavis2002;ParkerRoyal2006;Parrish2004.


ing example exists in the Certificate of Degree of Indian Blood that identifies certain artists as Native American or not, within a growing and lucrative native art market. The Certificate demonstrates how arbitrary such notions are, even as they remain crucial for access to cer-tain educational, cultural, and economic resources (Fadden & Wall 2011: 35).

(…) the representation of identity is always already in an unfinished state,

marked by the stain of subjectivity. (Parker Royal 2006: 139)

All these disturbing complexities must be taken into account when considering our inclina-tion to work with source or diasporic populations. It has become clear that the academic mi-lieu prefers to avoid confrontation – whether from displaced prudishness, atavistic guilt, or the need to remain politically correct. Sl. Zizek points out that political correctness is limit-ed in the sense that «it imposes a series of rules about the content of our statements», but doesn’t modify our “subjective positioning”, which is precisely what needs to be completely overthrown (2012: 139). Though probably, the debate lies elsewhere because, as highlighted in D. Parker Royal’s quote, this specificity of identity, which is always an on-going quest and is marked by subjectivity, cannot be questioned (in the sense that there is no question of de-nying an individual the right to proclaim the identity which best suits him). The problem arises when the statement becomes an automatic guarantor of knowledge.

Most of the time, what appears to happen in museums, is the formation of a consortium (in Europe, we call that a consultative group) of museum staff with a high degree of exper-tise and education in museology (at least we hope so), interfacing with people from diaspo-ras or source communities, most of whom are citizens from the general public.

For clarification, it’s necessary to state – after Robin Boast in his contribution called Neo-colonial Collaboration: Museum as Contact Zone Revisited – that these consultative groups are in-formal ones; they don’t have the same legal authority granted in the United States (2011: 57).

At times, this kind of relationship is useful in providing a direct transmission of the public’s hopes and desires for the institution they’re visiting. Theoretically, my first reaction would be to ask why the civil society, that has been given (even temporarily) a right of ex-pression in relation to the ethnography museum, should be drawn primarily from within the domain of the diaspora or as members of source communities? In order not to step on anyone else’s toes, here’s an example close to home: why then couldn’t a Belgian citizen, with a passionate interest in Africa, be given the same opportunity to participate in consultative critique as members from African diasporas? Why couldn’t he join them? Does the fact that they originated in these diasporas ensure an inherent legitimacy to introduce more perti-nent or decisive opinions on museum activities?


Furthermore, most people invited from source communities are asked for advice or in-put that I would qualify as “pseudo-scientific”. They are encouraged to give information on objects, to participate in selections, essentially performing work that museum scholars have a right to assert only because they have appropriate and recognised knowledge from years of rigorous education and practice.

This activity is initiated on the pretext of performing an auto-ethnography, as defined by Mary Louise Pratt as a “phenomenon of the contact zone”, and actually, it’s already biased because as she said, “people undertake to describe themselves in ways that engage with rep-resentations others have made of them” (Pratt 1991: 35). In this context, auto-ethnography would only have scientific relevance as “ethnography” if the information gathered is realised by people from source populations who use the same scientific methodology; I would say who share or who can analyse and question the “rhetoric’s of value” established by the insti-tution11. This “rhetorics of value” is precisely what transforms the museum in a heterotopic location, as defined by Michel Foucault, as a parallel space; a space other; “a kind of utopia effectively realised” (Foucault 2001: 1574; 2009). Any anthropologist who has worked with scholars belonging to the source populations he is studying knows how much those shared references are useful and allows for the direct transmission of knowledge through a dia-logue based on professional expertise and skills; even if, in the European academic environ-ment, the perception of “indigenous anthropologist” continues to evidently incorporate a disturbing oxymoron (Clifford 1997: 79).

This doesn’t disqualify any interest for those auto-ethnographies presented by mem-bers of civil society, because they bring another type of information: more personal, emo-tional, and specifically relating to their life experience. The importance of their input is de-rived from the competences of other disciplines: sociology, history of migrations, psychology, etc., but not necessarily of anthropology – or perhaps anthropology, but then as part of the fields associated more closely to cognitive sciences.

In anthropology we need field research, analysis of data and knowledge from studies al-ready conducted or published within this domain, and comparison between field investiga-tions and interviews.

At this point, I would like to describe an event which I not only witnessed, but which I, to some extent, instigated, and that allows us to see the traps, as well as the advantages, of what I will call “home” anthropological research, in the sense that the source population is invited into “our territory”, rather than the other way around (where anthropologists go in search of individuals belonging to the societies they wish to study). Note the permanent im-

11 ToreferencethisconceptdevelopedrecentlybyC.Kratz,2011;alsoseehercontributioninthispublication.


balance in situations of research or observation wherever they take place. There are always driving forces, not just financially, but conceptually as well. No population I’m aware of has ever invited an anthropologist to “come study us”. If that situation has ever existed, it’s cer-tainly exceptional. There is, however, sometimes a request, desire, or need to produce and sell manifestations of one’s identity, but this is generally determined by invitation and most often includes full financial support from the host institution. As J. Clifford points out: «Dif-ferences of power, control, and design of budgets determined who would be the collectors and who the collected» (1997: 195).

On the occasion of the exhibition I curated in 2009, Persona. Masks of Africa: Identities Hidden and Revealed, a group of Central Pende dancers (from Southwest Democratic Repub-lic of Congo) were invited to perform with masks. The performance took place on May 16-17, 2009, and was one of the events produced as part of the “Read-Me” project, financed by the European Commission and co-organised by African diaspora organisations and the Africa Museum (RMCA).

It should be noted that, today, the Central Pende no longer use their masks except for secular celebrations and festivals, during which the dancers demonstrate their choreo-graphic and theatrical virtuosity12. The male initiation rituals, which would once have been the masks’ natural environment, ended in the 1980s. Z.S. Strother’s work on the subject (1998) describes the last initiation, at which she managed to be present.

Among the invited dancers, one in particular (A. Kibala) was especially passionate about every aspect of masks and their performance. He even created a community museum in Gungu (where the annual Pende festivals take place) that housed a collection of masks and other Pende cultural objects. His acquired knowledge on this heritage was impressive and worth highlighting. We decided to organise a conference in collaboration with diaspora as-sociations and the education service at RMCA, facilitating the sharing of his knowledge by complementing it with that of a scholar. To accomplish this, I asked an anthropologist and curator from my division to prepare a slide presentation and work with A. Kibala to plan a public session that would offer useful information about the past and present use of masks by the Pende. The scholar I invited was V. Baeke, an anthropologist who had conducted field-work for years in Cameroon. At the museum, she also studied extensively several DRC pop-ulations, while relying on the groundwork of other scholars. Regarding the Pende, she had already read, analysed, and compared written material, including documents created by the Pende themselves, anthropological publications, reports written by colonial administrators, soldiers, and missionaries, and had published several essays in 2011 and 201213. That is, she

12 Theatrical,inthesensethattheypresentvariousrecognisablecharacters.13 Baeke2011;2012.


accomplished what is required of researchers who seek historic information in the archives. Additionally, she was frequently in touch with Z.S. Strother (known for her fieldwork in the region and subsequent publications) and exchanged notes with her in a spirit of collegiality. Z.S. Strother never considered Pende research to be her personal bailiwick and it is worth noting her generosity toward V. Baeke throughout the process. The all too often encounter of some anthropologists or art historians considering “their” field of research a form of in-tellectual property has, it appears to me, an incongruity reminiscent of Leopold II’s person-al ownership of the Congo!

All this to express my high esteem for V. Baeke and her work. I also recognise A. Kibala’s contribution on a contemporary understanding of how masks are used by the Pende of the central region (to differentiate them from the Pende living geographically further east).

The conference took place in a convivial atmosphere with each contribution enriching the other so meaningfully that despite the story I’m about to share, I cannot lament the ex-periment in any way. However, during her presentation, V. Baeke showed a photo of an his-toric Eastern Pende mask and explained the way it was used in performance based on pre-vious publications by Strother, de Sousberghe, etc. A. Kibala disagreed with her in a peremptory manner, citing his personal experience. V.B. specified that the object was an Eastern Pende piece no longer in use, and her Congolese interlocutor entrenched himself behind the legitimacy of his Pende identity. V.B. retreated quietly from his adamant ad-vance and the conference was able to continue without much of a ripple. So far, so good … I privately noted that it was clear to what extent analysis on the basis of archives, documents, and ideally field research were needed to complete the data that individuals from a society might share with an anthropologist.

At the close of her presentation, however, when the f loor was opened to questions, there was an angry remark by someone from the Congolese diaspora, who claimed that the small incident we had witnessed proved how important it was for such conferences to have mem-bers of the source community present to correct the nonsense that “whites” churned out about populations to which they don’t belong. And the stunned audience, astonishingly, nodded in agreement! To this day I regret not having intervened to open up the dialogue to-ward a more balanced understanding, as I remain convinced that V.B.’s data was well-found-ed. The conference was instead brought to a hurried close with the excuse that it had already run late. I recall speaking about it at length with K. Ndiaye, an anthropologist and member of the diaspora associations with whom we were working14, who was also offended by the treatment V.B. had received and which, based on the evidence, she hadn’t deserved, given how respectfully she had, in turn, treated her interlocutor.

14 Seehiscontributioninthisbook.


Relating this story isn’t an attempt to suggest that this kind of experiment isn’t worth the effort, but rather confirms that a visit from an invited group of Pende certainly shouldn’t inhibit us from going to DRC to compare the information gleaned “at home” with that which other willing participants can offer locally. Likewise, contrasting information accumulated in libraries, with that held in the memories of those who were in the field before us and had direct encounters with other people and representatives, remains essential.

I am not trying to cast doubt on the value of these workshops. I believe more should be organised and indeed expanded to address these delicate areas of interpretation. Classroom discussions like this will never replace fieldwork15, and scientifically conducted fieldwork must be carried out by trained anthropologists and art historians, hopefully including aca-demics from source populations. Claiming legitimacy on cultural identity alone, however, is absurd. It is worth asking ourselves if this kind of acquiescence arises from a sense of guilt, that however justified, is to my mind, not likely to be resolved in this manner.

In August 2012, in Santa Fe, New Mexico (USA), I received a leaflet describing the Twelfth Annual Native Cinema Showcase, organised by the Smithsonian’s National Muse-um of the American Indian and the Southwestern Association for Indian Arts, including an introduction by the following authors (reproduced below, exactly as it appeared in print):

Kevin Gover (Pawnee)

Director, National Museum of the American Indian

Bruce Bernstein, PhD

Director, Southwestern Association for Indian Arts

I couldn’t help noticing that Kevin Gover’s Pawnee identity was emphasized over his aca-demic credentials: as I discuss above, any expression of identity has its own justification, however, it’s rather the striking imbalance I perceived between the two that stood out. Even if it’s perfectly appropriate to proclaim legitimacy through ethnic identity in the context of a native Indian film festival16, it’s startling to see then, “Bruce Bernstein” followed by an ac-

15 Knowingthatthefielditselfincessantlyundergoesprofoundandconstantchange,andthere-forecanneverbesufficientonitsown.

16 Andalsobecause,asNancyMithloconfirms,«inclusionoftribalaffiliationsisastandardprac-ticeacrossNativeNorthAmerica».Shealsoinsistsonthefactthatamongnativeartistssomeprefernottostatethetribalaffiliation«becauseoftherestrictiveconnotations»andforsomeothers:«it’sapointofhonor»;allstatementsthatIplaceinthe,alwayslegitimate,«expressionofidentity»(NancyMithlo,personalcommunication).ThechallengehereisnottodiscusshowKevinGoverwouldhavelikedordoespresenthimself;it’sreallytoemphasizethefactthatthiskindofunbalancedpresentationoccursfrequently,provokingaweird,uncomfortablefeeling.AddressingBruceBernsteinonthatspecificissueduringtheannualfeastdayatSantaClaraPueblo(12August2013),heansweredthatitwasnothisresponsibilityandaddedironicallythat,wouldhehavebeenresponsibleforit,hewouldhaveplacedhisnamefirst(probablycon-


ademic affiliation as if the two could be equally interchangeable. It’s even more surprising, given that Kevin Gover is himself a well-known academician, professor, and scholar, and could surely have furnished his own academic titles, instead of, or in addition to.

Much like R. Philipps (see also her contribution to this volume), who discusses in a pre-vious article, notorious cases in which researchers not belonging to source populations were suppressed, as if the inability to claim such an affiliation were a defect (2003: 165) – I find myself extremely perplexed by such positions. She notes that the museum prefers to mini-mise the role it played in colonialism’s onerous history, and offers the relevant example of the Nitsitapiisini exhibition, dedicated to the Blackfoot Indians, that they themselves helped to organise at the Glenbow Museum, which:

(…) having pulled off a superb, fully collaborative exhibit, wanted to silence its

own role out of some misconceived belief that the inclusion of the non-Natives

who contributed ethnographic and museological knowledge and skills

throughout the duration of the project would have undercut the exhibit’s au-

thenticity as “truly” Blackfoot. (Philipps, ibid.: 165)

Why must we arrive at such extreme solutions? As if the only means of re-establishing the truth, to offset stereotypes generated in the colonial context, was to resort to another type of extreme position, the essence of which, dilutes the collaborative effort. Couldn’t we, in-stead, propose analyses and displays aligned closer to reality that are initiated by peer schol-ars17, whatever field of research, cultural origin, or “identity”?

Some believe this ideal goal cannot be reached without first allowing the subjectively positive presentation of those whom colonial history has soiled and bullied. In the “Read-Me” project devoted to diasporas and to their relationships with ethnography museums, K. Ndiaye expressed concern that he might not be capable of an objective enough approach to his own society. He explained that he would find it difficult to resist presenting the Manja-ku (Guinea-Bissau, Senegal) in a predominantly positive light, if only to counterbalance the fact that they had so often been subjected to disrespectful and simplistic interpretations. K. Ndiaye’s remark, given from a critical distance and with acute dialectic analysis, under-scores the inevitability of biased discourses that some refuse to accept or consider. Muse-ums, in attempts to affirm credibility they fear to have lost, or which they indeed already lost when they were installed as champion standard-bearers and imperial showcases for coloni-al enterprise, prefer to play the card of acquiescent compromise. Nevertheless:

sideringthealphabeticalorder)!17 Idon’tmeanpeerscholars,necessarilybasedonacademicaffiliation,butmuchmoreonexpe-

rience,competencyandskills(seebelow).


(…) the collaborative paradigm is founded on a need to deconstruct the singu-

lar, distanced, and depersonalized authority of the modernist museum, but

the deconstruction remains incomplete when museum fails to disclose their

processes fully. (Philipps, ibid.: 165)

Taking relevant testimonies into consideration, a contradiction arises, as if belonging to a source community automatically legitimates an intervention that requires, in theory, a spe-cific education reinforced by scientific rigor18 (Clifford 1997: 79). As a result, this activity rais-es many questions and creates experiences of unprecedented risk, as in the case of the Na-tional Museum of the American Indian (NMAI) in Washington, where the mission is to show Native American Indians avoiding the usual stereotypes19. This stage is perhaps necessary for restoring the self-esteem essential to all human communities; an esteem that was abused and vandalised by unacceptable oppression that remains secretly active even today, whatev-er steps have been taken to minimise it. Furthermore, there is probably not enough distance to resist emotionally charged judgments compromising reason, as could be seen during the painful controversies linked to another institution created to address the tragedy of Sep-tember 11, 2001. Organisers of the National September 11 Memorial Museum, intent on pre-senting the facts in the most objective way possible, suggested including photos of the ter-rorists responsible for the attacks on the World Trade Center. They were challenged, especially by family and friends of the victims who interpreted this gesture as a personal in-sult and an insensitive attempt to prolong their pain. Surprised, the organisers explained their point of view: «You don’t create a museum about the Holocaust and not say that it was the Nazis who did it»20.

Because ethnography museums, by definition, work with collections belonging to living cultures frozen as objects exhibited in showcases, I sometimes feel as if we are still commit-ting acts of extreme violence (Bouttiaux 2012: 35). To soften the blow, should we, therefore, offer only idealised images? Nothing could be less clear.

The ability to reason is formed from within. Any human being has the capaci-

ty for reason, however, this ability must be modelled. The emergence of reason

(Bildung) is activated through disciplines. The disciplines through which rea-18 Consideringscientificrigor,seealsotheessayofOlivierdeSardan,2008.19 Whichofcoursewasanecessity,butasAmyLonetreeanalyzed(2006a,b,c),theresultwasn’t

convincing,creatingnewmisunderstandingsbytheuseofasometimesobscurepostmoderndiscourse(ibid.2006b:640),avoidingsensitivethemeslikethe500yearsofgenocideandthestillproblematicinherentpoliticalviolencetowardNativeAmericanIndians.

20 J.Daniels,CEOoftheNationalSeptember11MemorialandMuseumFoundation,quotedbyP.CohenintheNew York Times,June3,2012,p.1and20-21.


son is built are themselves schools of thought. They are the product of a proc-

ess of transindividuation at the heart of which the individual thought experi-

ments from the researchers who marked the history of these disciplines,

constitute a body of knowledge shared and reviewed by a community of peers,

and recognised as such. (Stiegler 2012: 246)

The professional skills and expertise evoked above need not necessarily be exclusively aca-demic, of course. That said, however, specific credentials are usually needed to get a job in a museum and there is no valid reason, besides a kind of reverse discrimination (always dubi-ous), that members of a diaspora or source community should not be held to the same pro-fessional standards when applying. Alternatively, outside of conventional academic careers, there exist many independent scholars who followed paths outside the university, whose value is judged by the quality of their work, ideas, publications, and in the context we are concerned with here, exhibits they’ve organised and/or curated. Based on their contribu-tions, these independent scholars are often considered “academics” by others in the field, and respected as such.

Increasingly, in a developing trend that is proving to be quite rewarding, it is artists, musicians, and writers who are introducing fresh and thoughtful approaches that they then transform into museum installations. These projects, undertaken in partnership with the host institution’s staff or independently of them, as in the case of site-specific commissions, are often conceptually engaging and provocatively challenging, asking much from their au-dience. Here, I name but a few recent examples in the US involving the artists Fred Wilson, Willie Cole, Nick Cave, Radcliffe Bailey, and José Bedia21, or those created on a smaller scale, but no less promising, undertaken at RMCA in Tervuren with Chéri Samba, Sammy Baloji, and Patrick Mudekereza22. One must recognise that in many of these experiments, the in-fluence of the institution inevitably recalls J. Clifford’s reservations (1997) concerning an ob-vious and inherent imbalance. This negative influence is more radically addressed in R. Boast’s troubling assessment on neo-colonial attitudes still embedded in museums today. Some would argue that the first five artists are “born and bred” Americans (Cuban in the

21 Mining the Museum: an Installation by Fred Wilson,April1992-February1993,MarylandHis-toricalSociety,Baltimore;Fred Wilson: Objects and Installations: 1979-2001,October2001-January2002,UMBCFineArtsGallery;Anxious Objects: Willie Cole’s Favorite Brands,October2007-January2008,MontclairArtMuseum,NewJersey;Meet me at the Center of the Earth. Nick Cave,March-July2009,YerbaBuenaCenterofArts,SanFrancisco;RadcliffeBailey:Memory as Medicine,June-September2011,HighMuseumofArt,Atlanta;Transcultural Pil-grim/ Three Decades of Work by José Bedia, September - January2012, FowlerMuseumatUCLA,LosAngeles.

22 Chéri Samba moto na Tervuren,May-September2003;Congo Far West. Artists in Residence.Sammy Baloji & Patrick Mudekereza,May-September2011,RMCA,Tervuren.


case of Bedia), and therefore probably didn’t experience the same kind of tensions as artists birthed and raised in Africa. Of course, I’m not debating the identity they’re claiming, given the subjective elaboration I discussed above and because it’s clear that they chose to animate their work with their African “roots” and heritage, thus reinforcing it with a sensitivity fo-cused on this self “identification” (see page ##). Regarding the tensions – less because of their nationality than because of their status as international celebrities – these artists prob-ably navigate more freely, enduring less abuse within the burdensome bureaucratic weight of museums.

As R. Boast points out, an insidious form of neo-colonialism indeed persists. As I previ-ously mentioned, in many museums we still observe a tendency to treat members of diaspo-ras and source populations in a condescending and paternalistic manner. The power dy-namics that J. Clifford alludes to, as well as the logic of exploitation and reciprocity, truly are entwined in the system, but on this point, we should add that they exist whether or not one is a member of a diaspora. Every curator or scholar associated with museums could relay dozens of stories illustrating the frustrations suffered, the tensions inflicted, and the obli-gations imposed according to a persistent hierarchical model. Economic and political pres-sures must be taken into account and are continuously at work, generating constraints, rules, and duties (Kratz & Karp 2006: 14; Bennett 1988, 2006). While the proportions may vary slightly from one institution to another, there is not one that escapes these restrictions, or whose staff is not indoctrinated into a system that imposes their strict compliance. Un-like universities, where scholars seek to retain their free will and freedom of expression in pursuing their work, museums offer less fertile ground, notably because it’s necessary to maintain a level of production destined for the general public.

Some will likely accuse me of not differentiating sufficiently between diasporas and source populations, with the understanding that the latter are theoretically still engaged in the culture of origin, while the former are included, even if not fully integrated, into West-ern culture through immigration by choice or by circumstantial deracination. It is true that in some experiments undertaken by museums or other institutions involving source popu-lations, there are invited individuals who travel, for a limited time, to participate in a specif-ic event. They may provide information about objects in a collection, take part in a perform-ance showcasing their identity, create a work of art, or participate in any other activity for which they are welcomed as representatives of identity X. The distinction, even if one intui-tively senses it to some extent, sometimes seems unfair to me and is, in any case, not always justified. Why couldn’t citizens of diasporas around the world claim membership in a source population and act accordingly? N. Stanley’s thoughts on the presence of a Dani or Asmat audience member watching a performance conducted by other Indonesians is enlightening.


He challenges his own assumption that this person comes straight from the village. Why couldn’t he have lived, in this case, in Chicago or elsewhere in the United States for years? Ac-tually, it’s common when dealing with these “exotic shows” to see artists from abroad asking relatives or acquaintances (who are immigrants already settled in the host community and thus identified as “diaspora”), for help or for participation in the event. How should we ad-dress Native American Indians who are in fact “at home”, while marginalized and treated as a kind of diaspora (often because they are displaced in reservations), but also as a source population called upon for the needs of science and entertainment? How should we then re-ceive people who “reinvent” their culture and identity in their homelands to satisfy tourists’ desire for exoticism? They could also occasionally be ready to travel to the West to perform, even if they are urbanized within their own country and embracing a different religion than displayed in their spectacles (Comaroff & Comaroff 2009, Hall 2006). What kind of values could these arbitrary categories advance in a largely globalised world in which one journeys easily from one continent to another, from one country to another, and from the rural to the urban? For our purposes, the last example of rural and urban environments is naturally the most relevant, since our expectations of source populations – without daring to say it – is to exhibit lifestyles distinctly different from our own. Unfortunately, we have not yet finished being tangled in our contradictions!

It appears to me that two distinct issues haven’t been taken into consideration enough: first, the right to express an opinion about museum activities that anybody from civil soci-ety should possess, and second, the conviction that members of source populations auto-matically command the skills to make interventions in museum productions.

I observe from both sides, a weakness which consists in having a scientific staff employ-ing almost no one from source communities with education and working experience (in-deed, it’s rare that qualified people from diasporas are incorporated in scientific staff), and a consultative body from the civil society that lacks local (indigenous23) representation (which nevertheless are the primary visitors).

The contact zones as first characterised by Mary Louise Pratt, and then by James Clif-ford in the more specific context of museums, didn’t offer the results that had been hoped for, not only because they are asymmetric, but also because they are, in the final analysis, only contact zones. Which means when the contact is completed, the current that was devel-oped during the interaction disconnects, as if switching off a light, and the resulting rela-tionships tend not to continue into the future (as explained by R. Boast in his 2011 contribution).

23 Thatisanynativeinhabitant.


R. Boast directs blame toward the unfailingly, neo-colonial nature of the museum that leads to contact zones that are “not really sites of reciprocity” (Boast 2011, 63), as James Clif-ford also noticed, but are:

(…) despite the best efforts of people (...) asymmetric spaces of appropriation.

No matter how much we try to make the spaces accommodating, they remain

sites where the “Others” come to perform for us, not with us. (Boast 2011: 63)

As if the museum could never rid itself of this denigrating substrate that harnesses people from diasporas and source communities into stereotypical roles, rarely considering them as full partners. In this context, their presence becomes a kind of ethnic token whom we devel-op and organise contact with (contacts that we hold up and celebrate), but not yet in most cases, collaborations with long-term sustainable objectives. Still, we speak of “us” and “oth-ers”, which will continue to undermine our motives as long as ethnography museums give presentations of the world as if our Western world was not part of it. It’s the deep-seated, in-herent nature of some museums that must change or they will remain colonial history mu-seums, not to say neo-colonial (museums that perpetuate and reinforce the domination of one people over another).

This is why I believe that carefully chosen members of the diasporas should participate more substantially in our reflections, so as not to squander the capital of those qualified specialists originating from within these populations who can knowledgeably offer indis-pensable exchanges and meaningful contributions from the side of the scientific communi-ty, within the framework of this project (civil society is much more considered in our other “Read-Me” European project, now conducted by the Pigorini Museum in Rome).

What we need today is to go beyond contact zones to acquire insertion zones functioning with the same criteria of exigency and quality for any applicant who would like to be active-ly involved in these zones.

In conclusion, I will leave you with these photographs and the metaphor they illustrate that perfectly symbolise the figurative arena we still occupy today.

This obelisk, erected in the heart of Santa Fe in 1868 (Fig. 1), continues to commemorate, in a “native” Indian zone, the victory of “imported” Americans upon those that are called “native”. The inscription incised on the north side of the monument reads: To the heroes who have fallen in various battles with ______ Indians in the Territory of New Mexico (Fig. 2). Before the word “Indians”, one can see a chiselled void where the word “savage” once was inscribed. This alteration offers a startling piece of evidence about what people don’t dare to say any


more24. The monument, as a whole, has a disturbing presence projecting out of the centre of what were once Indian lands. The inscription faces directly toward the New Mexico History Museum across the street, housed in the 15th century adobe building that was once the Pal-ace of the Governors, the northern most seat of Spanish government in the King of Spain’s “New World” empire. To this day, Puebloan jewellers, potters, and weavers sell to tourists un-der the portal facing the obelisk. In this context, erasing “savage” seems too much about su-perficial political correctness25 and at the same time not enough to express outrage over present-day marginalization of first peoples who are a substantial percentage of the popula-tion inhabiting this geographic zone. It apparently proves that it’s not yet possible to look at

24 FromAugust18-December31,2011,aspartoftheCounting CoupexhibitorganizedbyRyanRiceattheMuseumofContemporaryNativeArts(MoCNA)inSantaFe,aneventcalledFill In The Blank,askedthepublictoquestionthespaceleftbythesuppressionofthewordsavagebyfillinginpostcards.Morethan1,500peopleappeartohavetakenpart.CoryKratzandTomJoycepersonalcommunications,2012.

25 It’simportanttonoteherethatthiserasureappearstobethesubversivestatementofanac-tivistandshouldperhapsbeconsideredas“performanceart”(NancyMithlo,personalcommu-nication). Inmyopinion, theappropriateanswer,bothscientificallyandhistorically,wouldhavebeentorestorethemonumenttoitsoriginalstatewiththeword“savage”re-inscribed,controversialindeed,butreflectingacommonviewpointfromthepast.Asaresult,thepoliti-cal“correct”superficialitycomesfromthefactthatiswasonlymaintainedinitspresentstate.Afullypoliticalcorrectness(alwaysquestionableofcourseseep.##)wouldhavebeentore-movethemonumentaltogether,whichwasinfactrequestedbyNAACP(NationalAssociationfortheAdvancementofColoredPeople;Mitchell&Staeheli2005:361-362).

Fig. 1. Santa Fe, obelisk. Fig. 2. The inscription.


this past with a distanced indifference. Rather than becoming an historical monument commemorating an impassioned situation, this obelisk illustrates an account about a zone where contact was made without insertion and immersion, a zone that the dominating pop-ulation of the time claimed as a battle won against their foe.

For me, this represents an appropriate analogy for postmodernism, with its multilay-ered contradictions that are simultaneously visible when scrutinised, and yet still hidden in the shadows, due to an ingrained familiarity that offers invisible shelter to these inconsist-encies … but this will be saved for another debate!

Author’s acknowledgment: I would like to express my deep gratitude to Tom Joyce who spent many hours reviewing the English translation of this text.

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Biographies

Anne-MArie BouttiAux, PhD, is Chief Curator and Head of the Ethnography Division of the Royal Museum for Central Africa in Tervuren, Belgium. An anthropologist and art histo-rian, she has conducted extensive field research in West Africa, especially in Ivory Coast, Guinea-Bissau, Mauritania, Niger, and Senegal. She has organized many exhibitions, in-cluding Persona; Masks of Africa; Identities hidden and revealed (2009); GEO-graphics: A map of Art Practices in Africa, past and present (2010); and Fetish Modernity (2011). She led two ma-jor collaborative projects funded by the European Commission: Africa. Museums and Her-itages for which Audiences; READ-Me – European Network of Diasporas Associations and Eth-nography Museums, and she now leads a third one, Ethnography Museums and World Cultures intended to launch an International Network of Ethnography Museums (RIME).

Steve Bourget is currently Director for Research and curator for the Americas at the Museum of ethnography in Geneva (MEG). Prior to this position, he was Associate Professor in the Department of Art and Art History at the University of Texas. Bourget has directed many archaeological projects in Peru, and is currently conducting a long-term research program at the Moche monumental site of Dos Cabezas in the Jequetepeque Valley. For the reopening of the MEG, he will present an exhibition on Moche rulership, Mochica Kings: Divinity and Power in Ancient Peru (June 2014 - January 2015). His latest publications include Sex, Death and Sacrifice in Moche Religion and Visual Culture (University of Texas Press, 2006), and The Art and Archaeology of the Moche (University of Texas Press, 2008). He also recently curated an exhibition on Ancient Peru at the Musée du quai Branly, Sex, Death and Sacrifice in Mochica Religion (March 9th - May 23rd 2010).

Pietro CleMente is Chair of Cultural Anthropology at the University of Florence. His focus is on migration and Italian subaltern cultures, with special attention to popular arts and oral traditions. He investigates museums and museography, and collaborates on projects on the relations between anthropology and contemporary arts. His area foci are in Tuscany and Sardinia. He is President of the Board of Simbdea (Società Italiana per la Museografia e i Beni Demo-Etno-Antropologici), the Italian Society for Museum and Heritage Anthropol-ogy. Since 2002, he has co-edited the periodical Antropologia Museale, and since 2003 he has directed the scientific journal Lares. He is also member of the Directing Board of var-ious scientific committees for museums and research centers. Among his circa 200 sci-entific publications, are his two volumes on museums: Graffiti di museografia antropologi-

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