Museums and the Formation of National and Cultural Identities

TLDR: In this article, the authors present a case study of the Museum Ethnographers Group discussing the role of museums in the promotion of multiculturalism in the display of material culture in museums.

Abstract: Multi-culturalism has become, albeit belatedly in England, one of the buzzwords of the educational establishment. Exactly three years on from the Swann committee report, optimistically entitled Education for All, and in the wake of the ensuing debates on the relative merits of an initiative that may be 'multi-cultural' but is not necessarily always actively 'anti-racist', the controversy continues.2 By April 1986, multi-culturalism was also on the agenda of the museum ethnographic establishment, at the annual conference of the Museum Ethnographers Group. In addition, specific proposals were advanced that a policy decision be made by the Group concerning dealings with the apartheid regime in South Africa.3 This essay is written then, in the context of what might be interpreted as the moment of a more selfconsciously political conception of the roles available to museums in general. It also comes at a moment of renewed interest in the ethnographic collection as a possible site for academic anthropology's engagement with the multicultural initiative inspired by documents like the Swann Report. Moreover, such an involvement has the potential, acknowledged by both the anthropological establishment and its critics, of redeeming the discipline's tarnished reputation as a product and perpetrator of the colonial process. In order to understand some of the difficulties and contradictions arising from implementing a multicultural initiative in the display of material culture already designated 'ethnographic', I want to elaborate a case study situated at a comparable historical conjuncture in 1902, when the Education Act of that year announced the same objective of 'Education for All'. More specifically, the 1902 Act also made provision for school children accompanied by their teachers, to count visits to museums as an integral part of their curriculum; an early indication of government recognition of the educational potential of such institutions.5 Another effect of this Act was to generate a series of debates within a professional body which is still the official organ of the museums establishment today: the Museums Association.6 The focus of these discussions was threefold: concern with the problem of attracting a larger and more diverse public, proving the museums' capacity as a serious educational resource and, in the case of the ethnographic collections, as a serious 'scientific' resource. While the existence of such debates cannot be taken as a measure of the efficacy of any resultant policies, it does give a clear sense of the selfappointed role of museums within the State's educational programme at this moment. 1902 was a significant year in other respects since it marked the renewal of concerted strategies by both contending parliamentary parties to promote the concept of a homogeneous national identity and unity within Britain. Imperialism was one of the dominant ideologies mobilised to this end. The Empire was to provide the panacea for all ills, the answer to unemployment with better living conditions for the working classes and an expanded overseas market for surplus goods. Through the policy of what was euphemistically referred to as 'social imperialism', all classes could be comfortably incorporated into a programme of expansionist economic policy in the colonies coupled with the promise of social reforms at home. It was in this context that museums and in particular the ethnographic sections, attempted to negotiate a position of relative autonomy, guided by a code of professional and supposedly disinterested ethics, while at the same time proposing themselves as useful tools in the service of the colonial administration. The degree to which the museum as a site of the production of scientific knowledge and as the custodian of cultural property can claim a position of relative autonomy from the vagaries of party politics and State intervention, is an issue central to an understanding of the ethnographic collection's actual and possible role today.