E-reader for the guidelines Care of Collections from Colonial Contexts Guidelines for German Museums Care of Collections from Colonial Contexts Click here for the Guidelines for German Museums: Care of Collections from Colonial Contexts Tis E-reader complements and supplements the guidelines of Care of Collections from Colonial Contexts 2 IMPRINT CONTENTS E-reader 4 CARE OF COLLECTIONS FROM COLONIAL Care of Collections from Colonial Contexts CONTEXTS: AN E-READER TO COMPLEMENT AND SUPPLEMENT THE GUIDELINES Publisher: German Museums Association (German Museums Association) 5 LEGEND OF SYMBOLS USED Copyediting (German edition): CONTEXTA. Dr Anette Nagel and Petra Oerke GbR 6 EXAMPLES FROM MUSEUM PRACTICE Translation: Tradukas GbR 7 Collecting and Preserving Design: MATTHIES WEBER & SCHNEGG 9 Researching Title photo: Provenance researcher Ndzodo Awono with a leopard figurine from Cameroon, 20 Exhibiting and Educating Übersee-Museum Bremen Photo: Volker Beinhorn 36 Returning 60 POLICIES, GUIDELINES AND RECOMMENDATIONS The E-reader is also available in German and French. 61 International Agreements and Declarations 63 Guidelines on the Participation of Indigenous Communities (Indigenous Engagement Policies) 69 State-Sponsored Programmes 71 Museum Guidelines and Recommendations Sponsored by 80 Overview of Further Policies and Guidelines Issued by Individual Museums 84 NATIONAL LEGISLATION 90 DATABASES © German Museums Association, 94 FURTHER READING Berlin, February 2021 99 CREDITS ISBN 978-3-9822232-0-9 CARE OF COLLECTIONS FROM COLONIAL CONTEXTS: LEGEND OF SYMBOLS USED AN E-READER TO COMPLEMENT AND SUPPLEMENT THE GUIDELINES Tis E-reader complements and expands on the Guidelines for German Museums. COLLECTING INT INTERNATIONAL EXAMPLES FROM Care of Collections from Colonial Contexts, 3rd edition 2021. It is intended as a more MUSEUM PRACTICE detailed supplement to the hands-on toolkit provided by the Guidelines. Drawing on examples from museum practice, policy guidelines and legal provisions, it provides museum staf with a comprehensive insight into how museums in Germany and PRESERVING DE GERMAN EXAMPLES FROM MUSEUM around the world are working with collections from colonial contexts. PRACTICE Te frst section comprises a selection of brief examples from all areas of museum practice in handling collections and human remains from colonial contexts and ofers museums some ideas for their own work; the texts contain links to websites RESEARCHING INTERNATIONALE AGREEMENTS AND providing further information. Te E-reader also presents a series of practical DECLARATIONS examples on the return of collection items from Germany and other countries to the countries of origin. EXHIBITING GUIDELINES ON THE PARTICIPATION OF Te second section of the publication goes into greater depth, ofering information INDIGENOUS COMMUNITIES on national and international policies, guidelines, recommendations and legal provi- sions that are relevant for museums. It concludes with an overview of the online da- tabases of various museums as well as some recommendations for further reading. EDUCATING STATE-SPONSORED PROGRAMMES Te E-reader is available in German, English and French and can be downloaded from: museumsbund.de/kolonialismus RETURNING MUSEUM GUIDELINES AND Tis accompanying publication makes no claim to completeness and will not be RECOMMENDATIONS updated. All the information and links are those current on 22 July 2020. Te German Museums Association would like to thank all the institutions that have OVERVIEW OF FURTHER POLICIES AND actively supported the compilation of this E-reader with examples from practice. GUIDELINES ISSUED BY INDIVIDUAL MUSEUMS 4 5 7 GO TO CONTENTS COLLECTING AND PRESERVING NETHERLANDS Words Matter Guide INT Nationaal Museum van Wereldculturen, Amsterdam, Berg en Dal, Leiden, 2018 Analogous to the Rijksmuseum project (see below) the Dutch Nationaal Museum has compiled a brochure devoted to museum terminology. In addition to short entries on EXAMPLES FROM MUSEUM PRACTICE use of language and choice of words in a museum context, which are designed to pro- vide information and sensitise people to this issue, Words Matter: An Unfinished Guide Te following is a list of examples from museum practice of how collections from to Word Choices in the Cultural Sector contains the beginning of an alphabetical list of colonial contexts are being handled in Germany and other parts of the world. Its sensitive words. It describes the contexts in which these have been used in the past or focus is on collecting and preserving, researching, exhibiting and educating as well are used today and suggests more appropriate terms. as returning collection items. Wherever possible, links to websites ofering further in- formation are provided and contacts and cooperation partners named. Te projects, Adjustment of Colonial Terminology exhibitions and examples of returns of collection items are arranged chronologically Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam, since 2015 starting with the most recent ones. A research team is evaluating the museum’s terminology, concentrating initially on object descriptions and labels. In its exhibitions, publications and audio guides and on its website, the museum’s approach is to try to use the language of the present without falsifying history. Words that Europeans once routinely used to describe oth- er cultures or peoples and that may be perceived as insulting are being re-evaluated and where necessary replaced by less racist terms. Te project is taking the same approach to the digital registration system and is evaluating the use of anachronistic language and descriptions written from a Eurocentric perspective. Te team com- prises twelve curators who are in regular contact with other curators, information specialists, museums and interest groups. 3 Rijksmuseum Terminology Rijksmuseum Removing Racially Charged Terms From Artworks’ Titles and Descriptions, artsbeat.blogs, 2015 6 7 7 GO TO CONTENTS USA RESEARCHING File under: Indigenous DE Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, Massachusetts GERMANY INT This project evaluated the terminology of the library catalogue with regard to pre- Research projects approved by the Deutsches Zentrum Kulturgutverluste (German judiced and European/Western terms for Indigenous communities and compiled Lost Art Foundation): suggestions for more inclusive terminology. 3 Gregory Younging, Elements of Indigenous style: a a Guide for Writing by and Das Glas vom Gleis – Archäologie der Bagdadbahn unter kolonialen Vorzeichen about Indigenous Peoples, Edmonton, Alberta, 2018 (Glass from the Tracks – Archaeology of the Baghdad Railway in a Colonial Context) Römisch-Germanisches Zentralmuseum, Mainz The Anchorage Project Provenienzen von ethnographischen Objekten in Mittelhessen (Provenance of Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History (NMNH), Ethnographic Objects in Central Hesse) National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI), Anchorage Museum of Oberhessisches Museum Gießen and Philipps-University Marburg History and Culture, 2010 Provenienzforschung in der außereuropäischen Sammlung Tis project is part of the exhibition project Living Our Cultures, Sharing Our Herit- der Universitätsmedizin (Provenance Research in the Overseas Collection of age: Te First Peoples of Alaska, in which around 600 objects from the NMNH and the University Hospital) NMAI are being permanently loaned to the Anchorage Museum and thus returned University of Rostock to their region of origin. Tis ofers conservationists an opportunity to focus on the Koloniale Provenienzen der Natur. Der Ausbau der Säugetiersammlung preparation of objects made by Native Alaskans from the skin of whales, seals, wal- am Museum für Naturkunde Berlin um 1900 (Colonial Provenances of Na- ruses and sea-lions. In this context, comprehensive studies of this material are being ture: the Expansion of the Mammals Collection at Berlin‘s Natural History carried out by various specialist disciplines and Native Alaskan experts in order to Museum around 1900) raise awareness and improve the treatment of this exceptional material. Museum für Naturkunde Berlin 3 Landis Smith, Kelly McHugh, Michele Austin Dennehy, Kim Cullen-Cobb, The Die globalen Handelsnetzwerke der Alfelder Tierhandelsunternehmen Anchorage Project: Gut Decisions in Cultural and Museum Contexts, AIC Objects Reiche und Ruhe (The Global Trading Networks of the Alfeld Animal Trading Specialty Group Postprints, Vol. 16, 2009, pp. 73-86 Company Reiche und Ruhe) Georg-August University Göttingen and Stadt- und Tiermuseum, Alfeld Ancestral Heads and Trophy Skulls from Former German New Guinea. Approaching Provenance and Acquisition of a Collection of Culturally Sensitive Objects at the Ubersee-Museum Bremen Übersee-Museum, Bremen Sensitive Provenances – Human Remains from Colonial Contexts in the Collections of Göttingen University Georg-August University Göttingen 07/2020–07/2023 Contact: Dr. Marie Luisa Allemeyer Cooperation: depends on the respective provenance of the human remains Tis project, funded by the VW Foundation, is investigating two collections of human remains from (proto-) colonial contexts in Göttingen with respect to their origin, the circumstances under which they were acquired, their transfer and their trans- 8 9 formation into “things of knowledge” in academic collections. Te interdisciplinary Confronting Colonial Pasts, Envisioning Creative Futures project uses several diferent approaches: a critical evaluation of history, anatomical Ethnologisches Museum der Staatlichen Museen zu Berlin