Learning about museum exhibits and collections from source communities
Academic Year:
2018 - 2019 (June 1, 2018 through May 31, 2019)
Funding Requested:
$489.50
Project Dates:
-
Applicant(s):
Overview of the Project:
In the Museum Anthropology course (Anthrarc 497), students investigate the changing role of anthropology museums from colonial collecting institutions to organizations that collaborate with the communities from which their collections originated, commonly called “source communities.” Students learn about these critical changes in museum practice by engaging with museum exhibits and through a course project in which they examine museum collections and then learn about the cultural context of these objects from members of the source community. The course project focuses on a different museum collection whenever it is taught. In the winter 2019 semester, students are examining a collection of ethnographic objects and related plant materials that were collected from Native Anishinabe communities in Michigan and Ontario during a 1933 project that examined traditional basket-making techniques. This collection is curated by the Museum of Anthropological Archaeology (UMMAA). To enhance the engaged learning in this course, funds are requested to take students on a field trip to the Ziibiwing Center of Anishinabe Culture and Lifeways, the Saginaw Chippewa Tribal Museum. The field trip serves a dual purpose. Students will experience differences in representation, voice, and authority through museum exhibits, as well as learning about the cultural context of the objects in the museum collection they are researching for their course project. Funds are also requested for a small honorarium for a member of the source community to meet with the students and discuss the museum collection from their perspective.