Challenging Ideology: Looking at Historical Museum Practices Through an Indigenous Lens
As referenced in the Truth and Reconciliation’s call to action, museums and archives play a critical role in telling Canadian and Indigenous history, which has not always been accurately told in this country. To do this, museums and archives need to authentically represent the Indigenous voice in museum and archive spaces. In this series, we intend to intersect with Indigenous knowledge and explore Indigenous recommendations and current Indigenous practice used in museums and archives. This series is supported by a grant from the BC Museums Association, which presents the opportunity to focus on synergies and intersections of museums and archives. Presenters include professionals with expertise and interest in museums and archives. The first two sessions provide shared concepts and stories for exploring these themes, while the third event is more interactive.
EVENT GOALS AND OBJECTIVES
The goal of these events is to be a starting point of dialogue for museum professionals to ask and consider how to reflect Indigenous experiences, worldviews, culture, interpretations, and inherent ways of knowing more accurately in a museum setting.
About Part 1 of this webinar series:
This webinar will provide input into what it means to “decolonize museums” from an academic and museum perspective. This panelist session with represent perspective rather than concrete answers. Questions that will be handled are: how do museums portray exclusion? What are steps museums must take to confront a colonial structure and systematic racism? How have museums pondered history of colonial appropriation and cultural restitution?
About this Part 2 of this webinar series:
This webinar will examine the ideology of decolonization as a current movement in museums and archives. This webinar will reflect more on the current activities surrounding decolonizing museums and archives today rather than providing concrete answers. I.e. what are some dialogues relating to decolonizing? Ideologies? Professional insight? What have been some of the most important and impactful changes in decolonizing museums to date? How do the panelists position themselves in this topic and any other relative insights they might have?