Addressing colonial history and (post)colonial continuities is a major challenge for the Humboldt Forum, and will decisively shape the activities of this cultural institution. This volume features essays and conversations of prominent museum experts from around the world who have supported and advised the Humboldt Forum in its development. Through their statements, they take part in international discussions such as the intense debate about provenance and restitution of ethnological collections.
Includes contributions from George Okello Abungu (Nairobi), Kwame Anthony Appiah (New York), Philipp Blom (Vienna), Hartmut Dorgerloh (Berlin), Rita Eder (Mexico City), Hu Wei (Shanghai), Jyotindra Jain (New Delhi), Lars-Christian Koch (Berlin), Lee Chor Lin (Singapore), Neil MacGregor (London), Natalia Majluf (Lima), Wayne Modest (Amsterdam), Nazan Ölçer (Istanbul), Barbara Plankensteiner (Hamburg), Thomas Thiemeyer (Tübingen), and Abdoulaye Touré (Dakar).
What is the Humboldt Forum's position on globally discussed questions about handling collections from colonial contexts? With the opening of the Forum, this volume is bringing international voices together.
How can western approaches be broken down? How are ethnological objects in European collections perceived in the societies from which they originated? How do researchers gain free access worldwide to archives, inventories and exhibits in museums?
The Humboldt Forum already began dealing with these questions as it was being developed and is supported in this by international museum experts. Berlin's new venue for culture and science presents itself as a forum in the literal sense: a place for diversity of opinion and international debates.