Category Archives for Using Collections

Putting Natural History Museums to Work for Human Rights

Written by Henry McGhie, Curating Tomorrow, henrymcghie@curatingtomorrow.co.uk.

Every year, 10th December is commemorated as International Human Rights Day, the date when the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted by the members of the United Nations. This year is particularly momentous, as it is the 75th anniversary of the Declaration’s adoption. What has this got to do with museums? The original Declaration includes a number of commitments (set out in 30 Articles) that are obviously related to the work of museums: the right to education, the right to information and freedom of expression, the right to take part in public affairs, among others. Museums often focus on one (article 27) that gets summarized as being ‘the right to participate in cultural life’, but that isn’t it’s full or proper title or scope: more correctly, it is that “Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits.” Note especially the part about sharing in scientific advancement and its benefits: we will come back to this.

Now, the Universal Declaration is not perfect, it is 75 years old after all, and it reflected a world rather different than our world today. Hundreds of millions of people were still under colonial rule. The environment didn’t feature in the Declaration, as human impacts on the environment were not as massive, and not as obvious. Nevertheless, the Declaration has been supplemented by many additional agreements, many of which have a legal standing. However, the necessity of a decent quality environment has been recognized for decades. Indeed, it has been argued that most or possibly all of the 30 rights in the original Universal Declaration rely on a decent quality environment. Sustainable development really got going in the early 1970s, with the Stockholm Conference on the Human Environment, that recognized that people have a right to a decent quality environment. Fast forward 50 years, to 2022, and that right was finally formally recognized by the United Nations. More recently, the inherent rights of nature have been the subject of court cases and in some cases natural features have been granted rights, which helps protect them and to take polluters to court for environmental damage. 

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How Do You Do Decolonial Research in Natural History Museums?

Written by Jack Ashby, Assistant Director of the University Museum of Zoology, Cambridge.

Subhadra Das and Miranda Lowe’s paper, Nature Read in Black and White: Decolonial Approaches to Natural History Collections (2018) acted as a wake-up call to our sector, effectively founding a discipline in natural history museums. In the five years since, a lot of work has begun to address the colonial legacies underpinning collections of animals, plants, fungi and rocks.[i] The principal aims of this work include telling more honest stories about the different kinds of injustice involved in the acquisition of collections; and addressing the fact that our museums have long been prioritising narratives elevating white individuals over everyone else. In doing so, it is hoped that a greater diversity of people will feel represented by our museums, thereby enhancing the relevance of the collections.

Natural history collections dwarf those of any other museum discipline, and unlike sectors which have been thinking about this for decades, the practices underpinning their creation have not traditionally prioritised recording associated cultural or social histories. Like others who felt inspired by Subhadra and Miranda’s call to action, faced with contemplating how to begin to unpick the stories hidden behind literally millions of ‘scientific’ specimens, it was fundamental to consider the question, where do you start with decolonial research in natural history museums? Obviously, there is no one answer, but I thought it could be helpful to list a few possible approaches. One underlying element is to recognise how colonialism and its framings have shaped the way that events took place – from major historical moments to minute individual acts – and how the stories about these events have been told.

Below is a list of possible starting points for research, with examples of what that could look like in practice (in reality most of these overlap). For me, each has something to say about the entwined human and environmental costs of the colonial project – questions that natural history museums are uniquely placed to address.

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Discovering Treasures in the Depths of the Dagnall.

Written by Ruth Cowlishaw of Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine.

This year marks Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine’s 125th anniversary. The school was the first institute of its kind back in 1898, built to help investigate some of the tropical diseases brought back to the busy port city from shipping expeditions and trade. To celebrate such a major milestone an array of events and activities have been planned by the school, including outreach events and fundraising, whilst also giving us a chance to reflect on our history. One such planned scheme was the distribution of internal funds for exciting projects, proposed by staff members that would make a difference in this very special year.

Mary Kingsley Building, LSTM. ©LSTM

The Dagnall Laboratory situated in the Mary Kingsley Building is the main teaching laboratory for the school. Within its walls it houses many historical pathological and entomological samples, from mosquito wings and blood films to seven-meter-long tapeworms. Throughout the years a selection of these samples has been used to help educate thousands of medical professionals, postgraduate students and armed forces personnel. However, a large part of the collection became forgotten and neglected as specimen preservation skills and staff were lost over time. With news of potential funding myself and the team saw an opportunity to rediscover these “lost” specimens and decided to put together a bid with the aim to reinvigorate our collection. The project not only aligned with the 125 Anniversary theme of Heritage and History but also looked forward to the future.

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Deaccessioning of the Non-Manx Herbarium in the Natural History Collection, Manx Museum.

Written by Laura McCoy, Curator of Natural History, Manx National Heritage.

The Manx Museum, part of Manx National Heritage, is both the national museum and part of the National Trust of the Isle of Man, which is technically not a part of the UK, it is a Crown Dependency. Its collecting focus is to represent the Island and its history, similar to county museums in the UK. No other museum represents our Island better and that is our strength. When accessing our material, researchers are looking for something relating to the Island itself or how it sits in context to a wider geographical area. We are an Accredited museum and, like many others, we have a collections development forum, made up of curatorial and collections management staff, through which any new proposed acquisitions have to be assessed – but this has not always the case. We still have objects within the collection which would not pass our collections development policy today. 

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How to Find Ectoparasites on Study Skins and Explore Natural Heritage Shared between Colonial and Provincial Museums

Written by John-James Wilson, Lead Curator of Zoology at World Museum, National Museums Liverpool & Jing Jing Khoo, Postdoctoral Research Associate at Institute of Infection, Veterinary & Ecological Sciences, University of Liverpool.

Selangor Museum was established in Kuala Lumpur by British colonial officials in 1887. A purpose-built museum building, opened in 1907, was designed by Liverpool-born architect Arthur Hubback, but there is a stronger link between Selangor Museum and Liverpool.

Selangor Museum’s early director Herbert Robinson was also born in Liverpool and had worked as an assistant at the Liverpool Museums, now known as World Museum. Selangor Museum wasn’t a large institution, with just three British curators and three museum hunters from Sarawak, one being Charles Ulok. But through the museum’s work, a European knowledge system was imposed onto the local wildlife.

The museum’s work included extensive hunting on the hill and mountains and islands of Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia. The museum soon ran out of storage space in Kuala Lumpur and specimens were routinely sent to England. Hundreds of specimens were sent to Robinson’s former workplace, World Museum, in 1914.

https://archive.org/embed/from-selangor-museum-to-liverpool

Click link above for 3-minute video about Selangor Museum and its connection to Liverpool made for the Green Representatives Network at Monash University in Selangor.

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