New Caledonia has an unusual linguistic dynamic in comparison to other French overseas territories. While New Caledonia was established as a penal colony in 1853, the other French islands were settled as plantation colonies in the 17th and 18th centuries. In these areas, French Creole is usually the lingua franca and has lower status than French. In New Caledonia, although French has official status and dominates in state institutions, it is the native language of only half of the population. There are 28 indigenous languages and a French Creole, Tayo, spoken mostly in the rural areas. The 2014 census population revealed a multicultural New Caledonian population, it did not however record the rate of multilingualism in speakers. The present study conducted in two stages addresses a gap in the research by focussing on patterns of language use and social attitudes of New Caledonians towards their own multilingualism. The same methodology was used to collect data in both stages of the research so that a comparative analysis could be carried out between urban and rural New Caledonia. This paper focuses on social perceptions of ancestral languages and cultures as well as challenges to their preservation in multilingual spaces, as New Caledonia transitions towards the thorny question of independence in a referendum, expected to be held between 2016 and 2018.Preliminary results from the study show a difference in the language habits between older and younger generations on New Caledonians of Melanesian descent. Although French is perceived as the lingua franca by all, English is more valued than ancestral Melanesian languages by the younger generations. In terms of cultural representations and links with family history, there seems to be a discrepancy between the younger and the older generations. Whilst the older generations perceive the Centre Culturel Tjibaou as a traditional space for Melanesian art and culture their younger counterparts on the contrary view it as a place associated with contemporary art and music performances.
This article examines the challenges associated with collecting and exhibiting objects to represent immigration history. We consider a range of Australian museums, from large federal institutions, for example, the Australian National Maritime Museum (ANMM), to state-based organisations such as the Immigration Museum (IM, Victoria) and the Migration Heritage Centre (MHC, New South Wales), as well as smaller communitybased and council-run museums like Hurstville City Library Museum and Gallery and Fairfield City Museum and Gallery (New South Wales). We analyse and compare various strategies at play in museums dealing with immigration in order to consider the ways that contemporary Australian museums are approaching this important part of national history, taking as a particular focus different models of collecting (traditional collecting, temporary loans and leaving objects in situ). Our research is informed by a study of the existing literature about objects in migration museums and exhibitions together with site visits. It offers an original approach by comparing museums at national, state and local levels in Australia and exploring future directions, such as artistic works and the digital model, which would in our opinion benefit exhibitions in this area. It has been complemented by interviews with key staff in these institutions in order to consider critically the approach and challenges the industry currently sees for itself. First, we consider the role and function of objects within the museum space generally before focussing on their effective contribution to the representation of diverse migrant stories.
This article examines how contemporary war museums represent war and war-making. It looks at and compares the ideas underpinning the permanent exhibitions of two museumsthe Historial of the Great War in Péronne (France) and the Military History Museum (MHM) in Dresden (Germany)-, analyzing examples from the exhibitions to illustrate the argument. It also discusses the architecture of these museums and their respective horizontal and vertical configurations. Our analysis demonstrates that the Historial promotes an anti-war message in the name of European reconciliation whilst the narrative put forward by the MHM allows for the possibility of war. On a theoretical level, it shows that a cosmopolitan mode of remembering, although consensus-oriented, can create surprisingly different political positions whilst suggesting that an agonistic turn in representing war and war-making in the museum, with an onus on multiple, even conflicting, perspectives, can help respond to contemporary challenges related to difficult history.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.