Book Reviews

Abstract

Museums and Source Communities:. Routledge Reader by Laura Peers and Alison K. Brown, eds. New York: Routledge, 2003. 280 pp. Based in Anchorage, Alaska, Dawn D. Biddison is Alaska Collections Project Assistant Curator for the Arctic Study Center (ASC) of the Smithsonian Institution. Her work on the Sharing Knowledge website (http://alaska.si.edu/) and the permanent Smithsonian gallery and learning center planned for the 2010 Anchorage Museum expansion is based on collaboration with Alaska Native Elders, artists, scholars, and tribal representatives.

Colourising the past: Digital visual repatriation of colourised Sámi photography

“…The term visual repatriation refers to the practice of bringing archival photos produced by outsiders (i.e. anthropologists) back to the so-called source communities represented in the photos (Dudding 2005;Edwards 2003;Lien and Nielssen 2021c). Visual repatriation projects have typically implied offline collaboration but may also be set up through digital platforms (Marselis 2017;Marselis and Schütze 2013).…”

“…A typical post includes a colourised photo with an introductory text, or caption, written by Somby, and the original monochrome photo is often included for comparison. The photos are discussed in a manner that resembles forensic readings of offline visual repatriation (Edwards 2003;Lehtola 2021). The participants draw on a broad variety of online and offline sources to contextualise the photos; for example, they may search digitised church registers and commercial genealogical databases, such as MyHeritage, or use Google Street View to name a location.…”

Doing Diversity in Museums and Heritage

“…Unlike organisations in the economic sector, where organisational learning is a tool to increase productivity, organisational learning in the context of museums aims to foster democratisation through participation. (See, for example, Brown & Peers 2003, Dahlgren & Hermes 2015, Lynch 2011, Macdonald 1998, Meijervan Mensch 2012, Mörsch 2009, Runnel & Pruulmann-Vengerfeldt 2014, Sternfeld 2013, Witcomb 2003 The chapter draws on an understanding of museum organisations and heritage as relational and co-produced, as dynamic and complex, as assemblages of people, materialities, practices and ideas , Waterton & Dittmer 2014. Knowledge in organisations is not static, and learning is not unidirectional or dependent on fixed structures.…”