Museums after Empire in Metropolitan and Overseas France

New Constellations of Difference in Europe's 21st‐Century Museumscape

“…Although these latter terms are sometimes used in relation to a range of forms of diversity, including those of gender and sexuality, for the most part what is meant are “those ethnically‐marked cultural differences associated with the international movement of peoples” (Bennett :28). While that international movement can refer to that which takes place within Europe, the greatest amount of attention under the cultural diversity label has been directed to those who have moved to Europe from outside it as part of colonial and postcolonial migration (Ford :628).…”

“…While on the one hand, the move from Paris, where the Museum of Popular Arts and Traditions was located, to the country's southern edge could be seen as part of a welcome attempt to decentralize, the placing of this particular museum away from the political center might also be seen as a marginalization of its non‐national perspective within the national political geography. As such, it does not act as much as it might have done to challenge the emphasis on “unity” that Caroline Ford () argues has remained through most of the reorganization of France's museums, including the Musée du quai Branly (MQB). Whether MuCEM will kickstart a broader wave of high‐level attention to European museums of popular arts and traditions, folklife, and folklore remains to be seen.…”

“…UK Prime Minister David Cameron was widely reported as having echoed this in a speech in Munich the following February, with his argument that: “Under the doctrine of state multiculturalism, we have encouraged different cultures to lead separate lives, apart from each other and the mainstream.” Multicultural initiatives, it was being claimed, had failed to lead to a more integrated society in which citizens from diverse backgrounds would feel part of a state that allowed for and gave recognition to cultural diversity. There was even a suggestion by Jean‐Loup Amselle in 1996 (Ford :636) that multiculturalism had fuelled senses of difference and legitimated non‐citizenly participation and values, and that it had contributed to “affirmative exclusion.” “Islam” was at the center of these debates in many countries, including Germany and the United Kingdom (Göle ), though in Hungary and Romania the focus was on the Roma.…”

A palace as legacy: The former French colonial museum – perspectives from the inside

“…1 Indeed, the recent academic and political debates on 'colonial fractures' show that these ambiguities are central to self-understandings as well as understandings of colonial history in France -and of its consequences in contemporary society. 2 Various researchers -in history, the history of art, architecture, anthropology and cultural studies -have studied the Palais de la Porte Dorée: either as a 'vestige of the colonial empire' (Aldrich, 2004;Lebovics, 2004;L'Estoile, 2007) or as one ethnographic museum among others, in the context of 'museums in postcolonial Europe' (Thomas, 2012) or in France (Dias, 2000;Ford, 2010;Mazé et al, 2013). Anthropologists have mainly focused on the movement and successive reinterpretations of the ethnographic collections it has held, especially during the 'moment du Quai Branly' (Le Débat, 2007;Ethnologie française, 2008).…”