“…As guardians of national historical memory and shared history, museums of national history are commonly perceived as neutral, authoritative and trustworthy (Knell : 4). But, as Aronsson and Elgenius point out, as institutions where historical identity is constructed, aestheticised and represented, national museums should be analysed as ‘manifestations of cultural and political desires’ rather than as ‘straightforward representations of historical or national facts’ (Aronsson and Elgenius : 2).…”
Section: Museums As Sites For ‘Nationalisation’ Of Culture and Historymentioning
confidence: 99%
“…National museums are inherently tied to the political, social and cultural discourses and power structures of the society of which they form part (Palhegyi : 1049) – ultimately, the collections and displays claim, articulate and represent dominant national values and myths (Aronsson and Elgenius : 1). National museums are not only pedagogic ‘cathedrals of science’: they are also ‘normative agents’, directing people ‘what to see, think, and value’ (Luke : 3), and powerful centres for developing and popularising official mythologies about the nation and state (Aronsson ; Knell ; Molyneaux ; Palhegyi ; Tappe ). As Molyneaux reminds us: the self‐consciously selective accumulation of material objects in museums (…) [does] not preserve ‘the’ past; rather each institution provides the structure (architectural and ideological) within which much more specific pasts are conceived, structured, reinforced and promulgated.…”
Section: Museums As Sites For ‘Nationalisation’ Of Culture and Historymentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Beyond contributing to anchoring the nation discursively in time and space, national museums also continuously engage in meaning production – defining and modifying the meaning of museum objects to reflect (and speak to) broader ideological frames. As Knell () reminds us, a museum object is imbued with multiple meanings and can be used as material evidence to represent different epochs and historical narratives. Once the objects are placed in an ideological environment, value and meaning get attached to them, usually through text (wall texts, catalogues, curatorial and political statements, etc.).…”
Section: Nationalising Objects Through Meaning‐creationmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…National museums are inherently tied to the political, social and cultural discourses and power structures of the society of which they form part (Palhegyi 2017: 1049)ultimately, the collections and displays claim, articulate and represent dominant national values and myths (Aronsson and Elgenius 2015: 1). National museums are not only pedagogic 'cathedrals of science': they are also 'normative agents', directing people 'what to see, think, and value' (Luke 2002: 3), and powerful centres for developing and popularising official mythologies about the nation and state (Aronsson 2011;Knell 2011;Molyneaux 1994;Palhegyi 2017;Tappe 2011). As Molyneaux reminds us:…”
Section: Museums As Sites For 'Nationalisation' Of Culture and Historymentioning
To overcome the traumas of the 1992–1997 civil war, the Tajik authorities have turned to history to anchor their post‐independence nation‐building project. This article explores the role of the National Museum of Tajikistan, examining how the museum discursively contributes to ‘nationalising’ history and cultural heritage for the benefit of the current Tajik nation‐building project. Three main discursive strategies for such (re)construction of Tajik national identity are identified: (1) the representation of the Tajiks as a transhistorical community; (2) implicit claims of the site‐specificity of the historical events depicted in the museum, by representing these as having taken place within the territory of present‐day Tajikistan, thereby linking the nation to this territory; and (3) meaning‐creation, endowing museum objects with meanings that fit into and reinforce the grand narrative promulgated by the museum. We conclude that the National Museum of Tajikistan demonstrates a rich and promising, although so far largely unexplored, repertoire of representing Tajik nationness as reflected in historical artefacts and objects of culture: the museum is indeed an active participant in shaping discursive strategies for (re)constructing the nation.
“…As guardians of national historical memory and shared history, museums of national history are commonly perceived as neutral, authoritative and trustworthy (Knell : 4). But, as Aronsson and Elgenius point out, as institutions where historical identity is constructed, aestheticised and represented, national museums should be analysed as ‘manifestations of cultural and political desires’ rather than as ‘straightforward representations of historical or national facts’ (Aronsson and Elgenius : 2).…”
Section: Museums As Sites For ‘Nationalisation’ Of Culture and Historymentioning
confidence: 99%
“…National museums are inherently tied to the political, social and cultural discourses and power structures of the society of which they form part (Palhegyi : 1049) – ultimately, the collections and displays claim, articulate and represent dominant national values and myths (Aronsson and Elgenius : 1). National museums are not only pedagogic ‘cathedrals of science’: they are also ‘normative agents’, directing people ‘what to see, think, and value’ (Luke : 3), and powerful centres for developing and popularising official mythologies about the nation and state (Aronsson ; Knell ; Molyneaux ; Palhegyi ; Tappe ). As Molyneaux reminds us: the self‐consciously selective accumulation of material objects in museums (…) [does] not preserve ‘the’ past; rather each institution provides the structure (architectural and ideological) within which much more specific pasts are conceived, structured, reinforced and promulgated.…”
Section: Museums As Sites For ‘Nationalisation’ Of Culture and Historymentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Beyond contributing to anchoring the nation discursively in time and space, national museums also continuously engage in meaning production – defining and modifying the meaning of museum objects to reflect (and speak to) broader ideological frames. As Knell () reminds us, a museum object is imbued with multiple meanings and can be used as material evidence to represent different epochs and historical narratives. Once the objects are placed in an ideological environment, value and meaning get attached to them, usually through text (wall texts, catalogues, curatorial and political statements, etc.).…”
Section: Nationalising Objects Through Meaning‐creationmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…National museums are inherently tied to the political, social and cultural discourses and power structures of the society of which they form part (Palhegyi 2017: 1049)ultimately, the collections and displays claim, articulate and represent dominant national values and myths (Aronsson and Elgenius 2015: 1). National museums are not only pedagogic 'cathedrals of science': they are also 'normative agents', directing people 'what to see, think, and value' (Luke 2002: 3), and powerful centres for developing and popularising official mythologies about the nation and state (Aronsson 2011;Knell 2011;Molyneaux 1994;Palhegyi 2017;Tappe 2011). As Molyneaux reminds us:…”
Section: Museums As Sites For 'Nationalisation' Of Culture and Historymentioning
To overcome the traumas of the 1992–1997 civil war, the Tajik authorities have turned to history to anchor their post‐independence nation‐building project. This article explores the role of the National Museum of Tajikistan, examining how the museum discursively contributes to ‘nationalising’ history and cultural heritage for the benefit of the current Tajik nation‐building project. Three main discursive strategies for such (re)construction of Tajik national identity are identified: (1) the representation of the Tajiks as a transhistorical community; (2) implicit claims of the site‐specificity of the historical events depicted in the museum, by representing these as having taken place within the territory of present‐day Tajikistan, thereby linking the nation to this territory; and (3) meaning‐creation, endowing museum objects with meanings that fit into and reinforce the grand narrative promulgated by the museum. We conclude that the National Museum of Tajikistan demonstrates a rich and promising, although so far largely unexplored, repertoire of representing Tajik nationness as reflected in historical artefacts and objects of culture: the museum is indeed an active participant in shaping discursive strategies for (re)constructing the nation.
“…While often understood at the popular level as scientific and objective, national museums are better understood as inherently tied to the political, social, and cultural discourses and power structures of the society to which they belong. Not surprisingly, then, they often serve as powerful propaganda tools and centers for developing and distributing official mythologies about the state (Aronsson 2011;Knell 2011;Molyneaux 1994). Furthermore, national museums provide the "scenography and stage" for identity politics in which the individual can discover his or her place within the larger national body, in tum reifying the symbiotic nature of the individual and their national community (Knell 2011, 4).…”
Section: National Museums Nationalization Socialist Yugoslavismmentioning
This article concerns two national museums in Croatia during the socialist period, the Museum of the Revolution of the Peoples of Croatia and the Historical Museum of Croatia. Both state-developed institutions were intimately tied to the process of nationalization as they helped articulate the place of the Croatian nation within the ideology of supranational Yugoslavism founded on the ideas of socialist patriotism, brotherhood and unity, self-management, national assertion, and South Slavic culture and community. This paper therefore traces the development and collapse of Yugoslavism in Croatia's national narrative by analyzing how these museums adapted the mythology of socialist Yugoslavism for a particularly Croatian context. Specifically, this paper investigates the ways in which these museums operated in an often ambiguous national-supranational discourse in order to reinforce the historical precedents of Croatia as part of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. I argue that these museums were envisioned by party elites and museum curators alike as essential to the project of building socialist Yugoslavism by adapting and altering Croatia's previous national pantheon of heroes, places, objects, and events to fit into a larger and distinctly supranational Yugoslav framework.
PurposeThis paper aims to examine the transformation of the concept of cultural tourism within the sociopolitical empowerments, changes of visual realms and normative contexts, which is embedded within museums as institutions.Design/methodology/approachThese discussions will be conceptualized through investigating the shifts in the metamorphosis of the architectural vocabulary of Egypt's museums between nineteenth and twentieth centuries. This analysis will be highlighted through connecting both the notion of the “tourist reflexivity” of John Urry and Jonas Larsen in The Tourist Gaze 3.0 (2011) and the notion of the “interstitial spaces” and “new internationalism” of Homi Bhabha in The Location of Culture (1994). The analysis expands to interrogate these two notions as prelude for reflecting on representations of colonial and postcolonial museums in Egypt, starting from the Museum of Egyptian Antiquities, Cairo (c. 1863) to the most recent, the Egyptian Grand Museum, Cairo (c. 2002).FindingsThe analysis revealed that while colonial museums endeavored to stage external cultural authority and postcolonial ones staged traditions' liminality through “New internationalism”, they created spatiotemporal interstices. This finding, while is a timely example with the rising global cultural encounters that emerged during this transformative age, it challenges the collective imaginations of architects to liberate from traditional nationalism.Originality/valueThe paper offers novel theoretical and architectural analysis of Egypt's museums through the exigency of nationalism and “new internationalism”. The encounter between both notions is a timely example given the recent involvements by the “Modern State” and the recent pandemic upheaval that revealed the inevitability of globalism and the discursivity of such notions.
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