Abstract: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 communi… Show more
“…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%
“…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). 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 ).…”
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.
“…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%
“…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). 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 ).…”
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.
“…Therefore, while Croatia was not isolated from its fellow Yugoslav republics when it came to museum practice, many of the ideas discussed in this article can be considered, at least nominally, "Croatian." There was undoubtedly a "Yugoslav spirit" present in Croatian museology as Croatian museologists were often in conversation with their fellow Yugoslav practitioners and theorists, and many of the mythological tropes developed in Croatian museums affirmed the founding myths of the socialist Yugoslav state (Palhegyi 2017). Nonetheless, Croatia often led the way in Yugoslavia in terms of its commitment to museology as an academic discipline and profession, as evidenced by the University of Zagreb establishing the first postgraduate program for museology in Yugoslavia (program in 1966; courses taught as early as 1946), the founding of the Museum Documentation Center in Zagreb (1955), and the establishment of the first museological journal in Yugoslavia, Muzeologija (1953).…”
The communist period for Yugoslav Croatia brought about dramatic changes in museum practice and theory between the early 1950s and late 1970s. Driven by questions concerning how to properly develop socialist museums, Croatian museum professionals sought to transform the bourgeois history museum into a truly popular institution that would make Croatia’s cultural legacy accessible to the masses and allow visitors to understand their place in the socialist Yugoslav imaginary. To this end, museum professionals developed two new museum models, the Revolutionary Museum and the Native Place Museum. Revolutionary Museums were charged with memorializing the founding myths of socialist Yugoslavia, chief among them the anti-fascist, communist revolution during World War Two, and the postwar building of socialism. Native Place Museums similarly reinforced the Yugoslav state by exhibiting local history and culture within the larger trajectory of socialist Yugoslavism. Furthermore, these two models were front and center for new museological experimentation intended to create a distinctly socialist museum space that would engage the everyday working-class visitor. Analyzing contemporary museological journals and museum planning documents, I argue that these museum models were successful in implementing much of the new museological theory, but in doing so moved away from one of the fundamental principles of museum practice: the exhibition and explanation of authentic material culture to the museum visitor.
This study aims to discuss how the state of the Republic of China, which is Chinese-oriented, created the discourse of the national holiday of Peace Memorial Day to reinforce Taiwanese nationalism. Peace Memorial Day was proclaimed to commemorate the tragedy of the state’s massacre of Taiwanese locals on 28 February 1947, usually known as the ‘228 Incident’. Based on resources collected from the two officially sponsored museums, this study explored how the Republic of China government has ‘selectively’ presented the sources of the 228 Incident, reshaping the contested text as part of a mnemonic past shared by itself and society, and on which basis it has developed the cultural discourse embodying Taiwanese nationhood. The research results also suggest that the officially constructed memory underscores the core value of democratisation not only to reinforce the notion regarding the Republic of China as a ‘Taiwanese’ government, but also to mark the distinction between the Republic of China and the People’s Republic of China as two ‘national’ unities.
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.
