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In addition, her collections include some material increasingly under threat, this case study can pro-
made by other groups but used by those Kelabit vide valuable insights into the way in which humans
who still live in the forest environment. This mate- in one particular context perceive and interact with
rial is also of the rural world, however, and items their environment.
used by the Kelabit but which are part of a wider,
urban, globalized economy are not included in the
collections. The book, on the other hand, does
acknowledge and describe this aspect of the Kelabit’s Grasping Museums: Three New Museum Studies
material world, recording the ways in which such Anthologies
objects were valued in their superior practicality and Reinventing the Museum: Historical and
also their use in the expression of status. Contemporary Perspectives on the Paradigm
In a chapter on irau feasts, at which high status Shift. GAIL ANDERSON, Editors. Walnut Creek, CA:
couples display their wealth by providing food and AltaMira Press. 2004. Pp. xii, 402.
drink for others in large quantities, Janowski dis-
Museum Studies: An Anthology of Contexts.
cusses how such feasts had changed by the late
BETTINA MESSIAS CARBONELL, Editor. Malden, MA:
1980s. Death feasts were no longer held and mega-
Blackwell Pub. 2004. Pp. xxxiii, 640.
liths no longer erected for the dead. A new type of
feast had come into being, accompanying ceremonies Grasping the World: The Idea of the Museum.
such as those when a couple’s first child was pre- DONALD PREZIOSI AND CLAIRE J. FARAGO, Editors.
sented to the community and the parents acquired Burlington, VT: Ashgate Pub. 2004. Pp. xxiv, 804.
new parental names. Chapters such as this one and
others on the longhouse itself, the importance of the
hearth, Kelabit agriculture and another on clothes, PETER H. WELSH
hair and personal adornment, provide a broader Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ
context in which to view the collections of material.
The collections were clearly not made for exhibi- Three substantial anthologies pertaining specif-
tion, but as an ethnographic record, and there is an ically to museum theory and practice were pub-
underlying sense of “salvage ethnography.” Some lished in 2004. Taken together, they offer a range
material was commissioned, which represents items of perspectives about the foundations and futures
still used but no longer normally made, for example. of museology. One indication of the diversity of
The implication is that the relationship which the approaches is that out of the 135 articles included
Kelabit have with the forest is inevitably changing, in the three volumes, comprising over 1,800 pages,
and Janowski discusses the effects of the introduction only three of the selections appear in more than one
of Christianity (the fact that the religion has been volume, and none appear in all three (tables of con-
embraced is itself in part a result of the Kelabit atti- tents for each of the anthologies can be found on-
tude to the forest, the source of “life force,” now seen line). All three of the anthologies represent, each in
by many Christian Kelabit as deriving from God), and its own way, how museums came to take their pres-
the availability of objects from outside the Highlands. ent form and position in society. Each of the books
Despite these changes, the wild forest remained cen- could be useful as a classroom text, and each has its
tral to the Kelabit world view and to Kelabit identity place in a personal library.
in the 1980s. The implication is that logging in the Anderson’s anthology, while having the most
Kelabit Highlands, which began in the 1990s, may ambitious title, is the most conventional of the three.
lead to the loss of the Kelabit link to the natural world It brings together works that are fully within the
on which their sense of identity depends. mainstream of Americanist museology, and for that
This is a carefully presented book which will reason alone it offers a useful survey of how those
prove an invaluable guide for museum curators who lead American museums at the turn of the 21st
holding collections of Kelabit material, but it will century conceive of their profession. The volume is
also be of interest to ecologists and anthropologists divided into five parts, with articles grouped around
with an interest in the relationship between people basic institutional “roles”—Relevance, Publics,
and the natural world. With the world’s rainforests Public Service, Objects, and Leadership. Anderson
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68 MUSEUM ANTHROPOLOGY VOLUME 28 NUMBER 1

provides a general introduction to the volume, and “Top-down management” versus “Bottom-up man-
gives a list of additional readings at the end of each agement,” “Focus on past” versus “Relevant and
section. The bibliography that concludes the volume forward-looking,” and “Inwardly driven” versus
is simply a compilation of the short lists of works “Responsive to visitor needs.” These contrasts would
provided as “Additional Recommended Reading” at be equally at home in management assessments of
the end of each of the sections. practically any service-oriented organization. This
Few of the works in Reinventing the Museum will is because the items in Anderson’s list are concen-
be unfamiliar to anyone who has been attentive to trated exclusively within the domain of museum
developments in American museums over the past work that I have called “engagement” without
decade or so; only four of the thirty-four selections attending to the two other fundamental domains of
were published before 1989. Overwhelmingly, these “materiality” and “representation” (see Welsh 2005).
are assessments of the state of the art written by That is, they have to do with relationships that
individuals who are professionally embedded in museums establish with their communities, but
museums. Steven Weil, Harold Skramstad, John they do not address those issues connected, on the
Falk, Lynn Dierking, Chandler Screven, Kathleen one hand, with acquiring, keeping, and displaying
McLean, Marie Malaro, and Willard Boyd are all rep- material culture, or, on the other hand, with employ-
resented. With the exception of Lisa Corrin’s article ing various tropes to create associations between
on “Mining the Museum,” none of the selections objects and subjects.
strays far from the well-worn concerns about Given the title of the book, and the editor’s asser-
improvements in practice that are regularly encoun- tion about the transformation of museums, it seems
tered at the annual meeting of the American appropriate to ask whether the changes in museums
Association of Museums. Steven Weil, with four con- in the last decades do indeed constitute a paradigm
tributions, retains his stature as the principal voice shift, and, if so, do these selections support that con-
of the American museum (no other author has more tention. Paradigmatic change, as understood in a
than one selection). Similarly, three articles come Kuhnian sense, rises from the periphery, not from
from the 1999 issue of Daedalus that focused on the core. Kuhn identified anomalies in “normal sci-
museums with an assemblage of luminaries at the ence” as fundamental to shifting paradigms. When
time (three other authors are represented in both experience and theory get sufficiently out of sync—
Daedalus and Reinventing the Museum). Like so when anomalies eventually overwhelm the capacity
much institutionalized museum literature, these of existing theory to resolve them—we see new par-
works are like young children’s toys—carefully engi- adigms emerge. But paradigms are robust and can
neered to remove sharp edges and subtle colors. The be remarkably resistant to change, so when insiders
tone is reminiscent of much motivational writing— identify, and then identify with, a so-called paradigm
slightly chiding but concluding with an upbeat tone. shift in museums, it seems prudent to scrutinize
Anderson states in her introduction that muse- their motives. Close examination of this anthology
ums have been transformed over the past century indicates the persistence of anomalies that may be
from being “collection-driven” to “visitor-centered.” harbingers of an actual “revolution.” Anomalies are
This “reinvention” is seen in the “general movement apparent in contestations over the possession of col-
of dismantling the museum as ivory tower of exclu- lections that pit museums against new claimants.
sivity and toward the construction of a more socially These are addressed with “deft deliberations”
responsive cultural institution in service to the (Monroe and Echo-Hawk) but do not alter the core
public” (pg. 1). Anderson lays out a set of contrasts assumption of institutional rights to control mate-
by which she distinguishes between “traditional” rial remains of the past. (Karen Warren’s article on
museums and “reinvented” museums. These crite- the ethics of resolving cultural property issues is also
ria are the essentially the same as those which included here, but it is listed with a publication date
appeared in her earlier book on museum mission of 1999, rather than 1989 when it first appeared;
statements (Anderson 1998). Interestingly, taking I note this because it was an important point of ref-
the items in the list by themselves, it would be dif- erence in the deliberations that led to the Native
ficult to recognize anything distinctively museolog- American Graves Protection Repatriation Act
ical about them. They include contrasts such as [NAGPRA] in the early 1990s.) Anomalies are also
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apparent when, time and again, museums seek audi- considered here, it also contains the most selections
ences beyond the educated and privileged segments that are overtly challenging of museums’ role in
of society. Highlighting topics such as “Making post-modern social settings. Where Reinventing the
Meaning Together,” (Silverman), or even developing Museum includes articles that are only mildly crit-
lists of questions museums might use to detect gender ical and never ironic, Grasping the World is fully
or ethnic bias in public programs (“Evaluating the engaged with the broad critique of museums as the
Ethics and Consciences of Museums” by Robert end products of imperialism. However, given that
Sullivan) are examples of responding to circum- the editors are both art historians, the majority of
stances rather than creating a new framework for selections highlight issues that are most prominent
the profession. Being “visitor centered” is indeed a within art museums.
change in museum behavior, but it is as much a The chapters are reprinted from a variety of
response to the necessities of institutional survival journals and books, and all but a handful were orig-
than as a transformation of intellectual purpose. inally written in the 1980s and 1990s. In contrast to
What Anderson sees as a fundamental shift appears Reinventing the Museum, only two of the authors
in the selections more like attempts to resolve anom- represented in Grasping the World appear to work
alies in the existing museum paradigm. As the selec- in museums, with the great majority earning their
tions in the other anthologies confirm, the position of livelihoods in academic settings. A few of the arti-
museums in their social contexts is not fundamentally cles, such as Haraway’s “Teddy Bear Patriarchy,”
different than it has been for the past century. Bennett’s “The Exhibitionary Complex,” and
Reinventing the Museum is most useful for a Clifford’s “Histories of the Tribal and the Modern,”
basic, undergraduate, introduction to the current have had wide circulation and impact. Three of the
state of museums. It may also be useful to museum articles were revised for inclusion here, and two
administrators who are looking for tools to raise were written specifically for this book (“The Genesis
their staff ’s—or board’s—awareness of trends and Early Development of the Royal Museum of
within their profession. Most of the selections are Stockholm” by Magnus Olausson and Solfrid
short, and only a few are conventionally academic. Söderlind, and “Performing Identity: The Museal
The book is less likely to be of interest to those with Framing of Nazi Ideology” by Sandra Esslingen).
a scholarly interest in museums; the majority of the The volume offers clues that it was originally com-
selections are taken from widely available books and piled as a set of seminar readings. Most sections
journals (eight of the fourteen journal selections are begin with one or two selections that establish the
from Museum News and Curator). Someone who is theme, followed by chapters that address topics
preparing to enter the museum profession might with greater specificity. For instance, the section
do better to make sure that the books from which “Observing Subjects/Disciplining Practice” begins
the selections were taken are in their library. with Malreaux’s introduction to his Museum
Anyone who has been around the field for a while Without Walls, followed by a short piece by Foucault
probably already owns the original books and might and several more extended chapters.
think twice before adding this volume to their per- Works selected for inclusion range from key
sonal library. foundational works (“The Museum: Its Classical
Grasping the World is the most dramatically dif- Etymology and Renaissance Genealogy” by Paula
ferent from Reinventing the Museum. It is the out- Findlen, and “Museums and the Formation of
growth of the editors’ work on a graduate seminar National and Cultural Identities” by Annie Coombes
and academic conference, and it is both broader in [both are also included in Museum Studies]), to the
its concept and narrower in its subject. It is broader highly specific (“Museums in Eighteenth-Century
by placing museums in deep historical context— Rome” by Francis Haskell and Nicholas Penny).
looking back to the Sixteenth, Seventeenth, and Many of the articles concentrate on the European
Eighteenth Centuries—as well as by addressing the origins of the idea of museums, and most employ the
conceptual foundations of the institution. According museums as synecdochal symptoms of modernism.
to the editors, their purpose was to produce “an insti- The final section, “Representing Adequately”
tutional critique of museology at large” (p. xi). In includes works by Moira Simpson, Ruth Phillips,
addition to being the largest of the three volumes Néstor García Canclini and Rasheed Araeen, on
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70 MUSEUM ANTHROPOLOGY VOLUME 28 NUMBER 1

treatments of ethnicity in museums. Grasping the lection of papers, reading the collection of texts
World is the only one of the three anthologies to (and thereby the narrative histories explicit or
include illustrations and photographs. covert within) otherwise, as a paratext woven in,
The section introductions are an important through, and against the collection constitut-
ing the anthology, to enable our readers to
contribution to the volume; they are substantial and
consider the consequences of museums and
analytical. Preziosi and Farago treat the sections museology today on their own terms. Taken as
as chapters built to emphasize a particular theme. a whole, the volume articulates a critical histo-
The six sections/chapters are: Creating Historical riography of the institution of the museum and
Effects; Instituting Evidence; Building Shared of museology—and inevitably, of art history
Imaginaries/effacing Otherness; Observing Subjects/ itself. (pp 7–8, italics are in the original)
Disciplining Practice; Secularizing Rituals; Inclusions
and Exclusions: Representing Adequately. In their Such overly embellished and aggrandizing lan-
commentaries, the editors reflect the skeptical guage is annoying, but it is a minor annoyance in
ambivalence that is prevalent in the academic cri- relation to the value of the complete volume. This is
tique of museums. Museums are a symptom—and a collection well suited to a graduate seminar that
hence an entry point for analysis—of the rise of the considers how the early histories of museums have
modernist, enlightenment secularization of Euro continuing relevance for the profession. The most
American traditions in which individualism and significant challenge for a teacher is to translate
commoditization rose to dominance. The selec- these texts so they become meaningful beyond rar-
tions—for the most part—employ museum practices ified academic contexts.
to exemplify more wide ranging social processes. For The third anthology, Museum Studies: An
Preziosi and Farago, like many of the academic crit- Anthology of Contexts takes a middle path between
ics whose work they have selected, entering a the other two. It is the most comprehensive compi-
museum is like opening a vein of modernism’s cir- lation of the three books considered here, with the
culatory system. most temporal and conceptual breadth. Museum
The commentaries are interesting reflections on Studies includes some important 19th and early
some of the themes regularly encountered in criti- 20th century statements by figures such as Peale,
cal discourse pertaining to museums. Questions Agassiz, Boas and Balfour which establish the con-
such as the historical validity of presentations of dis- texts out of which subsequent institutional devel-
placed objects in museum settings, the continuing opments have arisen. It draws on works by art
legacy of exoticism and race in museum collection historians, anthropologists, historians, and sociolo-
and representation activities, and the tenuous and gists, as well as by museum curators and educa-
shifting relationships between subjects and objects tors. Its position as a bridging text is evident in that
in the context of museums are all highlighted and it contains articles that overlap with the other two
explored. The selections that the editors have chosen anthologies while the other two share no selections.
to elucidate these points are relevant and pertinent, Works by John Cotton Dana and Lisa Corrin appear
and show that these sorts of concerns have hovered in Museum Studies and Reinventing the Museum;
around museums since their inception. Paula Findlen, Annie E. Coombes, Carol Duncan,
Where Reinventing the Museum suffers from Alan Wallach, and Donald Preziosi can be found in
unrealized ambition, Grasping the World, is some- Museum Studies and Grasping the World.
times tortured in its pretentiousness. Take, for In addition to being comprehensive, Museum
example the guide to readers in the editors’ general Studies is the most deliberately designed to char-
introduction: acterize the field. For instance, the selections are
organized into a number of sections—Context,
In their present context [this anthology], these Nature, Nation, History, Audience, and Art—but
texts are deployed in juxtaposition to a series of
Carbonell provides an alternative arrangement of
editorial commentaries that both link and mark
differences between the texts, and serve as cat- the titles—sort of an alternative table of contents—
alysts and work points for further discussion. At that reorganizes the selections according to topics
the same time, each essay is intended to func- of Museum History, Museums in Theory, Museum
tion as an anamorphic patch in the overall col- Practices, and Museum Poetics (in this”Alternative
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71

Taxonomy,” most of the selections are listed several Carbonell offers an overview of her approach
times). Carbonell provides concise introductions to to the anthology in a general introduction. Her
each of the sections in which she summarizes how aim, as set out in general introduction, is to
each selection contributes to the theme of the sec- approach the collection and presentation of texts
tion. In addition, the book includes an extensive and much like a curator, equating her anthology to a
useful index—an unusual and welcome feature in “Museum of Museology,” and a “retrospective
an anthology. The section listing the contributors group exhibition.” Highlighting the multifaceted
offers a sentence or two summarizing their career and multidisciplined aspects of working in and
and lists a number of their publications beyond the studying museums, she asserts that “the rhetoric
one from which the selection was chosen. And finally, of museology relies on the same four poetic ‘master
Carbonell has assembled a well-organized and rel- tropes’—metaphor, metonymy, synecdoche, and
evant bibliography that offers direction for students irony—identified by Kenneth Burke in A Grammar
wishing to pursue topics further. of Motives” (p. 6–7). She finds that Burke’s con-
Museum Studies includes 53 selections that sideration of irony, in particular, “proves useful in
span time, discipline, and continents; they range in the analysis, as it may be in the actual construc-
length from just one or two pages, to over twenty tion of museum narratives and modes of display”
pages. The earliest selections include Peale’s call, because it “promises to temper the inclination to
in 1792, for assistance in establishing a national be overly constructive (metaphor), overly reduc-
museum, and J.C. Robinson’s assessment, in 1857, tive (metonymy), or overly simplistic (synecdoche).”
of the direction museums and collections might Here, while she acknowledges them, Carbonell
take. The most recent are analyses of museum prac- glosses over the obstacles of employing an ironic
tice from 2000 and 2001. As might be expected, the mode in museum settings. As Carbonell notes,
bulk of the chapters were originally written in the Burke recognizes in irony the potential for high-
1980s and 1990s. Carbonell has included works that lighting dialectical qualities in representations,
consider the development of museums of art, of revealing how representations always stand in jux-
history, of natural history, and anthropology. Some taposition to their negation. Such a dialectical view
useful contributions are those by Susan Crane can activate the agency of the subject. An ironic
(“Memory, Distortion, and History in the Museum”), stance can be effective as a way of displacing an
Curtis Hinsley (“‘Magnificent Intentions,’ Washington, expected system of meanings and highlighting
D.C., and American Anthropology in 1846”), and incongruity. However, when irony is deployed in
Carol Duncan and Alan Wallach (“The Universal museums without attention to the implications of
Survey Museum”). A number of chapters address institutional power relations, it can become an
issues of museum development in India (“Museum instrument of oppression (Welsh 1999). Irony
Matters” by Gyan Prakash), Africa (“Museums requires that all parties are able to manipulate the
Without Collections: Museum Philosophy in West meanings at play, and without substantial reflexive
Africa” by Malcolm McLeod), as well as Europe and investment irony can easily backfire when deployed
the United States. I appreciated seeing examples of across differences in interest, outlook, wealth, and
work by Maurice Berger (“Zero Gravity”), Georges power (Schildkrout 1991 [included in this volume];
Bataille (“Museum”), and Mary Bouquet (“Thinking Riegel 1996; Butler 1999). I raise this point not so
and Doing Otherwise: Anthropological Theory in much as a criticism, but as a caution. In fact,
Exhibitionary Practice”). At the end of each section, Carbonell is to be commended for introducing a
Carbonell adds a short “Meditation”—and these sophisticated, yet direct, framework for organizing
include poems by Alice Friman (“At The Holocaust ideas about representation in museums.
Museum”) and James Fenton (“The Pitt-Rivers The most obvious absence, acknowledged by
Museum, Oxford”), an essay by Zora Neale Hurston Carbonell, in this anthology—this is also true of
(“What White Publishers Won’t Print”), and a reflec- Grasping the World—is consideration of the process
tion by Le Corbusier (“Other Icons: The Museums”). of collecting and keeping material remains. Both
Taken together, the selections offer a diverse Museum Studies and Grasping the World attend
overview of the museum field. almost exclusively to the representational domain
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72 MUSEUM ANTHROPOLOGY VOLUME 28 NUMBER 1

of museums. To the extent that the selections in demic critiques and practitioners’ concerns, and
these two volumes are concerned with materiality, taken together they are a well-balanced presentation
it is in how objects and artifacts become transformed of recent thinking about museums. The appearance
by institutional interpretation. Similarly, treatment of these three in the same year could also be taken to
of museums’ engagement with publics is based on be an indication that museums are interesting places
analysts’ ruminations on their personal experiences, to think about, and that the issues and concerns that
not on analysis of data. are played out in museums are interesting outside of
Museum Studies would be a strong foundational the narrow confines of professional practice.
text for an introductory graduate course on the
history and development of modern museums. Just
by including—in an easily accessible format— References Cited
selections such as Boas’s “Museums of Ethnology
and Their Classification,” or Dana’s “The Museum Anderson, Gail, ed.
as an Art Patron,” which show up in course reading 1998 Museum Mission Statements: Building a Distinct
packets as hardly-legible photocopies Carbonell has Identity. In Professional Practice Series. Washington, DC:
American Association of Museums.
provided a real service. But more than that, this
Butler, Shelly Ruth
anthology makes a contribution to the museologi-
1999 Contested Representations: Revisiting into the
cal literature by implementing a vision of history Heart of Africa. London: Gordon and Breach.
and possibility in museums. Riegel, Henrietta
The appearance of these three books, virtually 1996 Into the Heart of Irony: Ethnographic Exhibitions
at once, suggests that the field of museum studies and the Politics of Difference. In Theorizing Museums:
Representing Identity and Diversity in a Changing World.
has attained a stature and complexity that calls for Sharon Macdonald and Gordon Fyfe, eds. Sociological
comprehensive surveys. It is possible that the field Review Monograph; 43. Cambridge, Mass.: Blackwell. Pp.
has attained a level of maturity that warrants 83–104.
compilations of the significant works that define it. Schildkrout, Enid
These texts also show notable diversity in the way 1991 Ambiguous Messages and Ironic Twists: Into the
Heart of Africa and the Other Museum. Museum
that museums are imagined. If titles can be used as Anthropology 15(2): 16–24.
an indication of these different orientations, we Welsh, Peter H.
might conclude that insiders are perceiving tectonic 1999 Scrap Irony: An Exhibit Essay. In City and Society
transformations of their world, while outside Annual Review, 1998, Jack Kugelmass, ed. Washington:
American Anthropological Association, Society for Urban,
observers see museums grappling with becoming
National & Transnational/Global Anthropology.
corporate repositories for contested celebration. 2005 Re-Configuring Museums. Museum Management
These volumes exemplify the divide between aca- and Curatorship 20(2): 103–30.