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CAM Bulletin #35 July/August 2016
Tuesday, July 5, 2016                                                                                                                        Unsubscribe
CAM Bulletin #35 July/August 2016
Upcoming Events: Heritage and Nation Building Symposium and Indigenous Heritage Roundtable, June 2017

CAM Publications: Access in Museums in South Asia

CAM Distance Learning Programme

International Museum Day

Anubhav: A Tactile Experience: a special gallery for people with disability
 
Race, Diversity and Politics in Conservation

RE-ORG International: Projects for Collections Documentation and Storage

The Voice of the Child in Museums
 
Book Review: Interpreting Difficult History at Museums and Historic Sites
 
Renew Your CAM Membership or Join
 
CAM Executive Council

UPCOMING EVENTS

Heritage and Nation Building
CAM Triennial General Assembly
Hosted by the
Glenbow Museum and Archives
Calgary, Alberta, Canada
June 19-23, 2017

Tour Blackfoot heritage sites in Southern Alberta, June 19-20 (optional) Indigenous Heritage Roundtable, National Aboriginal Day, June 21 (optional)
Roundtable discussion and Action Plan development:
  • UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples
  • Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s Calls for Action
  • Best Practices for Heritage and Indigenous People Today
Heritage and Nation Building Symposium, June 22-23
Canada marks the 150th anniversary of Confederation in 2017. This symposium provides an opportunity to explore the role of museums and heritage organisations in creating and promoting a national identity with colleagues from throughout the Commonwealth during Canada’s sesquicentennial year. Session themes include:
  • The Road to Independence: museums and heritage organisations’ place in shifting national identities
  • Museums, Human Rights and Identity
  • Participatory Governance: How museums can promote the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
  • Human Remains Management, in collaboration with the Iziko Museums of South Africa
  • Migration: Cities - (Im)migration and Arrival Cities, in collaboration with ICOM CAMOC and ICOM ICR;
  • Use of technology in information sharing about objects and collections
  • Indigenous and scientific approaches to conservation

Glenbow Museum, Calgary

Call for Papers
CAM invites proposals for papers, panels, Ignite! sessions, workshops, posters, and other presentation forms. Interested presenters should send a 300–500 word proposal and a 200-word biography by July 31, 2016 to: Catherine C. Cole, CatherineC.Cole@telus.net; 1-780-424-2229 for more information.

CAM PUBLICATIONS
Access in Museums in South Asia
Organisers of the recent workshop on Access in Museums in South Asia held at the Maharaja Sawai Man Singh II Museum, City Palace, Jaipur, India in March, are preparing a publication of a basic ‘how to’ guide that will address how to conduct an audit, simulate the experience of being differently-abled, and the basic considerations involved in developing an access policy as well as architecture and exhibition design, and artifact interpretation. The publication is being produced in collaboration with ICOM ICTOP and ICOM Canada through a Special Projects Grant from ICOM.

CAM DISTANCE LEARNING PROGRAMME
A new cohort of students will be starting in the Caribbean in the coming months: six students from Guyana as well as students in Barbados and the Bahamas. If you live in the Caribbean and are interested in taking this course, now would be a good time to sign up as we’ll start a private Facebook page so students can all support one another through the course. We welcome new students on an ongoing basis. If you need training in basic museum studies, and would be interesting in participating in the distance learning programme, review the information on our website http://www.maltwood.uvic.ca/cam/programs/distance_learning.html and contact the Secretariat CatherineC.Cole@telus.net.

NEWS FROM COMMONWEALTH MUSEUMS

International Museum Day, May 18, 2016
 
The City Palace Museum, Udaipur
By Bhupendra Singh Auwa, Administrator in Chief


A visitor painting at Moti Chowk, The City Palace Museum, Udaipur, Rajasthan, India on International Museum Day 

Maharana of Mewar Charitable Foundation
Every year since 1977, the International Council of Museums (ICOM) has organised International Museum Day (IMD) which represents a unique moment for the international museum community. On this day, participating museums plan creative events and activities related to the International Museum Day theme, engage with their public and highlight the importance of the role of museums as institutions that serve society and its development.  

The objective of International Museum Day is to raise awareness of the fact that, “Museums are an important means of cultural exchange, enrichment of cultures and development of mutual understanding, cooperation and peace among peoples.” Organised on and around 18 May each year, the events and activities planned to celebrate International Museum Day can last a day, a weekend or a whole week. The theme of 2016 international museum day was Museums and Cultural Landscapes.

The City Palace Museum, Udaipur was set up in 1969 by Maharana Bhagwat Singh ji to safeguard and preserve the cultural heritage and the time honoured traditions of the people of Mewar.

On May 18th the City Palace Museum, Udaipur celebrated International Museum Day with events and activities including:
  • Hilarious mime shows at Baadi Mahal based on the theme of museums
  • Making cultural landscapes of the City Palace, Udaipur at Moti Chowk, in which children and adults both participated and painted on canvas
  • Savour the living heritage flavours of landscape of Mewar, food gallery at the Lakshmi Chowk, Zenana Mahal
Anubhav: A Tactile Experience: a special gallery for people with disability
By Siddhant Shah, MA, Heritage Architect and Access Management Consultant
 

A visually challenged visitor experiencing the carving on a Jain votive tablet during the Tactile Walk with Siddhant Shah at the National Museum, New Delhi. Credit: Siddhant Shah
 
The National Museum of India created a tactile gallery for visually challenged visitors consisting of replicas of 22 rare artifacts, an audio guide with details about each work, and informative labels in braille. The gallery was created with the help of UNESCO, Saksham (an NGO working with blind people), Open Knowledge Community, IIT Delhi, and the National Platform for the Rights of the Disabled (NPRD).
 
I worked closely with Rige Shiba, Joyoti Roy, Vasundhra Sangwan and other members of the outreach and curatorial team at the museum, to write the descriptive script for the audio guides and develop the digital access and interpretation materials for these tactile models. Scriptwriting was extremely stimulating as the aim was to increase access for all visitors, particularly visitors with visual disabilities. The script was carefully edited to make sure the facts and important details were included while highlighting the tactile and physical qualities of the replicas they would be touching.
 
The gallery includes replicas of a 5th century Buddha’s head made in plaster of paris and a miniature painting made using dots on a paper so that the painting can be felt when someone touches it. The objects were carefully selected by the team to interest visitors of all ages and be representative of the museum’s huge collection which covers many centuries and media.
 
I also conducted an access audit of their website and suggested ways to improve digital access and presence. Digital access is equally as important as physical access. One may not be able to come into the museum but if the website is correctly DESIGNED then he/she would be able to have a positive EXPERIENCE.
 
I guess the litmus test was successful as one of the visually challenged visitors very humbly thanked me and said, “For the first time in my life history was something more than a braille reading, it was a treat to touch and hear about these historical collections.”
 
For any details on museum access, please contact shahsiddhant12@gmail.com.  
 
Race, Diversity and Politics in Conservation
By Sanchita Balachandran Curator/Conservator of the Johns Hopkins Archaeological Museum
Excerpts from a talk given at the American Institute for Conservation (AIC) Annual Meeting in Montreal, Canada, May 16, 2016


http://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/local/93klbd/picture29965410/

Nearly every academic discipline has acknowledged that objects have multiple values and meanings, that they embody relationships, histories, memories and identities. But the concept of multiple meanings and resonances of objects is often an abstract one, something left to imagine rather than viscerally experience. In art conservation, we have been slow to recognize that objects are not merely a sum of the materials they are made from, but rather, that their ‘intangible’ values may in fact be as important, if not more important than the tangible heritage we’ve trained to conserve. 

Today, cultural heritage is regularly in the headlines for its destruction, not its conservation. The destruction of archaeological sites and art objects captures the public’s attention rather than the bloodshed, forced migration and trauma of hundreds of thousands of people from these same places. But why do these places and objects matter when there are so many urgent crises? Why is their conservation and preservation needed?

Because cultural heritage, not cultural property, can still be claimed by even those communities that have been traumatized and marginalized, and systematically and legally oppressed and annihilated for generations. As long as a tangible link exists between people and their past, there remains hope for a more just and dignified present and future. As long as these tangible sites and objects exist, there is evidence that people were here, that their histories, their memories and their past mattered, and that they are still here, still matter, and will continue to matter in the future. 

If we believe that conservation has a role to play in pursuing social justice, then it means changing the way we work. It means recognizing that we are stewards of collections through historical and political circumstance; that our authority can be both utilized for the cause of equality, but also abused. It also means that while we may be authorized to physically conserve collections, they and the histories and stories they represent also belong to the people who claim them. Our work has to support and make possible the right of people to tell, sing and perform their own narratives of their own cultural heritage.
Our profession is at a turning point. We can maintain the status quo as the world changes around us, making us even less vital to the urgent concerns of the day. Or we can acknowledge our own past, and begin to think and work differently in the present. What is at stake here is not what conservation is, but what conservation could be.

Conservation in the twenty-first century can no longer just be about objects.  Conservation also has to be about the people whose lives are inscribed on them.

The full text is at: http://www.conservators-converse.org/2016/05/race-diversity-and-politics-in-conservation-our-21st-century-crisis-sanchita-balachandran/  

RE-ORG International: Projects for Collections Documentation and Storage
By Alicia Ghadban, Consultant and Catherine Antomarchi, Collections Unit Director, ICCROM


RE-ORG India: New Delhi, 2011
 
Following ICCROM’s 2011 survey it was recognised that 60% of museum collections worldwide are at serious risk due to overcrowding and poor storage conditions. As a result ICCROM, in partnership with UNESCO, developed RE-ORG – a tool designed to help smaller museums (under 10,000 objects) who do not have access to outside expertise and whose collections in storage are at risk due to incomplete documentation systems and growing concerns related to overcrowding and accessibility.
 
In 2013 at the request of ICCROM’s General Assembly, a wide-scale call for project proposals was launched, and all Member States were contacted to solicit their interest in developing national or regional capacity building projects focusing on storage reorganization. As a result, ICCROM received letters of interest and project proposals from 44 countries, and subsequently launched the RE-ORG International programme. The methodology has since been applied in Argentina, Belgium, Canada, Greece, India, Iraq, and Serbia.
 
In Canada, the most recent RE-ORG project was completed at the Colchester Historeum in Truro, Nova Scotia, as part of the RE-ORG Canada program. Over a three day period, ten professionals joined for a collaborative effort in reorganizing the storage area (30 square metres) containing a mixed collection of about 10,000 objects. Through this joint initiative, they made significant improvements in access and space efficiency with low-cost expenditure. This opportunity allowed each professional to gain practical experience implementing a storage reorganization project so that they may implement one at their own institution.
 
I would personally recommend the RE-ORG framework to any museum looking to improve their collection storage and collections management procedures. Being able to quantify our current condition against a shared scale, and track improvements against standardized metrics was incredibly helpful.
 â€“ RE-ORG Canada (Ontario) participant
 
ICCROM encourages the ‘train the trainer’ approach in order to develop national and regional training initiatives. This practice is essential to the RE-ORG programme as it allows for the development of heritage professionals that can teach and adapt the methodology to various contexts, as well as guide museums in making appropriate modifications to their collections storage.
 
ICCROM, the International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property, is dedicated to the conservation of cultural heritage that exists to serve the international community as represented by its 134 Member States.


RE-ORG Canada: Atlantic, 2015

The Voice of the Child in Museums
By Dr Sue Dale Tunnicliffe, Reader in Science Education, University College London, IOE
 
Children spend more time out of formal school than in. Learning is the acquisition of both skills and facts. It occurs in and out of school. The varied genre of museums contributes to such learning in partnership with the child, their family, friends, carers and their home situation as well as the culture of the country and community in which they live.
 
As a biologist specialising in education I am fascinated by learning opportunities afforded by the wide contents of this museum genre, historical, scientific and cultural, as well as the everyday street and gardens. Moreover we know that children learn about phenomena in their world from the earliest years, they are intuitive scientists. 
 
My fascination is the voice of the child and how they interpret and make senses for themselves from their own knowledge base, of that which they see. Much of my work has been on analysing the spontaneous conversation generated by children in both an ‘informal context’; in out of school visits with family, groups or others as well as in so called 'formal trips’ organised by particularly schools often with defined links to school work.
 
Through years of teaching and researching science, I noticed that some so called leisure visit are often 'formal' in the sense that one adult, often the father, directs the viewing and leads the often declarative, dialogue. Let us recognise such dialogues in our museums, recognise the voice of the child in their spontaneous interpretation of everyday problems and start scaffolding activities to develop their understanding. Science educators talk about children’s science, school science and scientists since; I add ‘my science’ for the child’s own interpretation, collectively similar, hence there exists a children’s science. Surely this also applies to historical, cultural and other collections too? We must listen and act.
 
BOOK REVIEW
Rose, Julia. Interpreting Difficult History at Museums and Historic Sites. Lanham, Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield/American Association for State and Local History (AASLH), 2016.
Review by Catherine C. Cole

Many CAM members deal with difficult history, whether our shared colonial history or histories specific to our own communities or countries.   
 
In Interpreting Difficult History, Julia Rose introduces difficult history as a concept and its growing importance in late 20th and early 21st century museology as museums increasingly embrace their role in not just preserving and interpreting history but as catalysts for social justice, using our awareness and understanding of difficult history to create a more fair and inclusive world.

Ross has developed Commemorative Museum Pedagogy (CMP), an approach to interpreting difficult histories that considers the need for heritage workers to be sensitive to the needs of visitors. She discusses the 5Rs for engaging learners: reception, resistance, repetition, reflection, and reconsideration. Within this approach she introduces three building blocks: the Face, the Real, and the Narrative, to help both visitors and history workers to envision ways they can take action to respond to historical suffering.
 
The book is grounded in her experience at Magnolia Mound Plantation in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, a site that interprets plantation slavery and the challenges faced by staff and visitors in coming to terms with that history.  
 
Do you interpret difficult history at your museum? Please share your experience with CAM members – send a 300 word article and a photograph to the CAM Bulletin, CatherineC.Cole@telus.net.
 
RENEW YOUR CAM MEMBERSHIP OR JOIN NOW!
If you have not renewed your membership since December, it has expired – please renew now! CAM needs your ongoing support. New members are always welcome. Members receive the CAM Bulletin and may participate in the distance learning programme, apply to host an intern at your museum, and receive a discount and are eligible for travel bursaries for workshops and symposia. As part of the international museum community CAM members have a voice at ICOM and in Commonwealth deliberations.
 
Payment is accepted by PayPal, electronic bank transfer or bank draft. Please complete the membership form: http://www.maltwood.uvic.ca/cam/about/membership_info.html.
 
Welcome New Members
Graham Black, Centre for Museum and Heritage Management, Nottingham Trent University, Nottingham, UK; Ryan Shackleton, Know History, Canada; Olja Mladjenovic, Cardiff University, Wales, UK;
Jodi Simkin, Nuyumbalees Cultural Centre, Canada; Moira McCaffrey, Oxford Station, Canada
 
CAM Executive Council, 2014-2017
Welcome to new Council member Dr. Shabnam Inanloo Dailoo, Assistant Professor and Director of the Heritage Resources Management Program at Athabasca University http://heritage.resources.athabascau.ca/. With more than 15 years of experience in heritage conservation theory and practice in Canada and internationally, Shabnam holds a PhD in Environmental Design from the University of Calgary as well as certificates from ICCROM in Conservation of Built Heritage and Communication and Teaching Skills in Conservation and Science. For more info about the CAM Council, go to: http://www.maltwood.uvic.ca/cam/about/current_executive_council.html.
 
CAM would like to thank outgoing treasurer Ericka Chemko for her support over the past few years, first as Membership Secretary and since 2014 Treasurer.

CAM is an Affiliated Organisation of ICOM and an Accredited Commonwealth Organisation.
JOIN CAM
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Contribute to the next CAM Bulletin!
Send news of people and events, or a 300 word profile of your institution by August 15 to CatherineC.Cole@telus.net.
 
CAM listserve
Executive

President: Rooksana Omar, Chief Executive Officer, Iziko Museums of South Africa

Vice-President: Amareswar Galla, Founding Executive Director, International Institute for the Inclusive Museum, India

Treasurer: Shabnam Inanloo Dailoo, Director/ Assistant Professor, Heritage Resources Management Program, Historical Resources Intern Program, Athabasca University (from May 2016)

Past-President: Martin Segger, Centre for Global Studies, University of Victoria, Canada

Members

Lumepa Apelu, Principal Officer, Museum of Samoa 

Richard Benjamin, Head, International Slavery Museum, National Museums Liverpool , UK

Claude Faubert, Museum Consultant, Canada

David Mbuthia, Head, National Museums of Kenya (NMK) Central Region

Kim Outten Stubbs, Chief Curator, National Museum of The Bahamas

Huism Tan, Head, Curation and Exhibitions, National Library Singapore

Mrinalini Venkateswaran, Museum Consultant, New Delhi, India
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