Chipangura, Njabulo and Seabela, Motsane Getrude (2024) Community Collaborations and Social Biographies of Museum Collections from Colonial Contexts: Meanings of Zulu Beadwork. Museum Worlds, 12 (1). pp. 16-30. ISSN 2049-6729
Preview
Available under License Creative Commons Attribution Non-commercial Share Alike.
Download (2MB) | Preview
Abstract
In this article, we look at collections of Zulu beadwork at Manchester Museum and Ditsong National Museum of Cultural History tracing their provenances and social biographies. We present these two institutions as colonial museums founded on similar ideals of presenting objects as cultures of the “other” in absence of object and community agency. In rethinking colonial contexts associated with processes of collecting beadwork, we look at how these museums can be decolonized by collaborating with communities. Decolonization is deployed here as both a theory and a method toward the integration of Indigenous ways of knowing and doing in museum practices. Methodologically, the article highlights decolonial strategies in the form of open, democratic, inclusive, and multivocal engagement that we embraced undertaking the research.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Keywords: | beadwork; collaboration; decolonization; isimodeni; KwaNongoma; materiality; |
| Academic Unit: | Faculty of Social Sciences > Anthropology |
| Item ID: | 21505 |
| Identification Number: | 10.3167/armw.2024.120103 |
| Depositing User: | Njabulo Chipangura |
| Date Deposited: | 07 May 2026 13:23 |
| Journal or Publication Title: | Museum Worlds |
| Publisher: | Berghahn Journals |
| Refereed: | Yes |
| Related URLs: | |
| Use Licence: | This item is available under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial Share Alike Licence (CC BY-NC-SA). Details of this licence are available here |
Downloads
Downloads per month over past year
Share and Export
Share and Export