Native Americans and Museums
March 4, 2000
Participants: Jesse Goodglass, Erel Pilo, Julie Leff, Heather McConnell, Brett Mole, Kyle Forrester, Jon Reisman
What is the power of a museum? How do museums portray people? animals? culture? Who have the voices in museums and who are silenced?
In one short day we attempted to wrestle with the question of museums and their portrayal of Native Americans. We began our day at the American Museum of Natural History, and waiting on line by the Haida canoe, each member of the group picked out a poem or two to keep in a pocket. The poems were all written by contemporary Native American poets. Giving them voice in a museum where so much is dead offered a wonderful way of expressing some of the feelings we encountered in our visit there.
We began at the butterfly exhibit, discussing the butterfly effect (and mostly trying to see if we could get any of the butterflies to land on us). Leaving there, we walked through the back corridors of the museum, pausing to read Teddy Roosevelt's strong exhortations about patriotism and manhood which were written on the walls of the Rotunda. Upstairs in the entrance to the Woodland Indians hall, we listened to the story of Selu, carried corn seeds in our pockets (and mouths) and examined the ways in which people were portrayed.
Overwhelmed, we dined under the whale and then headed down to the Smithsonian's National Museum of the American Indian, housed in the old Custom's house. We all noted the irony that the start of the exhibit hall was beneath a portrait of Columbus.Here, instead of descriptions written on the walls by nameless curators, were pieces which were explicated by story and each piece had the name of the curator. Much relieved to be in a living exhibit, instead of one which felt so dead, we shared more of our poems and spoke about the ways in which museums can empower. The end of our day was out on the tip of Manhattan - sharing poems and talking about time.
In subsequent trips the questions about who decides which parts of history and culture make it to museums have come up again and again. While we may not always find answers to those questions, it seems that the sharing of poetry in those places provides us a voice for some of those feelings and questions we have and will continue to have.
Our Situques
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Suggested Reading:
Vine Deloria, Red Earth, White Lies
Terry Tempest Williams, "Curator" in Pieces of White Shell
John Marshall III, Not All Indians Dance
F. David Peat, Blackfoot Physics
Marilou Awiakta, Selu Seeking the Corn Mother's Wisdom
Web Resources:
The American Museum of Natural History
National Museum of the American Indians
