Chip Colwell: Why museums are returning cultural treasures
Čip Kolvel (Chip Colwell): Zašto muzeji vraćaju kulturna blaga
Chip Colwell is an archaeologist who tries to answer the tangled question: Who owns the past? Full bio
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and a museum curator,
back to where they came from.
they're social and educational,
jer su društveni i edukativni,
because of the magic of objects:
zbog magije predmeta:
sopstvene mašte.
to gaze upon our human empire of things
uz promišljanje i čuđenje.
visits each year.
posetilaca svake godine.
have become a battleground.
postali bojno polje.
don't want to see their culture
ne žele da vide svoju kulturu
which they have no control over.
nad kojima nemaju nikakvu kontrolu.
to their places of origin.
of the Parthenon Marbles,
held by the British Museum.
koja se čuva u Britanskom muzeju.
from museums everywhere.
iz muzeja širom sveta.
to those made by Native Americans.
sa onima koje su uputili Indijanci.
more than one million artifacts
više od milion predmeta
of Native American skeletons.
let's start with the War Gods.
počnimo sa bogovima rata.
of the Zuni tribe in New Mexico.
plemena Zuni u Novom Meksiku.
began to collect them
da ih prikupljaju 1880-ih
da su ih sagledavali kao lepe,
of Picasso and Paul Klee,
Pikasa i Pola Klea
the modern art movement.
modernog umetničkog pokreta.
did exactly as it's supposed to
baš ono što je trebalo
malo poznata umetnička forma
a little-known art form
a terrible crime of cultural violence.
kulturnog nasilja.
is not a piece of art,
nove ratne bogove,
in a long ceremony.
ili da proda boga rata.
should be returned.
contradicts the refrain
je u suprotnosti sa rečima
najpoznatiji svetski arheolog:
not just to drive movie plots,
ne samo radi pokretanja zapleta filma,
of museums for society.
nesumnjivu dobrobit muzeja za društvo.
with the Sonoran Desert's past.
pustinje Sonore.
the city's bland strip malls
jednoličnih tržnih centara
just waiting to be discovered.
koja samo čeka da je otkriju.
I started taking archaeology classes
počeo sam da pohađam časove arheologije
even helped me set up my own laboratory
da postavim svoju laboratoriju
had a dark history.
ima mračnu prošlost.
became a tool for science,
of social and racial hierarchies.
o društvenim i rasnim hijerarhijama.
were plundered from graves,
pljačkani su iz grobova,
came across white graves,
na grobnice belaca,
as specimens on museum shelves.
kao primerci na policama muzeja.
boarding schools,
were on the cusp of extinction.
na rubu izumiranja.
but the labels don't matter
ili kolonijalizmom,
that over the last century,
Indijancima oduzimana prava i kultura.
were taken from them.
protesta Indijanaca,
through the US Congress,
Native Americans to reclaim
koji je omogućio Indijancima da povrate
and human remains from museums.
i ljudske ostatke iz muzeja.
da sasvim shvate
how a piece of wood can be a living god
especially with DNA,
posebno pomoću DNK,
into the past.
Frank Norwick declared,
Frenk Norvik izjavio:
that benefits all of mankind.
koji koristi čitavom čovečanstvu.
all of this was an enigma
je sve ovo bila zagonetka
want their heritage back
da im se vrati nasleđe
spend their entire lives
about living ones?
what to do next,
šta bih sledeće radio,
former prison cell on Robben Island.
Nelsona Mandele na ostrvu Roben.
a country bridge vast divides
da premosti ogromne podele
reconciliation.
makar nesavršeno, pomirenje.
in the ruins of the past?
u ruševinama prošlosti?“
of Nature and Science.
many other institutions,
za razliku od mnogih drugih institucija,
the legacy of museum collecting.
sa nasleđem muzejskih prikupljanja.
the skeletons in our closet,
sastali smo se sa desetinama plemena
we met with dozens of tribes
these remains home.
kako da vratimo te ostatke kući.
who will receive the remains,
oko toga ko će primiti ostatke,
become undertakers,
they had never wanted unearthed.
čije iskopavanje nikad nisu želeli.
and our Native partners
i naši indijanski partneri
of the human remains in the collection.
skoro sve ljudske ostatke u zbirci.
hundreds of sacred objects.
that these battles are endless.
da su ove bitke beskrajne.
of the museum world.
muzejskog sveta.
more museums with more stuff.
in an American public museum
američkih javnih muzeja
beyond the reach of US law,
and outside our borders.
i van granica naše zemlje.
with a respected religious leader
sa poštovanim verskim vođom
named Octavius Seowtewa
in Europe with War Gods.
sa bogovima rata u Evropi.
with a history of dubious care.
o kome se sumnjivo brinulo u prošlosti.
had added chicken feathers to it.
dodao mu je kokošje perje.
is now state property
da je bog rata sada državna imovina
no longer served Zunis
više ne služi Zunima,
of the objects to the world."
would establish a dangerous precedent
uspostaviti opasan presedan
claimed by Greece.
koji zahteva Grčka.
to his people empty-handed.
svom narodu praznih ruku.
the Ahayu:da so far away.
da su Ahajude toliko udaljene.
that's missing from a family dinner.
nedostaje na porodičnoj večeri.
their strength is broken."
njihova snaga je narušena.“
in Europe and beyond
do not represent the end of museums
ne predstavljaju kraj muzeja,
about one percent
jedan procenat ukupne kolekcije.
500 cultural items and skeletons,
500 kulturnih predmeta i skeleta,
of its total collections.
99,999 odsto ukupne zbirke.
with Native Americans
to share their culture with us.
da podele svoju kulturu sa nama.
to visit the returned War Gods.
da posetim vraćene bogove rata.
overlooking beautiful Zuni homeland.
iznad prekrasne domovine Zunija.
by a roofless stone building
kamenom građevinom bez krova
da ih ne ukradu ponovo.
of turquoise, cornmeal, shell,
od tirkiza, kukuruzne kaše, školjki,
true purpose in the world.
ratnih bogova u svetu.
the histories that we inherit.
prošlost koju nasleđujemo.
did not pillage ancient graves
nisu pljačkali drevne grobnice
for correcting past mistakes.
za ispravljanje grešaka iz prošlosti.
da se vrati dostojanstvo,
the voiceless objects of our curiosity.
bez prava glasa.
to fully understand others' beliefs,
razumemo verovanja drugih ljudi;
places for living cultures.
turn lazy circles high above.
lenjo ide ukrug visoko gore.
that their culture is not dead and gone
da njihova kultura ne bude mrtva i nestala
for the War Gods to be.
bolje mesto za bogove rata.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Chip Colwell - Archaeologist, museum curatorChip Colwell is an archaeologist who tries to answer the tangled question: Who owns the past?
Why you should listen
Chip Colwell is an archaeologist and museum curator who has published 11 books that invite us to rethink how Native American history is told. His essays have appeared in The Atlantic, The Guardian and TIME, while his research has been highlighted in the New York Times, BBC, Forbes and elsewhere. Most recently, he wrote Plundered Skulls and Stolen Spirits: Inside the Fight to Reclaim Native America’s Culture, which The Wall Street Journal dubbed "a careful and intelligent chronicle" and won a 2018 Colorado Book Award.
In 1990, Colwell fell in love with archaeology. Still in high school, he decided to make a life for himself discovering ancient windswept ruins across the American Southwest. But in college he discovered that archaeologists have not always treated Native Americans with respect. In museums were thousands of Native American skeletons, grave goods and sacred objects -- taken with the consent of Native communities. Disheartened, he planned to leave the field he revered. But an epiphany struck that instead he should help develop a new movement in archaeology and museums based on the dignity and rights of Native Americans.
When Colwell was hired as a curator at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science, he had the chance to address the dark legacies of museum collecting. He and his colleagues began consulting with hundreds of tribes about the return of skeletons and sacred objects. In this work, Colwell realized, too, there was an important story to share that explored vital questions. Why do museums collect so many things? Why is it offensive to some that museums exhibit human remains and religious items? What are the legal rights of museums -- and the moral claims of tribes? What do we lose when artifacts go home? And what do we gain?
Chip Colwell | Speaker | TED.com