Decolonizing German and European History at the Museum

Sieg, Katrin

doi:doi:10.3998/mpub.10142415

Katrin Sieg

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Overview
Contents

Decolonizing German and European History at the Museum examines efforts by European museums to investigate colonialism as part of an unprocessed past, confront its presence, and urge repair. A flurry of exhibitions and the overhaul of numerous large museums in the last decade signal that an emergent colonial memory culture is now reaching broader publics. Exhibitions pose the question of what Europeans owe to those they colonized.

Decolonizing German and European History at the Museum shows how museums can help visitors mourn historic violence and identify the contemporary agents, beneficiaries, victims, survivors, and resisters of colonial presence. At the same time, the book treats the museum as part of the racialized power relations that activists, academics, and artists have long protested against. This book asks whether museums have made the dream of activists, academics, and artists to build equitable futures more acceptable and more durable—or whether in packaging that dream for general audiences they curtail it. Confronting colonial violence, this book argues, pushes Europeans to face the histories of racism and urges them to envision antiracism at the global scale.

Resources

Person looking a work of art depicting two black figures kneeling in front of a white figure.

Sans Papiers. Musée de l’Immigration 2010

From Chapter 2

Fig. 1. Sans Papiers. Musée de l’Immigration 2010. With permission by Mathieu Pernot.

Glass-covered cabinet of colonial clothing and objects.

Colonial Vitrine, pre-2013

From Chapter 3

Fig. 2. Colonial Vitrine, pre-2013. With permission by CiB and DHM.

A poster for Deutsches Historisches Museum featuring a photo from the exhibition.

Poster of exhibition German Colonialism: Fragments of its Past and Present

From Chapter 4

Fig. 3. Poster of Exhibition German Colonialism: Fragments of Its Past and Present. With Permission by DHM.

Floorplan of exhibition German Colonialism: Fragments of its Past and Present

From Chapter 4

Fig. 4. Floorplan of Exhibition German Colonialism: Fragments of Its Past and Present. With Permission by DHM.

A man on the right examines two open books in a glass-covered case.

A visitor looks at exhibits related to the Herero Massacre during a press preview of the new exhibition: German Colonialism: Fragments of its Past and Present

From Chapter 4

Fig. 5. A visitor looks at exhibits related to the Herero Massacre during a press preview of the new exhibition: German Colonialism: Fragments of Its Past and Present at the German Historical Museum (Deutsches Historisches Museum) on October 13, 2016, in Berlin, Germany. Permission by Getty Images/Carsten Koall.