{"id":455,"date":"2016-01-26T10:54:30","date_gmt":"2016-01-26T18:54:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/miriamposner.com\/classes\/dh150w16\/?p=455"},"modified":"2016-01-26T10:54:30","modified_gmt":"2016-01-26T18:54:30","slug":"week-4-the-museum-as-an-apparatus-of-national-identity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/miriamposner.com\/classes\/dh150w16\/2016\/01\/26\/week-4-the-museum-as-an-apparatus-of-national-identity\/","title":{"rendered":"Week 4: The Museum as an Apparatus of National Identity"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>What provides the basis for any given culture&#8217;s sense of self and nation? I wrote a paper in an anthropology class last quarter\u00a0about the power of sport as an apparatus for shaping\u00a0nationhood.\u00a0In one example, I looked at <a href=\"http:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/10.1111\/amet.12028\/abstract\">soccer tournaments in rural, Amazonian Peru<\/a> and how the structure and rules of the sport help integrate modern laws (which favor unity under the state) with indigenous cultural values (which hold the individual in high regard). In another example, I looked at <a href=\"http:\/\/onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/10.1525\/jsae.2007.7.2.19\/full\">ski telecasts in Slovenia<\/a> and how the media acts as a vehicle for contrasting Slovenia with other nations and using visual cues and language to construct a national identity.<\/p>\n<p>Bennet&#8217;s &#8220;The Exhibitionary Complex&#8221; points to the State using museums as a means of setting up rules and control in much the same way as do soccer tournaments in Peru. But\u00a0as this week&#8217;s readings point out, the role of museums in shaping a nation and a culture extends much further. One quote from the Introduction to &#8220;Exhibiting Cultures&#8221; really stood out: &#8220;Carol Duncan and Alan Wallach have analyzed the\u00a0architecture, decoration, and art-historical arrangement in\u00a0what they call universal survey museums\u2014the Louvre, the\u00a0Metropolitan Museum of Art, and so on\u2014and conclude that\u00a0these elements create rituals of citizenship.&#8221; What museums choose to display and how they choose to display it has a great influence on the public&#8217;s notion of a place. Tourists often seek out\u00a0museums\u00a0when\u00a0traveling, and citizens visit\u00a0museums for education and enrichment, so curators and museum architects are instrumental in shaping these experiences and peoples&#8217; views.<\/p>\n<p>An interesting tension arises\u00a0when museums display art of other cultures. Does the displaying museum get to define nationhood by means of its exhibitionary practices, or does the culture whose works are on display have a say? Which state has the right?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What provides the basis for any given culture&#8217;s sense of self and nation? I wrote a paper in an anthropology class last quarter\u00a0about the power of sport as an apparatus &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/miriamposner.com\/classes\/dh150w16\/2016\/01\/26\/week-4-the-museum-as-an-apparatus-of-national-identity\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Week 4: The Museum as an Apparatus of National Identity&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_eb_attr":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-455","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/miriamposner.com\/classes\/dh150w16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/miriamposner.com\/classes\/dh150w16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/miriamposner.com\/classes\/dh150w16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/miriamposner.com\/classes\/dh150w16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/miriamposner.com\/classes\/dh150w16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=455"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/miriamposner.com\/classes\/dh150w16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/455\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/miriamposner.com\/classes\/dh150w16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=455"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/miriamposner.com\/classes\/dh150w16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=455"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/miriamposner.com\/classes\/dh150w16\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=455"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}