It has been bugging me for some time. Why, when I walk into exhibitions on the theme of the transatlantic slave trade, don't I feel the emotion I expect and that the subject matter warrants? Has exposure (I refrain from saying over-exposure) through museums and reading made me numb to the horrific treatment of my ancestors?
I questioned this last month when I went to Bristol to see Breaking the Chains, the British Empire and Commonwealth Museum's 2007 bicentenary offering. Museologically, academically, visually, historically, contemporaneously - it's all there. Visitors are sufficiently fed. But for me there was something missing.
It's not simply that I can see something similar in Liverpool, or in London's Docklands (though done less well). I am starting to believe that an academic treatment of this subject is to its detriment. It feels somehow disconnected from me - the emotion has been replaced by cold facts and figures.
This is one of the drawbacks of museums in the western world. The concentration on an academic approach robs us of our ability to feel - makes us theorise over and above connecting on a humane level.
I have also noticed that in these exhibitions, the sections that deal with Africa before white invasion - a staple in slavery exhibitions - mention all too sweepingly Africa's scientific, mathematical, artistic (I could but won't go on) contribution to the world.
Yes, there needs to be a separate exhibition to do this justice but perhaps it is the duty of the curator to give more detail and even put book references within the displays.
I'm looking forward to the Black Cultural Archives centre, which has just received £4m from the Heritage Lottery Fund with plans to open in Brixton, London in 2011. It promises to be a centre for the African and Caribbean London communities.
My hope is that those voices are heard. My fear is that for a centre like this to survive, it will feel it has to follow the western academic model that so many of us have taken as gospel.
I questioned this last month when I went to Bristol to see Breaking the Chains, the British Empire and Commonwealth Museum's 2007 bicentenary offering. Museologically, academically, visually, historically, contemporaneously - it's all there. Visitors are sufficiently fed. But for me there was something missing.
It's not simply that I can see something similar in Liverpool, or in London's Docklands (though done less well). I am starting to believe that an academic treatment of this subject is to its detriment. It feels somehow disconnected from me - the emotion has been replaced by cold facts and figures.
This is one of the drawbacks of museums in the western world. The concentration on an academic approach robs us of our ability to feel - makes us theorise over and above connecting on a humane level.
I have also noticed that in these exhibitions, the sections that deal with Africa before white invasion - a staple in slavery exhibitions - mention all too sweepingly Africa's scientific, mathematical, artistic (I could but won't go on) contribution to the world.
Yes, there needs to be a separate exhibition to do this justice but perhaps it is the duty of the curator to give more detail and even put book references within the displays.
I'm looking forward to the Black Cultural Archives centre, which has just received £4m from the Heritage Lottery Fund with plans to open in Brixton, London in 2011. It promises to be a centre for the African and Caribbean London communities.
My hope is that those voices are heard. My fear is that for a centre like this to survive, it will feel it has to follow the western academic model that so many of us have taken as gospel.
