Empowering Australia: Collecting and Interpreting the Material Culture of Australian Technology in New South Wales, 1880-1972. In Australian social history, the industrial museum occupies an important but largely forgotten place. Today, Sydney's exciting Powerhouse Museum is increasingly conscious of its legacy and lineage, dating from its creation as the Technological and Sanitary Museum of 1880. Nevertheless, much of the material culture of manufacture and innovation that lies in its collect ....Empowering Australia: Collecting and Interpreting the Material Culture of Australian Technology in New South Wales, 1880-1972. In Australian social history, the industrial museum occupies an important but largely forgotten place. Today, Sydney's exciting Powerhouse Museum is increasingly conscious of its legacy and lineage, dating from its creation as the Technological and Sanitary Museum of 1880. Nevertheless, much of the material culture of manufacture and innovation that lies in its collections remains uninterpreted and inaccessible to historians and the public. This project seeks to 'recover' the past of the Museum, and its role in Sydney's heritage of research, design and the applied arts; and to demonstrate the dynamic relevance of historical research to the Museum's present and forward plannning.Read moreRead less
Special Research Initiatives - Grant ID: SR0354824
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$30,000.00
Summary
Indigenous Collections and Knowledge Archives Research Network. We will develop an ongoing inter-disciplinary network of researchers (museum researchers, anthropologists, art historians, musicologists, linguists) working with Indigenous collections (ethnographic, anthropological, fine art) and knowledge archives (sound, film, photographic and print). The network will create an exceptional research resource, and facilitate communication between holding institutions, researchers and local Indigeno ....Indigenous Collections and Knowledge Archives Research Network. We will develop an ongoing inter-disciplinary network of researchers (museum researchers, anthropologists, art historians, musicologists, linguists) working with Indigenous collections (ethnographic, anthropological, fine art) and knowledge archives (sound, film, photographic and print). The network will create an exceptional research resource, and facilitate communication between holding institutions, researchers and local Indigenous communities. As well as facilitating pure research (eg. documenting the material, investigating memory systems and processes of cultural change) the project will play a significant role in community development (e. g. repatriation of images and information to Indigenous communities will benefit present generations and fulfil social, emotional and intellectual needs).Read moreRead less
The application of concept lattices to digital museum collection management and access. The project provides Australia access to, and champions for, leading-edge, content-based multimedia management and retrieval. For the past two decades, Australia has been a world leader in museum management, particularly in the areas of collection access and digitisation. This project will assist one of the nation's most significant museums to maintain a competitive edge nationally and internationally throu ....The application of concept lattices to digital museum collection management and access. The project provides Australia access to, and champions for, leading-edge, content-based multimedia management and retrieval. For the past two decades, Australia has been a world leader in museum management, particularly in the areas of collection access and digitisation. This project will assist one of the nation's most significant museums to maintain a competitive edge nationally and internationally through new approaches to annotating, searching and navigating digital collections. Trialled in this major institution, the project outcomes have great potential for dissemination and application throughout the collections sector.Read moreRead less
Explaining the Changing Roles of Collections, Curators and Exhibitions in the Production of Museum Images of the Pacific:1900-2000. This study advances the hypothesis, developed as the result of previous research, that museum representations of the Pacific between 1900-2000 were the result of the changing relationship between three factors: the construction of a particular cutural map of the region via the provenance attributed to collections, curatorial activities and exhbitions. It employs Edw ....Explaining the Changing Roles of Collections, Curators and Exhibitions in the Production of Museum Images of the Pacific:1900-2000. This study advances the hypothesis, developed as the result of previous research, that museum representations of the Pacific between 1900-2000 were the result of the changing relationship between three factors: the construction of a particular cutural map of the region via the provenance attributed to collections, curatorial activities and exhbitions. It employs Edward Said's post-colonial theory to explain the factors involved in the production of particular images and their transformation through the colonial and post-colonial periods. This is done in three case studies of two museum anthropology departments: The Australian Museum and the American Museum of Natural HistoryRead moreRead less
Producers and Collectors: Uncovering the Role of Indigenous Agency in the Formation of Museum Collections. The research will make a significant contribution to Australian and world scholarship, show the innovation and leadership of Australian scholars in the study of museum collections, and promote goodwill and better diplomacy with Australia's nearest neighbours in PNG. Through examining the history of social relations between Papua New Guineans and 'outsiders' in a region that has long been t ....Producers and Collectors: Uncovering the Role of Indigenous Agency in the Formation of Museum Collections. The research will make a significant contribution to Australian and world scholarship, show the innovation and leadership of Australian scholars in the study of museum collections, and promote goodwill and better diplomacy with Australia's nearest neighbours in PNG. Through examining the history of social relations between Papua New Guineans and 'outsiders' in a region that has long been the focus of Australian interests, the project will contribute to the National Priority' Understanding our region and the world'. By unlocking information about the origin and history of ethnographic collections from Australia's oldest museum, their cultural significance will be shared more widely.
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Reconceptualising Heritage Collections: Multidisciplinary Approaches to Museum Collections and Documentation. Museums worldwide are responding to technical advances in digital media. Collection databases and their availability on the World Wide Web are part of this initiative. The potential scope for collections documentation has been transformed by digital technologies, but in reality this has not been matched by the quality of information held in databases - its relationship to current knowled ....Reconceptualising Heritage Collections: Multidisciplinary Approaches to Museum Collections and Documentation. Museums worldwide are responding to technical advances in digital media. Collection databases and their availability on the World Wide Web are part of this initiative. The potential scope for collections documentation has been transformed by digital technologies, but in reality this has not been matched by the quality of information held in databases - its relationship to current knowledge, the needs of online users and new interdisciplinary approaches to material culture research. This project will reconceptualise museum collections acquisition, documentation practices, create a new multidisciplinary multimedia knowledge structure and reform museum practice to address these issues to greatly enhance the value of collections.Read moreRead less
Discovery Indigenous Researchers Development - Grant ID: DI100100014
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$366,000.00
Summary
'To wake them up again': Digital futures for the international diaspora of early ethnographic collections from Arnhem Land. Informed by the Indigenous inheritors of Arnhem Land's endangered languages and traditions, this project will produce findings of world-heritage significance that will inform the importance of early ethnographic collections held in museums worldwide to well-being and cultural survival in our local communities. There is enormous local interest in our region's recorded histor ....'To wake them up again': Digital futures for the international diaspora of early ethnographic collections from Arnhem Land. Informed by the Indigenous inheritors of Arnhem Land's endangered languages and traditions, this project will produce findings of world-heritage significance that will inform the importance of early ethnographic collections held in museums worldwide to well-being and cultural survival in our local communities. There is enormous local interest in our region's recorded history. In recent years, the return of digitised materials from significant ethnographic collections has helped to stimulate the on-going maintenance of our cultures markedly. The sense of history that they bring is proving invaluable in maintaining well-being and community amid the hardships of local life, and in particular, in stimulating youth engagement with tradition.Read moreRead less