About

This research project aims to unpack the inherent legacies of colonial knowledge production still prevalent in museums today. I propose to study how a museum housing, collecting, and displaying southern African material culture, the Horniman Museum and in Gardens in London, has been influenced by its diverse colonial interactions with Africa. And how this legacy has become imbricated in the museum archives. This research would aim to set a new standard for interrogating how museums are continually influenced and constructed by the colonial histories found in their archives, both paper and material, and how this impacts on the knowledge imparted onto the displays. This project comes at a time of increasing interest in decolonising museums and will add to this growing body of literature by interrogating how colonial legacies are active in museums in a practical way. Where this project differs from current approaches is its focus on the construction and use of museum archives in relation to the knowledge produced around previously colonised peoples and their material culture.The project will draw from a wide range of material, both theoretical and fieldwork in museum spaces. The outcome of this project is to outline practical methodologies to assist in decolonising museum practise and spaces in a collaborative and inclusive manner.