Baggage and Belonging: Military Collections and the British Empire (1750-1900)
Lead Research Organisation:
National Museums Scotland
Abstract
Over 130 military museums in the UK preserve the historical collections of British regiments, corps and services. Their collections contain artefacts acquired by British servicemen in colonial warfare and on imperial garrison duties across the globe, variously acquired as trophies, prize, souvenirs, curios and specimens. These artefacts are little known outside the constituency of military history and within their current institutions rarely researched in reference to their complex intercultural biographies.
Focussing on military campaigns in India and Africa from 1750 to 1900, this project will undertake an interdisciplinary reappraisal of military collections. By tracing collections histories through archival evidence it will both investigate the meaning of non-European artefacts in military organisational culture and their value as material witnesses of encounters between non-European peoples and imperial forces. Research questions include:
1. What does the pattern of taking, recording and modification of objects tell us about the characteristics of British military collecting in the context of colonial and imperial warfare?
2. How does a more nuanced analysis of the transference of objects in war revise our understanding of colonial and post-colonial relationships?
3. How did military governance, cultural sanction and contingency work to establish boundaries around the taking and disposal of objects?
4. How can we address the tensions between the original communal role of these military collections and their contemporary function in public military museums?
The material legacy of non-European military campaigns in military and non-military museums is widespread, yet the systematic understanding of this legacy is virtually absent from the analytical and historical literature. Military collecting offers an under-developed source for critically reappraising the linkages between museum collections and imperial history in the post-colonial period.
Colonial African and Indian campaigns (estimated as 60-70% of total non-European collections) will be tracked through multiple military museum collections examined in tandem with institutional records, archives, registers, as well as biographies, diaries and photographs related to individual collectors. An in-depth examination of objects and documents will deliver a more multifaceted understanding of military governance, communal military culture and individual agency. The project will highlight hidden histories of taking and retention, going beyond the simplistic view of all such military artefacts as 'loot'. This revisionist approach will allow comparisons across former European imperial powers of a complex and controversial topic. It will enable a critical reassessment of the relevance of these collecting practices and material legacies today.
The multidisciplinary project team at National Museums Scotland (NMS) will be supported by an academic and museum-based Advisory Board drawn from the fields of visual and museum anthropology, military history, military anthropology and archaeology. Comparative analysis will draw on research from previous pilot projects undertaken on campaigns in Tibet, China, New Zealand and North America. The National Army Museum (NAM), the project partner, also holds extensive collections and has the wider networks (including the Army Museums Ogilby Trust) to assist with the delivery of knowledge exchange workshops and the organisation of the international seminar.
Outputs will include two knowledge exchange workshops, an international seminar, a special exhibition (National War Museum, National Museums Scotland, Edinburgh), enhanced gallery interpretation (National Army Museum, London; National Museum of Scotland and National War Museum, Edinburgh), community engagement, online features and pdf catalogue information, and 3-4 publications (articles and a book in addition to non-refereed articles).
Focussing on military campaigns in India and Africa from 1750 to 1900, this project will undertake an interdisciplinary reappraisal of military collections. By tracing collections histories through archival evidence it will both investigate the meaning of non-European artefacts in military organisational culture and their value as material witnesses of encounters between non-European peoples and imperial forces. Research questions include:
1. What does the pattern of taking, recording and modification of objects tell us about the characteristics of British military collecting in the context of colonial and imperial warfare?
2. How does a more nuanced analysis of the transference of objects in war revise our understanding of colonial and post-colonial relationships?
3. How did military governance, cultural sanction and contingency work to establish boundaries around the taking and disposal of objects?
4. How can we address the tensions between the original communal role of these military collections and their contemporary function in public military museums?
The material legacy of non-European military campaigns in military and non-military museums is widespread, yet the systematic understanding of this legacy is virtually absent from the analytical and historical literature. Military collecting offers an under-developed source for critically reappraising the linkages between museum collections and imperial history in the post-colonial period.
Colonial African and Indian campaigns (estimated as 60-70% of total non-European collections) will be tracked through multiple military museum collections examined in tandem with institutional records, archives, registers, as well as biographies, diaries and photographs related to individual collectors. An in-depth examination of objects and documents will deliver a more multifaceted understanding of military governance, communal military culture and individual agency. The project will highlight hidden histories of taking and retention, going beyond the simplistic view of all such military artefacts as 'loot'. This revisionist approach will allow comparisons across former European imperial powers of a complex and controversial topic. It will enable a critical reassessment of the relevance of these collecting practices and material legacies today.
The multidisciplinary project team at National Museums Scotland (NMS) will be supported by an academic and museum-based Advisory Board drawn from the fields of visual and museum anthropology, military history, military anthropology and archaeology. Comparative analysis will draw on research from previous pilot projects undertaken on campaigns in Tibet, China, New Zealand and North America. The National Army Museum (NAM), the project partner, also holds extensive collections and has the wider networks (including the Army Museums Ogilby Trust) to assist with the delivery of knowledge exchange workshops and the organisation of the international seminar.
Outputs will include two knowledge exchange workshops, an international seminar, a special exhibition (National War Museum, National Museums Scotland, Edinburgh), enhanced gallery interpretation (National Army Museum, London; National Museum of Scotland and National War Museum, Edinburgh), community engagement, online features and pdf catalogue information, and 3-4 publications (articles and a book in addition to non-refereed articles).
Planned Impact
In rethinking the colonial histories of military campaigns and the perceived sensitivities that arise in connections with these, the project will influence understanding and practice in a range of non-academic contexts. Our non-academic impact strategy includes two knowledge exchange workshops, a special exhibition, contributions to gallery renewal programmes, online information in the shape of pdf catalogues, project updates, features and blogs. In addition we will be reaching museum audiences through public events, community engagement programmes, articles and features in museum based publications, and target media. The Museums' communications teams will provide media support to publicise the project.
Partnership between National Museums Scotland (NMS) and the National Army Museum (NAM) draws into the ambit of the project a 130 strong network of regimental, corps and service museums in the United Kingdom, their staff and visiting publics and the Army Museums Ogilby Trust. Other Targeted interest groups include the Museums Ethnographers Group and International Committee for Museums of Arms and Military History.
Key to knowledge exchange will be the workshops hosting staff from regimental museums (up to 40 professional staff over two workshops). The first workshop "Dividing the Spoils: military collecting reconsidered" will introduce the project and ways of understanding a range of non-European material culture. The second workshop "Fearless display: interpreting military collection histories" will look at the research findings, how multiple histories can be displayed, and the potential for community engagement. These workshops will promote understanding and discussion as pathways to influence the public interpretation and professional perception of military collections. They will enable participating museums to deliver their stated objectives of making these collections relevant to diverse audiences and build the knowledge base and curatorial confidence of their staff.
Central to non-academic impact will be a special exhibition at the National War Museum, NMS, Edinburgh. Reaching a large national and international audience (597,000 visitor p.a.) this will be a vehicle for showcasing research results and will bring the artefacts from regimental, corps and service museums to new audiences in situ and online. There will be a public engagement programme of events and activities, all providing a platform for media profile as well as dissemination and promotion of the project publications.
At NAM, public impact will be achieved through the planned gallery renewal in the new Discovery gallery, as part of its continuous refreshment programme. Research findings on NMS collections will feed into scheduled renovations of galleries at the National Museum of Scotland and the National War Museum. The infrastructure of public events, community engagement, outreach activities and educational programmes built around these displays will be key to dissemination of the findings and impact.
The project has policy relevance. Souvenir and curio hunting, trophy taking and looting are continuous elements of behaviour in war zones. These practices remain matters of international concern in relation to the loss of cultural heritage, and are live issues for defence establishments in their management and media management of military deployments overseas. The July 2015 Oxford Union debate on reparations to India demonstrated that this history remains a relevant and contested public issue. In light of present policy concerns, an intercultural historiography of imperial era military collecting offers clarity around the complex motivations underlying acquisition and appropriation of objects in conflict and the memorialisation of these conflicts for later generations. Addressing these issues will be a principal strand of the international seminar which will feature participants with relevant military operational command experience.
Partnership between National Museums Scotland (NMS) and the National Army Museum (NAM) draws into the ambit of the project a 130 strong network of regimental, corps and service museums in the United Kingdom, their staff and visiting publics and the Army Museums Ogilby Trust. Other Targeted interest groups include the Museums Ethnographers Group and International Committee for Museums of Arms and Military History.
Key to knowledge exchange will be the workshops hosting staff from regimental museums (up to 40 professional staff over two workshops). The first workshop "Dividing the Spoils: military collecting reconsidered" will introduce the project and ways of understanding a range of non-European material culture. The second workshop "Fearless display: interpreting military collection histories" will look at the research findings, how multiple histories can be displayed, and the potential for community engagement. These workshops will promote understanding and discussion as pathways to influence the public interpretation and professional perception of military collections. They will enable participating museums to deliver their stated objectives of making these collections relevant to diverse audiences and build the knowledge base and curatorial confidence of their staff.
Central to non-academic impact will be a special exhibition at the National War Museum, NMS, Edinburgh. Reaching a large national and international audience (597,000 visitor p.a.) this will be a vehicle for showcasing research results and will bring the artefacts from regimental, corps and service museums to new audiences in situ and online. There will be a public engagement programme of events and activities, all providing a platform for media profile as well as dissemination and promotion of the project publications.
At NAM, public impact will be achieved through the planned gallery renewal in the new Discovery gallery, as part of its continuous refreshment programme. Research findings on NMS collections will feed into scheduled renovations of galleries at the National Museum of Scotland and the National War Museum. The infrastructure of public events, community engagement, outreach activities and educational programmes built around these displays will be key to dissemination of the findings and impact.
The project has policy relevance. Souvenir and curio hunting, trophy taking and looting are continuous elements of behaviour in war zones. These practices remain matters of international concern in relation to the loss of cultural heritage, and are live issues for defence establishments in their management and media management of military deployments overseas. The July 2015 Oxford Union debate on reparations to India demonstrated that this history remains a relevant and contested public issue. In light of present policy concerns, an intercultural historiography of imperial era military collecting offers clarity around the complex motivations underlying acquisition and appropriation of objects in conflict and the memorialisation of these conflicts for later generations. Addressing these issues will be a principal strand of the international seminar which will feature participants with relevant military operational command experience.
Publications
Allan, Stuart
(2019)
Dividing the Spoils: Perspectives on Military Collecting and the British Empire
Author Unamed, Researchers Are Named
(2017)
Exploring Indian and African Artfefacts
in History Scotland
Hartwell N
(2022)
Framing colonial war loot
in Journal of the History of Collections
Hartwell N
(2019)
A repository of virtue? The United Service Museum, collecting, and the professionalization of the British Armed Forces, 1829-1864
in Journal of the History of Collections
Hartwell, Nicole
(2021)
'Framing colonial war loot: the 'captured' spolia opima of Kunwar Singh'
in Journal of the History of Collections
Hartwell, Nicole
(2018)
Uncovering Stories of Military Collecting
in History Scotland
Hartwell, Nicole
(2019)
Artefacts of Mourning from the Indian Uprising, 1857-8
Henrietta Lidchi
(2024)
Mario Laarmann, Clément Ndé Fongang, Carla Seeman and Laura Vordermayer, eds., Reparation, Restitution, and the Politics of Memory/Réparation, Restitutions et les Politiques de la Mémoire. Beyond Universalism/Partager L'Universel. (Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter 2023).
in H France, No.24.
| Title | Legacies of Empire, National War Museum, Edinburgh Castle, Temporary exhibition |
| Description | Legacies of Empire is a temporary exhibition that opened in November 2020 (postponed from the original date in April 2020 due to the Covid19 pandemic) which explores the forms of appropriation that occur in times of war. Legacies of Empire is about encounters and confrontations between nations and cultures in times of war. The exhibition features objects that have been researched during the research project, objects that were taken, purchased or otherwise collected by British military and naval personnel during colonial wars or garrison service across the British Empire. Today, they are preserved in national and military museum collections. The contentious material legacy of the British Empire is represented in each object. The images and artefacts come from the National Museums Scotland, the National Army Museum, as well as Black Watch Castle and Museum, the Highlanders' Museum, the Royal Engineers Museum, and the Prince of Wales's Own Regiment of Yorkshire Collection, York Army Museum. The exhibition is organised into several sections. The Culture of War; Loot and Prize; Trophies; Allies, Gifts and Trades; Relics, Momentos and Memorials; Collectors. In addition a panel is attached which cites the project in the context of current iniatitives and research at National Museums Scotland on colonial collecting, and invites visitors to respond. The sections arise directly from the theoretical framework that the project has developed, and aims to explain military conceptions of the value of artefacts as well as their significance in their original contexts. The labels are longer than is usual in order to show the results of the provenance research including the identification of the item, the way it was appropriated in a military context, and the way in which the object was accessioned into the museum. |
| Type Of Art | Artistic/Creative Exhibition |
| Year Produced | 2020 |
| Impact | The exhibition is currently in the grip of the restrictions of opening and closing museums due to the Covid pandemic. Adjustments to scheduling and content had to be made, however though adjustements were made to both timing, and some newspaper articles had coverage . A webpage with a number of images of the collections featured was current, also allowing visitors to providing a taste of the see the exhibition for remote visitors. The opening coincided with the publication of the Dividing the Spoils book, and so feedback was forthcoming from those interested in the issues. The exhibition's run has been extended will be open until Spring 2022, to allow physical visitors to see it as public health controls lifted. The exhibition was open for three years, from 2020-2023. |
| URL | https://www.nms.ac.uk/exhibitions-events/exhibitions/national-war-museum/legacies-of-empire/ |
| Description | We have developed a methodological framework for understanding the value systems that governed military-colonial collecting which is highly relevant to current debates about the colonial origins of European museum collections. By researching the content and provenance of UK military museum collections relating to the extra-European world (specifically Ghana, Ethiopia, Nigeria, South Africa, India and Pakistan), we have traced how military law, regulation and culture influenced the taking of objects in colonial warfare and directed objects on different pathways into museums. We can demonstrate how and why certain object types were valued for preservation in military museum collections, and treated within a hierarchy of importance within military culture, while other types were instead converted into money and channelled into art and anthropology museums, either directly or via the market. This has a fundamental impact on the work of other scholars who are more interested in the restitution debate, but less interested in the operation of military law, for example, and thus may not understand specifics, this has an implication in how collections gained value over time, and have circulated between museums and within the artmarket. In the early stages of this project a key finding was the plenitude of collections in military museums from African countries and India, and their different and more memorial character than artefacts arising from similar conflicts now present in national institutions dedicate to art, decorative arts or history. These were important and exciting early findings. We began to understand the deep strand of emotion, biography and materiality to invested in military the collections, something not addressed within the wider scholarly or professional museum community. We began to think of categories that could apply such as trophy, loot, relic that could fruitfully link military history and material culture theory in ways more thought- provoking than is currently the case. Tthe increased attention to the question of colonial collections during the development of the research work has made the findings or public as well as scholarly interest. |
| Exploitation Route | We believe that museums undertaking provenance research into their colonially-sourced collections will be able to adapt our methodology to benefit the cataloguing and interpretation of their collections. They will benefit from theoretical insights and histories made available which cross military history and material anthropology and which are alert to the knowledge practices of both. International comparative work between the military and other museums of former European colonial powers could draw on the framework we offer to deepen understanding of historic Western collecting of the wider world. This international work is in part being taken forward by the lead researcher (Lidchi), in her role as PI of a project based in the Netherlands which includes a research stream on military collecting in the Dutch context, and includes capacity for European based provenance laboratory sessions. The project has had a commitment to access and the items surveyed during the project (c. 700) will be uploaded onto our website as searchable pdfs. All the military museums who have been part of the project have received a detailed catalogue of the findings, the searchable pdfs are the public face of this, but are useable and accessible to all researchers interested in this subject who can then contact the relevant museum. This primary information will be made available in the near future online. The theoretical and analytical information has been shared in seminars, webinars, talks, as well as publications. In 2020, we published the edited collection "Dividing the Spoils, Perspectives on Military Collections and the British Empire". Feedback has been enthusiastic with scholars and museum professionals already citing key essays, and university classes using it in teaching. The virtual conversation about the book hosted by the Research Centre for Material Culture, was attended by 169 people and has been subsequent viewed by 500 since 14 January 2021. The outcome of research and discussion has been a much fuller appreciation of the ways in which objects work as part of military memorial culture, and these insights have been shared in academic, museological and policy based circles. In particular the role of the lead researcher (Lidchi) in policy based work has been informed by the research undertaken, and the types of historical understandings it lends to discussions held today in Europe and beyond. The PI has now been nominated on several national committees linked to questions of restitution (the Netherlands, Austria) and is working on follow-on research linked to military collecting coming from the Dutch-Indonesian colonial relationship, as part of a large research project funded by the National Knowledge Agenda in the Netherlands, entitled Pressing Matter: Owership, Value and the Question of Colonial Herirage in Museums. |
| Sectors | Education Government Democracy and Justice Culture Heritage Museums and Collections Security and Diplomacy |
| URL | https://www.nms.ac.uk/collections-research/our-research/featured-projects/collecting-practices-of-the-british-army/ |
| Description | The findings of the project, and the collections that have been part of the project research are the basis for a new exhibition that has opened at the National War Museum at Edinburgh Castle, in November 2021 (delayed from the anticipated opening in April 2020 and adapted for Covid regulations). This exhibition will be open until April 2023. The research, the thematic layout, the audio visual film at the end, and the objects featured have come to light as part of the research. Several magazine articles have been written about the research and now the exhibition, including in the National Museums Scotland's in house magazine for members Explorer, as well as being advertised in The Herald, and Britain at War, as well as a Radio 3 programme. The collections featured are online, and the exhibition includes visibly the possibility of responding to it, given its subject matter. We have had good feedback regarding its narrative style and content. Further educational events are planned, and the exhibition is presented inside and outside the museum. We understand that an academic review of the exhibition is planned, but we do not know when it will emerge. The award is also being used as a case study for work undertaken by the Principal investigator in her other role as Chief Curator, in the Netherlands and now as Executive Director of the Wheelwright Museum of American Indian Art. Since 2019, Henrietta Lidchi has been working in regard to developing policies regarding colonial collections (including military colonial collections) in the Netherlands, and beyond. In 2019 - 2020, she was part of the Dutch Peer Review committee looking at provenance research, and a member of the National Advice Committee on Colonial Collections whose finding were published in October 2020, influencing Dutch national policy and is also now part of a Dutch project funded by the Netherlands National Research Agenda. Since beginning of 2022, Henrietta Lidchi has also been nominated as expert advisor on the Austrian Ministry of Culture commission on colonial collections providing advice in April 2023. She was also nominated for a consultation with Danish government organisations, as well as working with the University of Edinburgh and the University of Toronto to look at consultation processes linked to ancestral human remains linked to Indigenous communities in Canada. In her role now as Executive Director of the Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian, she works in a field informed by debates about the retention of collections made under colonial circumstances. The impact of the findings of the project, are therefore broad, influencing international professional practice, as well as informing academic debate. In addition insights have been used to understand and manage provenance research and to consider the question of colonial collections in National Museums Scotland. So both directly and indirectly the findings of this project are being fed into policy discussions and research based decision making on a comparative (European) basis. The project has also included Knowledge Exchange workshops with professionals in the military museum sector and included those especially interested in the research project as part of the international workshop held in London at the National Army Museum in February 2020. The postdoctoral researcher especially, but equally the leading researchers sustained a level of engagement attending and participating in a wide variety of talks, workshops, conferences. Some of the feedback has been included in the engagement activities section. The project has surveyed a number of museum collections, and twenty four pdf catalogues in addition to those of National Museums Scotland and National Army Museum will make the military museums collections available. These public catalogues are supported by more in depth catalogues to which the various museums have access, thus providing them with the research that has arisen out of the project which they can share with enquirers and visitors. This renders 700 objects more accessible to those seeking to survey military collections and colonial conflict. It also provides support for all the staff in military museums who will have access and comparative data for collections. The National Army Museum will also be linking it digital catalogue to this. All this information will be maintained by National Museums Scotland on its research webpages. The second book is currently being devised and written, with several chapters in draft form, this with invitations to write contributions to museum based publications and wider publications means that we believe the impact of the research will be important in terms of scholarship. The second volume has been somewhat delayed due to the impact of Covid19, restricting access to archives, and creating corporate change in both institutions. "Dividing the Spoils" the first publication was reissued as a paperback in 2022 by Manchester University Press in 2022 and is in 63 World Cat libraries. Articles continue to be published which have arisen out of the research including a text to be used by the Open University published as Questioning the Poetics and Politics of Exhibition World Cultures (published in 2025 by Routledge, editors are Sean Nixon, Jessica Evans and Stuart Hall). Other publications scheduled are a book with Stuart Allan and Henrietta Lidchi in production and in discussion with Berghahn, this is to be submitted in 2025. A further essay has been submitted for publication as To Know From Whence You Came, and is a Festschrift in honour of John Mack of the University of East Anglia which will draw substantially from this work. This will be published in 2025. Findings are being used repeatedly for policy initiatives in the Netherlands, the UK, Austria and being used to inform those working through the Native American Graves and Repatriation Act in the USA who wish indigenous remains to be returned. Presentations recently at the Marshall McKay Seminar at the Autry Museum of the American West is targeted at practitioners in the field of Native American collections who are interested in understanding European and international initiatives as regards repatriation and return. The essay will be published and circulated to Native American museums, libraries and archives. Similarly although both researchers have left the employment of the National Museums Scotland, their findings continue to influence work of staff and students. Henrietta Lidchi continues to supervise two post-graduate students, in the UK (Edinburgh) and in the Netherlands (Amsterdam). We also note that other initiatives have cited the influence of Baggage and Belonging namely the initiatives of naval museums, and the use of the terms that were used especially by Baggage and Belonging researchers - namely that of "taken" as the active verb for collecting in colonial situations. The research have also been contacted by those interested in naval expeditions to the Pacific, and consulted on future grant projects. |
| First Year Of Impact | 2017 |
| Sector | Government, Democracy and Justice,Culture, Heritage, Museums and Collections |
| Impact Types | Cultural Policy & public services |
| Description | Expert Committee, Objects collected out of Colonial Contexts in Federal Museums, Ministry of Culture, Austria (2022-2023) |
| Geographic Reach | Multiple continents/international |
| Policy Influence Type | Participation in a guidance/advisory committee |
| Impact | The document that will emerge from the advisory committee is destined to change the landscape regarding the retention of cultural objects in museums, this is directly linked to their relevance on civil society. |
| Description | Koloniale Collecties en Erkenning van Onrecht/Colonial Collections and a Recognition of Injustice |
| Geographic Reach | Multiple continents/international |
| Policy Influence Type | Participation in a guidance/advisory committee |
| Impact | PI Dr Henrietta Lidchi served as an independent expert on questions linked to colonial heritage, collections and museums, between 2019 and 2020. The Advisory Committee on the National Policy Framework for Colonial Collections was convened in September 2019 by the Minister of Culture, Education and Science in the Netherlands. This Advisory Committee was assigned the task of writing a report on the way forward with colonial collections in the Netherlands in the context of European changes. The report was published in October 2020, as of 29 January the Minister of Culture, Education and Science announced and laid her national policy framework for the treatment of colonial collections in front of the Tweede Kamer in the Dutch Parliament. This development has received national and international attention. |
| URL | https://www.raadvoorcultuur.nl/documenten/adviezen/2020/10/07/summary-of-report-advisory-committee-o... |
| Description | Participation in Danish consultation regarding the presentation of Colonial Collections (early 2022) |
| Geographic Reach | Europe |
| Policy Influence Type | Contribution to a national consultation/review |
| Description | Participation in the Marshall McKay seminar and the Marshall McKay publication |
| Geographic Reach | North America |
| Policy Influence Type | Contribution to new or improved professional practice |
| Description | Provenance based research in museums in Europe |
| Geographic Reach | Europe |
| Policy Influence Type | Influenced training of practitioners or researchers |
| Impact | PI Dr Henrietta Lidchi has been involved in a government funded initiative and museum based initiatives looking the colonial histories of objects, taken in war and during periods of colonial control. She is currently on the steering group of member of the Pilot Provenance Project: Researching Objects of the Colonial Era. Steering Group (NIOD, Rijksmuseum, NMVW). This is a two year Dutch government funded project looking into strands of provenance research and methodologies for developing provenance research. It is undertaken in the context of national and international discussion. PI Dr Henrietta Lidchi also runs the provenance unit in the National Museum of World Cultures in the Netherlands, this researches collections that are linked to either military of other events and regularly produces reports on its collection, including journal Provenance, which has directly drawn in its second volume from research on British military collecting. PI Dr Henrietta Lidchi is a principal investigator on a Dutch government research project looking at military events and collections in the Dutch context. This one of several workstrands in the Netherlands National Research Agenda funded project "Pressing Matter: Ownership, Value and the Question of Cultural Heritage in Museums". |
| URL | https://www.materialculture.nl/en/research/projects/pressing-matter-ownership-value-and-question-col... |
| Description | The Austrian Ministry of Culture report published in July 2023, which included text written by Henrietta Lidchi regarding colonial collections, appropriation and return. The report is now published as: Recommendations of the Advisory Committee for Guidelines for Collections in Austrian Federal Museums from Colonial Contexts, 2023 |
| Geographic Reach | Multiple continents/international |
| Policy Influence Type | Participation in a guidance/advisory committee |
| Impact | This document is now being implemented by the Austrian Government. |
| Description | the project has influenced the approach of National Museums Scotland in its "Colonial Histories and Legacies" work during 2020-22 |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Policy Influence Type | Influenced training of practitioners or researchers |
| URL | https://www.nms.ac.uk/collections-research/our-collections/colonial-histories-and-legacies-in-our-mu... |
| Title | Ad-Lib database bringing together objects surveyed in military museum collections and searchable pdfs online |
| Description | Around 700 objects have been surveyed as a consequence of the Baggage and Belonging project. These have been entered into a free standing database that will be made accessible in two ways. The first is the provision of a pdf catalogue that will be free to download, this includes items surveyed from the key project partners National Museums Scotland and National Army Museum as well as the participating military museums (see list below). These pdfs make information on the collections surveyed by the project publicly available, including in particular the associations between objects and with military events or military figures, as well as identifying the manner in which the collections were acquired. These pdfs sit alongside much more detailed catalogue information sent to the museums themselves, which brings together all the information that the project gathered about their collection so that this is usable by them in the short and long term. The database provides information about not only trends in collecting but the performance of the objects in military culture, and provides additional information from archival sources. The pdf datasets increase the availability of military collections overall, as a number of institution do not have online catalogues. These pdf datasets will be publicly available on National Museums Scotland's database and linked to National Army Museum's database, and the National Army Museum in due course will link the dataset in pdf form to their database through a webportal. The uploading of the final pdfs are currently awaiting one final photograph from the National Army Museum which we hope to resolve by end of March 2021. Participating military museums: Black Watch Museum Bodmin Keep, Cornwall's Army Museum Cameronians' Collection Cheshire Military Museum Essex Regiment Museum Gordon Highlanders Museum Green Howards Museum Gurkha Museum HorsePower Keep Military Museum Lancashire Infantry Museum Museum of the Mercian Regiment (WFR Collections) Mercian Regiment Museum (Worcestershire) Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment Regimental Museum of the Royal Welsh Royal Green Jackets Museum Royal Engineers Museum Royal Lancers Museum Royal Norfolk Regimental Museum The Highlanders' Museum (Queen's Own Highlanders Collection) York Army Museum |
| Type Of Material | Database/Collection of data |
| Year Produced | 2021 |
| Provided To Others? | Yes |
| Impact | The database is currently being used within the context of the project, and allowing new insights, and search functions. The dataset overall allows understanding of the distinction of military museum collections and their links across institutions. Through the online pdf catalogues, data will be available to a much broader public than previously able to access the information and therefore allow researchers, students, scholars and the general public, nationally and internationally, a capacity to links these datasets across collections. |
| URL | https://www.nms.ac.uk/collections-research/our-research/featured-projects/collecting-practices-of-th... |
| Description | University of Edinburgh and University of Toronto consortium looking at the retention of human remains by Anatomy Museum, University of Edinburgh |
| Organisation | University of Edinburgh |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Sector | Academic/University |
| PI Contribution | Henrietta Lidchi is a member of the consortium to provide advice and contributions linked to the methodologies that can work for community collaboration and consultation on sensitive matters arising from and pertaining to the retention of ancestors by European collections. |
| Collaborator Contribution | The partnership is run through the University of Edinburgh and the University of Toronto, and is arising from the postgraduate research linked to University of Edinburgh collections. The aim ultimately is to come to a view about the most appropriate way of either retaining, researching or returning the ancestors in the University of Edinburgh collection. |
| Impact | At present we are in the early stages, however it has resulted in two workshops with representatives of First Nations, Inuit and Metis communities in Canada, and Native American communities in the USA. Two workshops were held in January of 2023. |
| Start Year | 2022 |
| Description | University of Edinburgh and University of Toronto consortium looking at the retention of human remains by Anatomy Museum, University of Edinburgh. |
| Organisation | University of Edinburgh |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Sector | Academic/University |
| PI Contribution | In 2023 I was part of the working group that both developed and planned consultations with a number of First Nations and Inuit communities in Canada and Scotland. This resulted in a workshop in November called: Indigenous Ancestors in the Collections of the University of Edinburgh. The consultation was very productive, and whilst I was not able to attend the final workshop, I was in all stages of the preparation. |
| Collaborator Contribution | The University of Edinburgh and the University of Toronto are lead partners, including academics and researchers. They have also generated the funds to allow in person consultation from indigenous community members. |
| Impact | The outcomes will be publications and policy developments at the university of edinburgh as regards consideration of colonial collections and collections linked to indigenous communities. |
| Start Year | 2022 |
| Description | 'Can we trust ourselves? Ethnographic objects in military museums', Henrietta Lidchi and Nicole Hartwell, Museum Ethnographers Group Annual Conference, 25 April 2019 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | To alert museum professionals in the ethnographic field to the relevance and importance of military museum collections. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
| Description | 'Military Ethics in a Multicultural Britain' Conference held at the Centre for Historical Analysis and Conflict Research at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst. Nicole Hartwell Presented 'A Historical Perspective' on the panel 'The Military Challenge' with Lieutenant General James Bashall (former Commander, Home Command), Brigadier Bill Wright (Deputy Commandant, RMAS) and Dr Stephen Deakin. 70 people attending from British army, wider defence and civil society. 14 February 2018 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
| Results and Impact | This was an extremely valuable opportunity by invitation only to attend a closed conference held by the British Army at Sandhurst. This developed a wider recognition of the project within the military, and addressed a large audience. Connections were made with senior military personnel who offered to assist in providing access to regimental museum collections. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| Description | 'Provenance Research and Military Collections', Nicole Hartwell, 2-4 April, 2019, National Army Museum Regimental and Corps Museums Conference |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | This introduced and discussed the work of the project with museum professionals out of the military sector, and was used to test this activity and to gather support and feedback. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| Description | 'Thinking Beyond Loot: The Colonial Origins of Collections' |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Looking at the techniques and methodology of provenance research. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| Description | A silver mounted Asante Gourd |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Keep everyone informed about the research project and the developments. However we are aware as the project develops that people having been referring to the website, reading the information and contacting us. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | https://www.nms.ac.uk/collections-research/our-research/featured-projects/collecting-practices-of-th... |
| Description | Advisory Board at the National Museum of World Cultures, Leiden, 27-29 November 2018 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Keep everyone informed about the research project and the developments. However we are aware as the project develops that people having been referring to the website, reading the information and contacting us. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| URL | https://www.nms.ac.uk/collections-research/our-research/featured-projects/collecting-practices-of-th... |
| Description | Advisory Board, National Museum Scotland, May 2019 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Advance the research agenda of the project, and to start to develop the second publication through presenting the theoretical framework and case studies. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| Description | Attendance and presentation of paper on project (later published) at the ICOMAM Conference, Nicole Hartwell, 1-3 October 2018 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Nicole Hartwell presented a paper at the ICOMAM conference on a specific aspect of the project. This was a good opportunity to communicate the aims of the project to an international audience and to begin to draw parallels with European museums and colonial collecting. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| Description | Attendance at AMOT Conference. 11 October 2017 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The purpose of attending was that of reinforcing the messaging regarding the research, and to develop further relationships with military museums. Twelve regimental museum curators were contacted to organise future visits. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| Description | Attendance at Magdala 150 Event at SOAS, London, 22 May 2018 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Local |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Nicole Hartwell attended this event which brought together a group of scholars to discuss various aspects of the campaign. This led to connections made with scholars in other institutions as well as the general public who had travelled to Ethiopia and traversed the terrain of the campaign. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| Description | Attendance at the Abyssinian Campaign Seminar Day at Bankfield Museum, Halifax, 21 April 2018 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Nicole Hartwell attended this event which was organised by the descendants of officers who had fought in the campaign in 1868 and hosted by the Duke of Wellington's Regiment museum. This provided a unique insight into the perspectives of ancestors on the issue of taking spoils of war in the aftermath of battle. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| Description | Attendance at the British Army Cultural Property Protection Group Meeting, National Army Museum, 21 November 2018 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
| Results and Impact | Henrietta Lidchi and Nicole Hartwell attended this working group meeting with a view to broaden understanding of our project with policy makers and to draw parallels between nineteenth century and present day practice. Connections were made with a view to assist with one of the emerging aspects of the project - translation of Arabic inscriptions on objects. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| Description | Attendance at the National Army Museum Regimental and Corps Museums Open Day, Nicole Hartwell, 11 April 2018 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Nicole Hartwell attended this event where she made contact with curators from regimental and corps museums in order to widen knowledge of the project and arrange future research visits. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| Description | Attendance at the Private View of the Maqdala 1868 Display at the Victoria and Albert Museum, 5 April 2018 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Nicole Hartwell attended the Private View prior to the opening of the display Maqdala 1868 at the Victoria & Albert Museum. This was attended by the Ethiopian Ambassador. Nicole discussed the project with the Director of the V&A, Tristram Hunt to broaden knowledge amongst national institutions in the UK. There is potential for the project to collaborate with the V&A on a community engagement event in 2019. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| Description | BBC, Radio 3, Free Thinking programme, New Thinking about Museums, 13/10/2020, Henrietta Lidchi interviewed about miltitary collections and Baggage and Belonging |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A broadcast e.g. TV/radio/film/podcast (other than news/press) |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | The programme was part of a strand that looked at new research in museums, and two of those interviewed were interested in each other's work. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
| Description | Considering the material legacies of colonial conflict, St Andrews University, The Art of War course, 29 October 2020, Henrietta Lidchi and Stuart Allan |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | Students were engaged and asked a number of questions, this relating to colonial conflict and object biographies for a more art historical course. Question and answer session was lively. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
| Description | Consultation with Imperial War Museum |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Stuart Allan met with the Executive Director and staff of the Imperial War Museum's IWM Institute discussing the development of the Legacies of Empire exhibition and other project outputs in relation to the Institute's planning of a forthcoming Empire and Conflict season for 2025. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
| Description | Culture of Implication: How European Museums are addressing questions of return |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | Presentation at the University of New Mexico on 21 September 2023 at the International Studies Institute at UNM, Albuquerque, New Mexico. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
| Description | Curators Meeting at the Fife and Forfar Yeomanry Museum Cupar, presentation on the project to an audience of 12 regimental museum curators. 28 September 2017 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The purpose was part of the overall dissemination of the project purpose, building support and recognition, listening to comments and views, and deciding ways of moving forward in working with the military museum sector. In particular understanding the concerns of curators working the military museum sector, their needs and requirements, and understanding better the range of collections. Giving the opportunity to curators to ask questions. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| Description | Dividing the Spoils: Perspectives on Military Collecting and the British Empire |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | This was drawing attention to the publication of the book that has been ordered by a number of those interested in the issues and the research project overall. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
| URL | https://www.nms.ac.uk/collections-research/our-research/featured-projects/collecting-practices-of-th... |
| Description | Flash Gordon: Museum Treasures Reveal Truth at Last on the Loot of Scotland's Empire, The Herald, 27 December 2020, pp.28,53,54. Feature on Legacies of Empire exhibition |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | No specific feedback at present |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
| Description | Henrietta Lidchi, "Museums and the Ethics of Retention", Invention of History lecture and seminars, March 2022 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Undergraduate students |
| Results and Impact | Discussion raised questions regarding military collecting, the central topic of the research. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
| Description | Henrietta Lidchi, "Of Colonial military objects, contest and sentiment", seminar Luxembourg Centre for Contemporary and Digital History (online), February 2022. |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | The lecture was in the context of discussing new research directions, and the history of warfare. Questions were asked as regards questions of governance. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
| Description | Henrietta Lidchi, "Understanding current debates about restitution, repatriation and return", Reinwardt Academie, October 2021 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an open day or visit at my research institution |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | Understanding and appreciation of provenance research and aspects of british military colonial engagement. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
| Description | Henrietta Lidchi, 'Perilous Gestures, thinking through the return of cultural objects', February 2020 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | This was a public lecture at the Victoria and Albert Museum, to which academics, museum professionals, policy makers and students came as well as online journalists. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
| Description | Henrietta Lidchi, 'Policies in regard to Colonial Collections', HERE: Heritage Reflections conference, February 2021. |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | These events two workshops and a breakout coaching sessions for young professionals, were organised by the Dutch Rijksdienst voor het Cultureel Erfgoed (RCE) and Mondriaan Fonds (MF). This was workshop training on an issue that is increasingly on the museum agenda throughout Europe. The workshop included a number of questions from the audience. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
| Description | Henrietta Lidchi, Changing Practices in the Dutch National Context |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The conference in Ghent was for the purposes of reviewing the experience of Belgium colonial collecting. The paper presented set a comparative tone between Dutch moves in the recent past, with UK colonial collecting and the question of trophies and relics - as discovered in military colonial collections - and a consequence about the Baggage and Belonging Project. This conference was attended by policy makers and academics as well as activists. A number especially commented on the paper. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| Description | Henrietta Lidchi, Colonial History and Restitution: A round discussion among museum professionals, Leiden, 21 January 2020 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The talk was a roundtable discussion then published in 2020. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
| Description | Henrietta Lidchi, Panel discussion regarding "Restitution" online (Lund Humphries), linked to book launch, November 2021 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | This was a group discussion linked to Alex Herman's new publication which aims to provide a short introduction to the question of restitution in a European context. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
| Description | Henrietta Lidchi, Restitution and Return in Europe, May 2019 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Undergraduate students |
| Results and Impact | The presentation was at the University of California, Davis, on the invitation of Professor Hulleah Tsinhnahjinnie, and as a consequence the class had an assignement on questions of history and return. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| Description | Henrietta Lidchi, Understanding Current Debates about Repatriation, Restitution and Return for Reinwardt Academy, MA Applied Museum and Heritage Studies, 21 October 2020 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | The students reported greater understanding and were engaged in the issues. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
| Description | Henrietta Lidchi, panel discussion regarding "Ongemakkelijk Erfgoed" (Walburg Press) online, linked to book launch, May 2021 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | This event was linked a book publication and was a discussion about questions of colonial heritage. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
| Description | Idle no/know more: strategies for decolonising museums, seminar, University of Edinburgh, 30 October 2020 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Undergraduate students |
| Results and Impact | The seminar was a broad tackling of the issues of de-colonisation undertaking with Dutch based colleagues but refering to military appropriations in times of war. The audience was engaged and enthusiastic. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
| Description | International Workshop |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Keep everyone informed about the research project and the developments. However we are aware as the project develops that people having been referring to the website, reading the information and contacting us |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
| URL | https://www.nms.ac.uk/collections-research/our-research/featured-projects/collecting-practices-of-th... |
| Description | International Workshop, Baggage and Belonging, February 2020 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The workshop planned over two days (just before the shutdown from the pandemic) included speakers from the UK, USA, Netherlands and Jamaica who were brought together to discuss current understanding of military and naval collecting, provenance research and its links to the restitution debate. This included looking at new areas of research and comparative models. The workshop was intended to reach active researchers and those engaging profoundly in new debate through collections and historical work. All noted how valuable it was, and several has exchanged papers, and asked to be kept involved in future initiatives. It included discussion of military ethics. The workshop started on the first day with a keynoted provided by Professor Edward Spiers and Henrietta Lidchi, Stuart Allan, Nicole Hartwell each gave presentations. Members of the Advisory Board chaired sessions, and participated in a concluding self-reflective session at the end where the merits of working in a cross-disciplinary fashion and what membersthe project learning of the Advisory Board had learned from each otherwas considered. The full second day included sessions on Military Governance. (Pauljac Verhoeven, Staci-Mari Dehaney, David Whetham); Collecting (John McAleer, Mirjam Shatanawi, Zachary Kingdon, Daniel Simpson); Afterlives (Chris Wingfield, Jonathan Fine, Jacques Schuhmacher, Desha Osborne). All the abstracts are online on the project website. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
| URL | https://www.nms.ac.uk/media/1162650/abstracts-and-speaker-biographies-25220.pdf |
| Description | Interview by Henrletta Lidchi and Stuart Allan, for Britain at War, Vol 167, pp. 16-22, entitled "To the victor belong the spoils" |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A magazine, newsletter or online publication |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Supporters |
| Results and Impact | The article will cover both the Legacies of Empire exhibition and the Dividing the Spoils publication. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
| Description | Jackie McGlone, "Loot, Spoils, Trophies and Beyond", Explorer Magazine, pp16-19, featuring exhibition and project |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A magazine, newsletter or online publication |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Information about forthcoming exhibition to museums supporters |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
| Description | Knowledge Exchange Workshop, 'Reconsidering Ethnographic Collections in Regimental Museums', 11 September 2018 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The project team convened at the National Army Museum to lead our first knowledge exchange workshop where regimental museum curators were invited to discuss the opportunities and challenges raised when working with ethnographic collections in their museums. 5 regimental museum curators were in attendance. We discussed a number of issues including community engagement, repatriation and how to make such collections more accessible to the wider public. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| Description | Knowledge Exchange Workshop: Reconsidering Ethnographic Collections in Military Museums |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Keep everyone informed about the research project and its developments, here especially regimental museums. However we have been aware as the project develops that people having been referring to the website, reading the information and contacting us. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | https://www.nms.ac.uk/collections-research/our-research/featured-projects/collecting-practices-of-th... |
| Description | Kunwar Singh's Silver Fly Whisk |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Keep everyone informed about the research project and the developments. However we are aware as the project develops that people having been referring to the website, reading the information and contacting us. This object is linked to a further item collection by Pearse which is on display in Legacies of Empire at the National War Museum (open in November 2020 and open until Spring 2022). |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | https://www.nms.ac.uk/collections-research/our-research/featured-projects/collecting-practices-of-th... |
| Description | Legacies of Empire exhibition webpage with object features |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | The Legacies of Empire webpage includes a selection of the objects featured in the exhibition, as well as a summary of the exhibition itself. The objects featured show the results of the provenance research including the identification of the item, the way it was appropriated in a military context, and the way in which the object was accessioned into the museum. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
| URL | https://www.nms.ac.uk/exhibitions-events/exhibitions/national-war-museum/legacies-of-empire/ |
| Description | Legacies of Empire, Explorer Magazine, p.9 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A magazine, newsletter or online publication |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | Feature on exhibition being opened. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
| Description | Legacies of Empire, two part conservation blog by Lydia Messerschmidt of National Museums Scotland |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The blog is in two parts document in fascinating detail the conservation and reconstruction of one of the earliest items in the Legacies of Empire exhibition, a horn cup from Ethiopia from the 18th century. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
| URL | https://blog.nms.ac.uk/tag/legacies-of-empire/ |
| Description | Marshall McKay Seminar: International Repatriation Efforts |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Part of a workshop aimed at members of Tribal Libraries, Archives and Museums in the USA and the Pacific, to look at initiatives linked to the Native American Graves and Repatriation Act, and how communities could successfully lobby to request ancestral remains and cultural belongings. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2024 |
| Description | Meeting of the Advisory Board of the project, including presentation of the results of the research so far and detailed discussion with Advisory Board. Presentation by Colonel Charles Sloan regarding military collecting. 17 November 2017 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The Advisory Board convenes every six months, and we are now using this forum in which the aims and the objectives of the project is discussed to include either academics or those in the military museum field. We invited Colonel Charles Sloan of the Association of Scottish Military Museums/Army Museums Ogilby Trust. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| Description | New web pages for the National Museums Scotland highlighting project. |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The purpose is to advertise and make accessible through the website the ongoing research that is being conducted through the project. The aim is to build up this web resource as the project develops. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| URL | https://www.nms.ac.uk/collections-research/our-research/current-research/baggage-and-belonging/ |
| Description | Nicole Hartwell attended Curators Meeting at the Fife and Forfar Yeomanry Museum Cupar, 28 September 2017 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | This was a presentation to museum curators to build support early in the research process. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| Description | Nicole Hartwell attended Trustees Meeting of the Association of Scottish Military Museums, Gordon Highlanders Museum, Aberdeen, 14 September 2017 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | This was a presentation to museum trustees to build support early in the project. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| Description | Nicole Hartwell, 'A Victorian Military Martyr: The Relics of General Charles Gordon' at Société Française d'Etudes Victoriennes et Edouardiennes Conference 'Showcasing Empire', Aix-Marseille Université, Aix-en-Provence, 19-22 February 2020 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Contribution of research project to conference about historical research. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
| Description | Nicole Hartwell, 'Provenance Research and Nineteenth Century Military Collecting', November 2019 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Providing a public platform for the value and methodology of provenance research through the case studies. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| Description | Nicole Hartwell, Researching Military Collections: The Cawnpore Cross |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Public/other audiences |
| Results and Impact | The webpage received feedback in the shape of the public sending us examples of similar crosses, one in a private collection. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | https://blog.nms.ac.uk/tag/baggage-and-belonging/?_ga=2.187865896.1495958838.1614441765-1223069324.1... |
| Description | Nicole M. Hartwell, 'Exhibiting colonial legacies', Re-thinking the Indian Rebellion, Community Curators project at the Highlanders' Museum, 16 March 2022. |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Looking at exhibition strategies for community curators with discussion. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
| Description | Participation in dialogue at the Association of Tribal Libraries Archives and Museums conference in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, USA, October 2023 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | This was a part of a panel discussion with other key practitioners in the field on the question of repatriation and the management of such in European countries, in the light of new regulations in North America. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
| Description | Presentation of the project at a workshop on 19th century collecting, British Museum, Henrietta Lidchi and Nicole Hartwell, 21 February 2019 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Henrietta Lidchi and Nicole Hartwell presented current research findings to colleagues working in similar areas in the context of China at the British Museum. This was an opportunity to broaden knowledge of the project at a national level and to make contacts with colleagues working on similar themes. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| Description | Presentation of the project to colleagues at the Department of Scottish History and Archaeology, 6 December 2018 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Local |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Nicole Hartwell presented present project research findings to colleagues in the Department of Scottish History and Archaeology. This provided a unique opportunity to broaden the discussion of themes relevant to the project with colleagues from other time periods, and draw connections / similarities. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| Description | Presentation of the project to colleagues at the Department of World Cultures, National Museums Scotland, 27 April 2018 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Local |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The project team presented their present project findings to colleagues at the Department of World Cultures, National Museums Scotland. This resulted in a productive discussion with regard to the differences between cultures of collecting in both departments at the museum. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| Description | Presentation on the project at the National Army Museum Curator's Course, audience of 30 regimental museum curators. 10 October 2017 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The purpose was part of the overall dissemination of the project purpose, building support and recognition, listening to comments and views, and deciding ways of moving forward in working with the military museum sector. Developing this in particular partnership and as part of training program developed by the National Army Museum. Giving the opportunity to curators to ask questions and understand the methodology of the project and its overal aims. To inform military museum curators and address their concerns. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| Description | Presentation on the questions of restitution, repatriation and return at Ucross Symposium in Denver, Colorado, June 2023 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Brief invited presentation to the assembled gathering of new and emerging practitioners and Native American curatorial staff and staff working on Native American collections. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
| Description | Provenance Laboratory (Pressing Matter Research project workshop for Dutch and Indonesian scholars) (17/05/2022) |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
| Results and Impact | This provenance workshop, led by Henrietta Lidchi, brought together researchers from Germany, Netherlands, Indonesia to look at histories of collections and the methodological questions that arise from the doing of provenance work and working in archives. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
| Description | Second Advisory Board Meeting with tour of Magdala 1868 Display, Victoria & Albert Museum, 24 May 2018 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The Advisory Board convened every six months, and we used this forum in which the aims and the objectives of the project was discussed to include either academics or those in the military museum field. For this event we reached out to Alexandra Jones, curator of the Magdala 1868 exhibition who provided a detailed presentation on the curatorial vision behind the display. This experience led to an interesting discussion between members of the Advisory Board on issues including the display of complex histories and repatriation. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| Description | Stuart Allan, Legacies of Empire exhibition presentation |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Those attending a meeting presenting the National Museums Scotland's year ahead, including journalists, were informed about the exhibition. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| Description | Summer School on cultural objects, The Hague, Leiden University Faculty of Law, August 2019, Henrietta Lidchi |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
| Results and Impact | To undertake a workshop thinking through what are the criteria of colonial collections and the mechanism by which they are taken. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| Description | That Careful Edge: collection histories and dialogical relations in the post-colonial museum (25/04/2022) |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The presentation was in the context of a day workshop at the University of Oslo, looking at heritage and colonial inheritances (25 04 2022). |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
| Description | The box that went on the March to Kandahar |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Keep everyone informed about the research project and the developments. However we are aware as the project develops that people having been referring to the website, reading the information and contacting us. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| URL | https://www.nms.ac.uk/collections-research/our-research/featured-projects/collecting-practices-of-th... |
| Description | Thinking with Henrietta Lidchi and Stuart Allan, Dividing the Spoils, Research Centre for Material Culture public webinar, 14 January 2021 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The event was both planned as a critical engagement with the recent publication and the research project. Colleagues from Sweden, Germany, UK, the Netherlands reported to have watched it at the time or on catch up and to have used the results. Also led to discussion as to future initiatives. We know that a 169 people attended the event, and more than 500 have watched it through the facebook channel used by the RCMC. One professional colleague noted: "I recently listened in on your conversation at the RCMR about your new book, which was brilliant (I ordered the book but haven't received it yet). I'm currently writing a paper on our military collections from the Congo and you opened some really productive lines of thought" After the Thinking Through discussion, Henrietta Lidchi and Stuart Allan were asked to give a specific teaching sessions to University of Utrecht students, who were for the purposes of this class, sent an introductory chapter from the book. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
| URL | https://www.materialculture.nl/en/events/thinking-henrietta-lidchi-stuart-allan-dividing-spoils |
| Description | Third Advisory Board Meeting at the National Museum of World Cultures, Leiden, 28 November 2018 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The Advisory Board convenes every six months, and we used this forum in which the aims and the objectives of the project is discussed to include either academics or those in the military museum field. On this occasion we invited colleagues at the National Museum of World Cultures in Leiden and Bronbeek Museum in Haarlem to discuss the Dutch perspective on colonial collecting and Dutch military collecting and representation thereof. This was also a unique opportunity to connect with scholars in the fields of anthropology and military history in the Netherlands, and to begin to draw parallels between British and Dutch colonial histories and colonial collecting. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
| Description | To Know from Whence You Came (Keynote speech, 23/05/2022 at University of East Anglia) |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | This was a conference that celebrated the contribution of Professor John Mack at the University of East Anglia. It included speakers from the USA, Nigeria, Kenya, Uganda, Japan, Netherlands. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
| Description | Trustees Meeting of the Association of Scottish Military Museums, Gordon Highlanders Museum, Aberdeen, presentation on the project to an audience of 10 regimental museum trustees. 14 September 2017 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Regional |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The purpose was part of the overall dissemination of the project purpose, building support and recognition, listening to comments and views, and deciding ways of moving forward in working with the military museum sector. As Trustees the representatives are both practitioners and policy makers. The meeting led to the development of a fact sheet for all military museum participants concerning the aims and objectives of the project, and key staff, specifically addressing their concerns regarding contested histories. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
| Description | Understanding Current Debates about Restitution, Repatriation & Return: Workshop/training for staff at military museums, Henrietta Lidchi, 17 July 2020 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | The course delivered through (2 hours) was offered through the National Army Museum to military museum professionals who wanted to understand the current discussions regarding restitution in the context of military collections. The workshop, led by Henrietta Lidchi, sparked a number of questions and in particular a briefing about complex European debates and how these may affect military institutions working throughout the UK and the ways of tackling such questions from within their perspective and value system. The National Army Museum undertook an evaluation. In answer to the question "Did you find the course/topics useful?" 100% response was yes and further comments were: <> In answer to the question: "Do you feel more confident to approach parts of your collection", 100% answered yes. Further comments included: <> Asked for overall feedback, in addition to being interested in our publications, participants fed back: <> |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2020 |
| Description | Upload of story emerging from General Gordon and Sudan Campaign, 19 april 2019 |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Engagement focused website, blog or social media channel |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | International |
| Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
| Results and Impact | Keep everyone informed about the research project and the developments. We have had news that people are following the project through the blogs. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2019 |
| URL | https://www.nms.ac.uk/collections-research/our-research/featured-projects/collecting-practices-of-th... |