New explorations into South Sudanese museum collections in Europe
Lead Research Organisation:
Durham University
Department Name: History
Abstract
The new state of South Sudan is best known for its deeply troubled history; from enslavement and colonisation in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, to the prolonged civil wars that led both to its independence in 2011 and to continued post-independence conflicts. This history of violence and victimhood poses both analytical and practical challenges to scholars and nation-builders alike: how can we better understand the interactions and strategies pursued by people even in violent contexts? How can we study and celebrate the creativity, resilience and reciprocities that also run through South Sudanese history? How can we gain a richer picture of the region's past, one that reaches beyond deterministic narratives of conflict and ethnic division?
One resource for doing this lies unexploited in our midst. European museums house an estimated 20,000 objects, originally acquired by European travellers, traders, missionaries and officials in the Southern Sudanese region in the nineteenth or early twentieth century. These items range from household objects, jewellery, weaponry and musical instruments to large, visually striking figurative statues. They are now housed in locations as diverse as St Petersburg, Rome and Kent. Many of the collections have rich supporting documentation - including accounts of expeditions, diaries, photographs and correspondence concerning acquisitions by museums. Yet they have not yet been the subject of extensive comparative enquiry.
'New explorations into South Sudanese museum collections in Europe' is an international research network investigating this huge but largely untapped resource for advancing understandings of South Sudan's history, global connections and creative arts. Not only do these collections provide new sources on the region's past, they also expose complex narratives of interaction, in both its violent and more peaceful aspects. Exploring material connections and reciprocities will make new intellectual advances on the history of South Sudan possible and allow us to rethink this history with potential for significant intellectual and social impacts.
The network brings together academics from different disciplines with museum practitioners and heritage stakeholders to develop a research agenda on South Sudanese museum collections across Europe. It is the first of its kind to connect these dispersed collections with South Sudanese communities, addressing not only the collections' academic significance, but also their potential contribution to developing more inclusive understandings of South Sudanese identity. These objects can reveal histories of economic and cultural exchange within the region that has become South Sudan. Through their acquisition, export and display in Europe, they also embody the often violent and extractive incorporation of this region into imperial and transnational economies. They offer the potential for deeper and more nuanced understandings of how people in the Upper Nile region negotiated new trading opportunities as well as the coercive predation through which these objects were acquired.
Through three workshops with international participants, the network will make tangible steps towards a major programme of research on the collections, involving institutions in both Europe and South Sudan. It will serve as a unique international hub for museums with significant South Sudanese collections, facilitating new comparative perspectives on as yet disconnected collections and histories. A key priority is to involve South Sudanese in this research process, while providing an important opportunity for current curators and researchers to reflect on the past and present display of these collections, their reception by European audiences and the narratives they project. The initial results will be published in a special journal issue aimed at multidisciplinary audiences and online to reach the widest possible academic and non-academic audiences.
One resource for doing this lies unexploited in our midst. European museums house an estimated 20,000 objects, originally acquired by European travellers, traders, missionaries and officials in the Southern Sudanese region in the nineteenth or early twentieth century. These items range from household objects, jewellery, weaponry and musical instruments to large, visually striking figurative statues. They are now housed in locations as diverse as St Petersburg, Rome and Kent. Many of the collections have rich supporting documentation - including accounts of expeditions, diaries, photographs and correspondence concerning acquisitions by museums. Yet they have not yet been the subject of extensive comparative enquiry.
'New explorations into South Sudanese museum collections in Europe' is an international research network investigating this huge but largely untapped resource for advancing understandings of South Sudan's history, global connections and creative arts. Not only do these collections provide new sources on the region's past, they also expose complex narratives of interaction, in both its violent and more peaceful aspects. Exploring material connections and reciprocities will make new intellectual advances on the history of South Sudan possible and allow us to rethink this history with potential for significant intellectual and social impacts.
The network brings together academics from different disciplines with museum practitioners and heritage stakeholders to develop a research agenda on South Sudanese museum collections across Europe. It is the first of its kind to connect these dispersed collections with South Sudanese communities, addressing not only the collections' academic significance, but also their potential contribution to developing more inclusive understandings of South Sudanese identity. These objects can reveal histories of economic and cultural exchange within the region that has become South Sudan. Through their acquisition, export and display in Europe, they also embody the often violent and extractive incorporation of this region into imperial and transnational economies. They offer the potential for deeper and more nuanced understandings of how people in the Upper Nile region negotiated new trading opportunities as well as the coercive predation through which these objects were acquired.
Through three workshops with international participants, the network will make tangible steps towards a major programme of research on the collections, involving institutions in both Europe and South Sudan. It will serve as a unique international hub for museums with significant South Sudanese collections, facilitating new comparative perspectives on as yet disconnected collections and histories. A key priority is to involve South Sudanese in this research process, while providing an important opportunity for current curators and researchers to reflect on the past and present display of these collections, their reception by European audiences and the narratives they project. The initial results will be published in a special journal issue aimed at multidisciplinary audiences and online to reach the widest possible academic and non-academic audiences.
Planned Impact
This network will be the first of its kind to comparatively examine South Sudanese museum collections held across Europe in collaboration with South Sudanese stakeholders. It will have key impacts beyond the academy on a) museum practice in Europe and b) cultural development in South Sudan. These impacts will be developed through engagement and collaboration between different sectors:
- The public sector in both Europe and South Sudan: the network will influence museum practice on South Sudanese collections. Institutions will learn more about the objects in their care and gain opportunities to establish links across Europe and with South Sudan. The network will partner and work closely with the Pitt Rivers Museum as one route to the co-production of knowledge with this sector. Impacts in the South Sudanese culture and heritage sector will be enabled through greater recognition and understanding of their dispersed cultural heritage, links with overseas institutions and increased national attention on heritage.
- The third sector in South Sudan: civil society organizations involved in community cohesion and cultural understanding will gain access to an important resource for exploring South Sudanese history. More nuanced understandings of South Sudanese history and inter-ethnic relationship that will emerge also have the potential to inform post-conflict interventions and reconciliation processes in South Sudan.
- The wider public in Europe and South Sudan will gain greater understanding and contextualization of the cultural history and arts of South Sudan, and of the economic, cultural and knowledge exchanges between Africa and Europe in the age of exploration and empire.
Significant platforms for impact are built into the network's core activities, and we will take steps to consolidate these opportunities and engage potential research users at appropriate stages. By working with existing contacts and established networks in South Sudan we will be able to reach wider public audiences as well as those professionally engaged in heritage and peace-building. A website will be maintained through the life of the network, which will provide a central point to disseminate and publicise research activities. Media contacts will be utilised at key points to attract wider attention.
The workshops themselves are an important arena for impact. We have adopted a workshop format as the network's principal activity, which is intended to encourage collaboration and engagement between participants from different disciplines and sectors. The structure and activities of the network have been designed to facilitate the co-production of knowledge, enriching academic knowledge and increasing the applicability of the research beyond scholarship. Practitioners from all museums with major South Sudanese collections have confirmed their willingness to participate and their attendance has been budgeted.
Key individuals in South Sudan's cultural and academic sectors are core participants. Senior representatives of civil society organisations, who will bring insights from programming in South Sudan, have been included in the workshops (and budget where appropriate). The final workshop in Juba provides an unrivalled platform to reach a cross section of local and international stakeholders (such as UNESCO) and build a platform for deep and lasting impact on the process of nation building in South Sudan.
The impact strategy will be overseen by the PI, who has extensive experience working with NGOs, policy makers and other research users in South Sudan. Her research has been influential in shaping interventions with customary authorities and local justice in South Sudan (forming the basis of an impact case study for REF 2014). The Co-I brings recent experience of engaging with heritage stakeholders in Kenya (including National Museums of Kenya) on a recent ESRC-funded project about heritage and constitutional reform.
- The public sector in both Europe and South Sudan: the network will influence museum practice on South Sudanese collections. Institutions will learn more about the objects in their care and gain opportunities to establish links across Europe and with South Sudan. The network will partner and work closely with the Pitt Rivers Museum as one route to the co-production of knowledge with this sector. Impacts in the South Sudanese culture and heritage sector will be enabled through greater recognition and understanding of their dispersed cultural heritage, links with overseas institutions and increased national attention on heritage.
- The third sector in South Sudan: civil society organizations involved in community cohesion and cultural understanding will gain access to an important resource for exploring South Sudanese history. More nuanced understandings of South Sudanese history and inter-ethnic relationship that will emerge also have the potential to inform post-conflict interventions and reconciliation processes in South Sudan.
- The wider public in Europe and South Sudan will gain greater understanding and contextualization of the cultural history and arts of South Sudan, and of the economic, cultural and knowledge exchanges between Africa and Europe in the age of exploration and empire.
Significant platforms for impact are built into the network's core activities, and we will take steps to consolidate these opportunities and engage potential research users at appropriate stages. By working with existing contacts and established networks in South Sudan we will be able to reach wider public audiences as well as those professionally engaged in heritage and peace-building. A website will be maintained through the life of the network, which will provide a central point to disseminate and publicise research activities. Media contacts will be utilised at key points to attract wider attention.
The workshops themselves are an important arena for impact. We have adopted a workshop format as the network's principal activity, which is intended to encourage collaboration and engagement between participants from different disciplines and sectors. The structure and activities of the network have been designed to facilitate the co-production of knowledge, enriching academic knowledge and increasing the applicability of the research beyond scholarship. Practitioners from all museums with major South Sudanese collections have confirmed their willingness to participate and their attendance has been budgeted.
Key individuals in South Sudan's cultural and academic sectors are core participants. Senior representatives of civil society organisations, who will bring insights from programming in South Sudan, have been included in the workshops (and budget where appropriate). The final workshop in Juba provides an unrivalled platform to reach a cross section of local and international stakeholders (such as UNESCO) and build a platform for deep and lasting impact on the process of nation building in South Sudan.
The impact strategy will be overseen by the PI, who has extensive experience working with NGOs, policy makers and other research users in South Sudan. Her research has been influential in shaping interventions with customary authorities and local justice in South Sudan (forming the basis of an impact case study for REF 2014). The Co-I brings recent experience of engaging with heritage stakeholders in Kenya (including National Museums of Kenya) on a recent ESRC-funded project about heritage and constitutional reform.
Organisations
Description | This research network debated, disseminated and documented the value and potential for a range of work with objects of South Sudanese origin held in European museums, and explored the creative possibilities for working with South Sudan's material cultural heritage more broadly. A series of three workshops in the UK and South Sudan brought together museum and heritage professionals, academics, artistic and cultural practitioners and community representatives. Wider audiences were reached through media engagement and through the network website and its online resources: workshop reports, blogs, links and a working inventory of South Sudanese objects in museum collections in Europe and Russia. We are currently working on an edited book collection focusing on the histories and meanings of individual objects within and beyond the museum collections, with contributions from a wide range of the network participants. Taken together this body of documentary outputs and the connections forged through the network activities will provide a valuable basis for future research and engagement work to build upon and extend. Key findings: The objects from South Sudan housed in European museums embody ambiguous and contentious histories: histories of creativity, skill and exchange, but also of conflict, exploitation, predation and imperialism. For South Sudanese people today, they may represent precious cultural heritage that has otherwise been lost or threatened by colonialism, conflict and displacement; but which has also been rendered hidden, inaccessible or distorted by processes of European collecting and curating. There are important questions for museum curators and others seeking to work with these collections about how to deal with the categories and identities which are reified within museum displays, such as ethnic differences and ethnographic categorisations - and which may be a source of division among South Sudanese today. The network identified the need for collaborative initiatives that could bring contemporary perspectives together with historical knowledge in and on South Sudan to better describe and display some of these objects. Digital technologies offer the potential to share images or reproductions beyond the European museums, as well as to better engage and inform museum visitors. Objects and materials have their own life. In a museum context, it can be hard to convey their previous uses and significance or to free them from dominant narratives. The creative arts are an important way of working with material culture and museum collections which will allow for objects to be 'reanimated' or 're-storied' and their meanings interpreted and communicated. South Sudan is in the unique position of not inheriting a museum from the colonial state. There is an opportunity to creatively think through what social role museum(s) might play for South Sudanese people, going beyond a focus on constructing a national museum to explore other ways of sharing, preserving and celebrating cultural heritage, and for using objects to explore and generate a sense of shared heritage and history, in all its complexity, trouble and dynamism. There is clear potential for work on material culture to bring different communities together, to explore shared histories and cultures, and act as a tangible starting point for dialogue and healing. The challenge is how to tap this potential without becoming too limited by a peacebuilding framework for cultural heritage. In a context of continual external aid interventions, work on culture, heritage and the arts differs strikingly from most initiatives in South Sudan because it celebrates the assets that communities already have, rather than trying to fill gaps in their needs. |
Exploitation Route | The network has identified key questions around the potential for research and engagement work with museum collections that will be of relevance to researchers, museum and heritage professionals and organisations, and those working to encourage cultural and artistic production, peace and connections between communities in South Sudan and its diaspora. The network website makes available important resources for future work on and beyond South Sudan, particularly the working inventory of South Sudanese objects in European museums, as well as the issues and questions raised in the workshop reports, which provide important signposts for future research and engagement directions, including the potential for creative and artistic work around museum objects. |
Sectors | Creative Economy Education Culture Heritage Museums and Collections |
URL | https://southsudanmuseumnetwork.com/ |
Description | The network brought together museum curators from across Europe for the first time to consider the connections and significance of their holdings from South Sudan, resulting in a new inventory of these collections and an open-access, illustrated publication highlighting key objects with chapters authored by a range of museum and heritage professionals and practitioners, as well as academic contributors (Pieces of a Nation: South Sudanese Heritage and Museum Collections, Sidestone Press, 2021). The network workshops enabled South Sudanese participants to explain and debate the contentious histories of museum objects and displays. According to the network partner, the Pitt Rivers Museum (PRM), the meetings enabled its curatorial staff 'to engage closely with colleagues from all over Europe on collections and their stake holder communities, and facilitated many follow up communications and research directions. The network was vital in establishing a further network of South Sudanese Diaspora members living in UK, who were invited to come to the PRM in November 2018 to view collections and take part in a film training course. As part of this course, the community group made a film which summarized their feelings about museum collections for the diaspora community: https://vimeo.com/306151198. Dr Zoe Cormack, the network's Co-I, took a lead role in this work as a current Research Affiliate of the Museum. The diaspora group's visit was timed to coincide with another initiative that arose directly from the AHRC network's activity, being a Mellon Foundation funded Global South Visiting Professorship at the University of Oxford in 2018 for Jok Madut Jok, one of the network's participants. This successful set of initiatives led to a further Diaspora group visit to the PRM in Feb 2020, with an expanded number of community participants from different parts of the UK. The network and its ongoing impact have therefore been instrumental in fostering and developing a range of museum-community relations both in South Sudan and in the UK.' Another network member also initiated the relabeling of objects in the British Museum catalogue from 'Sudanese' to 'South Sudanese'. The final workshop held in collaboration with UNESCO in Juba, South Sudan, raised awareness of the European collections among South Sudanese government, heritage and arts and culture personnel, as well as providing a forum to debate the future of museums in the new country. It led to further work by Cormack and a key network participant advising UNESCO over a potential World Heritage Site in South Sudan. In November 2022, Cormack also presented a copy of the book 'Pieces of a Nation' to the Minister for Culture in South Sudan, who put it on display in her office. The network website disseminates information and resources, with a total of 7156 views (2017-20) and 1412 Twitter followers. The book publication has been read online 570 times as of 14/03/23. |
First Year Of Impact | 2017 |
Sector | Culture, Heritage, Museums and Collections |
Impact Types | Cultural |
Description | Support for open-access book publication with Sidestone Press, provisionally titled Recovering Cultures: The arts and heritage of South Sudan in museum collections, edited by Cormack and Leonardi |
Amount | £4,000 (GBP) |
Organisation | British Institute in Eastern Africa |
Sector | Public |
Country | Kenya |
Start | 03/2019 |
End | 03/2020 |
Description | Exploring our South Sudanese identity at the Pitt Rivers Museum |
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 | With the support of the network Co-I Zoe Cormack and the network partner the Pitt Rivers Museum, network member Jok Madut Jok was resident at the Pitt Rivers Museum as a TORCH-Mellon 'Global South visiting professor' in 2018. Jok was formally the Undersecretary for Culture in the Government of South Sudan and has been a key member of the South Sudan Museum Network. As part of his programme in Oxford, TORCH supported a 2 day film workshop for South Sudanese diaspora members in the UK to visit the Pitt Rivers Museum, see some of the South Sudanese collections and gain experience in film making. The workshop was facilitated by Zoe Broughton from Film Oxford. The group made a film titled 'Exploring our South Sudanese Identity at the Pitt Rivers Museum', available on Vimeo. The film records the group's increased awareness of South Sudanese cultural heritage and museum objects as a result of the workshop/visit, and raises a number of important questions about the value of material cultural heritage in carrying and expressing memory, emotional connections to 'home' and belonging in diaspora. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
URL | https://southsudanmuseumnetwork.com/2019/01/02/exploring-our-south-sudanese-identity-at-the-pitt-riv... |
Description | Eye Radio programme on South Sudan Museums Network, April 2018 |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Media (as a channel to the public) |
Results and Impact | The network Co-I, Zoe Cormack, was interviewed about the South Sudan Museums Network for an hour-long arts and culture programme 'Our Archives' broadcast by Eye Radio in Juba, South Sudan. Eye Radio is the biggest radio broadcaster in South Sudan. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
Description | South Sudan Museum Collections website and blogs |
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 website includes information about the AHRC-funded South Sudan Museum Collections network and detailed reports of the three workshops held in Durham, Oxford and Juba, South Sudan. Blog entries also discuss work by the Co-I, Zoe Cormack, on South Sudanese objects in European museums, and an initiative by network members and partners at the Pitt Rivers Museum, Oxford, to record a film with members of the South Sudanese diaspora, entitled 'Exploring our South Sudanese Identity at the Pitt Rivers Museum.' The website also includes a working inventory of South Sudanese objects in museum collections in Europe and Russia produced by the Co-I Zoe Cormack through other funded research and updated and shared with the network members. The website has had 4,509 views as of 12 March 2019. Usually 100-200 views per month. The network also has 1171 followers on Twitter. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017,2018,2019 |
URL | https://southsudanmuseumnetwork.com/ |
Description | South Sudan in Focus radio programme, Voice of America, 7 Feb 2018 |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A press release, press conference or response to a media enquiry/interview |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Media (as a channel to the public) |
Results and Impact | The network Co-I, Zoe Cormack, and network member Atem El-Fatih of the Likikiri Collective in South Sudan, were interviewed by VOA for a 5-minute report on the South Sudan Museums Network. The programme's listeners are mainly in East Africa, including South Sudan. At the time of the broadcast VOA estimated an audience of around 11 million listeners weekly. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
URL | https://www.voanews.com/a/4243162.html |
Description | South Sudanese collections and their histories: workshop at Durham University |
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 brought together museum curators from across Europe, individuals working with cultural heritage in South Sudan (government and NGOs) and academics working in history, anthropology, archaeology and museum studies, to discuss the history, significance, politics and potential uses of South Sudanese objects in museum collections. There was real interest and enthusiasm among all participants to develop ideas for 'reanimating' these objects by reconnecting them with South Sudanese communities at home and in the diaspora, including through creative and artistic work. We also discussed the challenges for museums in engaging diverse audiences and in (re)presenting these South Sudanese objects in their collections. The curators and other professional participants reported that these discussions and the knowledge and contacts they gained through the workshop were very helpful for their work. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2017 |
URL | https://southsudanmuseumnetwork.com/workshop-1-2/ |
Description | Working with objects: comparative approaches, technology and display: workshop at Pitt Rivers Museum, Oxford |
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 | This workshop brought together many of the same participants as the first workshop in July 2017 together with some new ones, including museum curators from across Europe, members of the South Sudanese diaspora, the Director of Archives in the South Sudan Ministry of Culture, the founder of a South Sudanese women's craft organisation and academics working in history, anthropology, art history, museum studies and ethnomusicology. Discussions focused on the history, politics and challenges of cultural heritage work in South Sudan, on engaging diverse museum publics/audiences in Europe, and on the latest digital tools for engagement and dissemination around museum objects. Participants also discussed and provided feedback on the potential reimagining of a particular museum display on South Sudan in the Pitt Rivers Museum, and on future directions for further collaboration, research and engagement around the South Sudanese museum collections. In the short term we agreed on a planned open-access edited book publication to which network members and other invited authors will contribute short entries on individual objects. The workshop confirmed the interest, enthusiasm and commitment of the participants to pursue further collaborative work. As a direct result of these discussions, network partner and advisory board members Chris Morton (Pitt Rivers Museum) and Jok Madut Jok (Sudd Institute/University of Juba) were awarded a TORCH Mellon 'Global South Visiting professorship' for Jok to spend Michaelmas term 2018 at the Pitt Rivers Museum Oxford. During his fellowship, Jok was helping to inform plans for the redisplay of South Sudanese material at the Pitt Rivers Museum. Also as a result of the workshop discussions and involvement of network members, the British Museum conducted the relabelling of its South Sudanese objects from their previous designation as 'Sudanese' (Feb-June 2018). |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
URL | https://southsudanmuseumnetwork.com/events-2/workshop-2/ |
Description | Workshop on 'Connecting museum collections with South Sudan', UNESCO Juba Office, South Sudan |
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 aim of the workshop was twofold: (1) To provide an update on the ongoing work on South Sudan's historical cultural heritage in European institutions; (2) As an opportunity for deeper discussion of the relevance and potential of museum objects for developing cultural and research initiatives that will connect communities and enrich understanding of South Sudanese history, heritage and arts. The workshop facilitated an extended conversation among South Sudanese heritage professionals, academics and artists about the priorities for future research and action. The discussions highlighted some key insights and areas of future focus for a range of museum projects: • In a context of continual external aid interventions, work on culture, heritage and the arts differs strikingly from most initiatives in South Sudan because it celebrates the assets that communities already have, rather than trying to fill gaps in their needs. • South Sudan is in the unique position of not inheriting a museum from the colonial state. There is an opportunity to creatively think through what social role museum(s) might play for South Sudanese people. A flagship national museum project can have a role. However, there may be advantages to thinking in terms of a range of mobile, temporary, smaller-scale, local and community based projects (some are happening spontaneously already). These may be more feasible, accessible and inclusive as a way of building connections and understanding between South Sudanese. • The value of cultural and heritage is not always articulated well or recognised in wider society. Participants had several suggestions of how to raise public profile and interest. • Museum-based cooperation and collaborative work would be welcomed by Juba based practitioners and scholars. In part, this would involve partnerships and knowledge exchange between European museums holding significant South Sudanese collections and practitioners in South Sudan. There are also valuable regional networks (e.g. in the National Museums of Uganda and Kenya) to tap into. It is also a priority to collaborate with communities in South Sudan. • The creative arts are an important way of working with material culture and museum collections which will allow for objects to be 'reanimated' and their meanings interpreted and communicated (to publics and within the museum space). There is considerable expertise in Juba to implement creative work around museum collections and heritage. • Heritage projects and research are uniquely positioned to involve students, to contribute towards educational development and raise public awareness of history and culture. All initiatives should embed ways of creating the next generation of South Sudanese heritage leaders and reaching out to publics. • There is potential to promote peace and dialogue through museum and heritage work. However, promoting peace should not be the only focus. Participants are also keen to address other fundamental and exploratory questions (such as identity and what it means to be South Sudanese) through material culture and arts. • Ethical questions, especially around community collaborations and maintaining equal partnerships, must be continually addressed. Building on discussions at the workshop, Co-I Zoe Cormack and Rebecca Lorins (network member) contributed towards the development of a successful British Academy/GCRF project looking at concepts of resilience in South Sudanese art (PI Tamsin Bradley, Portsmouth University). Zoe's role on the project is to extend work on South Sudanese historic museum collections and make an online archive of contemporary artists practices in South Sudan (in collaboration with Rebecca Lorins and the University of Juba). Following the workshop, Co-I Zoe Cormack and Paul Lane (network member) are also advising UNESCO South Sudan about Deim Zubeir - a historic slave fort in South Sudan, which UNESCO and the Ministry of Culture are working to get listed as a World Heritage Site. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2018 |
URL | https://southsudanmuseumnetwork.com/events-2/workshop-3/ |