Working Towards a More Anticolonial Repatriation Process

There is little research on the long-term impact of repatriation, particularly how it is interpreted for the public and the sustainability of relationships created. The focus of current debate on the Benin Bronzes overshadows a number of repatriations from UK museums to Indigenous Nations over the past 30 years. This important history has not been studied before and holds the potential to revolutionise UK practice and policy. My PhD will create a more nuanced understanding of the legacy of repatriation; breaking down the 'loss' versus 'gain' dichotomy that exists in the field. I will also seek to outline how the repatriation process can be made more anticolonial, and how this practice could be used to inform broader anticolonial museology.
Utilising a qualitative case study approach analysing belongings returned to Indigenous Nations in North America, this PhD will address the gap in current literature concerning the impact of repatriation on UK museums and practitioners. I will explore the role of policy, emotions, interpretation, and legacy within the repatriation process.
This is urgent, critical work that will support current rethinking, innovation of practice, and inform long-term planning. Utilising an anticolonial feminist activist methodology, my research will inform work to decolonise museums and emphasise the urgent and important nature of this work.
I will challenge the very concept of a museum - originally a tool of empire built on collections - to explore how repatriation can promote anti-colonialism by dismantling and transforming these institutions' ethos and practice. This research will re-examine the role of objects in museology by arguing that museums can be anticolonial and create greater meaning in the physical and theoretical spaces left by repatriated belongings.