(16)--V1_06_Museums 博物馆学概论.pdfVIP

6 MuseuMs, HuMan RigHts, and univeRsalisM ReconsideRed Jennifer Barrett In 2002, 18 of the world’s major museums and galleries signed a “Declaration on the Importance and Value of Universal Museums,” a statement acknowledging that “the international museum community” should firmly discourage the illegal traffic in archaeological, artistic, and ethnic objects.1 They also stated that “objects acquired in earlier times must be viewed in the light of different sensitivities and values, reflective of that earlier era.” The signatories of the declaration describe their museums as serving “not just the citizens of one nation but the people of every nation.” This statement, and the responses to it, highlight and contextualize the tension between the historical practices of universal museums and changing cultural values. In the late twentieth century, the role of the museum as a space of public inclu- sion was keenly debated and the accompanying scholarship, the “new museology” and the more recent “critical museology,” challenged museum practitioners and researchers to further rethink the museum’s place in the public sphere. What is only beginning to be examined more frequently, however, is the importance of museums as places that contribute significantly to generating and sustaining dis- tinct subnational communities.2 This examination can be seen as a type of renewal. In important, perhaps paradoxical, ways, we see the museum coming closer to fulfilling its ambitious brief inherited from the Enlightenment ideals of the eight- eenth century.3 By continually seeking new ways to be accessible and open to all communities and individuals, the public museum appears more responsive, demo- cratic, and capacious. At the same time, however, the project of including multiple communities may simultaneously produce tensions in museums, regardless of