Abstract

In recent decades, the museum world has devoted time and resources to studying the opinions and actions of their visitors; however, it is much more difficult to access perspectives of a more general public that includes non-visitors. This article situates popular visual culture as a form of engagement between museum professionals and the public. By analyzing the museum scene of the Marvel Studios movieBlack Panther, as well as responses to it, and then contextualizing these within the history and current events of the museum field, I identify ways in which popularly received visual culture can spur change in other cultural industries—creating productive critiques that can evolve into impactful dialogue and action to model responsive research and more inclusive museum practices.

Highlights

  • Susan Dine n ABSTRACT: In recent decades, the museum world has devoted time and resources to studying the opinions and actions of their visitors; it is much more difficult to access perspectives of a more general public that includes non-visitors

  • Museum professionals and scholars are at the forefront of these shifts, but do their concerns align with those of the general public, which is increasingly interested in the role of the museum as a resource and as a shaper of cultural industry? In recent decades, society at large has looked more closely at the histories of institutions like museums and how those histories often intersect with issues of social and racial inequalities

  • In 2018, these critiques visually coalesced in a museum scene in the widely popular Black Panther movie of the Marvel Cinematic Universe

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Summary

Museum Representation in Black Panther

Susan Dine n ABSTRACT: In recent decades, the museum world has devoted time and resources to studying the opinions and actions of their visitors; it is much more difficult to access perspectives of a more general public that includes non-visitors. In the dialogue between the curator and Killmonger, the reference to colonial expeditions of Africa may seem relatively benign; the curator’s line about the mining tool being a Benin work is almost surely the writers referencing the “Benin Expedition of 1897.” This is a rather misleading name for a British-led invasion of Benin City characterized by extensive burning and looting, as evidenced by the pervasive dispersal of cultural objects (estimated at more than 10,000) such as the “Benin Bronzes” to museums in Europe and the United States. The curator and the security officers die per Killmonger’s heist plans, symbolizing early his later intent to use force against white oppressors This scene unapologetically confronts viewers and the museum world about problematic pasts that live today in institutionalized settings. Per the 2018 Black Panther movie, the museum, the universal museum, in broad public perception is, at best, an institution that must receive justifiable critique to improve or, at worst, a colonial relic that perpetuates power imbalances and should be treated as such

Dialogue and Action
Conclusion
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