Sepulcherised Objects and Their Decolonial Futures in African Museums: The “Robert Edward Codrington Collection” at the Zimbabwe Natural History Museum

Abstract

This essay builds on the emerging (museum) decolonizing perspectives to (i) explore the biographical details and modes of curation and classification to which “ethnographic”1objects collected during the colonial era have been exposed; to (ii) foreground the complexities of inherited colonial museum processes embedded in African urban contexts; and, to (iii) consider alternative modes of engagement with ethnographic objects and local Indigenous communities to challenge the embedded regimes of care and the marginalization rendered to Indigenous epistemologies. One of the biggest questions facing museums in the world today is how to deal with the hordes of objects collected from various Indigenous communities and placed in museums far away from the communities who made and used them. Using the case of an “ethnographic” collection in a former colonial museum, we call for a paradigm shift in museum practices, and challenge the present state of affairs of museum curatorship. We then briefly suggest possible ways in which such museums can confront their imperial histories and unsettle their inherited regimes of care and representation. We call for museums to enter into conversations with communities, listening to them and effecting curatorial activities that re-center local ways of knowing, while embracing the complexities associated with such engagements.