• Work in pairs for this activity. Select two objects that aren't your own. Discuss what you think these objects are, where they are from, and why the collector chose it.
• Feedback your ideas to the group - describe your thoughts about the object(s). Pass the object(s) around for handling during conversation (if appropriate!).
• The owner(s) of the object(s) will then respond with their own reason for collecting/keeping the item.
• How useful was it hear the rationale for collecting the objects from their owners? Did it change their meaning for you?

• If you were to curate a display using these objects, what are some of the themes you might choose? (e.g. type, colour, date, etc.). Group brainstorming exercise.
• Vote on which of these themes you would like to choose to create an interesting display.
• Work together as a group to create three different displays/contemporary cabinets based on selected themes.
• Document your cabinet displays visually through sketching/photography.

1. Mara Mattoscio, "What's in a Face? Sara Baartman, the (Post)colonial Gaze and the Case of Vénus Noire (2010)." in, Feminist Review 117 (2017), pp.56-78
2. Sadiah Qureshi, "Displaying Sara Baartman, The 'Hottentot Venus'." in, History of Science, Vol.42, No.2, (June 2004), p.233-257.

1. Gianna Bouchard, "Murder in Miniature." in, Performance Research, Vol. 24, No. 5, (2019), pp.93-100.
2. Clare Brant,  "Death in a Nutshell: Frances Glessner Lee's 'Nutshell Studies in Unexplained Death'." "Death in a Nutshell: Frances Glessner Lee's 'Nutshell Studies in Unexplained Death'." - Alternative Formatsin, The European Journal of Life- Writing. Vol. IX (2020), pp.85-89.

This reflection piece interrogates what a focus on movement can bring to understanding more-than-human relationality in a museum space. It does so by zooming in on choreography and taxidermy as practices that both enable movement and kinesthetic becoming. It focusses on “Send out a Pulse!”, an artistic intervention for the Australian Museum in Sydney. Said piece is a nontraditional, choreographic audio walk made by the author as part of “How to Not be a Stuffed Animal”, an interdisciplinary, artistic-scholarly duo. Following a flightway of birds’ extinction stories, ways to activate response-ability through multispecies movement will be explored.

(On Danish National Museum's arrangement) "The main principle was, that rather than grouping objects together according to their various sites of origin, Thomsen arranged the whole collection on the basis of materials, namely stone, bronze (or 'brass' as Thomsen termed it) and iron and, secondarily, according to their apparent function or use, much as did Fox at a later date. The origins of Thomsen's system, soon known, of course, as the Three Age System, are not entirely clear."

"'all attempts at an arrangement of Objects and Antique Art, must, to a certain extent, be arbitrary and artificial'; and that 'in the present state of antiquarian knowledge, a chronological classification could not be fully carried out', Wilde adopted a primary arrangement according to 'Material' and a secondary division, according to 'Use'."

As Wilde explained 'the classification and arrangement usually employed in Natural History according to Class, Order, Species, and Variety, has, for the sake of convenience, been adopted'.

The display began on the stairway with stone implements, proceeding to the gallery where stone, earth, vegetable and animal materials, together with skeletons and other human remains, were arranged. Coins and metals [...] [L]arger objects were attached to walls; smaller ones, arranged in trays. Each was labelled and numbered, 'the numbers extending throughout the different series. Drawings and casts supplemented original objects whenever possible or, when it was considered necessary for the completion of a 'series', were again designated as such in his catalogue.

• The features of the museum - how closely does it conform to Fiona Candlin's definition of micromuseums below? How does it deviate?

• What are the aims or mission of the museum?

• Who is it's target audience/ what community does it serve?

• How does the museum convey knowledge about its theme or topic? How does their approach differ from more traditional museums that may cover similar topics/themes?

Glass cases classify objects into groups, testifying to the depth and range of the collection. They also separate objects from viewers, allowing visitors to look but not touch, confirming the objects’ value and the care being taken to preserve them. Glass induces both a sense of an artifact’s value but also of mastery over the specimens of extinct species or far-flung peoples.

Viewers respond differently to objects in this context, understanding them as part of a system of information: extracted from their original culture, classified, labeled, and absorbed into the new system. The museum becomes an empire of knowledge.

The Celestial Emporium of Benevolent Knowledge.....[:] animals can be divided into (a) those belonging to the Emperor, (b) those that are embalmed, (c) those that are tame, (d) pigs, (e) sirens, (f) imaginary animals, (g) wild dogs, (h) those included in this classification, (i) those that are crazy-acting (j), those that are uncountable (k) those painted with the finest brush made of camel hair, (l) miscellaneous, (m) those which have just broken a vase, and (n) those which, from a distance, look like flies. 

1. Select a theme or idea that is of particular interest to you as a starting point - for example, you might choose to focus on the concept of taxonomy, or colonialism. 
2. Begin by decorating the box - you might use collage, create partitions, add drawings, text or photographs to the surface. You can begin this at home if you wish. Gemma will also demonstrate some practical techniques in class.
3. Fill your box with objects, ephemera, notes, photographs etc. that you have collected over the course of the module and/or add personal objects from your collection/education prior to joining the Museum Studies MA.
4. Photograph your micro-cabinet and post the results on your padlet - if you're feeling adventerous, you can even animate your knowledge box in the form of a GIF or a short video clip (example above made by Gemma, animating Katrina's performance and knowledge themed micro-cabinet).

1. Gemma Angel, "A Movement of the Soul. Embodied Encounters With Human Remains in the Phantom Museum." in, United Academics Journal of Social Sciences. Vol.2, No.1, (2013), pp.1-10.