CFP: Museum and Society Colloquium, Bucharest, Romania
Location: Romania
Call for Papers Date: 2006-08-27
Call for Papers
Museum and Society Colloquium
Museum of the Romanian Peasant, Bucharest
October 6th-8th, 2006
The colloquium proposes an analysis of identity discourses in societal museums and a retrospective and reflexive look on the relationship between Museum and Society, generally speaking. Even more, looking towards the future the question can be raised of what kind of museums do we need and for what types of societies?
This year, the Museum of the Romanian Peasant (MRP) celebrates its centenary. In 1906 it became the first ethnographic museum in Romania. Since then, it functioned as a museum of National Art, of Popular Art, of the Communist Party, and, after 1990, as the Museum of the Romanian Peasant. In 1996, it was awarded the EMYA prize (European Museum of the Year).
Throughout this time, the peasant was constantly alongside the museum, but bearing different faces. In one way or another, the peasant’s symbolic centrality for the building of the Romanian national-state and its identity remained at the core of the museum’s exhibit. The museum’s aesthetics and ideology followed the society’s transformations and changed from a classical ethnography to the contemporary vision, considered by many ….as postmodern. Building upon its experience as an ethnography museum, MRP nevertheless seeks to gather in this colloquium researchers interested in the intertwined discourses of Museum and Society, such as anthropologists, sociologists, historians, art critics and others.
The deadline for receiving abstracts (500 words) and a short CV is August 27th, 2006. Presentations in both English and French are accepted. The colloquium papers will be published in the museum’s anthropological journal MARTOR.
The travel and accommodation fees for a maximum of 15 participants will be supported by the organizers.
Contact:
Gabriela Cristea
Researcher – Research Department
Museum of the Romanian Peasant
Sos. Kiseleff, no. 3
Sect. 1, Bucharest
ROMANIA
Phone: 004021.317 96 58
Email: cristea.gabriela@gmail.com
