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| To view lecture (51 min.) online, visit YouTube |
In September, we welcomed Phillip Gordon of the Australian Museum of Sydney to lecture on the museum’s work with indigenous groups.Gordon, a Goorang Goorang Aboriginal person from Central Queensland, serves as the Aboriginal Heritage Officer at the Australian Museum. The presentation was co-sponsored by HMA, Museum Studies Graduate Certificate Program at the University of Hawai‘i, and Bishop Museum. He discussed the importance of cultural institutions building strong working relationships with Indigenous groups in order to foster successful cultural heritage projects. Consultation between the museum and an indigenous group should be the first step toward assisting these groups in gaining access to their cultural heritage. He also emphasized that such projects must be reciprocal in nature, in that the Indigenous groups should benefit in some significant way from the project. Gordon shared with the audience a number of successful web-based collaborative projects between indigenous Aboriginal groups and museums in Australia. One interesting project was the Ara Irititja Project. The project assists Anangu Aboriginal people living in remote areas of Central Australia in retrieving and repatriating lost photographs, films, sound recordings and objects. These items are digitized and uploaded to computers in work stations located within Anangu communities. People in the community are then able to view the materials, edit and add data—which is collected and stored. For museum personnel working with indigenous people, Phillip Gordon’s lecture reinforced the fact that cultural institutions must learn to respect Indigenous people’s right to have access to their cultural property. Museum professionals should actively seek useful and sustainable ways to assist Indigenous groups in gaining access to their cultural heritage. A video of the lecture will be available on YouTube. DVD copies of two projects from the Australian Museum: Keeping Culture: Achieving Self-Determination Through the Development of Aboriginal Cultural Centres and Keeping Places; and Indigenous Objects of the Hunter Valley from the Morrison Collection can be borrowed. Contact the following: Stacy Hoshino of HMA at hawaiimuseums@gmail.com; Noelle Kahanu of Bishop Museum at nkahanu@bishopmuseum.org; or Melissa Rand of the Museum Studies Program at UH at museum@hawaii.edu
