"Cannibal Tours and Glass Boxes" poses a number of probing questions about the role and responsibility of museums and anthropology in the contemporary world. Michael Ames, an internationally respected museum director, challenges popular concepts and criticism of museums and presents an alternative perspective which reflects his experiences from many years of museum work. Based on the author's previous book, "Museums, the Public and Anthropology", the new edition includes seven new essays which argue, as in the previous ...
Read More
"Cannibal Tours and Glass Boxes" poses a number of probing questions about the role and responsibility of museums and anthropology in the contemporary world. Michael Ames, an internationally respected museum director, challenges popular concepts and criticism of museums and presents an alternative perspective which reflects his experiences from many years of museum work. Based on the author's previous book, "Museums, the Public and Anthropology", the new edition includes seven new essays which argue, as in the previous volume, that museums and anthropologists must contextualize and critique themselves - they must analyze and critique the social, political and economic systems within which they work. In the new essays, Ames looks at the role of consumerism and the market economy in the production of such phenomena as worlds' fairs and Mcdonald's hamburger chains, referring to them as "museums of everyday life" and indicating the way in which they, like museums, transform ideology into commonsense, thus reinforcing and perpetuating hegemonic control over how people think about and represent themselves. He also discusses the moral/political ramifications and conflicting attitudes towards Aboriginal art (is it art or artifact?); censorship (is it liberating or repressive?); and museum exhibits (are they informative or disinformative?). The earlier essays outline the development of museums in the Western world, the problems faced by anthropologists in attempting to deal with the often conflicting demands of professional as opposed to public interests, the tendency to both fabricate and stereotype, and the need to establish a reciprocal rather than exploitative relationship between museums/anthropologists and aboriginal people. Written during the course of the last decade, these essays offer an accessible, often anecdotal, journey through one professional anthropologist's concerns about, and hopes for, his discipline and its future. "Michael M. Ames is Director of the Museum of Anthropology and is a Professor in the Department of Anthropology at the University of British Columbia.".
Read Less
Add this copy of Cannibal Tours and Glass Boxes: the Anthropology of to cart. $18.00, very good condition, Sold by Kona Bay Books rated 3.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Kailua-Kona, HI, UNITED STATES, published 2002 by Univ of British Columbia Pr.
Choose your shipping method in Checkout. Costs may vary based on destination.
Seller's Description:
Used-VeryGood in Very Good jacket. Hardcover in very good condition. Foxing as usual. Previous owner marking on first loose end page. Page within are clean of markings.
Add this copy of Cannibal Tours and Glass Boxes: the Anthropology of to cart. $80.22, good condition, Sold by Bonita rated 4.0 out of 5 stars, ships from Newport Coast, CA, UNITED STATES, published 1992 by Univ of British Columbia Pr.