Kerstin Smeds - Academia.edu (original) (raw)
Papers by Kerstin Smeds
Object Matters: Archaeology and herigate in the 21st century and Unruly heritage: an achaeology of anthropocene. Tromsø , Norway, September 20, 2018, 2018
WHAT THIS IS ABOUT: Objects in museum collections that has ”escaped” the ordinary classification ... more WHAT THIS IS ABOUT: Objects in museum collections that has ”escaped” the ordinary classification systems and registers: CATERGORIES OF INVESTIGATION: 1. Objects nobody knows what it is 2. Objects known, but have lost their reg. numbers, context or the provenience they once had 3. ”free findings” (”lösfynd”) and other oddities with no information or lost context, thus of no ”scientific” relevance. 4. Trash – broken items or deteriorated material.detta är en powerpoint om ett forskningsprojekt, presenterat på forskarworkshop i Tromsö hösten 2018Object Matters, Tromsö Universite
Under museernas varmote i Umea i april anordnade UEForum ett seminarium om utstallningsmediet. En... more Under museernas varmote i Umea i april anordnade UEForum ett seminarium om utstallningsmediet. En av deltagarna var Kerstin Smeds, professor i museologi. Har publicerar vi hennes anforande dar hon ...
This book of essays explores concepts of museum, place, memory and landscape. It is inspired by t... more This book of essays explores concepts of museum, place, memory and landscape. It is inspired by the 2016 ICOM General Conference in Milan, the topic of which was Museums and Cultural Landscapes. Th ...
Thirty years ago, Kenneth Hudson, the grand old figure of the European museum world, said that th... more Thirty years ago, Kenneth Hudson, the grand old figure of the European museum world, said that there are chiefly two qualities that will be demanded of the museums in the future: pluralism of inter ...
Museology has in most parts of the world been, and still is, perceived as a theory of the museum ... more Museology has in most parts of the world been, and still is, perceived as a theory of the museum institution itself; the museum as social phenomenon; the museum’s role in society and learning, muse ...
Nordisk Museologi, 1970
Med anledning av Ase Enersrvedrs kritik av juryns arbete vid museifestivalen i Stavanger i fjol m... more Med anledning av Ase Enersrvedrs kritik av juryns arbete vid museifestivalen i Stavanger i fjol med temat Vän eller Fiende?, vill underrecknad framföra följande: For det första. Ase Enerstvedt har bade ratt och fel i att en festival inte ar rätta platsen för en jury att kritisera utställningsideerna. Å andra sidan säger hon själv på föregående sida, att den som deltar med utstallningsideer må vara förberedd på både god och dålig kririk, «en erfaring som museumsfolk ikke er vant til». Just det. Och det var precis vad som skedde i Stavanger.
Nordisk Museologi, 1970
Museologi är ett ämne som befattar sig med begreppet Förlust i vår kultur, som existentiellt, fil... more Museologi är ett ämne som befattar sig med begreppet Förlust i vår kultur, som existentiellt, filosofiskt och praktiskt problem, kopplat till tiden och främst till den materiella verkligheten. Museologin, liksom också museet, ägnar sig åt studium och analys av människans säregna och fåfänga kamp mot nedbrytningen, förgängelsen, förfallet, förruttnelsen, döden. Museologi är en ”kulturarvsvetenskap”, detta tämligen nya begrepp, som numera täcker också andra ”gamla” vetenskaper, eller delar av dem, såsom kulturhistoria, historia, etnologi och arkeologi. Precis som man om historieskrivningen för drygt 100 år sedan frågade sig om det var vetenskap eller konst, och till slut motvilligt erkände den som vetenskap, är det många som idag frågar sig om museologin överhuvudtaget är vetenskap. Och vad skall den vara bra för.
Nordisk Museologi, 1970
Some reflections on «the museologicalproject» Firstly, this article provides a very brief survey ... more Some reflections on «the museologicalproject» Firstly, this article provides a very brief survey of the discussion about museology as a «field of research and study», a debate which has been going on among ICOFOM-members for the last twenty to thirty years. ICOFOM was founded in 1976 in answer to demands from the field of museum practice, which changed radically in the 1970s. Since that time the crucial question has been: Is museology a discipline or is it not? What is the object of knowledge and the subject of research in museology?
Nordisk Museologi, 1970
Utställningar som begrepp och högst levande verklighet dissekeras i en licentiatavhandling av Jan... more Utställningar som begrepp och högst levande verklighet dissekeras i en licentiatavhandling av Jan Hjorth, som gjort en lång yrkeskärriär inom Riksutställningar. Det drygt hundrasidiga arbetet lades fram i Göteborg i oktober 2003. Att, som författaren säger, påstå att arbetet är gjort i den ”hermeneutiska traditionen” är kanske att ta i, då med detta avses endast att han varken ”väger och mäter” saker och ting, utan främst delar med sig av sina egna erfarenheter i branschen. Hjorth har fyra frågeställningar. Den första handlar om begreppet utställning, vad är det? råder det någon konsensus kring begreppet? Svaret blir egentligen nej, det finns oändligt många definitioner på begreppet ”utställning”. Samtidigt bryter författaren ner olika slags utställningar i sina enkla beståndsdelar, vad består de av? hur produceras de? vad är viktigt i denna process? Här presenteras en uppsättning ”case studies”, samt omdömen som producenter, skribenter och andra fällt om olika moment och komponente...
Nordisk Museologi, 1970
Museological shortcuts not. So why this fuss about museology (in Sweden)? If one wants to disting... more Museological shortcuts not. So why this fuss about museology (in Sweden)? If one wants to distinguish museology from Museum Studies, as many are inclined to, I would say that museology is characterized by a more theoretical approach often operating on a meta-level of thought and analysis. One of the pioneers of the new, theoretical museology of the 1970s was Anna Gregorová, who (1980:20) distinguished three domains worthy of studying: a. The museum's relation to reality and time (existential and semiotic dimension) b. The museum's relation to society (political and cultural political dimension) c. The museum's practical functions (organization and mission)
ICOFOM Study Series, 2015
The setting is a dark future where the world has begun to fall apart. We are witnessing the end o... more The setting is a dark future where the world has begun to fall apart. We are witnessing the end of civilization. Earth is inhabited by two sorts of creatures. One is the small good-hearted, human-like Eloi who live in small communities within large and futuristic, yet slowly deteriorating buildings, doing no work. The other is the pale and cruel Morlocks who live in dark caves and tunnels underground. Every now and then, the Morlocks will appear above ground, only to harass and chase the Eloi, then simply to eat them up. At the interface of these two worlds stands a ruined huge building called the Palace of Green Porcelain, containing heaps of oddities: a decomposing skeleton of a brontosaurus, remains of stuffed unknown animals, rusty metal objects and gadgets, a dump of ancient machines and technical apparatuses. Everywhere you see piles of trash, indefinable remnants, long since deteriorated.
Edition Museum, 2016
This paper will discuss some ideas on learning and "understanding" in a communicative p... more This paper will discuss some ideas on learning and "understanding" in a communicative process, particularly attached to objects in a museum setting. I will analyse our object relations and the idea ...
Designs for Learning, 2012
European Journal of Archaeology, 2010
inherently remains. What though, of the consequences for archaeology? How can the local Turkish v... more inherently remains. What though, of the consequences for archaeology? How can the local Turkish villagers help? Here I perhaps can share a recollection of the greatest European professor in the field, now dead. Next to me one day at a formal meal, he was tired having been the speaker at the evening’s lecture and rather taciturn. I ventured to make conversation by asking what he thought of the excavations at Çatalhöyük. He said in a tone of great fury, ‘Do not talk to me of this man Hodder! He has ruined the discipline of archaeology, ruined! Would he make the cleaning lady in the operating theatre conduct the operation? Would you wish to have your kidneys extracted by the cleaner? He has ruined the profession, ruined!’ I do not think that he would have been amongst the first to translate this beautiful watchman’s account into his language. The debate will assuredly continue. It seems to me, though, to be a greatly positive development. The apparent simplicity of the Konya plain masks an extraordinarily complex historical past, which is reflected in the culture of the local villagers if one takes care to listen. Indeed, one can put the case more formally, and say that we progress as scientists in any case by being as widely open to any form of interpretation as we can, whilst simultaneously taking scrupulous care over the way that our data are obtained. The project’s huge range of specialists comes together with artists, diggers, anthropologists, visitors, villagers, and watchmen to form a creative whole, with ideas continually fed into the mix from unexpected directions. In a way, indeed, by insulating the source of the data but opening up its interpretation to all comers, Hodder may be said to have solved the Popperian paradox: how to reconcile the need to be falsifiable in one’s assertions while finding a source of inspiration in the first place. The august, sadly late, European professor’s diagnosis is quite wrong, albeit in an illuminating way; Çatalhöyük’s kidneys are safe in the hands of fully-trained professionals, even as the monopoly over the project’s description has been relinquished. My one, albeit slight, disappointment with the book is that the translators have, apparently at least, not quite caught the tone of the Turkish in their English version. Turkish, in contrast to the impoverished English language favoured by today’s BBC, still works on different levels, two of which are a public, formal, elusive and suggestive discourse in contrast to a crude matey jocularity. Studiously avoiding any of the Turkish expressions used by the writer at all (other than informing us that many of the words were local) means that we cannot be sure whether in this instance such shifts were present but I suspect so, even if the original manuscript was a narrative stream. One almost certain slip is that the translator has written ‘beaten up’, presumably for the Turkish word dövmek, when what is really meant here is something like ‘buffeted’. The nuances are rather different and, as the expression is used throughout the book, one can hardly escape coming across it. Finally, there is a forward by Ian Hodder, along with a concluding explanatory interview in which the author explains much of what he would like to do, so there is some most useful orienting exegesis. I sincerely hope that the work has a significant sale. It is useful in multiple ways; indeed to all those who are interested in the sociology of archaeological excavation and encounters between scientific expeditions and local society, even if they are not specifically specialists in the Near East. It could potentially also make a wonderful textbook for almost all level of classes, when trying to make them aware of the structure of scientific practice in the field. In any second edition though, it would be most useful to have an appendix on the language of the original in more detail, and the way that the English version has been arrived at.
RIG-Kulturhistorisk tidskrift, 2010
Object Matters: Archaeology and herigate in the 21st century and Unruly heritage: an achaeology of anthropocene. Tromsø , Norway, September 20, 2018, 2018
WHAT THIS IS ABOUT: Objects in museum collections that has ”escaped” the ordinary classification ... more WHAT THIS IS ABOUT: Objects in museum collections that has ”escaped” the ordinary classification systems and registers: CATERGORIES OF INVESTIGATION: 1. Objects nobody knows what it is 2. Objects known, but have lost their reg. numbers, context or the provenience they once had 3. ”free findings” (”lösfynd”) and other oddities with no information or lost context, thus of no ”scientific” relevance. 4. Trash – broken items or deteriorated material.detta är en powerpoint om ett forskningsprojekt, presenterat på forskarworkshop i Tromsö hösten 2018Object Matters, Tromsö Universite
Under museernas varmote i Umea i april anordnade UEForum ett seminarium om utstallningsmediet. En... more Under museernas varmote i Umea i april anordnade UEForum ett seminarium om utstallningsmediet. En av deltagarna var Kerstin Smeds, professor i museologi. Har publicerar vi hennes anforande dar hon ...
This book of essays explores concepts of museum, place, memory and landscape. It is inspired by t... more This book of essays explores concepts of museum, place, memory and landscape. It is inspired by the 2016 ICOM General Conference in Milan, the topic of which was Museums and Cultural Landscapes. Th ...
Thirty years ago, Kenneth Hudson, the grand old figure of the European museum world, said that th... more Thirty years ago, Kenneth Hudson, the grand old figure of the European museum world, said that there are chiefly two qualities that will be demanded of the museums in the future: pluralism of inter ...
Museology has in most parts of the world been, and still is, perceived as a theory of the museum ... more Museology has in most parts of the world been, and still is, perceived as a theory of the museum institution itself; the museum as social phenomenon; the museum’s role in society and learning, muse ...
Nordisk Museologi, 1970
Med anledning av Ase Enersrvedrs kritik av juryns arbete vid museifestivalen i Stavanger i fjol m... more Med anledning av Ase Enersrvedrs kritik av juryns arbete vid museifestivalen i Stavanger i fjol med temat Vän eller Fiende?, vill underrecknad framföra följande: For det första. Ase Enerstvedt har bade ratt och fel i att en festival inte ar rätta platsen för en jury att kritisera utställningsideerna. Å andra sidan säger hon själv på föregående sida, att den som deltar med utstallningsideer må vara förberedd på både god och dålig kririk, «en erfaring som museumsfolk ikke er vant til». Just det. Och det var precis vad som skedde i Stavanger.
Nordisk Museologi, 1970
Museologi är ett ämne som befattar sig med begreppet Förlust i vår kultur, som existentiellt, fil... more Museologi är ett ämne som befattar sig med begreppet Förlust i vår kultur, som existentiellt, filosofiskt och praktiskt problem, kopplat till tiden och främst till den materiella verkligheten. Museologin, liksom också museet, ägnar sig åt studium och analys av människans säregna och fåfänga kamp mot nedbrytningen, förgängelsen, förfallet, förruttnelsen, döden. Museologi är en ”kulturarvsvetenskap”, detta tämligen nya begrepp, som numera täcker också andra ”gamla” vetenskaper, eller delar av dem, såsom kulturhistoria, historia, etnologi och arkeologi. Precis som man om historieskrivningen för drygt 100 år sedan frågade sig om det var vetenskap eller konst, och till slut motvilligt erkände den som vetenskap, är det många som idag frågar sig om museologin överhuvudtaget är vetenskap. Och vad skall den vara bra för.
Nordisk Museologi, 1970
Some reflections on «the museologicalproject» Firstly, this article provides a very brief survey ... more Some reflections on «the museologicalproject» Firstly, this article provides a very brief survey of the discussion about museology as a «field of research and study», a debate which has been going on among ICOFOM-members for the last twenty to thirty years. ICOFOM was founded in 1976 in answer to demands from the field of museum practice, which changed radically in the 1970s. Since that time the crucial question has been: Is museology a discipline or is it not? What is the object of knowledge and the subject of research in museology?
Nordisk Museologi, 1970
Utställningar som begrepp och högst levande verklighet dissekeras i en licentiatavhandling av Jan... more Utställningar som begrepp och högst levande verklighet dissekeras i en licentiatavhandling av Jan Hjorth, som gjort en lång yrkeskärriär inom Riksutställningar. Det drygt hundrasidiga arbetet lades fram i Göteborg i oktober 2003. Att, som författaren säger, påstå att arbetet är gjort i den ”hermeneutiska traditionen” är kanske att ta i, då med detta avses endast att han varken ”väger och mäter” saker och ting, utan främst delar med sig av sina egna erfarenheter i branschen. Hjorth har fyra frågeställningar. Den första handlar om begreppet utställning, vad är det? råder det någon konsensus kring begreppet? Svaret blir egentligen nej, det finns oändligt många definitioner på begreppet ”utställning”. Samtidigt bryter författaren ner olika slags utställningar i sina enkla beståndsdelar, vad består de av? hur produceras de? vad är viktigt i denna process? Här presenteras en uppsättning ”case studies”, samt omdömen som producenter, skribenter och andra fällt om olika moment och komponente...
Nordisk Museologi, 1970
Museological shortcuts not. So why this fuss about museology (in Sweden)? If one wants to disting... more Museological shortcuts not. So why this fuss about museology (in Sweden)? If one wants to distinguish museology from Museum Studies, as many are inclined to, I would say that museology is characterized by a more theoretical approach often operating on a meta-level of thought and analysis. One of the pioneers of the new, theoretical museology of the 1970s was Anna Gregorová, who (1980:20) distinguished three domains worthy of studying: a. The museum's relation to reality and time (existential and semiotic dimension) b. The museum's relation to society (political and cultural political dimension) c. The museum's practical functions (organization and mission)
ICOFOM Study Series, 2015
The setting is a dark future where the world has begun to fall apart. We are witnessing the end o... more The setting is a dark future where the world has begun to fall apart. We are witnessing the end of civilization. Earth is inhabited by two sorts of creatures. One is the small good-hearted, human-like Eloi who live in small communities within large and futuristic, yet slowly deteriorating buildings, doing no work. The other is the pale and cruel Morlocks who live in dark caves and tunnels underground. Every now and then, the Morlocks will appear above ground, only to harass and chase the Eloi, then simply to eat them up. At the interface of these two worlds stands a ruined huge building called the Palace of Green Porcelain, containing heaps of oddities: a decomposing skeleton of a brontosaurus, remains of stuffed unknown animals, rusty metal objects and gadgets, a dump of ancient machines and technical apparatuses. Everywhere you see piles of trash, indefinable remnants, long since deteriorated.
Edition Museum, 2016
This paper will discuss some ideas on learning and "understanding" in a communicative p... more This paper will discuss some ideas on learning and "understanding" in a communicative process, particularly attached to objects in a museum setting. I will analyse our object relations and the idea ...
Designs for Learning, 2012
European Journal of Archaeology, 2010
inherently remains. What though, of the consequences for archaeology? How can the local Turkish v... more inherently remains. What though, of the consequences for archaeology? How can the local Turkish villagers help? Here I perhaps can share a recollection of the greatest European professor in the field, now dead. Next to me one day at a formal meal, he was tired having been the speaker at the evening’s lecture and rather taciturn. I ventured to make conversation by asking what he thought of the excavations at Çatalhöyük. He said in a tone of great fury, ‘Do not talk to me of this man Hodder! He has ruined the discipline of archaeology, ruined! Would he make the cleaning lady in the operating theatre conduct the operation? Would you wish to have your kidneys extracted by the cleaner? He has ruined the profession, ruined!’ I do not think that he would have been amongst the first to translate this beautiful watchman’s account into his language. The debate will assuredly continue. It seems to me, though, to be a greatly positive development. The apparent simplicity of the Konya plain masks an extraordinarily complex historical past, which is reflected in the culture of the local villagers if one takes care to listen. Indeed, one can put the case more formally, and say that we progress as scientists in any case by being as widely open to any form of interpretation as we can, whilst simultaneously taking scrupulous care over the way that our data are obtained. The project’s huge range of specialists comes together with artists, diggers, anthropologists, visitors, villagers, and watchmen to form a creative whole, with ideas continually fed into the mix from unexpected directions. In a way, indeed, by insulating the source of the data but opening up its interpretation to all comers, Hodder may be said to have solved the Popperian paradox: how to reconcile the need to be falsifiable in one’s assertions while finding a source of inspiration in the first place. The august, sadly late, European professor’s diagnosis is quite wrong, albeit in an illuminating way; Çatalhöyük’s kidneys are safe in the hands of fully-trained professionals, even as the monopoly over the project’s description has been relinquished. My one, albeit slight, disappointment with the book is that the translators have, apparently at least, not quite caught the tone of the Turkish in their English version. Turkish, in contrast to the impoverished English language favoured by today’s BBC, still works on different levels, two of which are a public, formal, elusive and suggestive discourse in contrast to a crude matey jocularity. Studiously avoiding any of the Turkish expressions used by the writer at all (other than informing us that many of the words were local) means that we cannot be sure whether in this instance such shifts were present but I suspect so, even if the original manuscript was a narrative stream. One almost certain slip is that the translator has written ‘beaten up’, presumably for the Turkish word dövmek, when what is really meant here is something like ‘buffeted’. The nuances are rather different and, as the expression is used throughout the book, one can hardly escape coming across it. Finally, there is a forward by Ian Hodder, along with a concluding explanatory interview in which the author explains much of what he would like to do, so there is some most useful orienting exegesis. I sincerely hope that the work has a significant sale. It is useful in multiple ways; indeed to all those who are interested in the sociology of archaeological excavation and encounters between scientific expeditions and local society, even if they are not specifically specialists in the Near East. It could potentially also make a wonderful textbook for almost all level of classes, when trying to make them aware of the structure of scientific practice in the field. In any second edition though, it would be most useful to have an appendix on the language of the original in more detail, and the way that the English version has been arrived at.
RIG-Kulturhistorisk tidskrift, 2010