‘Westerners know more than us’
Conflict and negotiation in museum display of Tibetan art
Shelley Mannion
University of Lugano
4 September 2007
Glasgow, Scotland
8th Annual Conference of the European Sociological Association

Tibetans in exile
• 140,000 living outside Tibet
Switzerland 3rd largest exile community
• Challenges of cultural survival
Preservation of heritage
Transmission to next generation
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

Museums as sites of negotiation
• Shared heritage
Western museums as inheritors
Increase in Western Buddhist practitioners
• Museums as contact zones (Clifford 1997)
Collection becomes ongoing relationship
Reciprocity
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

The 14 Dalai Lamas Exhibition, Zurich
http://www.diedalailamas.ch
• August 2005 – April 2006
• 17,000 visitors
• Ethnographic visitor study (36 interviewees)
• Institution of Dalai Lamas through art
Conceived as means to advance scholarship
Didactic aims: Political-historical
• Explain the entire system
• Highlight individual characteristics
• Debunk myths and stereotypes
• Convey atmosphere
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

Visual and spatial languages: Exterior entrance
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

Visual and spatial languages: Chronological
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

Visual and spatial languages: Allotment of gallery space
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

Visual and spatial languages: Symmetric arrangement
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

Visual and spatial languages: Monastery-like design
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

Interpretive media: print catalogue and audio guide
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

Itineraries of identity
• MacDonald (1995)
• Five visitor itineraries:
General interest
Emotionally connected
Buddhists
Intellectual
Tibetan
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

Decoding visitor itineraries
• Hall (1980) triad of television news reception
Dominant-hegemonic
Negotiated
Oppositional
Non-consumption
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

Four Western itineraries
Itinerary Way identity expressed Type of reading
1) Intellectuals Proud of being Dominant-
experts hegemonic
2) General interest Lifestyle connection Non-consumption
Negotiated
3) Emotionally connected Imagined citizenship Non-consumption
through travel Negotiated
4) Buddhist Articulation of Non-consumption
Buddhist faith
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

Tibetan itineraries
• Preservation of heritage • Cultural transmission
Some oppositional response Practiced by families
Authenticity Not supported by environment
Translation competence Objects as reminders of lack of
knowledge
Complex negotiation with
exhibit and within family
• Both accepted audio commentary without question
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

Conflicts and negotiations
• Attitudes
• Interpretive messages
• Media
• Museum environment
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

Tibetan attitudes
• Embarrassment about lack of knowledge
• Outsiders: ‘Westerners know more than us’
• Reluctance to question or criticize
• Proud to see art in Western museums
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

Interpretive messages
• Not connected with the Tibetan ‘people’
• Intellectual focus problematic for novices
• Political emphasis perceived as attack
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

Media
• Audio guide suppressed Tibetan narratives
• Photographs “irrepressible” (Edwards 2001)
E. Edwards, (2001) Raw Histories: Photographs, Anthropology and Museums
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

Museum environment
• Silence obstructs cultural transmission
• Sacred objects in secular settings
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art

Conclusions
• Museum key site of negotiation for diaspora
conflicts
• Identity construction at ethnographic exhibitions
Tibetans filter through cultural identity
• Potential solutions to challenges
Acknowledge diversity
Be sensitive to self-deprecating attitudes
Support social itineraries
Open texts (photographs)
'Westerners know more than us': Conflict and negotation in museum display of Tibetan art