Transmitting the Intangible
Welcome to the symposium “Transmitting the Intangible: Indigenous Perspectives on Sustaining Memory and Contemporary Culture”!
This symposium considers various forms of indigenous cultural preservation. It is a two-day hybrid event, blending both online and offline components, featuring presentations, workshops, and panel discussions. The symposium is relevant to people who are interested in museological traditions, archival practices, and indigenous perspectives.
Scroll down to follow the streaming of the event
In conjunction with the ten-year mark of the Future Library, the symposium Transmitting the Intangible takes place 27–28 May 2024 at the Nordic Black Theatre at Cafeteatret in Oslo. The event is free, but registration is required.
Find information on registration here
The symposium explores traditions of safeguarding and care, cultural preservation, and knowledge transmission outside of- and in resistance to Eurocentric frameworks – centring the voices and perspectives of indigenous people, marginalized people, and people with roots in postcolonial contexts.
Art and other cultural manifestations produced by indigenous people today, increasingly expose the limits of prevailing approaches to conservation, archiving and collections management that are rooted in Eurocentric practices. These tend to privilege objects that can be physically or digitally collected, often overlooking networks of human relations and other cultural manifestations and forms of knowledge, that evade capture and domination by Western museological practices of acquisition and archiving. The symposium deals with such matters and explores new possibilities and perspectives on contemporary museological practices.
This symposium will bring together Sámi, Māori, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders, First Nations, Mixe, and other Indigenous and non-Western artists, archivists, conservators, curators, library and museum professionals, thinkers, and creative practitioners working, both in and outside of academia.
Themes
- Transmitting and activating living heritage, and the intangible and ephemeral aspects of art and cultural heritage.
- Ecological stewardship, longtermism, and intergenerational justice.
- Loss, loss compensation, care, and repair.
- The role and generative capacity of ritual, ceremony, and storytelling.
- The ways in which Indigenous knowledge and cultures are incommensurable with non-Indigenous, colonial logics and methods of musealization, conservation and archiving.
Program
Monday May 27
08:30 Arrival, registration, coffee, and mingling
09:30 Welcome! Introduction by the organizers
09:45 Opening remarks by Katie Paterson and Anne Beate Hovind
10:00 Liisa-Rávná Finbog: "Rebel with a Cause: Duodji as Political Intervention"
10:30 Nathan Sentance: "For my Ancestors, For my Descendants: Empowering Indigenous Collections Sovereignty in Museums" – virtual presentation
11:00 Break
11:15 Tharron Bloomfield: "Transmitting Loss: The Role of Artists and Museums in Recognizing Colonization Trauma"
11:45 Juanita Kelly-Mundine: "Dancing with Our Ancestors"
12:15 Lunch
13:15 Solomon Ratt: "More Than Children Stories: The Transmission of Culture in Traditional Stories"
14:00 Elin Már Øyen Vister: "Building Ethical Approaches in Cross-Cultural Work: Navigating Indigenous Land with Respect and Integrity"
14:30 Dylan Robinson: “The Museum's Confinement of Indigenous Kin”
15:15 Break
15:45 Marita Isobel Solberg: "Innermost Beeing Outermost / A Space Traveler" – virtual performance
16:15 Yásnaya Elena Aguilar Gil: TBD – virtual presentation
16:45 Break
17:00 Jo-ann Archibald: "Educating the Heart, Mind, Body, and Spirit Through Indigenous Storywork" – virtual keynote lecture
17:45 Wrap up of the first day
18:15 Dinner
Tuesday May 28
08:30 Arrival and coffee
09:10 Elin Már Øyen Vister – listening session
09:30 Aaliyah-Jade Bradbury: "Storylines: Decolonising Perspectives Through Stories"
09:45 Nina Tonga: "On Curating the Intangible: Reflections from the Pacific" – virtual presentation
10:15 Kanako Uzawa: "Crafting Ainu Voices in Museum Spaces" – virtual presentation
10:45 Break
11:00 Coby Edgar and Rebecca Barnott-Clement: "Collaborative Models of Care: Preserving Australian First Nations Digital Cultural Heritage" – virtual presentation 11:30 Joel Taylor: "Transmission Between Generations and Intergenerational Transmission"
12:00 Saara-Maija Pesonen: "Repatriation from a Conservation Perspective: Conservation Work in Sámi Museum Siida"
12:30 Lunch
13:30 Maritea Dæhlin: "I WANT TO BE TRADITIONAL" – performance
13:45 Gunvor Guttorm: TBD – virtual presentation
14:15 Wrap up and goodbyes to virtual attendees
14:20 Break
14:50 "Sámáidahttin / Māorification / Shxwelméxwelh" (not streamed)
16:00 "Holding Space" (not streamed)
16:30 Katie Paterson: "To Burn, Forest, Fire" – performance
17:00 Concluding remarks
Food
Organic plant-based lunch and dinner will be served by Wilder Kitchen – a food studio which curates food events and serves seasonal food made of locally sourced ingredients.
Prices
Lunch: 170 NOK
Dinner: 300 NOK
Payment
The meals must be paid in advance via Vipps nr. 804889 / Framtidsbiblioteket or PayPal
See recording of the event on Monday 27 May here
See recording of the event on Tuesday 28 May here
Organizers and Program Committee
The symposium is organized by the National Museum of Norway, RiddoDuottarMuseat, and the Future Library. The symposium is supported by the Fritt Ord Foundation and the Sámi Parliament.
- Brian Castriota, National Galleries Scotland / University College London
- Jina Chang, National Museum of Norway
- Rebecca Gordon, independent researcher
- Ayesha Fuentes, University of Cambridge
- Maren Haugfos, Deichman Library
- Anne Beate Hovind, Future Library
- Anne May Olli, RiddoDuottarMuseat
- Anja Sandtrø, National Museum of Norway
- Asti Sherring, National Museum of Australia / Canberra University
