Public Libraries of Suffolk County, New York

Our lives, collaboration, native voice, and the making of the National Museum of the American Indian, Jennifer A. Shannon

eng

Includes bibliographical references and index

illustrationsplates

index present

non fiction

Our lives

bibliography

Jennifer A. Shannon

School for Advanced Research resident scholar series

collaboration, native voice, and the making of the National Museum of the American Indian

In 2004 the National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI) opened to the general public. This book, in the broadest sense, is about how that museum became what it is today. For many Native individuals, the NMAI, a prominent and permanent symbol of Native presence in America, in the shadow of the Capitol and at the centre of federal power, is a triumph. At the grand opening, the museum's main message was We are still here. This message was most directly displayed in Our Lives: Contemporary Life and Identities, one of the NMAI's inaugural exhibitions and the main focus of this book. Ultimately, this is a record of the sincere efforts - and conflicts and triumphs - experienced by those who planned, developed, and constructed the NMAI's inaugural exhibitions. It is a narrowly focused snapshot of a particular kind of curatorial practise. It is also an account of many different kinds of people struggling to do their best under the weight of a monumental task: to represent all Native peoples of the Americas in the first institution of its kind, a national museum dedicated to the first peoples of the hemisphere. --Provided by publisher

Anticipation -- "Our Lives" -- Bureaucracy -- Expertise -- Authorship -- Exhibition -- Reception -- Reflection -- Epilogue: "Listening to OUr Ancestors" -- Appendix A: Who's Who: The people in this book -- Appendix B: Main messages of the "Our Lives" gallery -- Appendix C: Mission statement and goals of the National Museum of the American Indian