A confession: I am an archaeologist and a museum curator, but a paradoxical one. For my museum, I collect things, but I also return things back to where they came from. I love museums because they're social and educational, but I'm most drawn to them because of the magic of objects: a one-million-year-old hand axe, a totem pole, an impressionist painting all take us beyond our own imaginations. In museums, we pause to muse, to gaze upon our human empire of things in meditation and wonder. I understand why US museums alone host more than 850 million visits each year.
Priznajem, arheolog sam i kustos muzeja, ali paradoksalni. Prikupljam stvari za svoj muzej, ali ih i vraćam odakle su potekle. Obožavam muzeje jer su društveni i edukativni, ali uglavnom me privlače zbog magije predmeta: milion godina stara ručna sekira, totem, impresionistička slika - sve nas to vodi izvan granica sopstvene mašte. U muzejima zastajemo da bismo razmišljali, gledali naše ljudsko carstvo stvari uz promišljanje i čuđenje. Razumem zašto samo američki muzeji ugoste više od 850 miliona posetilaca svake godine.
Yet, in recent years, museums have become a battleground. Communities around the world don't want to see their culture in distant institutions which they have no control over. They want to see their cultural treasures repatriated, returned to their places of origin. Greece seeks the return of the Parthenon Marbles, a collection of classical sculptures held by the British Museum. Egypt demands antiquities from Germany. New Zealand's Maori want to see returned ancestral tattooed heads from museums everywhere. Yet these claims pale in comparison to those made by Native Americans. Already, US museums have returned more than one million artifacts and 50,000 sets of Native American skeletons.
Ipak, muzeji su poslednjih godina postali bojno polje. Zajednice širom sveta ne žele da vide svoju kulturu u udaljenim institucijama nad kojima nemaju nikakvu kontrolu. Žele da vide povratak svojih kulturnih blaga na mesto porekla. Grčka traži povratak Partenonskog mermera, zbirke klasičnih skulptura koja se čuva u Britanskom muzeju. Egipat zahteva antikvitete iz Nemačke. Novozelandski Maori žele da se vrate tetovirane glave predaka iz muzeja širom sveta. Ipak, ovi zahtevi blede u poređenju sa onima koje su uputili Indijanci. Američki muzeji su već vratili više od milion predmeta i 50 000 indijanskih skeleta.
To illustrate what's at stake, let's start with the War Gods. This is a wood carving made by members of the Zuni tribe in New Mexico. In the 1880s, anthropologists began to collect them as evidence of American Indian religion. They came to be seen as beautiful, the precursor to the stark sculptures of Picasso and Paul Klee, helping to usher in the modern art movement. From one viewpoint, the museum did exactly as it's supposed to with the War God. It helped introduce a little-known art form for the world to appreciate. But from another point of view, the museum had committed a terrible crime of cultural violence.
Da bih ilustrovao šta je u pitanju, počnimo sa bogovima rata. Ovo je duborez koji su napravili pripadnici plemena Zuni u Novom Meksiku. Antropolozi su počeli da ih prikupljaju 1880-ih kao dokaz o indijanskoj religiji. Došlo je do toga da su ih sagledavali kao lepe, prethodnike oštrih skulptura Pikasa i Pola Klea koji su pomogli pokretanje modernog umetničkog pokreta. Iz jednog ugla, muzej je uradio baš ono što je trebalo u slučaju boga rata. To je pomoglo da se uvede malo poznata umetnička forma koju će svet ceniti. Ali, sa drugog stanovišta, muzej je počinio strašan zločin kulturnog nasilja.
For Zunis, the War God is not a piece of art, it is not even a thing. It is a being. For Zunis, every year, priests ritually carve new War Gods, the Ahayu:da, breathing life into them in a long ceremony. They are placed on sacred shrines where they live to protect the Zuni people and keep the universe in balance. No one can own or sell a War God. They belong only to the earth. And so Zunis want them back from museums so they can go to their shrine homes to fulfill their spiritual purpose. What is a curator to do? I believe that the War Gods should be returned.
Za Zune, bog rata nije umetničko delo, pa čak nije ni stvar. To je biće. Kod Zuna, svake godine, sveštenici ritualno rezbare nove ratne bogove, Ahajude, u dugoj ceremoniji u kojoj im udišu život. Smešteni su na svetilištima gde žive da bi zašitili narod Zuni i održavali ravnotežu u univerzumu. Niko ne može da poseduje ili da proda boga rata. Oni pripadaju samo zemlji. Zato Zuni žele da se vrate iz muzeja u svoj dom, svetilište, da bi ispunili svoju duhovnu svrhu. Šta kustos treba da uradi? Ja verujem da bogove rata treba vratiti.
This might be a startling answer. After all, my conclusion contradicts the refrain of the world's most famous archaeologist: "That belongs in a museum!"
To je možda zapanjujući odgovor. Uostalom, moj zaključak je u suprotnosti sa rečima koje je ponavljao najpoznatiji svetski arheolog: „To pripada u muzeju!“
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
is what Indiana Jones said, not just to drive movie plots, but to drive home the unquestionable good of museums for society.
To je ono što je Indijana Džouns govorio, ne samo radi pokretanja zapleta filma, već i da bi naglasio nesumnjivu dobrobit muzeja za društvo.
I did not come to my view easily. I grew up in Tucson, Arizona, and fell in love with the Sonoran Desert's past. I was amazed that beneath the city's bland strip malls was 12,000 years of history just waiting to be discovered. When I was 16 years old, I started taking archaeology classes and going out on digs. A high school teacher of mine even helped me set up my own laboratory to study animal bones.
Nisam lako došao do svog stava. Odrastao sam u Tusonu u Arizoni i zaljubio sam se u prošlost pustinje Sonore. Bio sam zapanjen što se ispod gradskih jednoličnih tržnih centara nalazi 12 000 godina istorije koja samo čeka da je otkriju. Kada sam imao 16 godina, počeo sam da pohađam časove arheologije i odlazim na iskopavanja. Nastavnik mi je čak pomogao da postavim svoju laboratoriju da bih izučavao kosti životinja.
But in college, I came to learn that my future career had a dark history. Starting in the 1860s, Native American skeletons became a tool for science, collected in the thousands to prove new theories of social and racial hierarchies. Native American human remains were plundered from graves, even taken fresh from battlefields. When archaeologists came across white graves, the skeleton was often quickly reburied, while Native bones were deposited as specimens on museum shelves. In the wake of war, stolen land, boarding schools, laws banning religion, anthropologists collected sacred objects in the belief that Native peoples were on the cusp of extinction. You can call it racism or colonialism, but the labels don't matter as much as the fact that over the last century, Native American rights and culture were taken from them.
Ali sam na fakultetu shvatio da moja buduća karijera ima mračnu prošlost. Počevši od 1860-ih, skeleti Indijanaca su postali oruđe nauke, a prikupljeno ih je hiljade da bi se dokazale nove teorije o društvenim i rasnim hijerarhijama. Ljudski ostaci Indijanaca pljačkani su iz grobova, a čak su i uzimani sveži sa ratišta. Kada su arheolozi nailazili na grobnice belaca, skeleti su često brzo ponovo zakopani, dok su se kosti Indijanaca čuvale kao primerci na policama muzeja. Nakon rata, ukradene zemlje, internata, zakona koji su zabranjivali religiju, antropolozi su prikupljali svete objekte, verujući da su indijanska plemena na rubu izumiranja. Možete to nazvati rasizmom ili kolonijalizmom, ali etiketa nije bitna koliko činjenica da su tokom proteklog veka Indijancima oduzimana prava i kultura.
In 1990, after years of Native protests, the US government, through the US Congress, finally passed a law that allowed Native Americans to reclaim cultural items, sacred objects and human remains from museums. Many archaeologists were panicked. For scientists, it can be hard to fully grasp how a piece of wood can be a living god or how spirits surround bones. And they knew that modern science, especially with DNA, can provide luminous insights into the past. As the anthropologist Frank Norwick declared, "We are doing important work that benefits all of mankind. We are not returning anything to anyone."
Godine 1990, nakon više godina protesta Indijanaca, vlada SAD-a je preko američkog Kongresa konačno usvojila zakon koji je omogućio Indijancima da povrate kulturne predmete, sakralne objekte i ljudske ostatke iz muzeja. Mnogi arheolozi su se uspaničili. Za naučnike može biti teško da sasvim shvate kako komad drveta može biti živi bog ili kako duhovi okružuju kosti. Znali su da moderna nauka, posebno pomoću DNK, može pružiti sjajne uvide u prošlost. Kao što je antropolog Frenk Norvik izjavio: „Obavljamo važan posao koji koristi čitavom čovečanstvu. Ne vraćamo nikome ništa.“
As a college student, all of this was an enigma that was hard to decipher. Why did Native Americans want their heritage back from the very places preserving it? And how could scientists spend their entire lives studying dead Indians but seem to care so little about living ones?
Za mene kao studenta je sve ovo bila zagonetka koju je bilo teško odgonetnuti. Zašto su Indijanci hteli da im se vrati nasleđe sa mesta koja su ih čuvala? I kako su naučnici provodili čitav život izučavajući mrtve Indijance, a kao da im nije baš bilo stalo do živih?
I graduated but wasn't sure what to do next, so I traveled. One day, in South Africa, I visited Nelson Mandela's former prison cell on Robben Island. I had an epiphany. Here was a man who helped a country bridge vast divides to seek, however imperfectly, reconciliation. I'm no Mandela, but I ask myself: Could I, too, plant seeds of hope in the ruins of the past?
Diplomirao sam ali nisam znao šta bih sledeće radio, pa sam putovao. Jednog dana, u Južnoj Africi, posetio sam nekadašnju zatvorsku ćeliju Nelsona Mandele na ostrvu Roben. Doživeo sam prosvetljenje. Ovde je bio čovek koji je pomogao zemlji da premosti ogromne podele da bi se pronašlo, makar nesavršeno, pomirenje. Nisam Mandela, ali zapitao sam se: „Mogu li i ja da zasadim seme nade u ruševinama prošlosti?“
In 2007, I was hired as a curator at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. Our team agreed that unlike many other institutions, we needed to proactively confront the legacy of museum collecting. We started with the skeletons in our closet, 100 of them. After months and then years, we met with dozens of tribes to figure out how to get these remains home. And this is hard work. It involves negotiating who will receive the remains, how to respectfully transfer them, where will they go. Native American leaders become undertakers, planning funerals for dead relatives they had never wanted unearthed.
Godine 2007. angažovan sam kao kustos u Denverskom muzeju prirode i nauke. Naš tim se složio da se, za razliku od mnogih drugih institucija, moramo proaktivno suočiti sa nasleđem muzejskih prikupljanja. Počeli smo sa skeletima u našem ormaru, 100 njih. Nakon više meseci i godina, sastali smo se sa desetinama plemena da bismo smislili kako da vratimo te ostatke kući. To je naporan posao. Podrazumeva pregovore oko toga ko će primiti ostatke, kako ih s poštovanjem preneti, gde će otići. Indijanski lideri postaju pogrebnici i planiraju sahrane za mrtve rođake čije iskopavanje nikad nisu želeli.
A decade later, the Denver Museum and our Native partners have reburied nearly all of the human remains in the collection. We have returned hundreds of sacred objects. But I've come to see that these battles are endless. Repatriation is now a permanent feature of the museum world. Hundreds of tribes are waiting their turn. There are always more museums with more stuff. Every catalogued War God in an American public museum has now been returned -- 106, so far -- but there are more beyond the reach of US law, in private collections and outside our borders.
Deceniju kasnije, Denverski muzej i naši indijanski partneri ponovo su zakopali skoro sve ljudske ostatke u zbirci. Vratili smo stotine svetih objekata. Ali, shvatio sam da su ove bitke beskrajne. Repatrijacija je sada stalna odlika muzejskog sveta. Stotine plemena čekaju svoj red. Uvek ima još muzeja sa još stvari. Svaki bog rata u katalozima američkih javnih muzeja je vraćen - njih 106 do sada - ali ima ih još van domašaja zakona SAD-a, u privatnim kolekcijama i van granica naše zemlje.
In 2014, I had the chance to travel with a respected religious leader from the Zuni tribe named Octavius Seowtewa to visit five museums in Europe with War Gods. At the Ethnological Museum of Berlin, we saw a War God with a history of dubious care. An overly enthusiastic curator had added chicken feathers to it. Its necklace had once been stolen. At the Musée du quai Branly in Paris, an official told us that the War God there is now state property with no provisions for repatriation. He insisted that the War God no longer served Zunis but museum visitors. He said, "We give all of the objects to the world." At the British Museum, we were warned that the Zuni case would establish a dangerous precedent for bigger disputes, such as the Parthenon Marbles, claimed by Greece.
Godine 2014. sam imao priliku da putujem sa poštovanim verskim vođom iz plemena Zuni po imenu Oktavije Saoteva kako bismo posetili pet muzeja sa bogovima rata u Evropi. U Etnološkom muzeju u Berlinu, videli smo boga rata o kome se sumnjivo brinulo u prošlosti. Previše entuzijastični kustos dodao mu je kokošje perje. Ogrlica je bila ukradena. U Muzeju ulice Branli u Parizu, jedan službenik nam je rekao da je bog rata sada državna imovina bez odredbi o repatrijaciji. Insistirao je da bog rata više ne služi Zunima, već posetiocima muzeja. Rekao je: „Mi dajemo sve predmete svetu.“ U Britanskom muzeju, upozorili su nas da će slučaj Zuni uspostaviti opasan presedan za veće sporove, kao što je Partenonski mermer koji zahteva Grčka.
After visiting the five museums, Octavius returned home to his people empty-handed. He later told me, "It hurts my heart to see the Ahayu:da so far away. They all belong together. It's like a family member that's missing from a family dinner. When one is gone, their strength is broken."
Nakon obilaska tih pet muzeja, Oktavije se vratio kući svom narodu praznih ruku. Kasnije mi je rekao: „Srce me boli kad vidim da su Ahajude toliko udaljene. Svi oni treba da su zajedno. To je kao kada član porodice nedostaje na porodičnoj večeri. Kada jednog nema, njihova snaga je narušena.“
I wish that my colleagues in Europe and beyond could see that the War Gods do not represent the end of museums but the chance for a new beginning. When you walk the halls of a museum, you're likely just seeing about one percent of the total collections. The rest is in storage. Even after returning 500 cultural items and skeletons, my museum still retains 99.999 percent of its total collections. Though we no longer have War Gods, we have Zuni traditional pottery, jewelry, tools, clothing and arts. And even more precious than these objects are the relationships that we formed with Native Americans through the process of repatriation. Now, we can ask Zunis to share their culture with us.
Voleo bih da moje kolege u Evropi i šire uvide da bogovi rata ne predstavljaju kraj muzeja, već priliku za novi početak. Kada hodate hodnicima muzeja, verovatno vidite samo jedan procenat ukupne kolekcije. Ostatak je u skladištu. Čak i nakon vraćanja 500 kulturnih predmeta i skeleta, moj muzej je i dalje zadržao 99,999 odsto ukupne zbirke. Mada više nemamo bogove rata, imamo tradicionalnu keramiku Zunija, nakit, oruđe, odeću i umetnička dela. A još dragoceniji od ovih predmeta je odnos koji smo stvorili sa Indijancima kroz proces repatrijacije. Sada možemo da zatražimo od Zunija da podele svoju kulturu sa nama.
Not long ago, I had the chance to visit the returned War Gods. A shrine sits up high atop a mesa overlooking beautiful Zuni homeland. The shrine is enclosed by a roofless stone building threaded at the top with barbed wire to ensure that they're not stolen again. And there they are, inside, the Ahayu:da, 106 War Gods amid offerings of turquoise, cornmeal, shell, even T-shirts ... a modern gift to ancient beings. And standing there, I got a glimpse at the War Gods' true purpose in the world. And it occurred to me then that we do not get to choose the histories that we inherit. Museum curators today did not pillage ancient graves or steal spiritual objects, but we can accept responsibility for correcting past mistakes. We can help restore dignity, hope and humanity to Native Americans, the very people who were once the voiceless objects of our curiosity. And this doesn't even require us to fully understand others' beliefs, only that we respect them. Museums are temples to things past. Now they must also become places for living cultures.
Ne tako davno, imao sam priliku da posetim vraćene bogove rata. Svetište se nalazi visoko na platou iznad prekrasne domovine Zunija. Svetište je ograđeno kamenom građevinom bez krova oivičenom bodljikavom žicom, kako bi se postarali da ih ne ukradu ponovo. Tu su, unutra, Ahajude, 106 bogova rata oko kojih su darovi od tirkiza, kukuruzne kaše, školjki, pa čak i majice... moderan poklon drevnim bićima. Dok sam tamo stajao, dobio sam uvid u istinsku svrhu ratnih bogova u svetu. I onda mi je palo na pamet da ne možemo da biramo prošlost koju nasleđujemo. Današnji kustosi nisu pljačkali drevne grobnice niti krali spiritualne predmete, ali možemo prihvatiti odgovornost za ispravljanje grešaka iz prošlosti. Možemo pomoći da se vrati dostojanstvo, nada i čovečnost Indijancima, upravo onim ljudima koji su nekada bili predmeti naše radoznalosti bez prava glasa. To čak ne zahteva od nas da u potpunosti razumemo verovanja drugih ljudi; samo da ih poštujemo. Muzeji su hramovi prošlosti. Sada moraju postati mesta za žive kulture.
As I turned to walk away from the shrine, I drank in the warm summer air, and I watched an eagle turn lazy circles high above. I thought of the Zunis, whose offerings ensure that their culture is not dead and gone but alive and well, and I could think of no better place for the War Gods to be.
Dok sam se okretao da odem od svetišta, udahnuo sam topao letnji vazduh i posmatrao kako orao lenjo ide ukrug visoko gore. Pomislio sam na Zunije, čiji se darovi bogovima staraju da njihova kultura ne bude mrtva i nestala već živa i zdrava, i nisam mogao da zamislim bolje mesto za bogove rata.
Thank you.
Hvala.
(Applause)
(Aplauz)