Om tingets museala epistemologi. Reflektioner kring de kulturhistoriska tingens representativa historia

Abstract

On the Museal Epistemology and the Artefact. Reflections on the Representative History of Objects for Cultural History

The theme of this article is the musealized objects and the notion that these artefacts represent resources to cultural analyses and historical knowledge. A leading hypothesis is the concept that the late 20th century’s postmodern deconstructivism has changed our perspective of the artefact as a neutral vessel for historic and cultural knowledge. This has an on-going impact on cultural museums’ exhibitions. The first part of the article therefore presents a synthesized historic background to our present museum state, in accordance with the stated topic for investigation. The finishing part discusses what kind of impact the “cultural turn” has on present day exhibitions. The author state that we must both understand and accept the artefacts multidimensional meanings, as we also must comprehend why it is that the perfect exhibition doesn’t exist.