What a museum exhibition does
On social categorisation, historical progress and the new role of the museums
Exhibitions on museums, like every other genre of presentation, are always built up with the help of categories. Linked to categories we have a whole package of characteristics. The proper story about the Indian, the social marginalized or the scientist in the 19th century is of course a cultural and historical agreement and in so, we just “know” what types of narratives that are correct and what version that has to be rejected. Also our history needs to be written with the help of categories – the use of language is a toolbox in the construction of past and present. This article focuses on how credibility is achieved through social categorisation and what types of narratives that are built up with the help of the short texts in museum exhibitions. Furthermore, the article is discussing in what way these narratives connect to political issues and the rewriting of history in our time. In Swedish museums today it is a central topic how we are going to handle past times prejudices about the people we categorise as those who are not us. Also the museums themselves have been part of the western colonial politics, in the collection of gadgets and gizmos – and in the characterisation of mankind. This path is now under reconsideration, this history is now going to be rewritten and condemned. Most of us probably agree (politically) in the necessity of this, but in what new ways are cultural categories used today? When new narratives are built up, when other “stories proper” are produced, what happens with the claims of truth and the issue of historical correctness? What new demands are now directed towards the enlightened citizen, the visitor of the museum exhibitions?
