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Upon further investigation, I began to realize that storytelling really is everywhere in contemporary conservation. We find it most obviously in the form of the “artists interview” and in “community consultation”, which also double as practical acts of listening, recording and remembering. Even our treatment reports have a large dose of narrative in the ways in which they try to explain to future generations the choices we made, and the paths we took. Stories also hold much potential as forms of writing for the conservation field. A well spun yarn could incorporate and elucidate theoretical concepts that would otherwise be complicated and confusing, it could share knowledge and skills that would otherwise remain esoteric and hidden, it could provide sage advice and wise warnings from past experiences, and it could contextualize material culture in a way that would otherwise remain academic and aloof. Once I began to look for stories, I also realized that the emerging media landscape is leading to a revival in storytelling, which in turn is dramatically changing the voice of the museum. In a world in which the unmediated voice of blogs, podcasts, and such like, has allowed a multiplicity of stories to find an audience, the museum can no longer stand alone as the unassailable voice and must instead join the conversation as a knowledgeable participant [3]. The participatory museum has great potential for community building, encouraging the coming together of competing stories into dialogue, and negotiation rather than conflict. Such negotiations must necessarily be about more than simply the details of stories, it must question “the very meaning and nature of heritage” and therefore also the very idea of conservation itself “is open to renegotiation and redefinition” [4]. As I reflected upon the nature of storytelling, I became more convinced of its worth to our profession, as we crawl out of our dusty basements and into our glass windowed laboratories, putting conservation into the public eye, we find ourselves appearing on TV screens, computer monitors and in the pages of newspapers, and everywhere telling our stories. These were my initial thoughts when I started to consider the relationship between conservation and storytelling. But I’d like to end on a question; if asked today what tale of conservation would you tell? [1] Spitfire by Chris Wood, from the album Handmade life, on RUF Records, 2009 [2] M. Schnurer and L. K. Hahn, "Accessible Artifact for community discussion about anarchy and education", in R. Amster, A. DeLeon, L. A. Fernandez, A. J. Nocella II, and D. Shannon (eds.), Contemporary Anarchist Studies: an introductory anthology of anarchy in the academy, Routledge, London and New York, 2009, p. 147 [3] N. Simon, The Participatory Museum, Museum 2.0, Santa Cruz, 2010 [4] E. Waterton, L. Smith, and G. Campbell, "The Utility of Discourse Analysis to Heritage Studies: The Burra Charter and Social Inclusion", International Journal of Heritage Studies 12(4), July 2006, p. 351 About the author Daniel Cull Assistant Conservator The Musical Instrument Museum Website: http://dancull.wordpress.com Contact: daniel.cull@themim.org Daniel Cull is a Conservator, Wikipedian, Social Networker, and Blogger from the West Country of the British Isles. Trained at the Institute of Archaeology, University College London, where he received a BSc in Archaeology, MA in Principles of conservation, and an MSc in Conservation for Archaeology and Museums. He was later awarded an Andrew W. Mellon Fellowship at the National Museum of the American Indian/Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC. He currently works as an ethnographic musical instrument conservator at the Musical Instrument Museum,in Arizona. |
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