Decolonising the Catalogues

The Irish Museums Association (IMA)'s Decolonising the Catalogues conference, takes place Tuesdays and Fridays from 19 - 30 November 2021

Decolonising the Catalogues is a programme of online talks and practical application workshops exploring how museums are looking beyond decolonisation as centred around acquisition practices, to find a more collaborative and ethical approach to all areas of work within the museum. 

It specifically aims to examine how museums have traditionally excluded marginalised ethnic groups from the process of documenting and describing material created from within their culture: the language used, from our databases to our displays. 

Decolonising the Catalogues will additionally examine how, in Ireland, there is also a need to address the ways in which the indigenous culture of Mincéirs (Irish Travellers) has been largely ignored or misrepresented by museums.

Click here for detailed programme 

Programme at a Glance

Session One: Friday 19 November, 09:00 - 11:00. Moderator: Judith Finlay, National Museum of Ireland.

• Welcome, Dr Audrey Whitty, IMA Chair/National Museum of Ireland.
• Dr Dan Hicks, Professor of Contemporary Archaeology, School of Archaeology, University of Oxford and Curator of World Archaeology, Pitt Rivers Museum.

Session Two: Tuesday 23 November, 14:00 - 16:30. Moderators: Shauna Allen, Irish Museums Association (IMA) and Professor Olwen Purdue, IMA Board Member/Queens University Belfast. 

• Dr Hannah Turner, Assistant Professor, School of Information, The University of British Columbia.
• Marenka Thompson-Odlum, Research Associate, Pitt Rivers Museum.

Session Three: Friday 26 November, 09:30 - 12:30. Chair: Brian Crowley, Kilmainham Gaol - OPW.

• Mincéir/Irish Traveller Culture in Museums Panel: Dan Breen, Museum Curator of Cork Public Museum; Oein DeBhairduin, Author and Co-founder of LGBT Tara (Traveller and Roma Alliance); Rosa Meehan, Curator at National Museum of Ireland - Irish Folklife Division; Dr Hannagh McGinley, Education Officer for the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA); and Owen Ward, Traveller Education Officer at the Access Centre, NUI Galway.
• Ananda Rutherford, Research Associate, Provisional Semantics, Tate.

Session Four: Tuesday 30th November, 10:00 - 13:30. Moderator: Lar Joye, IMA Board Member/Dublin Port Company 

• Rachel Hand, Collections Manager, Museum of Archaeology & Anthropology Department, University of Cambridge.
• Miranda Lowe, Principal Curator, Crustacea, Natural History Museum.
• Aalia Kamal, Culture and Inclusive Heritage Officer, The Heritage Council.

The IMA would like to acknowledge the assistance of Judith Finlay and Declan Walsh, National Museum of Ireland, and Brian Crowley, Kilmainham Gaol - OPW, in shaping this programme. 

Registration

General registration: €10 per session, €35 for the full conference.

IMA members: Free registration once logged into a registered account.  Click here to sign in if not already completed this step and free registration will automatically be applied below. Note for Institutional Members: all staff within the institution can avail of free booking but must register via an account holder or by emailing the IMA. 

Students:  20% of available tickets are provided free of charge to students who must use their academic email address to register, using discount code: studentfws1x.

Volunteer/Community-led museums: 20 tickets are provided free of charge to staff or volunteers from community-led museums or members of relevant community representative groups. These will be allocated on a first come, first served basis by emailing office@irishmuseums.org.