The Hunterian
Collections tell stories – but whose stories? At The Hunterian, we’re asking uncomfortable questions about what collections reveal, while reimagining the roles museums can play in society today.
In Curating Discomfort, we explore the uncomfortable reality of museums as products of colonial systems, such as the British Empire. This series brings together community activists, social justice campaigners, and educators to dismantle the colonial ideologies embedded in collections and labels. It’s time to think critically about the past in our present.
Through The Emotional Museum, University of Glasgow researchers explore the complex feelings evoked by collections and museum spaces. Moving beyond labels and glass cases, we ask what objects really do to us. From joy to anger, discover how emotional responses reveal truth about power, identity and belonging – while reimagining what museums could be.
The Hunterian
Curating Discomfort - Nelson & Jesper - Gold Guinea Coin
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Museums are political places. ‘Curating Discomfort’ puts forward discomforting provocations and interventions to help us think critically about colonial systems, such as the British Empire.
Systems that used ideologies to justify the enslavement and colonisation of peoples and lands around the world.
Museums developed within this context, and they remain spaces that celebrate and memorialise colonial systems of the past in the present. Collections, displays, and labels are a political act that have legacies rooted in colonialism.
From the Hunterian Museum and the University of Glasgow, this series explores the Hunterian’s collections with academics, community activists, social justice campaigners and educators.
Hosted by Curator of Discomfort, Zandra Yeaman and featuring Nelson Cummins and Jesper Ericsson.
A transcript for this episode is available on the episode webpage.
Recorded, edited and produced by Charis Sandison, Eva López-López and Hollie Wade.