Date: February 28-March 2, 2006 Place: Seminar Room No. 6, National Museum of Ethnology, Osaka

JSPS Platform Program "Preserving the Cultural Heritage of Africa"

Today the outflow of cultural heritage of archeological or artistic values from Africa is emerging as a serious issue. In some cases looting has reached such a scale as to destroy archaeological sites totally. Few complete objects are kept in the original country, while many fine pieces can be found in major museums outside Africa including Japan. Meanwhile, there is a vigorous movement in many parts of Africa to build museums for the purpose of preserving and presenting on-site cultural heritage. This movement also challenges museums outside of Africa to review the prevalent one-sided approach to exhibitions of African treasures. It is now rather common for any museums to have close collaborative relationship with the people who are represented in the exhibitions.

This year, we, the National Museum of Ethnology, initiated a 3 years project entitled 'Preserving the Cultural Heritage of Africa: from Memories to Histories' as one of the JSPS (Japan Society for the Promotion of Science) Asia Africa Science Platform Program. The aim of the JSPS AA Science Platform Program is to create high potential research hubs in selected fields within the Asian and African region. It does this by establishing suitable collaborative relations among universities, research institues and museums in Japan and other Asian and African Countries. Our particular project, 'Preserving Cultural heritage of Africa' aims to construct a better international cooperation system for collection, analysis, exhibition and preservation of cultural heritage in Africa, with researchers' participation from African, European, American and Japanese institutes and museums.

In this colloquium, after sharing the purpose and general outline of the project among participating members, we plan to identify issues and agendas concerning the preservation and presentation of cultural heritage in Africa, and to clarify strategies to overcome some of the issues in the remaining period of our project.

The National museum is now planning to renovate her permanent galleries, including African Gallery, by updating the contents. We also would like to take advantage of this occasion and get advice from African colleagues for the composition of the new exhibition.

We do believe that this colloquium is an important occasion for forming the foundation of a research hub which plays positive roles in preservation and presentation of cultural Heritage of Africa.

Program

Participants from overseas

Participants from Japan