By: Lisa Lark
Published November 5th, 2009
It is clear from Imran Syed’s most recent column that he didn’t attend the Kelsey Museum opening and that he didn’t speak with any Kelsey staff members (Hoarding history, 11/02/2009).
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It is clear from Imran Syed’s most recent column that he didn’t attend the Kelsey Museum opening and that he didn’t speak with any Kelsey staff members (Hoarding history, 11/02/2009).
While it's true that the vast majority of the Kelsey's collection is kept in storage, by no means are these items being "hoarded" or are "concentrated in the hands of the elite few." The Kelsey Museum is open to the public, and its collections are used by researchers across campus and indeed across the world. Pieces from the Kelsey's collection are on display in museums in other states and countries.
Additionally, these items are not displaced because they are "redundant or conventionally uninteresting to the museum.” Items are kept in storage for many reasons. Some are not stable enough for display and need to be kept in climate-controlled settings. Others are not a part of the Kelsey's current thematic display. Some are currently being used by researchers or are under repair.
While I understand Syed’s dissatisfaction with 19th and early 20th century antiquities laws and, in fact, share his view, his argument about returning items to their countries is lost in the random list of complaints that he seems to have.
Syed moves from the concentration of wealth at the top of society to the fact no one ever uses these artifacts, detours to a comment about "colonialist advances" and then somehow ends with a demand for recognition that an archaeologist somewhere might have gotten an artifact under less-than-ethical circumstances. What is Syed’s real complaint? That the Kelsey has too many artifacts in storage? That the Kelsey should give everything back, except for the things they're using, the things they loan to people, or the things other people use? Or that colonialism is bad?
Syed would be well-served by researching his topic and focusing his argument. Complaining about a lot of different things on a similar topic doesn't indicate a valid argument about any of them.
Lisa Lark
School of Education
