Modernizing a Museum

Modernizing a Museum Supporting a Change in Practice

By Sdaahl K’awaas Lucy Bell, Head of Indigenous Collections and Repatriation, with Erika Stenson, Head of Marketing, Communications and Business Development

As we continue to work with the Government of British Columbia on a business case for modernizing the museum infrastructure, we are also considering what it means to modernize the way we work. Museums around the world are being urged to include diverse voices on history and reevaluate whose stories are told, and many are looking to the Royal BC Museum as a leader on how to approach this fundamental change.

One of the ways we are making change is in expanded community engagement processes. We are (slowly) taking steps toward ensuring that community engagement is core to our practice. This past September the museum held two two-day sessions with Indigenous people from across British Columbia. They came to the museum to learn about the Indigenous collections and programs and to give advice on modernization. Our guests offered immensely important advice and feedback on their existing experience with the museum and what could be transformed. including the truth of the negative impacts of colonization. Inclusion of all Indigenous people, elimination of the homogenization of the distinct cultures and languages, and highlighting the strengths and resilience of Indigenous people were also indicated as important. Recommendations call for changes at the systems level and include the requirement for significant investment to realize the goals, requirements and recommendations articulated in this report.

We, the museum staff, were so honoured to have our Indigenous guests take the time to visit us and give their advice. We look forward to strengthening our relationships, following through on the modernization advice we heard and continuing to build relationships with Indigenous people across British Columbia.”

Read the report at rbcm.ca/ IndigenousModernizationReport

The recommendations from those sessions are now publicly available in a report on the Royal BC Museum website. Below is an excerpt from the introduction.

“Participants agreed that staff of the

Indigenous Collections and Repatriation department are doing a great job; however, more needs to be done to address the needs and priorities of the Indigenous communities who are working hard to address Nation building and the resurgence of their cultures and languages. Echoed consistently was the need for the museum to work with Indigenous people to accurately portray the history of Indigenous people through an Indigenous lens,

1. Corey Bulpitt, Ernie Swanson and Chief Reg Young of the Haida Nation dance at a ceremony in Thunderbird Park to take down an aging pole and lay it to rest.

2. Artists and Royal BC Museum staff discuss the future of an Indigenous Artists’ Studio.