 WEB
LINKS and BIBLIOGRAPHY on ECOMUSEUMS
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The following are web sites of different ecomuseums,
open-air museums, site museums and community museums
that we encountered while doing research in preparation
for ICOM NEWS n°3 2005. We wish we could have
mention them in this issue. Space forbidding but web
site permitting, we can now do so.
Why
mention these museums and not other ones?
Ecomuseums
can be modest institutions. Indeed, as noted in ICOM
NEWS n°3 2005, ecomuseums are adopted by fragile ethnic
groups or populations that find in that form of new
museology a way to conserve and preserve their heritage
and culture. Many are struggling against the bullet-speed
modernisation of their countries. They do not display
classical or contemporary art masterpieces and cannot
be found easily in big cities, although some urban
examples are noteworthy. Thus, their visitors are
not the usual tourist masses that drive over in air-conditioned
buses. Most of the time, ecomuseums can be found far
from city centers and are not of easily accessible
and most of the time, they do not have official websites.
They are only talked and written about by people who
have visited them and have written about them on their
websites.
However,
ecomuseums are a big deal, being the result of kind
of a small revolution movement for a new museology
in the 1960's, and numerous organisations and associations
are dedicated exclusively to them and to their promotion.
See:
Ecomuseums based on Skansen-type ecomuseum have always
been very popular in (Northern) Europe, thus several
sites are easily found on this matter. See :
Knowing that, as noted above, ecomuseums are an important
way through for ethnic groups at risk, it is logical
to see them flourish in third-world countries like
in Africa, Asia and South America, or just in places
where the population feels an urgent need to reassure
themselves on the values of their community for example
in Native American reservations. Ecomuseums are also
constructed to fight against time and loss of memory
which is why some ecomuseums can be mixed with memorial.
This system not only allows preserving a way of living
but also to continue to live it. Indeed, ecomuseums
are occupied by their inhabitants who occasionally
receive "guests" (visitors). See :
This is a short list of ecomuseums around the world,
those that have their own websites and some that are
just mentioned in the press. But you may as well easily
find information on any search engines under "ecomuseums",
"site museums", "community museums" or under "ecomuseos",
"museos regionales", "ecomusei"...
TANZANIA
The Village Museum (open-air museum) is featured in
our latest issue through a picture of a Wabena dance
performance during the Ethnic Days, a programme devised
by the curators of the Village Museum, to help members
of different ethnic groups, even enemy, to get together
by showing their respective culture and learning more
about the other's by attending it. Creating the Village
Museum was also the best way the Tanzanian could find
to teach population the importance of protecting their
culture against illicit traffic of the community property.
Learn
more about the Village Museum on
We
can only highly recommend you to read Paul Msemwa
and Green Nyirenda's great article about the Village
Museum. We had asked them to write it for us but could
not eventually fit it in the paper version of ICOM
NEWS as scheduled.
CANADA
Kalyna Ecomuseum : http://kalynacountry.com/
The Cowichan and Chemainus Valleys Ecomuseum Society
(at Duncan) : http://www.duncanbc.com/
, http://tourismmall.victoria.bc.ca/Duncan/
CHINA
About ecomuseums in Guizhou, read the article by Wang
Shanshan on : http://www.humanrights.cn/zt/magazine/200402004826112452.htm
Norwegian Embassy article about cooperation with China
on: http://www.norway.cn/environment/minorities/ecomuseum.htm
CRETE
The Lychnostasis Open-air Museum : http://www.lychnostatis.gr/english.html
FINLANDE
Seurasaari Open-air Museum : http://www.nba.fi/en/seurasaari_openairmuseum
FRANCE
Famous (famous for being among the first ecomuseums)
Ecomusée de la communauté Le Creusot-Montceau : http://www.musees-bourgogne.org/les_musees/index.php?id_ville=39
MEXICO
Community museums of Oaxaca : http://www.oaxacaoaxaca.com/museums.htm
Museo Regional Comunitario Cuitlahuac : http://www.cuitlahuac.org
SENEGAL
Lebou People Ecomuseum : http://www.cresp.sn/ecoyoff/Ecomusee/siteweb/default.htm
Falia ecomuseum : http://www.unesco.org/csi/act/dakar/dakar1t2.htm
SOUTH
AFRICA
District Six (urban museum) : http://www.districtsix.co.za/
SWEDEN
Skansen : http://www.skansen.se/pages/?ID=221
UNITED
STATES
Ak-Chin Him Dak Ecomuseum (Indian reservation in Arizona)
http://www.visitphoenix.com/meeting/index.cfm?action=native&subSection=26
http://www.arizonalodging.com/nativeland/akchin.html
http://www.itcaonline.com/tribes_akchin.html
Anacostia Museum (neighbourhood museum in Washington
DC) : http://anacostia.si.edu/
VIET
NAM
Ha Long Bay Ecomuseum
See article by Amareswar Galla entitled "Culture and
Heritage in Development: Ha Long Ecomuseum, A Case
Study from Vietnam" in Humanities Research, Vol. IX,
No. 1, 2002, pages 63-76 (with photographs) and available
online at http://rspas.anu.edu.au/heritage
under "Related Links".
ZIMBABWE
Batonga museum : http://zimbabwe.ms.dk/articles/batonga_museum.htm
see also interesting report on west African ecotourism
and ecovillages on: http://www.dakar.unesco.org/natsciences_fr/rapport_2002/ecovillage.htm
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