Ethnological museums are under attack as global and local movements for racial justice, decolonisation and reparations have gained momentum.
The problem colonialism poses for museums is how to revere national history but not reproduce the ontological and epistemic assumptions embedded in the Western project of modernity and progress.
So far, museums have employed three interlinked strategies designed to distance themselves from colonial practices: initiating the return process, re-contextualising their display collections, and seeking to control the narrative through public relations and advertising.
Paradoxically, these methods only function to sustain the existing hegemony.
