British Museum - Collecting Things, Collecting People

Visits to the British Museum The history of collecting and its links to both Colonialism and Science  and will be explored, looking at how collecting is practised by ethnographers today to record changing societies. It considers the politics of collecting and debates about cultural property. Room 25: Africa The diverse cultural life of Africa has been expressed through everyday objects and unique works of art since ancient times. The Museum’s collection of over 200,000 African items encompasses archaeological and contemporary material from across the continent. Highlights on display in Room 25 include a magnificent brass head of a Yoruba ruler from Ife in Nigeria, the Tree of Life (a sculpture made out of guns) and some objects from the Torday collection of Central African sculpture, textiles and weaponry. When exploring the museum you are faced with an eclectic collection of artefacts which aims to give you a better understanding of the objects and the African culture.  The rooms are divided and categorised so that the information is not over whelming but exciting as you meander through the rooms. Room 24: living and dying

People throughout the world deal with the tough realities of life in many different ways. The displays in Room 24 explore different approaches to our shared challenges as human beings, focussing on how diverse cultures seek to maintain health and well-being The new displays provide case studies on the theme Living and Dying using material from New Zealand, Ghana, the Solomon Islands, South America and the North American Arctic.

The displays consider different approaches to averting illness, danger and trouble, and investigate people's reliance on relationships - with each other, the animal kingdom, spiritual powers spirits and the world around us.

Objects range from ancient gold artifacts and sculptures to a specially-commissioned art installation, Cradle to Grave by Pharmacopoeia

With in this room are several glass cabinets each from a different culture in the would and objects which are used in the celebration of life and the rituals of death. 


One thing that i noticed amongst the cultures is the celebration of both life and death and the use of objects as symbols. 
they all look at death mysteriously and always try to send the dead of in a very ceremonial way.  


There  are ways we  can deal with life and death for the people who lived on the Polynesian islands they carved large rock head in order to recognize the people of the past and living .

The exhibitionStudy task                                                                                                            What object would you collect to symbolize the way you think about life?  What would you collect to show the difference between your ideas and those of your parents about life? Life for me is a gift and the only way you can really recognize the magnitude or greatness of this gift is through death. Death itself can't really be symbolized it can only be represented through its effects which would be the life that was. The things it leaves behind and the way it effects others. With reference to this the objects which i would collect to reflect the idea of life and death would be images of the course of a life and the things within that.  the items which were used every day and those which have memory for each life the objects differ.