Who Owns the Past?
Sample Syllabus
PHIL 338: Who Owns the Past?
Wellesley College, Fall 2020, T2 (7-week course)
DRAFT, subject to change
In this course, we will examine a range of moral and political questions surrounding cultural heritage. We will employ an interdisciplinary array of sources in order to investigate key concepts including cultural and natural heritage, value, identity, colonialism, cultural property and landscapes, stewardship, and preservation. We will use these conceptual foundations to address practical questions, such as whether cultural artifacts in Western museums should be repatriated to their countries of origin; how we should resolve value conflicts between archaeologists and Indigenous communities; and whether institutions (such as governments or colleges) should continue to honor historical figures who perpetrated historical injustices. The course will involve a substantial independent research project on a topic of each student’s own choosing.
Readings:
1. Monday, 10/26: What is Heritage?
Rodney Harrison, "What is heritage?"
Helena de Bres, The Pink Guide to Philosophy
2. Thursday, 10/29: Foundations
Stuart Hall, "Whose Heritage? Unsettling 'The Heritage,' Re-imagining the Post-Nation"
Laurajane Smith, "Heritage, Identity, and Power"
Watch: World Heritage Explained video from UNESCO
3. Monday, 11/2: Cultural Property 1
Kwame Anthony Appiah, "Whose Culture Is It Anyway?"
Jana Thompson, "Cultural Property, Restitution and Value"
Ali Abbas Ahmadi, "The nuances of repatriation: Should the British Museum return its Egyptian collection?" at The New Arab
4. Thursday, 11/5: Cultural Property 2
Karin Evardsson Björnberg, "Historic Injustices and the Moral Case for Cultural Repatriation"
Lea Ypi, "Structural Injustice and the Place of Attachment"
Listen: "Planet Monet" from NPR's Planet Money podcast
5. Monday, 11/9: Appropriation 1
Paul C. Taylor, "Roots and Routes" from Black is Beautiful
George P. Nicholas and Alison Wylie, “Do not do unto others . . .” Cultural Misrecognition and the Harms of Appropriation in an Open-Source World"
Adrian L. Jawort, "The Dangers of the Appropriation Critique," at the Los Angeles Review of Books
Listen: Interview with Paul C. Taylor at Myisha Cherry's UnMute Podcast
6. Thursday, 11/12: Appropriation 2
Linda Alcoff, "The Problem of Speaking for Others"
Shelbi Nahwilet Meissner, "The moral fabric of linguicide: un-weaving trauma narratives and dependency relationships in Indigenous language reclamation"
Tunde Wey and John T. Edge, "Who Owns Southern Food?" at Oxford American
7. Monday, 11/16: Cultural Groups and Preservation
Chike Jeffers, "The Ethics and Politics of Cultural Preservation"
Suzy Killmister, "Group-Differentiated Rights and the Problem of Membership"
Listen: "What's the Value in Preserving Language?" at Open Questions Podcst
8. Thursday, 11/19: Monuments 1
Dan Demetriou and Ajume Wingo, "The Ethics of Racist Monuments"
Joanna Burch-Brown, "Should slavery’s statues be preserved? On transitional justice and contested heritage"
Listen: Interview with Michele Moody-Adams at Myisha Cherry's UnMute Podcast
9. Monday, 11/23: Monuments 2
Helen Frowe, "The Duty to Remove Statues of Wrongdoers"
Chong-Ming Lim, "Vandalizing Tainted Commemorations"
Listen: Oñate’s Foot from 99% Invisible (and follow-up episode!)
10. Monday, 11/30: Digital Heritage
Carolyn Korsmeyer, "Real Old Things"
Stuart Jeffrey, "Challenging Heritage Visualisation: Beauty, Aura and Democritisation"
Chad Elias, "Whose Digital Heritage? Contemporary Art, 3D Printing, and the Limits of Cultural Property"
Watch: Sarah Kenderine, "Visionary Art: Digital World" at World Economic Forum
11. Thursday, 12/3: Heritage and War
William Bülow, "Risking Civilian Lives to Avoid Harm to Cultural Heritage"
Elizabeth Scarbrough, "The Ruins of War"