Weaving Europe, Crafting the Museum

The idea that museums are not neutral spaces, and debates around decolonization, are central to current discussions about museums and cultural heritage in Europe, but the emphasis is generally on collections relating to the non-Western world. Weaving Europe, Crafting the Museum reminds us that we also need to consider how European and folk collections have been used in the past to ‘other’ particular communities or unite them against supposed ‘others’, and therefore how we engage with and display such collections in the future. * Folk Life: Journal of Ethnological Studies * Complex, enriching and beautifully written, Weaving Europe, Crafting the Museum is a key, interdisciplinary text composed of compelling stories, distinctive case studies and unique archival materials, entwined with textiles as carriers of meaning, migration and politics. * Janis Jefferies, Goldsmiths, University of London, UK * A pioneering effort of museum studies craftwork that weaves together Europe’s West and East and its histories of colonialism, nazism and socialism; disentangles shifting notions of ‘folk culture’; and highlights the challenging task faced by curators inheriting ambivalent historical collections. * Erica Lehrer, Concordia University, Canada * Weaves together a fascinating series of textile stories, narrated through the woven fabrics housed in German ethnographic collections … This book expands our understanding of museums, collections and materiality, and will definitely appeal to a wide range of scholars, including anthropologists, museum curators and textile historians. * Graeme Were, University of Bristol, UK *