The Rise of Private Museums and Heritage in East and Southeast Asia: Understanding Memory and Transformation

“亚洲博物馆热潮”的特点是一波新的博物馆建设项目，以及国家、地区和地方层面的大规模遗产指定计划。与此同时，学术界重新关注博物馆、纪念馆和文化保护实践所嵌入的不断变化的社会政治格局，以及与国家建设和国家有关的权力和权威问题。因此，纪念和治理问题已成为亚洲文化遗产研究框架的主要类型。虽然许多研究致力于分析国家博物馆和国家叙事，但目前对东亚和东南亚私营部门参与遗产、博物馆和纪念活动的增长现象的认识存在差距。尽管在相对较短的时间内，东亚和东南亚的少数民族社区、企业家、公司和家庭资助和经营了大量的博物馆和遗产地，而仅在中国，私人博物馆每年每周都在以显著的速度扩张。这个项目将通过产生关于私人博物馆影响的新知识来解决这种疏忽。亚洲的遗产和博物馆繁荣。在认识到记忆往往以不同和有争议的方式与遗产联系在一起（因此可能与官方历史不一致）时，这项研究将对私营部门如何利用遗产技术作为承认痛苦或创造更美好未来的手段产生新的见解。研究私营部门扩张所推动的纪念策略和战略，将使英国和亚洲的博物馆和遗产专业人员更好地了解该行业运营的机遇和限制。东亚和东南亚是开展此类调查的理想地区，因为社区仍在努力应对战争，种族灭绝，革命，政治动荡，或毁灭性的自然灾害。该网络将提供必要的框架来探索与以下问题相关的这些因素。什么样的记忆政治出现在私人博物馆、遗产地或纪念活动的背景下，并将继续被家长式国家隐藏或压制？遗产技术以何种方式被用来表达创伤或痛苦，如何表达？自由改革和私营部门的扩张如何为反记忆的出现和繁荣提供空间，特别是在中国、越南和老挝等社会主义后期国家？一个关键的问题将是问最近的现象与公众记忆和历史意识的生产挑战官方和公认的历史，并了解是什么动员人们恢复和重新评估记忆，突出的不满和损失或未来的希望和愿望。在研究当代亚洲私人博物馆和遗产地中出现的记忆工作类型时，本研究将了解该部门运作的条件以及所面临的政治，经济和文化挑战。这项研究的主要组成部分是两个国际活动，一个在布里斯托，另一个在莱顿，它允许参与者提出他们的书面调查结果，并与更多的观众分享。这些书面草稿将构成合编本书的基础。传播活动包括一个网站和博客、布里斯托和莱顿/荷兰学生之间的在线联合课堂，以及为博物馆和遗产部门撰写的一系列新闻文章。一项重要成果是一份简报文件，列出针对英国/欧洲和亚洲博物馆和遗产行业的结果和建议，并通过英国、欧洲和亚洲的网络分发。

The 'Asian museum boom' is characterised by a wave of new museum building projects together with wide-scale heritage designation programmes on national, regional and local levels. At the same time, there has been renewed scholarly focus on the shifting socio-political landscape in which museums, memorials and cultural preservation practices are embedded, and questions of power and authority in relation to the nation-building and the state. Consequently, issues around commemoration and governance have become dominant genres for the framing of studies of Asian cultural heritage.While much research has been dedicated to analysing state museums and national narratives, there exists a gap in current knowledge of the growth phenomenon of private sector involvement in heritage, museums and commemoration in East and Southeast Asia. This is despite the fact that over a relatively short period of time, there are significant numbers of museums and heritage sites financed and run by ethnic communities, entrepreneurs, corporations, and families in East and Southeast Asia, and where in China alone, private museums are expanding at a significant rate each week of the year.This project will address this oversight by generating new knowledge of the impacts of the private sector on the heritage and museum boom in Asia. In recognising that memory often attaches itself to heritage in diverse and contested ways (and so may be at odds with official histories), this research will produce new insights into how heritage technologies are used by the private sector as a means for the recognition of suffering or the creation of a better future. Examining the memorialising tactics and strategies driven by the private-sector expansion will enable museum and heritage professionals in the UK and Asia to better understand the opportunities and constraints under which the industry is operating.East and Southeast Asia are ideal regions to situate such an investigation as communities are still grappling with the legacies of war, genocide, revolution, political upheaval, or devastating natural disasters within living memory. This network will provide the necessary framework to explore these factors in relation to the following questions. What memory politics emerge in the context of private museums, heritage sites or commemorative practices and would remain otherwise hidden or repressed by paternalistic states? In what ways are technologies of heritage appropriated to give expression to trauma or suffering and how are these expressed? How does liberal reform and the expansion of the private sector offer a space for counter-memory to emerge and flourish, particularly in late socialist states like China, Vietnam and Laos? A key concern will be to ask how recent phenomena related to the production of public memory and historical consciousness challenges official and accepted histories, and to understand what mobilises people to recover and re-evaluate memory and give prominence to grievances and loss or future hopes and aspirations. In examining the types of memory-work that emerge in private museums and heritage sites in contemporary Asia, this research will develop an understanding of the conditions under which the sector operates, and the political, economic, and cultural challenges faced. The main components of this research are two international events, one at Bristol and the other in Leiden, which allows participants to present their written findings and share them with a larger audience. These written drafts will form the basis of a co-edited book. Dissemination activities include a website and blog, an online joint classroom between Bristol and Leiden / Dutch students, and a series of news articles for the museum and heritage sector. A key output is a briefing paper setting out results and recommendations aimed at the museum and heritage profession in the UK/Europe and Asia - and circulated through networks in the UK, Europe, and Asia.