The Encylopedic Museum
New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art © David Gill
In January the UCS Heritage Group will be considering the issue of the Encyclopedic Museum (Monday 14 January 2013, 4.30 pm; UCS Ipswich). The session will be led by Professor David Gill.
The starting point will be the formation of collections in the Encyclopedic Museums. A good place to start is Wilson’s history of the British Museum. Other museums to consider would be the Ashmolean and the Fitzwilliam, or looking further afield the Louvre or the Metropolitan Museum of Art.
The debate has been encouraged by James Cuno’s series of writings on the purpose of museums and collecting. (See review article here.)
Reading
Appiah, K. A. 2006. Cosmopolitanism: ethics in a world of strangers. London: Allen Lane.
Cuno, J. Editor. 2004. Whose muse? Art museums and the public trust. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
—. 2004. “The object of art museums.” In Whose muse? Art museums and the public trust, edited by J. Cuno: 49-75. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
—. 2005. “Museums, antiquities, cultural property, and the US legal framework for making acquisitions.” In Who owns the past? Cultural policy, cultural property, and the law, edited by K. Fitz Gibbon: 143-57. New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press / American Council for Cultural Policy.
—. 2008. Who owns antiquity? Museums and the battle over our ancient heritage. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
—. 2008. “Yesterday Nebuchadnezzar …” London Review of Books 30.
—. Editor. 2009. Whose culture? The promise of museums and the debate over antiquities. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
de Montebello, P. 2009. “”And what do you propose should be done with those objects?”.” In Whose culture? The promise of museums and the debate over antiquities, edited by J. Cuno: 55-70. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Gill, D. W. J. 2009. “Electronic review of James Cuno, Who Owns Antiquity? Museums and the Battle Over Our Ancient Heritage (Princeton University Press, 2008).” American Journal of Archaeology 113: 104.
MacGregor, N. 2009. “To shape the citizens of “that great city, the world”.” In Whose culture? The promise of museums and the debate over antiquities, edited by J. Cuno: 39-54. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Owen, D. I. 2009. “Censoring knowledge: the case for the publication of unprovenanced cuneiform tablets.” In Whose culture? The promise of museums and the debate over antiquities, edited by J. Cuno: 125-42. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Rosenberg, C. 2007. “Response to James Cuno.” In The acquisition and exhibition of classical antiquities: professional, legal, and ethical perspectives, edited by R. F. Rhodes: 27-30. Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press.
Wilson, D. M. 1989. The British Museum: purpose and politics. London: British Museum Press.
—. 2002. The British Museum: a History. London: The British Museum Press.
(old site) Heritage Futures 
Readers may also be interested in views of the Universal Museum from outside the Western world.See inter alia K. OPOKU
IS THE DECLARATION ON THE VALUE AND IMPORTANCE OF THE “UNIVERSAL MUSEUMS” NOW WORTHLESS? COMMENTS
ON IMPERIALIST MUSEOLOGY,
WHOSE “UNIVERSAL MUSEUM”? COMMENTS ON JAMES CUNO’S WHOSE CULTURE?
LOVE THE “UNIVERSAL MUSEUM” AND DESPISE THE OTHERS: COMMENT ON ARTICLE BY TRISTRAM HUNT. ARTICLES AT
http://www.museum-security.org
AFFIRMATIONS AND DECLARATIONS: REVIEW OF JAMES CUNO’S MUSEUMS MATTER.
http://www.modernghana
DEMOCRATIZATION THROUGH VANDALISM: NEW ANSWER TO DEMANDS FOR RESTITUTION OF CULTURAL ARTEFACTS?
IS THE STEALING OF CULTURAL OBJECTS OF OTHERS A SPECIFIC CULTURAL HERITAGE OF EUROPE OR IS IT A UNIVERSAL HERITAGE?
THERE ARE MANY MORE ARTICLES ON THE TOPIC TO BE FOUND IN MUSEUM SECURITY NETWORK AND MODERN GHANA.
Kwame Opoku