On October 24 & 25, 2024, the international workshop „From Contested Ownership to (In)Voluntary Returns. Interdisciplinary Perspectives on the Postcolonial Fight for Restitution and Repatriation“ took place in Erfurt, a co-operation of colleagues and research projects from the Universities of Erfurt and Jena. Diverse topics and lectures by guests from Africa and Europe shared interdisciplinary perspectives on the postcolonial fight for restitution and repatriation. Read more on the discussion in the conference report on HSozKult.
Among several international guests we especially welcomed Flower Manase, since 2009 curator of history at the National Museum of Tanzania (Museum and House of Culture, Dar es Salaam) and visiting Mercator Fellow to the CRC “Structural Change of Property” in October and November 2024. CRC’s podcast “Appropriate” reported on the workshop and also talked to Flower about her experiences and challenges during her work for a museum of history in Tanzania. Feel free to listen here!
The event as a whole was inspired by one of our current subprojects, “Voluntariness and the Repatriation of Human Remains from Colonial Contexts (1970-2021)”, conducted by Silvan Niedermeier during our second funding phase. The collaborative workshop was a result of our vivid exchange with the Collaborative Research Center TRR 294 „Structural Change of Property“ and the „Wissenschaftliche Koordinationsstelle Koloniales Erbe in Thüringen“ (KET).
Designed as a forum for lectures and project presentations on campus in Erfurt, the workshop was completed by a public panel discussion, downtown at the Café Franz Mehlhose on Thursday evening, titled „Verstecken? Ausstellen? Zurückgeben? Die Restitutionsdebatte und das Erfurter koloniale Erbe.“ Guests from local politics, the field of postcolonial research as well as local and international museums discussed today’s challenges of dealing with (post)colonial heritage and questions of restitution in Erfurt and Thuringia.
