ABSTRACT

The chapter examines the community consultation processes that a number of museums undertook in developing exhibitions on transatlantic slavery. The paper argues that a range of tensions were experienced within the consultation process and that these stem, in part, from a fundamental contradiction within contemporary museological debates. That contradiction centres on the rhetorical emphasis placed on the idea of museums as agents for social justice and the reality that museum are institutions concerns with the authorization of particular, and often triumphant, historical and cultural narratives. The tensions that this contradiction creates are not an easy one for curatorial staff who are concerned with social justice issues to successfully surf. Drawing on Nancy Fraser’s conceptualization of the politics of recognition, the chapter offers an analysis of the role of museum exhibitions, and the consultation process itself, in wider politics of recognition and social justice. The chapter stresses the need to rethink the relationship between museum’s and their communities and the need to develop negotiation strategies, rather than ‘consultative’ strategies in community outreach and engagement.