ABSTRACT
This chapter develops a set of interrelated themes concerning the sensorial dimensions of indigenous artifacts and the sensory typologies of their European collectors. These themes include the importance of touch in seventeenth- and eighteenth-century European collections compared to the dominance of sight in the modern museum; the Western association of the "lower" races with the "lower" senses; the links between museum display and imperialism; and, the complex sensory lives of indigenous artifacts in their cultures of origin. Artifacts from exotic lands offered Europeans the possibility of experiencing a safe but nonetheless potent contact with the "other worlds" from which they sprang. Europeans perceived themselves to be the rational, civilized, elite among the peoples of the world. The ethnographic museum was a model of an ideal colonial empire in which perfect law and order was imposed upon the natives.
