ABSTRACT
This chapter displays a newly accessioned selection of objects collected from the Calumet region of southeastern Chicago and northwestern Indiana at the 2014 Field Museum Members' Night in Chicago. It addresses the collections work in this chapter, it is its existence alongside our other projects in the community that makes research participatory. After presenting the methods and relationship between research, visual strategies, and action, the chapter discusses some of the dilemmas of power, positionality, and ethics that it has encountered during this project, including our relationship with ArcelorMittal, a major steel manufacturer in the region who has funded a part of our work. It discusses the most recent endeavor to demonstrate the unique combination of visual media that a museum can deploy in both ethnographic research and heritage management efforts. The theme, in part based on our research, will focus on art and heritage in the Calumet region.
