title: Stories, skulls, and colonial collections.
abstract: The essay explores the hypothesis of colonial collecting processes involving the active addition of the colonial context and historical past to museum objects through the production of short stories. It examines the emergent historicity of collections through a focus on the "histories" that museum workers and colonial agents have been attaching to scientific collections of human skulls. Drawing on the notions of collection trajectory and historiographical work, it offers an alternative perspective from which to approach the creation of singular histories and individual archives for objects in collections.
authors.affiliation: University of Lisbon.
authors.forename: Ricardo
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Roque
mesh_terms: D000884:Anthropology, Cultural / Q000193:education / Q000266:history; D001106:Archaeology / Q000193:education / Q000266:history; D018595:Colonialism / Q000266:history; D005085:Exhibitions as Topic; D049672:History, 19th Century; D049673:History, 20th Century; D049674:History, 21st Century; D009144:Museums / Q000266:history; D012886:Skull