The Ethnographic Museum

Ethnography is a way of looking. The first action an ethnographer does is to look – both carefully and intrusively – into the lives of people. An ethnographer is particularly interested in a world which falls out of the public eye: banal displays of reality, everyday items, the creation of customs and habits: celebrations, work rituals, subcultures, free time, the alien among us… But it is these things which are, for the ethnographer, the underlying elements of life, both unnoticed and undervalued. Yet it is these spheres which reveal the real secrets, and which allow us to view ourselves and others in a new light.

There is a great future for ethnography. Global processes across the world cause a feeling of longing for localness and distinction. The pressure of cultural standards paradoxically allows us to appreciate the power of an ethnographic vision, which is able to give a detailed account of the complexity of human existence and a feel for the world. The mad rush of civilisation demands the creation of a sphere allowing for a distanced experience of reality: this is made possible by ethnography.

“Inanimate objects are always in order and, unfortunately, are impossible to fault. I never managed to observe a chair shift from one leg to the other, or a bed rear up. Or tables, even those that are tired, that dared to kneel down. I suspect that objects do so for pedagogical reasons, as a constant reproach for our instability”.

Zbigniew Herbert, Objects in: 89 wierszy, Kraków 2008, p. 141. Translated by Jodi Greig and Paulina Duda.