Challenges of Documenting Ethnographic Objects

Challenges of Documenting Ethnographic Objects (Material Culture) and Intangible Heritage in Zimbabwe: Experiences from the Zimbabwe Museum of Human Sciences.


“With heritage: what gets recorded becomes all but immune to deliberate revision” – David Lowenthal

Introduction


The challenges that most of Africa faces today regarding the documentation of material culture, and Zimbabwe is no exception, began at collection or acquisition of the objects. Antiquarians and other early collectors in the first half of the twentieth century were not very systematic in their approaches. Consequently, objects were removed from their cultural contexts with inadequate or no documentation; hauled into the museum and locked or imprisoned there for tourist amusement and to satisfy settler curiosities about the African. When documentation began in earnest in the 1960s, the volunteers who were called in to help were usually enthusiastic but old, retired pensioners with neither the experience nor the expertise in documentation. This compounded the glaring anomalies that characterize the documentation systems in the national museums in Zimbabwe today. However, these early documentation efforts at least left a blue print from which we can begin to effect changes and improvements.


Background to the Ethnography Department and its Collection


National Museums and Monuments of Zimbabwe’s Ethnography department is housed at the Zimbabwe Museum of Human Sciences. The department is affectionately referred to by colleagues as ‘department rezvikwambo’ because goblins are among a diverse range of priceless pieces of art, cultural symbolism and African ingenuity that the department keeps for use by museums and the public for research, exhibitions and educational purposes. The Zimbabwe Museum of Human Sciences boasts as NMMZ’s only regional museum with this unique department. Besides being custodians of over 8 000 awesome ethnographic objects collected from various geographical and cultural localities around the country, the department documents living traditions associated with cultural sites and monuments.


The Accession Register

The most primary documentation record we have in my department is the Accessions Register. This register has, however, been affected by the anomalies of the initial documentation efforts. There are accession numbers in our accessions register that do not match any object or object description. Technically these are supposed to be non-existent objects and yet there are objects in the storeroom with no accession numbers. In some cases, completely different objects share the same accession number. At times the actual object on display in the galleries or in the storage area does not match the object name and description in the accession register. The Accessions Register is treated as a security document and is therefore kept in the strong room and can be accessed on request for purposes of documentation.


The Index Cards

The anomalies in the primary document have been duplicated in the secondary documents such as the index cards. Index cards in my department have different colours denoting a systematic order. Pink Cards denote arrangement of index cards according to numerical order. White cards denote arrangement according to object material type, while blue cards denote arrangement according artifact type and yellow denotes arrangement according top ethnic origins or provenance


Loans Register

The loans register is one of our most up to date documentation records and it has greatly helped during audits and verification of audit observations. It has also made it possible for us to process requests for hire of our objects and specimens for educational purposes. A comprehensive documentation system is, therefore, critical in facilitating collections related work and research.


Attempts to Rectify the Anomalies; Challenges and Constraints

There have been wide ranging efforts to correct the anomalies that characterize our documentation systems from internal capacity building workshops for curatorial staff to inventorying of the collections. In house training in documentation has been seriously hampered by high staff turn over in the last five years of both senior and junior curatorial staff as well as decapitating financial constraints.

Reconciliation exercise on missing objects
There have been internal audits to identify for the purpose of rectifying these anomalies notably in 1999, 2001 and 2006. Following the 2006 audit, NMMZ embarked on an exercise that involved identifying objects that were reported missing in 1999 and in 2001 as well as verifying if unaccounted objects were not loaned out or transferred to the galleries. From this exercise it was noted that some objects not physically found in the storeroom and assumed to be missing were in fact loaned to sister museums and other institutions.


According to the 2006 audit report 1575 objects were missing. The list included objects that were found missing in the 1999 and 2001 inventory. Total missing objects according to the 1999 and 2001 were 728. The number of those objects which supposedly disappeared after the 2001 inventory was 847. The verification process which started in 2006 and has been ongoing since then, has managed to account for 90objects which were deemed missing according to the 1999 and 2001 reports and a further 20 mistakenly identified as missing because of a changed location in storage area as well more than 113 which were accounted for by the loans records including the up to date loan register.


Challenges of Documenting Intangible Heritage


The documentation of intangible heritage in Zimbabwe, like elsewhere in Africa, has been beset by a host of problems including logistic and strategic challenges in recording secret cults like the Nyau dance and associated ritual practices. These groups do not easily, if at all, open up to anyone who is not one of them. It is therefore difficult to unmask the values associated with this dance and in accordance with ICOM standards.




The museum documentation system in its current state is biased toward tangible heritage, that is, objects and monuments. By its very nature, not all intangible heritages are documentable, both technologically and physically. In cases of intangible heritage associated with monuments, it is has been easier in that in that one can distil the tangible heritage with the intangible.


The other fundamental challenges in the documentation of intangible heritage are embedded in the fact some the heritage is contested both in terms of the custodianship of the sacred cultural landscapes, the values and the memory, for example, the Shavarunzi Cultural landscape.


Transition from Manual to Electronic Documentation System

Notwithstanding insurmountable challenges, efforts to revamp the documentation in tandem with ICOM international standards are ongoing including the digitization of artifact images. This transition from a manual to an electronic system has, however, been constrained by many factors such as limited financial resources, lack of appropriate computer hardware and software, as well as high staff turn over.


Conclusion

The importance of comprehensive documentation of any collection cannot be overemphasized. NMMZ does not underestimate or take lightly the importance of documenting national heritage under its care and my attendance of this conference partly explains its commitment to documentation efforts. Documentation is critical both for posterity, conservation purposes as well as to counter the illicit trade in cultural property which has become rampant in Africa.


I THANK YOU, NDATENDA, SIYABONGA!


Esther Chipashu

Curator of Ethnography

Zimbabwe Museum of Human Sciences (formerly Queen Victoria Museum)

Tel; +263-4-751797/8; Mobile:+263-913701040

E.mail: essychip@yahoo.com