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African and African Diaspora Collections
Michigan State University is the home of the largest
and one of the finest African Studies Programs in the nation. The many significant
research, service, and educational activities in Africa of faculty, staff,
and students have included a range of disciplinary interests and engagements
from assisting in the development of the University of Nigeria (the first
land-grant university in Africa) and U.S. national leadership of the divestiture
movement that directly impacted the downfall of South Africa's apartheid
government. MSU was also the home of the African Diaspora Research Project,
established in 1986 by the late Dr. Ruth Simms Hamilton, who pioneered the
study of the African diaspora when the notion of "diaspora" was a relatively
obscure concept.
Because of this exceptional concentration of scholars and educators working
in Africa and with African students, the university has developed a significant
collection of African and African diasporic materials. The majority of the
material culture collections and archival holdings related to those collections
are housed at the Michigan State University Museum; books and archival collections
are held at the MSU Library.
The collections represent a wide range of cultures and countries from the
continent of Africa and is particularly strong in material from Nigeria,
Liberia, Ethiopia, Kenya, Sierra Leone, Niger, Somalia and South Africa.
The African diasporic collections include materials from all over the world.
Collections include household implements and furnishings; objects used in
food preparation and storage; tools and weapons; musical instruments and
other objects of leisure; ceremonial objects; objects of personal adornment;
clothing and textiles; currency and trade goods; and objects made to express
individual creativity or to make statements about political and social issues
such as apartheid, war, human rights, or the AIDS epidemic. Examples of
materials include important collection of Doko textiles, an exceptional
collection of sowei masks from Sierra Leone and Liberia, Ethiopian paintings
dating from the 1930s, Tuareg metalwork from Niger, and Zulu traditional
and creative beadwork from the beginning of the 21st century
The collection is an invaluable resource for researchers of many scholarly
disciplines but particularly those relating to art history, anthropology,
folklore, sociology, and history. The collection is also regularly used
in exhibitions, publications, and teaching. A small portion of the collection
is on long-term exhibition in the MSU Museum and the Kresge Art Museum.
Donors/Fieldworkers:
Dr. Raymond Silverman, Dr. Neal Sobania, Dr. Cernyw and Morna Kline, Dr.
George and Nancy Axinn, Dr. Simon Ottenberg, Fred Ferris, Anton Bos, Robert
Bartlett and H.H. Burgess, James Ellison, Dr. Jean Brown, Robert Bartlett,
H.H. Burgess, Dr. C. Kurt Dewhurst, Dr. Marsha MacDowell, John Beck, Dr.
Joe Druse, Dr. Jon Abbink, Dr. Marco Bassi, Elisabeth Biasio, Girma Fisseha,
Dr. Alula Pankhurst, Worku Nida, Dr. Tsehai Berhane-Selassie, William Mithoefer,
Marit Dewhurst, Kate Wells, Barbara Porter- Spaulding, Robert Zigler, Virginia
Artis.
Related Collections:
Ethiopian Material Culture Collection
South African Traditional Arts Collection
Cernyw and Morna Kline Collection of African Material
Culture Nancy and George Axinn of African Textiles
and Art
Simon Ottenberg Collection of African Art
Jean Brown Collection of Pokot Material Culture
Robert Glew Collection of Nigerien Material Culture
Joseph Druse Collection of Nigerian Material Culture
William Mithoefer Collection of African Textiles
James Ellison Collection of Somalian Material Culture
Fred Ferris Collection of African Material Culture
Anton Bos Collection of African Material Culture
Robert Bartlett and H.H. Burgess Collection of African Material Culture
Exhibitions:
"Ethiopia: Traditions of Creativity," Michigan State University Museum,
East Lansing, Michigan, July 24 - December 16, 1994; Dillard University
Art Gallery, New Orleans, Louisiana, September 8 - December 8, 1995.
"African Connections: Perspectives on Collecting Culture," Michigan State
University Museum, East Lansing, Michigan, Jan. 31, 1999 - Sept. 5, 1999.
[see Raymond Silverman, http://museum.msu.edu/Exhibitions/Virtual/AfCon/
(28 March 1999) for more information on collectors of African material for
MSU Museum]
"African Art: Western Eyes," Kresge Art Museum, East Lansing, Michigan,
2005-ongoing.
"African Textiles from The MSU Museum Collections," Lansing Mall, Lansing,
Michigan.
"Expressions of Africa: Selections from the Museum Collections of Michigan
State University," Kresge Art Museum, East Lansing, Michigan, September
19-December 15, 1989.
"Drinking the Word of God: Expressions of Faith and the Search for Well-Being
in Two West African Communities," Michigan State University Museum, East
Lansing, Michigan, March 18, 2001 - January 20, 2002.
"Weavings of War: Fabrics of Memory," Vermont Folklife Center, Middlebury,
Vermont, 2005; Erie Art Museum, Erie, Pennsylvania, 2005; Design Gallery,
University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin, 2005; Michigan State University
Museum, East Lansing, 2006; Hostos Center for Arts and Culture, Bronx, New
York, 2006; Institute for Community Research, Hartford, Connecticut, 2006;
University Galleries, School for Arts, Florida Atlantic University, Boca
Raton, Florida, 2007.
Publications:
Raymond A. Silverman. Ethiopia: Traditions of Creativity. East Lansing,
Michigan: Michigan State University Museum, 1994.
Robert Glew and Raymond Silverman. "Drinking the Word of God: Expressions
of Faith and the Search for Well-Being in Two West African Communities,"
[virtual exhibition] http://museum.msu.edu/Exhibitions/Virtual/DrinkingtheWordofGod/
(January 2002)
Raymond A. Silverman. "African Connections Perspectives on Collecting Culture,"
[virtual exhibition] http://museum.msu.edu/Exhibitions/Virtual/AfCon/
(Jan. 6, 2003)
Raymond A. Silverman. "Ethiopia: Traditions of Creativity," [virtual exhibition]
http://www.h-net.msu.edu/~etoc
(24 September 1998).
Raymond A. Silverman. ed. Ethiopian Traditions of Creativity. University
of Washington Press and Michigan State University Museum, 1999.
Raymond A. Silverman. Expressions of Africa: Selections from the Museum
Collections of Michigan State University. East Lansing, Michigan: Michigan
State University Museum with Kresge Art Museum and African Studies Center,
1989.
Marsha MacDowell, ed. Weavings of War: Fabrics of Memory. East Lansing,
Michigan: Michigan State University Museum in collaboration with Vermont
Folklife Center and City Lore.
--compiled by Raymond Silverman, Lynne Swanson, and Marsha MacDowell, 2005.
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