Jan af Burén wrote:

>...the regime has used the representation of the past to diffuse very
well-defined ideological messages to the populace at large."...

Friedrich WAIDACHER replied:
> Striking examples of this have also been, to name but some, in Germany
1933-1945, the DDR, the Soviet Union, Ceaucescu's Romania.

>More subtle manifestations can, of course, also be found today

I have always felt that all museums were in the business of promoting
ideological messages. We see it in the 19th century British museums
exhibiting craft objects to encourage the working man to work harder and
better, or artefacts collected during the heyday of Empire to impress all
Britons with the power and might of their nation. We see it in museums that
try to tell <history from below> from a working-class blue collar
perspective, or from an indigenous perspective. This tradition is alive and
well in the very absorbing discussion on slavery that I have been following
on this list; that is surely about ideology.

There is nothing wrong with having and promoting an ideological position,
indeed I think it is unavoidable. The issue is surely about poor
scholarship, deliberate lies and omissions which create a knowingly false
picture. This may have been created, perhaps is always created, under
direct or indirect pressure by government to oppress or control citizens in
some way.

Any museum which has a position on any subject is surely in the business of
using <the representation of the past to diffuse very well-defined
ideological messages to the populace at large.>? I guess we assume that
museums in democracies are free of such goverment pressure, although
increasingly I think that assumption may be questioned.

I think we must also be careful not to assume that only people of whom we
disapprove are in the buisness of disseminating ideology. If we are not
careful to do this, we fail to recognise the nature and educative power of
our own messages. Perhaps we call this <education>, whereas <they> call it
brainwashing!

Julia Clark