--- Lori Allen <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > This topic has come up many times in my Graduate classes. Simply put, it > is unethical for a museum employee to collect personally what he or she is > involved in collecting for the museum. So you must either give up your > hobby, or keep working outside the field. Some museums now actually > require "non competing" clauses signed by employees. While I can agree with this, I do think there is a limit to how much stuff that museums can have and reasonably, should have. For example, say a collector has a nice collection of projectile points, all of which are well know styles that museums have plenty of examples. If that person gets a degree in archaeology and wants to work in a museum, should s/he have to give up the collection so as not to compete with the museum? I don't think so nor do I think it is unethical to keep a collection in a situation like that. If the items a collector is collecting like ephemera or camera equipment which there are plenty of good collections in museums all over the place, why shouldn't a collector keep collecting? Obviously if an item turns out to be rare and should be in a museum, I think any collector that works for a museum or not, should turn it over (or at least sell it at a reasonable price) to the museum. Personally, I'd rather see items in the hands of devoted collectors who take care of them than locked away in a museum storage vault never to see the light of day. Now saying that, I don't like the rampant antiques trade that is currently going on but I do think there is value in learning how to be a good collector. I should also point out that many museums either got started or got their collections from collectors. Such museum snobbery is just hurting us in the long run. Deb __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Yahoo! Movies - coverage of the 74th Academy Awards® http://movies.yahoo.com/ ========================================================= Important Subscriber Information: The Museum-L FAQ file is located at http://www.finalchapter.com/museum-l-faq/ . You may obtain detailed information about the listserv commands by sending a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "help" (without the quotes). If you decide to leave Museum-L, please send a one line e-mail message to [log in to unmask] . The body of the message should read "Signoff Museum-L" (without the quotes).