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A Shield Loaded with History

Encounters, Objects and Exhibitions

Bibliographic Data

ID12344153
AuthorsMaria Nugent (0000-0001-5258-697X, Australian National University, corresponding author), Gaye Sculthorpe (0000-0002-0881-8961, The British MuseumEmail)
Year2018
Volume49
Issue1
Pages28-43
Publication date2018-01-02
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueAustralian Historical Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1031-461X • E-ISSN: 1940-5049
PublisherRoutledge (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/1031461x.2017.1408663
OpenAlexW2792851053
LanguageEN
Citations received11

This article discusses an Aboriginal shield in the British Museum which is widely believed to have been used in the first encounter between Lieutenant James Cook's expedition and the Gweagal people at Botany Bay in late April 1770. It traces the ways in which the shield became ‘Cook-related’, and increasingly represented and exhibited in that way. In the wake of its exhibition at the National Museum of Australia in late 2015 and early 2016, the shield gained further public prominence and has become enmeshed within a wider politics of reconciliation. A recent request from the La Perouse Local Aboriginal Land Council to the British Museum to review knowledge about the shield has contributed to a reappraisal of claims about its connection to Cook's 1770 expedition. Preliminary findings of this review are presented. In the process, the article addresses larger questions concerning the politics surrounding the interpretation of the shield as a historically ‘loaded’ object

Archaeology · Art history · Exhibition · Interpretation (philosophy · Object (grammar · Political science · Politics · Shield · Sociology · Conservation Techniques and Studies · Cultural Heritage Management and Preservation · History · Law · Museums and Cultural Heritage · Philosophy · Geology · Paleontology

  • Keeping the Gweagal Shield

    Open Access•Sarah Keenan•Legalities•2023

  • Collections in the Expanded Field

    Open Access•Michael Jones•Heritage•2019

  • Connecting Collections

    Open Access•Jason M Gibson, Gaye Sculthorpe et al.•Museum Worlds•2024

  • Collections without End

    Open Access•Andrea Witcomb, Alistair Patterson•Museum Worlds•2018

  • A corroboree for the Countess of Kintore

    Open Access•Gaye Sculthorpe•Aboriginal History Journal•2018

  • Will my boomerang come back? New insights into Aboriginal material culture of early Sydney and affiliated coastal zone from British collections

    Open Access•Gaye Sculthorpe, Daniel Simpson•Australian Archaeology•2023

  • From history of science to history of knowledge? Themes and perspectives in colonial Australasia

    Open Access•John Beattie, R Morgan•History Compass•2021

  • The Aboriginal Shield from the Collection of the British Museum

    Open Access•Agnieszka Plata•Santander Art and Culture Law…•2022

  • Beyond Texts? Towards a Material Turn in the Theory and History of International Law

    Daniel R Quiroga‐villamarín, Daniel Ricardo Quiroga-Villamarín•Journal of the History of…•2020

  • Reports, silences and repercussion

    Andrew Hurley, Andrew Wright Hurley•Rethinking History•2020

  • How to address a 'curation crisis

    Sophie Price•Museum Management and Curatorship•2024

Unique citing works11
Citations per year1,38
Citation span2018 - 2024 (7)
Citation velocityrecent
Highly citedNo
Citation typesNeutral: 11
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