Muhammad10
T20I Debutant
- Joined
- Jul 7, 2013
- Runs
- 6,284
A British Museum curator has been accused of racism after saying ‘sometimes Asian names can be confusing’ on exhibition labels.
Jane Portal, from the London institution’s Asia department, was criticised during an #AskACurator session on Twitter, in which staff at musuems around the world answer questions.
Ms Portal was asked the question ‘How do you go about designing exhibition labels and information that are accessible to a wider range of people?’ by the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences in Sydney.
Responding from the British Museum’s official account, Ms Portal answered: ‘Curators write the labels based on their specialist knowledge and they are edited by our Interpretation department.
‘We aim to be understandable by 16 year olds. Sometimes Asian names can be confusing, so we have to be careful about using too many.’
This prompted a series of critical tweets from people accusing the Museum of being racist.
The museum attempted to clarify their comments, by saying: ‘We are limited by the length of labels. Dynasties & gods have different names in various Asian languages. We want to focus on the stories.’
But this was not taken lightly by some.
The Museum has since apologised for the comments in a statement issued on Twitter.
It said: ‘We would like to apologise for any offence caused. Jane was answering a very specific question about how we make the information on object labels accessible to a wider range of people.’
‘Label text for any object is necessarily limited and we try to tell the object’s story as well as include essential information about what it is and where it is from.
‘We are not always able to reflect the complexity of different names for eg periods, rulers, gods in different languages and cultures on labels.’
http://metro.co.uk/2017/09/13/briti...metimes-asian-names-can-be-confusing-6924998/
Jane Portal, from the London institution’s Asia department, was criticised during an #AskACurator session on Twitter, in which staff at musuems around the world answer questions.
Ms Portal was asked the question ‘How do you go about designing exhibition labels and information that are accessible to a wider range of people?’ by the Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences in Sydney.
Responding from the British Museum’s official account, Ms Portal answered: ‘Curators write the labels based on their specialist knowledge and they are edited by our Interpretation department.
‘We aim to be understandable by 16 year olds. Sometimes Asian names can be confusing, so we have to be careful about using too many.’
This prompted a series of critical tweets from people accusing the Museum of being racist.
The museum attempted to clarify their comments, by saying: ‘We are limited by the length of labels. Dynasties & gods have different names in various Asian languages. We want to focus on the stories.’
But this was not taken lightly by some.
The Museum has since apologised for the comments in a statement issued on Twitter.
It said: ‘We would like to apologise for any offence caused. Jane was answering a very specific question about how we make the information on object labels accessible to a wider range of people.’
‘Label text for any object is necessarily limited and we try to tell the object’s story as well as include essential information about what it is and where it is from.
‘We are not always able to reflect the complexity of different names for eg periods, rulers, gods in different languages and cultures on labels.’
http://metro.co.uk/2017/09/13/briti...metimes-asian-names-can-be-confusing-6924998/
