British Museum is right to keep Parthenon marbles, says new trustee (www.theguardian.com)
from HellsBelle@sh.itjust.works to world@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 01:07
https://sh.itjust.works/post/34938158

Dr Tiffany Jenkins, author of Keeping Their Marbles, will join new trustees including TV broadcaster and writer Claudia Winkleman, Lord Finkelstein, a Conservative peer who was an adviser to prime minister John Major, the historian and podcaster Tom Holland and the former BBC radio news anchor Martha Kearney for a four-year term. The chair of trustees is George Osborne, the former Conservative chancellor of the exchequer.

In her book Keeping Their Marbles: How the Treasures of the Past Ended up in Museums… and Why They Should Stay There, Jenkins examined the influences behind the high-profile battle to return museum artefacts in an attempt to repair historical wrongs. Her views are at odds with those of another well-known historian and broadcaster, Dr Alice Roberts, who recently met the Greek culture minister, Lina Mendoni, while filming her series on Ancient Greece for Channel 4.

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PugJesus@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 01:12 next collapse

Lord.

Eldritch@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 01:43 next collapse

Yes some of the arguments they make are completely absurd and tone deaf for keeping them. Like somehow the cultures that made them wouldn’t take care of them and it’s far too important for them to have have it and preserve it. Than the people they stole it from

HellsBelle@sh.itjust.works on 24 Mar 01:50 next collapse

The same argument has been made for hundreds of years, often by the British.

Fuck colonialism, and fuck Britain, because that’s where shit like that is derived from.

catloaf@lemm.ee on 24 Mar 02:04 collapse

Sometimes that’s true, like ISIS destroying stuff in the middle east. But that’s not happening in Greece.

RowRowRowYourBot@sh.itjust.works on 24 Mar 17:21 collapse

The British Museum is in a city that is absolutely targeted by nukes. Greece is not targeted by nearly as many. Greece should get its stolen stuff back.

courageousstep@lemm.ee on 24 Mar 03:05 next collapse

Jesus Christ. What racist sludge.

Deestan@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 06:41 collapse

The case studies, historical events, and intellectual movements discussed in the book all receive superficial treatment, and in general the content does not work in service of the argumentation.

That’s how academics say “this book is racist horseshit”

technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com on 24 Mar 16:40 next collapse

Racist colonial empire gonna racist colonial empire.

RowRowRowYourBot@sh.itjust.works on 24 Mar 17:18 next collapse

I always love the “we are keeping them here for safe keeping” line of thinking when London is absolutely targeted for attacks whereas the rural part of whateverland where this artifact is from is less safe despite not being targeted for attacks.

gcheliotis@lemmy.world on 24 Mar 18:22 collapse

Whether they are returned or not, truth is it will make no difference to any of my life concerns as a Greek. It will make the Acropolis museum a little more spectacular. And it may then bring a little more money than before. That’s it. So yeah, I support the return of all stolen treasures in principle, but the truth is that if they were ever returned it would be more cause for a brief swell of national pride and milked for what it’s worth by whichever government happens to be in place than anything of actual consequence.

Also, by having the artifacts stay at the British Museum, they bear testament to the massive scale extractive exploits of colonialism and how the fates of entire peoples have depended on the favor or disfavor of great powers. I kind of find it more embarrassing for the UK that they are keeping them and every time they refuse to return them it reminds me how rotten and racist the underbelly of western powers is, hidden not-so-well beneath a cultured and democratic veneer.