The Entwined Human and Environmental Costs of the Colonial Project

Although such research has long been mainstream in world cultures collections, natural history museums have only recently begun tracing their colonial histories, seeking to identify individuals obscured by power imbalances, and inviting consideration of specimens as artifacts of invasion, exploitation, and extraction, as well as scientific data. This article summarizes these developments within natural history, providing possible approaches and questions. It illustrates how the costs of the colonial project experienced by people and environments were intertwined and follow similar historical processes. Equally, the vital roles natural history collections are playing in researching global environmental crises can also be played by world cultures collections. By learning from each other's disciplinary research practices, natural history and world cultures collections have huge potential to increase their social relevance.