Pluralizing the Value of Things

• Applicant: Privatdozent Dr. Jonas Bens
• Subject Area: Social and Cultural Anthropology and Ethnology
• Term: since 2022
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 501989717

In recent years, ethnographic museums in Germany and other European countries have been engulfed in a controversial debate about the colonial provenance of their collections. This debate – as much as it rightly makes ongoing colonialism a topic of discussion – tends to systematically universalize specific regimes of value, particularly capitalist property and cultural heritage. We believe, however, that conceptions of how things are valued must be pluralized in a double sense. First, we need a more coherent theoretical and methodological framework to better understand the plurality of regimes, systems and spheres in which value is created – focusing on both indigenous and western/colonial value regimes and their multiple intersections. Second, we must think beyond research regions in order to bring different perspectives on value regimes into conversation with one another. This network will assemble a group of ten anthropologists and museum practitioners and enable them to work together over a longer period. The aim is to establish a dialogue between the anthropology of value and new approaches in the anthropology of materiality and personhood beyond regional approaches. Against the background of the current discussions on museums and colonialism, this network aims to develop decolonial approaches to rethink materiality in the context of a plurality of value regimes.

• DFG Programme: Scientific Networks
• Co-Investigator: Professor Dr. Philipp Schorch