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Article
Nature 140, 57 (10 July 1937) | doi:10.1038/140057a0;
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Ethnological Museums: Methods and Limitations
Abstract
DR. H. S. HARRISON, in his presidential address to the Royal Anthropological Institute delivered on June 29, played the part of a wandering sceptic, to use his own term, to excellent effect in setting out some of the more striking shortcomings of the ethnological museum as a place of exhibition of material objects bearing on man's cultural development. As he pointed out, there is a considerable body of exhibits, such as, for example, musical instruments, personal ornaments, money and currency, which find their place in a museum as 'material objects', but of which the real significance is non-material and is lost on either the distributional or comparative method of arrangement, as their interest lies not in form or material, but in their sociological functions and meanings.
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