Museums as Ritual Sites

Lieke Wijnia (she/ her) is Head of Research & Library at Museum Catharijneconvent in Utrecht, the Netherlands. Her research explores the dynamics between the arts, heritage and religion. She completed her PhD on the sacred in contemporary culture at Tilburg University in 2016. Her research was awarded the golden honorary medal of the Teylers Theological Society (2017) and the inaugural Jeffrey Rubinoff Postdoctoral Award (2018). James S. Bielo is Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Northwestern University.

The Enduring Value of Museum Ritual: Volume Introduction; Part 1. Ritualizing Diversity and Inclusion; 1. Living with Others: Fashioning a Post-Secular Citizen in the British Museum; 2. Remediating Colonialism: Stories of Gold in Harvard’s Natural History Museum; 3. (Un)Civilizing Rituals: Challenging Cultural Memory at the Canadian Museum for Human Rights; Part 2. Rituals of Consumption; 4. Visiting Helene: Jachthuis Sint Hubertus at the Crux of the Kröller-Müller Donor Memorial; 5. Corporate Racial Citizenship: How Black Cultural Patronage Reinforces Capitalism; 6. Like-able Me, Like-able There: Instagram Selfie-Taking as Ritual Practice; Part 3. (Re)Presenting and Interrogating the Sacred; 7. The Many Faces of Mary Magdalene: Curatorially Compared, Ritually Construed; 8. Scenes of Ritual Intimacy: Museums and the Display of Magical Practice; 9. Reassembling the Sacred in Museums: Two Case Studies from Korea; Part 4. Ritual Tradition: Constraint and Opportunity; 10. Rituals after Ruin: The Memorialisation of the University of Cape Town Jagger Library; 11. Rituals of Erasure and Transcendence: Exhibiting Indigenous Objects in Art Museums; 12. Curating Rituals: The Role of Curators in Shaping Narratives of Culture