National Museums in the Global North have come under critical scrutiny for being racist, holding stolen artefacts and for misrepresenting indigenous communities. Calls for decolonization and social justice have taken the museum as its central site for reimagining a more just society. But what exactly is the promise of the museum? What kind of social role and function does the museum fulfill in the nation-state? How does it -as is often assumed- aid democratization of knowledge and the practice of citizenship? Do museums in the Global South, and in the Middle East specifically, play a different role in society? And finally, can museums generate a more just society? 

This workshop will consider these questions by introducing participants first to the current debates & theoretical literature coming out of anthropology & museum studies. In the discussion of this literature, participants will be a) familiarized with the museum as a technology of governance emergent with the nation-state and b) with the current attempts to decolonize, dismantle and re-imagine a more just museum. Here, we will ask what participation in the museum is, by scrutinizing exhibition, conservation, and curation practices. In the second part of the workshop, we will scrutinize different kinds of museums more closely. Our scrutiny will range from anthropology museums to national galleries and memorial sites in Europe, the US, and the Arab World. We will take our previously asked questions into these cases and explore the limits and possibilities of the museum in various social and political contexts. Can museums generate a more just society? If so, what kind of social justice does it generate?