080062 SE Colonial Heritage and Decolonial Thinking (2024S)

In this seminar, we will explore images, spaces, and readings related to colonial heritage and decolonial thinking. The seminar will topics such as visual anthropology, colonial art, and memorial practices. Our topics of research will include the history of the slave trade, the forced or volunteer exhibition of people such as in “Völkerschauen”, as well as scientific and “entertaining” racism We will question the past but also the ways in which it remains present (or absent!) in museum displays, artistic practices, or popular discourse. The seminar would like to bring complexity, critical thinking, and decolonial methods at the forefront. We will also focus on colonial heritage in Austria and its legacies. How can we revisit these particular histories? What does remain active in our present and potential futures? Figures such as Angelo Soliman and his tragic afterlife, will be of interest. We will study different typologies of artefacts, including paintings, engravings, sculptures, photographs, or plaster casts. We will also discuss the work made by Austrian anthropologists, for instance, who also benefited from greater colonial expeditions. Students will have the possibility of doing a creative project as final outcome of the project.