For centuries, Western museums have collected, documented, and presented objects from other cultures. Yet paradoxically and even today, representatives of these cultures are seldom called on to participate in this process – from exhibition design to collection research. The Humboldt-Forum views multiperspectivity and the decentering of interpretive power as highly justified postcolonial demands that it will strive to honor. The project “Sharing Knowledge” initiated a unique cooperation with precisely these goals in mind. In 2014, students at the Universidad Nacional Experimental Indígena del Tauca in the Venezuelan Amazon region and staff of the Ethnologisches Museum in Berlin began working together to establish a joint interactive web platform. It will provide the basis for the consolidation, exchange, and accumulation of knowledge about ethnographic objects from the region. On the platform, all object-related attributes are negotiable; edits are stored on a continual basis. Knowledge is therefore always in the making.

You can find a detailed description of the project here.