ICOM International Council of Museums - International Institute for ...

“Referred to variously as “massacre”, “battle” or “event”, language reflects differentinterpretations of history”.This is an implicit statement that the museum is a transparent recorder and exhibiter ofhistory. However, by choosing to designate the clash as a “massacre”, the museumopts to repudiate transparency by emphasising its cultural leadership and directing ourreading of the clash as a negative event in which Noongar people were murdered.Current research indicates that the clash was an unfair contest, even an ambush,which resulted in the deaths, by European reckoning, of at least 15-20 Noongars andthe death of one European.The museum does not appear to recognise the power of its own voice in choosing theword “massacre” even though it offers the other words as historic possibilities in whatmasquerades as a neutral voice. It was a crucial museological moment when themuseum stopped using the established word “battle” to describe the clash andchanged to using “massacre”. The fact that the museum had the power to changewords, reinterpret history and offer a new version of truth is the crux of the museologyand history issue. By not highlighting this change, the museum achieves a glossingover of both its own power and the enormity of changing interpretations of history. Itis in those vital moments of change that museums need to state their own actionsclearly for the visitor, not to do so is to smooth over the various histories and to act as ifone version simply replaces another with the change being devoid of politics andmorality. Apart from the sheer discomfort associated with institutional revelations, theidea of the scientific role of the museum can also help to explain why these significantchanges are not highlighted for the visitor. In broad terms, as research advances, thepractice of scientific method is to replace one explanation with a new “improved” one.The scientific aspect of museums helps to explain why museums do not find itnecessary to explain their actions when switching from one version of history toanother.In addition to renaming the clash a “massacre”, the exhibition juxtaposes variousstatements – some historic and some curatorial - and in so doing reveals historicironies which also have the effect of seeming to direct the way in which the visitorshould interpret the material.“This unprovoked attack (on settlers) must not be allowed to pass over without theseverest chastisement... we feel and know from experience that to punish with severitythe perpetrators of these atrocities will be found in the end an act of the greatestkindness and humanity.”Charles McFaull, Editor of Perth Gazette, 1834The enormous irony of this statement needs no elaboration in 2006 – paternalism,arrogance and violence hiding behind “kindness” speaks for itself. Similarly, thefollowing statement is another glaring example of the ironic use of historic sources.“The destruction of European lives and property committed by (the Murray) tribe wassuch that they considered themselves quite our masters, and had become soemboldened that either that part of the settlement must have been abandoned or asevere example made of them. It was a painful but urgent necessity, and likely to bethe most humane policy in the end.”George Fletcher Moore, 1 November 1834These statements reveal the voices of 1834 and the arguments they used to justifykilling indigenous people. As such they are a powerful choice and had the museum leftthe telling of the clash to the voices of the day might have remained an example of theNew Museology choosing an ironic retelling of history as was attempted by the RoyalOntario Museum. However, the museum juxtaposes its own voice to these voices and294