Tuesday, 3rd June 2025, 5:30 – 7:30 PM GMT+1
On-site in the amphitheatre “Rouelle”, Jardin des Plantes, National museum of natural history, Paris (see map here)
Online, link on demand at museumsenjeuxcontemporains@gmail.com
The issue of repatriation has preoccupied museum staff and civil society for more than fifteen years. Until now, discussions have mainly focused on human remains, ethnographic collections, or Nazi-looted property. Recently, repatriation requests have begun to emerge in the field of natural history. While the first cases concerned palaeontology, how should one proceed when zoological, botanical or mineralogical collections face repatriation demands? This session reflects on the implications of this typological expansion, focusing on the specificities (legal framework, specimen status – unique/duplicates, etc.) that natural history collections present. It will address the provenance research method necessary for restitutions, especially considering the difficulty of identifying the specimens concerned in collections with incomplete documentation and multiple representatives of the same species. Even when they do not result in an actual restitution, these requests reveal knowledge about the objects and offer a fresh perspective on the collections as a whole.
Speaker
Paul Stewens, PhD Candidate in law, Maastricht university
Paul P. Stewens is a PhD Candidate with the Faculty of Law at Maastricht University. His dissertation focuses on the legal regulation of the extraction, ownership, and transfer of palaeontological objects. As one of the few experts in the field, his interdisciplinary work has appeared in both science and law journals. Outlets such as Science and The Economist have featured his research. He holds a Master in International Law from the Geneva Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies and has been actively involved in several high-profile fossil restitution controversies.
Abstract
Ever since Felwine Sarr and Bénédicte Savoy published their Rapport sur la restitution du patrimoine culturel africain in 2018, the issue of restitution has risen to prominence in the landscape of European museums. Museum staff, civil society, and governments in the Global North and Global South alike continue to negotiate issues of ownership, stewardship, conservation, and justice. Their usual focus: sacred artifacts, ancestral remains, cultural goods. Natural history museums, on the other hand, are only beginning to experience the first reverberations of this trend. This dichotomy is, however, a false one: blind to the intertwined genealogy of natural history collections and ethnological museums, and an impediment to synergies that would advance the cause of justice in both realms.
This lecture makes a case for an integrated perspective on restitution that understands natural history collections and ‘conventional’ cultural artifacts as two sides of the same coin—without losing sight of the particularities of the former. It is through this lens that the lecture proceeds to discuss the legal framework for the restitution of natural history objects, notably its pitfalls and potentials. A number of case studies on objects from different scientific disciplines adds the nuance that is crucial to a comprehensive introduction of the issue of restitution in the context of natural history museums.
Bibliography
Cisneros, Juan C., Aline M. Ghilardi, Nussaïbah B. Raja, and Paul P. Stewens. ‘The Moral and Legal Imperative to Return Illegally Exported Fossils’. Nature Ecology & Evolution 6 (2022): 2–3. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-021-01588-9.
De Araújo-Júnior, Hermínio Ismael, Renato Pirani Ghilardi, Victor Rodrigues Ribeiro, Ana Maria Ribeiro, Fernando Henrique De Souza Barbosa, Francisco Ricardo Negri, and Sandro Marcelo Scheffler. ‘Scientific Societies Have a Part to Play in Repatriating Fossils’. Nature Ecology & Evolution, 11 January 2024. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-023-02296-2.
Howe, Craig, and Lukas Rieppel. ‘Why Museums Should Repatriate Fossils’. Nature 630, no. 8017 (June 2024): 559–62. https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-024-02027-y.
Stewens, Paul P., Nussaïbah B. Raja, and Emma M. Dunne. ‘The Return of Fossils Removed Under Colonial Rule’. Santander Art and Culture Law Review 8, no. 2 (2022): 89–114. https://doi.org/10.4467/2450050XSNR.22.013.17026.
Stewens, Paul Philipp. ‘“Ubirajara” and Irritator Belong to Brazil: Achieving Fossil Returns Under German Private Law’. International Journal of Cultural Property 30, no. 3 (2023): 298–318. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0940739124000031.
OpenEdition vous propose de citer ce billet de la manière suivante :
Loeiza Iacono (2 décembre 2024). Session 6: Repatriations of Natural History Collections. Muséums et enjeux contemporains. Consulté le 9 novembre 2025 à l’adresse https://doi.org/10.58079/134fz
