American Indian Museum

Went to the new-ish Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian (NMAI), down on the Mall, yesterday. The building itself is very impressive, and the collection of artifacts is pretty amazing. But this museum will divide the romantics from the rationalists right down the middle, in terms of reactions to the concept of the museum.

The idea was to give the Native peoples control over the presentation, to let the Indians speak for themselves. So the museum is very strong in terms of Indian self-understanding, today. Lots of mystical talk about harmony with nature. (It's almost like Rousseau's noble savage had gone to college and become a museum curator. Even though that's kind of a paradox.) Lots of "we are one People" stuff about the Native peoples of the American continent; the museum includes the South and Central American native histories as well as Canada and the far North. So the museum is not organized by region, nations, or by any other rational scheme. There's just displays of various parts of the massive collection, from all regions and even all times (including contemporary works included in displays of priceless artifacts), many without labels. It's hard to find things you're interested in, and it's impossible, a large part of the time, to know what it is you're looking at.

A little too much romanticization of the Indians for my taste.

The museum does remind one of what a cruel, cruel world this still is. If there were really 120 million Native peoples in 1492, and there are 4.4 million today . . . that's exhibit A. Disease, war, disasters take their toll. Whole civilizations wiped out by smallpox and gunpowder. It's really a second holocaust museum in D.C.

With that, have a Happy Columbus Day.