Paper short abstract:

How can we display social aspects of transformation and hope in maritime spaces and narratives in museums and exhibitions? We use exhibitions curated at the German Maritime Museum to discuss potentials, challenges and barriers of bringing anthropological research into museums and public spaces.

Paper long abstract:

How can a museum use the sea to communicate alternatives and transformation processes that we study within our research? As two anthropologists at the German Maritime Museum, we discuss the exhibitions “CHANGE NOW – Ships Change the World” and “Toxic Legacies of War – North Sea Wrecks” as examples to analyse the potential of museums for public engagement with research on relations between people and the sea. Both use ships and shipwrecks as an entry point to access ideas around social, political, historical, economic and ecological aspects of marine environments.

Our exhibitions address the impacts of shipwrecks and ammunition remnants from the world wars, show how ships affect the marine eco systems and contextualise them as drivers of capitalist exploitation of workers and the environment. However, by centring ships we can also highlight their role in reaching and transforming desired futures. They tell stories about migration and about accessing resources for a new, more “sustainable” blue economy. Ships can be spaces for marine science, holidays, or new workplaces and as wrecks for marine habitats.

Environmental and maritime anthropologists worked on several aspects of the sea (for example Helmreich 2009 and 2011, McCall Howard 2016 and 2017, Nadel-Klein 2003, Olson 2010) yet museums often reproduce the single narrative of an exploited marine environment. The paper therefore explores opportunities and limits of using museum exhibition as methods to communicate the sea not only as a place of multiple crises but also as a space that can offer transformation.