British Museum and the Uk Cultural Identity - Article Example

 BRITISH MUSEUM AND THE UK CULTURAL IDENTITY In recent years, realization of the values of museums has created different arguments. Conservations, continuation and communication of cultural legacy, cultural variety, public welfare, collection and exhibition of education are argued to be the core values of museums. These values change depending upon the time. The function of museums, from their inception to date, has experienced collection, exhibition, and research at large. Every time it’s the result of complying with the requirements of time. Along with the globalization, some unique histories and cultures are undergoing significant changes and assimilation (Wright, 2009). The society as a whole would start to worry about their loss of individual identity, and their emotional pursuits. Cultural identity of a legacy is a primary source for people to identify themselves with and obtain belongings. Museum has the responsibilities to protect a people’s cultural heritage through various exhibitions and collections to promote cultural identity. Based on this, this essay seeks to examine the ways British Museum prospects of Britain’s imperial legacy and its impact on the cultural identity of Britain. Museums in the simplest aspect is the result and reflection of social progress and development (Bennett, 1995 p14). The developing ideology of British Museum is to let the public become the center of museums, and let the museum become the center of the society. British Museum takes many measures and works to make it become a real physical space through imperial legacies. British Museum is one of the world’s first national museums if it is juxtaposed against the world’s three most famous museums in Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (Smith & MacGregor, 2007 p26). British Museum was established on the basis of British political, economic and cultural progress. The collections in British Museum are the reflection of the power of Britain because most artefacts and souvenirs are housed in there. It is important to note and mention that the cultural tenets and foundations are also preserved and housed in the museum. The term culture refers to a way and lifestyle of a people. Cultural identity refers to the cultural inclination and recognition of human beings. Individuals obtain cultural identity through belonging to their cultures and cultural groups (Klanten et al., 2013 p142). Therefore, cultural identity is a social psychological process of keeping and innovating their cultural society. Cultural inclination also identify a process to construct identity by many cultural signs such as locations, history, groups, nationality, and religious beliefs. A museum as a harbor is a valuable resource for forming cultural identity and constructing individual identity. British museum has the functions of collecting, preserving, researching, displaying and educating. Through collections and analyzes of the antiques, museums can make systematical exhibitions to the public. It could be done through real objects, and then make educations on knowledge, skills and spiritual teachings (Klanten et al., 2013 p74). It is the most important characteristics of museums that are different from other cultural preservation ways. In various cultural activities, museum’s collections display irreplaceable roles in satisfying people’s seeking psychology (Verkuyten, 2013 p56). The British Museum was discovered and founded in 1753 and was open after six years later. From the 18th century to mid-19th century, the British Empire had undergone a significant expansion worldwide and implemented a cultural pillage from different countries (Appiah, 2006, p. 3)Many precious collections were shipped to London. Egyptian antiquities space is the largest exhibition space that stands for the civilization of Egypt (Cuno, 2012 p169). There are exhibition spaces of Greek and Rome showing ancient Greece and Rome's cultures; also, there are many oriental legacies indicating the ancient Chinese civilizations (Oldfield, 2013 p19). The British Museum has more than one hundred rooms for exhibitions, and currently has more than 7 million artefacts (Wilson & Anderson, 2001 p26). In 2009, the number of visitors to British Museum achieved 6 million; whereby 15 million visited the website of British Museum. Due to the limitations in terms of space, there are still more artefacts and collections that had not been presented to the public (Wilson & Anderson, 2001 p28). These artefacts and collections are still precious resources, and they are different from other British cultural facilities that have significant attraction. Therefore, in British Museum, there are the collections and legacies showing the old cultures and civilization as well as the modern cultures. These collections and legacies reflect the history of humankind, showing the significant expansion history and recent development of Great Britain. Numbers of precious manuscripts, books, specimens, and art collections could change the public’s feelings and experiences, and then change the people way of thinking (Kreps, 2003 p 78). These shape the British people psychological pride unconsciously and give them a feeling and sense of ownership for the artefacts housed in the museum. From this, one can clearly see that British Museum is not just geographical space, but the space of society, power and cultures. Therefore, British Museum is a real physical space as well as virtual cultural space. Following the development of Britain in the first half of the 19th century, British collected great number of precious treasures in British Museum from the entire world. Therefore, British Museum has become the British Empire’s cultural carrier since then (Story & Childs, 2013 p135). Even British Museum faces the pressure of collection repatriations that is faced required by many countries (Duthie, 2011, p13). Cultural identity role of the museum in different nations (Macdonald, 2001). She believed that the collections and building in the museum were the signs and objects of cultures, while cultures are the concrete reflections of various nations. The museums gather these objects so that naturally the museums are treated as the consideration of cultural identity. Firstly, from the city cultural aspect the museum has cultural coordinates to a certain degree in social development process, as the space for collecting human cultures. The museum by its cultural atmosphere gives the city spiritual soul and cultural advantage, shaping the natural appeal of the environment (Davis & Duren, 2011 p49). As an important part of social-cultural system, the museum reflects the changes in human history, science, and cultures. Therefore, the museum acts as an entrance point to the city while at the same time acting as a cultural mark and cultural image. When visitors land in London, British Museum is among one of the greatest places that they have to visit. It makes the British proud of its values as city culture. According to Bennett (1995 p59) the British Museum should take the responsibilities of establishing city’s cultural identity to cultivate modern London culture towards embracing museums in their entirety. This would be critical to ensure that the British society responds positively to happenings relative to Museums and cultural inclinations. Identity is crucial and necessary for modern society. Subsequently, new requirements are needed when British Museum faces many political, economic and social realities as well as consumerism and commercial benefit. Danziger (2008, p36) argued that the existence of British Museum should form a collective identity, displaying the role of cultural identity (Alexander et al., 2004 p39). In addition, London’s citizen structure has embraced diversification in its entirety. London has many immigrants and cross-culture citizens who went to London and need to establish connections with their home countries. Therefore, the Britain Museum could be a bridge for city identity. Local citizens can view their cultures, and they can understand London through Britain Museum. This could be used to establish their memories about London, and construct their city identity. The immigrants or cross-culture citizens could view their cultures, and make references to local cultures. Subjectively, the immigrants or cross-culture citizens enhance their status safety and city identity. On the basis of cultural identity, the museum could establish political identity for the nations (Bryant, 2003). In the 18th and 19th centuries, British Museum displayed great roles in creating Great Britain. As the knowledge carrier, the Museum has been treated as an important field for shaping collective identity. In the 20th and 21th centuries, the construction process of British identity needs a platform for everyone to participate. British identity is post-national, and a various national identity thus is based on free democracy and public political areas. Therefore, the existence of British Museum is of great importance for Britain identity and is a crucial field of collective memory and focus identity (Alexander et al., 2004 p 62). There are many exhibitions that show the history of Britain through special events or objects in British Museum as the carrier of ordinary emotions and collective memories (Kelley, 2013 p 56). Subsequently, British Museum has become a mass cultural space through free visit that makes it as an important source of cultural identity not only for the UK but also for the international travelers. At first, the audiences of British Museum were not the general public. Its space was limited, and scholars and severed academics governed it. According to Mathews (2000 p. 114), the audiences were mostly famous people. Example of them include Hume and Rousseau in the 1860s, Edward Gibbon and Edmond Burke in the 1870s, John Wilkes in the 1980s, and Richard Polwhere and John Nichols in the 1990s. Therefore, it can be said British Museum was totally for the elite class. By the mid-1990s, the readers and visitors had increased. The increased readers in the early 1990s were mostly students while still there were many limitations of visitors of British Museum in terms of ages and genders. Historically, in the British Museum, forbade children from entering it. Specifically, in 1837, the ages of visitors were limited to 18 without strictly complying, and many students aging at 16 or 17 were allowed to come in. It was treated as an education measure by allowing them to enter. Intuitively, females were rarely allowed to enter. Even though, there were still many females studying in British Museum such as Lady Maria Carr and Lady Ann Monson. This stems from the initial position in 1820, every limitation of entry to British Museum was canceled. All of these indicate that the audiences of British Museum were increasing. In the recent past the cancelling of limitations, freedom of visits, growing number of visitors and diversification of visiting subjects has confirmed the changed membership and audience from  elites to the general public (Falk, 2009 p. 55). Managers are required to treat the noble and the beggar equally. British Museum is becoming an actual cultural and educational space for not only the British, but also for international visitors. The collections and manuscripts in British Museum were for studying; the art collections are for every visitor from the world to cultivate their taste. The natural collections in British Museum could show the scientific progress to the ordinary people. The international civilizations in British Museum indicate the great influences to the British in the worldwide (Bryant, 2003, p. 398). The British can directly feel the impact of imperial legacies in culture identity, and international travelers also can feel their national cultural identity at the same time by visiting their civilizations. This is due to the fact that the quality and taste of cultural exposure at the Museums are refreshing. This implies that all people who visit the British Museum would have a good reason to study and learn from the richness of education in the Museums. In conclusion, museum is a space that is the reflection of public resources through legacies and collections. Similarly, it’s an important platform for cultural identity. British Museum conveys national spirit and international cultures to Britain so that international travelers and the public can feel the cultural identity through the exhibitions. First of all, as a real physical space, British Museum can show the local citizens and international visitors through numbers of collections and legacies that indicate the power of Great Britain in the history. Included is the cultural diversity of different nations thus every visitor can feel the touch of cultural uniqueness. As a virtual spiritual space, The British Museum is already treated as a critical field in city status for both natives and international travelers as the most famous places in London. In addition, the British Museum has been opened for the elite class to the ordinary people as a mass cultural space. Also, it displays a significant role in political identity to the nation. Therefore, British Museum still has a considerable influence on British cultural identity. Bibliography Alexander, J.C., Eyerman.R, and Giesen.B, 2004. Cultural Trauma and Collective Identity, California: University of California Press. Appiah, K. A. (2006). Whose culture is it?. 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