Sudan Ethnographic Museum

Last updated

The Sudan Ethnographic Museum is a public museum in Khartoum, the capital of Sudan. Established in 1956 as a branch of the National Museum of Sudan, it is located at the corner of El Mek Nimr and al-Gamaa Avenue in downtown Khartoum. Until its closure in the early 2020s, the museum presented cultural objects representing the lifestyles and traditions of different regions and some of the many ethnic groups of Sudan.

Contents

As happened to other museums in Khartoum, the Ethnographic Museum has been subject to looting and vandalism due to the war in Sudan since 15 April 2023. [1] A project for complete renovation and digital inventories of the collection was started in 2022 by the Cultural Protection Fund (CPF) of the British Council and other international, as well as Sudanese organizations. It is accessible online through the platform "Safeguarding Sudan's Living Heritage." [2]

Collection

History

The Ethnographic Museum was established in 1956 as a branch of the older and larger National Museum of Sudan during the last period of the Anglo-Egyptian colonial administration. Some of these objects had already been collected and given to Gordon Memorial College at the beginning of the twentieth century. [3]

Following their field studies in southern Sudan during the late 1950s and early 1960s, the Austrian social anthropologists Andreas and Waltraut Kronenberg donated grave sculptures of the Bongo people and other cultural objects from southern Sudan to the museum. In 1972, the museum was relocated and opened under the scientific direction of the German ethnologist Lothar Stein in a former officers club in al-Gamaa Avenue in downtown Khartoum. Stein, a scholar from Leipzig in former East Germany, had also collected artefacts for the museum in Kordofan and Darfur. [4] In 2002, the Ethnographic Museum was administratively separated from the Sudan National Museum and renamed Sudan Civilization Institute. [5]

During this period, the museum contained a modest collection of tribal artefacts representing different regions and ethnic groups of Sudan. Its sections were ordered by geographic region, showing how people lived in each climatic area. The first rooms presented life and artefacts from southern Sudan, then objects from the savannah regions south of Khartoum, followed by objects from the northern deserts. [6] Exhibits in the form of dioramas presented scenes from diverse ethnic groups, including the Baggara and Rashaida nomads, the Nuba peoples, as well as other Sudanese ethnic groups. [7]

After the Sudanese revolution of December 2019, the collection was rearranged in six sections: traditional musical instruments, including the Sultan of Yambio's big wooden war drum, Sudanese traditions of preparing food, handicrafts, of providing traditional Islamic education (Khalwa primary schools, studies of the Quran and Arabic language), the use of sailing boats on the Nile, as well as other Sudanese customs, such as wedding ceremonies and women's clothes and accessories. [3]

Renovation, digital access and protection against climate change

In November 2022, the British Council announced funding for a complete renovation of the inaccessible ethnographic museum through its Cultural Protection Fund (CPF). Apart from modernizing the former exhibition and including further cultural objects from pastoralists in Darfur and Kordofan, this project aims to prevent the impacts of flooding caused by climate change and to build a new domed roof for the museum. [8] For the British-Sudanese project "Safeguarding Sudan's Living Heritage from Conflict and Climate Change" (SSLH), the CPF also funded the creation of an online platform. As an overarching aim, the SSLH strives to support "vulnerable communities to document their culture and help build resilience [...] in a healthy environment." In more specific terms, the project stated: [2]

Our mission is to rally support for Sudan's living heritage and its multifaceted cultural panorama. It encompasses how people dance, create music, cultivate their food, care for their livestock, craft artifacts, celebrate traditions, and practice their beliefs. This cultural legacy is deeply interwoven into Sudan's history, landscape and identity, both rural and urban. It serves as a wellspring of local wisdom and vibrancy that can help shape Sudan's future.

— Safeguarding Sudan's Living Heritage

Partners in this project are several British, international and Sudanese cultural institutions, including the Sudan National Corporation for Antiquities and Museums, the British Institute of Eastern Africa, the Regional Conservation Office of the International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property (ICCROM)-ATHAR, the Cambridge Heritage Research Centre (CHRC), as well as the Mapping Africa’s Endangered Archaeological Sites and Monuments Project. The project received £ 1,893,340 from the CPF in partnership with the British government Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) and was started in December 2022. [9] Further, the SSLH is managed under the umbrella of the UNESCO Cultural Heritage conventions and in coordination with the National Council for Cultural Heritage and Promotional of National Languages. [2]

Another project for collecting and making Sudan's cultural heritage accessible online is Sudan Memory, funded also by the British Council's Cultural Protection Fund and started in 2018. [10] Similar to other museums in Khartoum, the Ethnographic Museum has been subject to looting and vandalism in the wake of the ongoing war in Sudan since 15 April 2023. [11]

Objects in the collection

See also

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sudan</span> Country in East Africa

Sudan, officially the Republic of the Sudan, is a country in Northeast Africa. It borders the Central African Republic to the southwest, Chad to the west, Egypt to the north, Eritrea to the northeast, Ethiopia to the southeast, Libya to the northwest, South Sudan to the south, and the Red Sea to the east. It has a population of nearly 50 million people as of 2024 and occupies 1,886,068 square kilometres, making it Africa's third-largest country by area and the third-largest by area in the Arab League. It was the largest country by area in Africa and the Arab League until the secession of South Sudan in 2011; since then both titles have been held by Algeria. Its capital and most populous city is Khartoum.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Demographics of Sudan</span>

The demographics of Sudan include the Sudanese people and their characteristics, Sudan, including population density, ethnicity, education level, health, economic status, religious affiliations, and other aspects of the population.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Music of Sudan</span> History of the music of Sudan

The rich and varied music of Sudan has traditional, rural, northeastern African roots and also shows Arabic, Western or other African influences, especially on the popular urban music from the early 20th century onwards. Since the establishment of big cities like Khartoum as melting pots for people of diverse backgrounds, their cultural heritage and tastes have shaped numerous forms of modern popular music. In the globalized world of today, the creation and consumption of music through satellite TV or on the Internet is a driving force for cultural change in Sudan, popular with local audiences as well as with Sudanese living abroad.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Baggara Arabs</span> Nomadic confederation in the Sahel

The Baggāra or Chadian Arabs are a nomadic confederation of people of mixed Arab and Arabized indigenous African ancestry, inhabiting a portion of the Sahel mainly between Lake Chad and the Nile river near south Kordofan, numbering over six million. They are known as Baggara and Abbala in Sudan, and as Shuwa Arabs in Cameroon, Nigeria and Western Chad. The term Shuwa is said to be of Kanuri origin.

The Janjaweed are an Arab nomad militia group from the Sahel region that operates in Sudan, particularly in Darfur, and eastern Chad. They have also been speculated to be active in Yemen. According to the United Nations definition, Janjaweed membership consists of Arab nomad tribes from the Sahel, the core of whom are from the Abbala Arabs, traditionally employed in camel herding, with significant recruitment from the Baggara.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Hawazma tribe</span> Community in kurdufan Sudan

Hawazma, part of Sudan's Baggara tribe, are cattle herders who roam the area from the southern parts of North Kurdufan to the southern borders of South Kurdufan, a distance of about 300 kilometers. Through their nomadic movement, the Hawazma know the area, terrain, ethnic groups, local tribes, tribal cultures, ecosystems, climate, vegetation, existence of risks and diseases, and water resources better than any other inhabitants of the region. The term Baggara is a collective name applied to all cattle-herding tribes with Arab roots. Cattle herders from Nuba tribes are not called Baggara. Cattle herders of middle and eastern Sudan, although they are Arab in roots, are also not Baggara. The Baggara occupy a wide area, from Kordofan, Mid-Western Sudan, to Darfur in the far Western Sudan and extending to neighboring Chad. They are a collection of seven major tribes: Hawazma, Messiria Humr Messiria Zurug, Rizeigat, Ta’isha, Habbaniya, Beni Halba, Awlad Himayd, and Beni Selam. All Baggara have similar physical facial features, costumes, dance, religion, food, and in general a common culture and way of life.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Nuba Mountains</span> Geographic area in Sudan

The Nuba Mountains, also referred to as the Nuba Hills, is an area located in South Kordofan, Sudan. The area is home to a group of indigenous ethnic groups known collectively as the Nuba peoples. In the Middle Ages, the Nuba mountains had been part of the Nubian kingdom of Alodia. In the 18th century, they became home to the kingdom of Taqali that controlled the hills of the mountains until their defeat by Mahdi Muhammad Ahmad. After the British defeated the Mahdi army, Taqali was restored as a client state. Infiltration of the Messiria tribe of Baggara Arabs has been influential in modern conflicts. Up to 1.5 million people live in the mountains, mostly ethnic Nuba, with a small minority of Baggara.

The Nuba people are indigenous inhabitants of central Sudan. The Nuba are made up of 50 various indigenous ethnic groups who inhabit the Nuba Mountains of South Kordofan state in Sudan, encompassing multiple distinct people that speak different languages which belong to at least two unrelated language families. Since 2011, when the southern part of Sudan became an independent state as South Sudan, the Nuba now live in the southern part of Sudan. Estimates of the Nuba population vary widely; the Sudanese government estimated that they numbered 2.07 million in 2003.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Justice and Equality Movement</span> Sudanese opposition group

The Justice and Equality Movement is an opposition group in Sudan founded by Khalil Ibrahim. Gibril Ibrahim has led the group since January 2012 after the death of Khalil, his brother, in December 2011. The JEM supported the removal of President of Sudan, Omar al-Bashir and nation-wide government reform.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">El-Obeid</span> City in North Kordofan, Sudan

El-Obeid, also romanized as Al-Ubayyid, is the capital of the state of North Kurdufan, in Sudan.

The Moro Nuba are a sub-ethnic group of the Nuba peoples in the Nuba Mountains of South Kordofan state, in southern Sudan. Many members of this ethnicity are Christians. The population of this ethnic group possibly exceeds 80,000 people.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Messiria tribe</span> Ethnic group

The Messiria, known also under the name of Misseriya Arabs, are a branch of the Baggara ethnic grouping of Arab tribes. Their language is Sudanese Arabic. Numbering over one million, the Baggara are the second largest ethnic group in Western Sudan, extending into Eastern Chad. They are primarily nomadic cattle herders and their journeys are dependent upon the seasons of the year. The use of the term Baggara carries negative connotations as slave raiders, so they prefer to be called instead Messiria.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sudanese Arabs</span> Majority population of Sudan

Sudanese Arabs are the inhabitants of Sudan who identify as Arabs and speak Arabic as their mother tongue. Some of them are descendants of Arabs who migrated to Sudan from the Arabian Peninsula, although the rest have been described as Arabized indigenous peoples of Sudan of mostly Nubian, Nilo-Saharan, and Cushitic ancestry who are culturally and linguistically Arab, with varying cases of admixture from Peninsular Arabs. This admixture is thought to derive mostly from the migration of Peninsular Arab tribes in the 12th century, who intermarried with the Nubians and other indigenous populations, as well as introducing Islam. The Sudanese Arabs were described as a "hybrid of Arab and indigenous blood", and the Arabic they spoke was reported as "a pure but archaic Arabic". Burckhardt noted that the Ja'alin of the Eastern Desert are exactly like the Bedouin of Eastern Arabia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Humr</span> Ethnic group in Sudan

The Humr are one of two branches of the Messiria, a subgroup of the Baggara ethnic group, native to the south-west province of Kordofan, Sudan. Speakers of Chadian Arabic, the Humr live in the area surrounding the towns of Babanusa, Muglad and Al Fula.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Culture of South Sudan</span>

The culture of South Sudan encompasses the religions, languages, ethnic groups, foods, and other traditions of peoples of the modern state of South Sudan, as well as of the inhabitants of the historical regions of southern Sudan.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Khalifa House Museum</span> Ethnographic museum in Omdurman, Sudan

The Khalifa House Museum is an ethnographic museum, located opposite the tomb of Muhammad Ahmad in the city of Omdurman in Sudan. Towards the end of the 19th century, it was the residence of the successor of the Mahdi, Khalifa Abdallahi ibn Muhammad and the headquarters of the administration of the Mahdi State. The House was converted into a museum in 1928 during the Anglo-Egyptian condominium.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Photography in Sudan</span> History of photography in Sudan

Photography in Sudan refers to both historical as well as to contemporary photographs taken in the cultural history of today's Republic of the Sudan. This includes the former territory of present-day South Sudan, as well as what was once Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, and some of the oldest photographs from the 1860s, taken during the Turkish-Egyptian rule (Turkiyya). As in other countries, the growing importance of photography for mass media like newspapers, as well as for amateur photographers has led to a wider photographic documentation and use of photographs in Sudan during the 20th century and beyond. In the 21st century, photography in Sudan has undergone important changes, mainly due to digital photography and distribution through social media and the Internet.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Visual arts of Sudan</span> History and present of visual culture in Sudan

The visual arts of Sudan encompass the historical and contemporary production of objects made by the inhabitants of today's Republic of the Sudan and specific to their respective cultures. This encompasses objects from cultural traditions of the region in North-East Africa historically referred to as the Sudan, including the southern regions that became independent as South Sudan in 2011.

Andreas Kronenberg was an Austrian social anthropologist, active as researcher in North Africa and Sudan, and later as professor for his academic field with a special focus on Africa at the University of Frankfurt/Main. He published social anthropological studies, mainly based on his field work, including participant observation, during the 1950s in French Algeria, French Equatorial Africa, and in the early years of the Republic of Sudan.

Sudan Memory is an online archive and cultural heritage project, provided by an international group of partners with the aim of conserving and promoting Sudanese cultural heritage. In the course of the project, digital reproductions of books and newspapers, photographs and films, visual art and architecture, as well as of other cultural objects in Sudan were created and published on the project's website.

References

  1. ↑ Salih, Zeinab Mohammed; Burke, Jason (2023-06-05). "Sudan officials fear for historical artefacts threatened by fighting". The Guardian. ISSN   0261-3077 . Retrieved 2024-02-07.
  2. 1 2 3 "Safeguarding Sudan's Living Heritage". www.sslh.online. 2023. Retrieved 2024-02-06.
  3. 1 2 "Sudan Ethnographic Museum, The History And Presence| Sudanow Magazine". sudanow-magazine.net. Retrieved 2023-09-30.
  4. ↑ Braukamper, Ulrich (1997). "Sudanese Studies in Germany". Sudan Notes and Records (1): 163. ISSN   0375-2984. JSTOR   44947731 – via jstor.
  5. ↑ Stein, Lothar. 2010. "Das wechselvolle Schicksal des Ethnographischen Museums in Khartoum". [The changing fate of the Ethnographic Museum in Khartoum] In: Alke Dohrmann, Dirk Bustorf and Nicole Poissonnier (eds.). Schweifgebiete. Festschrift für Ulrich Braukämper. Berlin: Lit Verlag, pp. 298-307. (in German)
  6. ↑ "Ethnographical Museum | Khartoum, Sudan | Attractions". Lonely Planet. Retrieved 2024-02-06.
  7. ↑ "Safeguarding Sudan's Living Heritage - Ethnographic Museum". www.sslh.online. Retrieved 2024-02-06.
  8. ↑ "British Council awards fresh £14m of Cultural Protection Fund to protect cultural heritage at risk due to conflict and climate change". britishcouncil.org. 2022-11-15. Retrieved 2024-02-06.
  9. ↑ "Safeguarding Sudan's Living Heritage". Culture in Crisis. Retrieved 2024-02-06.
  10. ↑ "About - Sudan Memory". www.sudanmemory.org. Retrieved 2024-02-08.
  11. ↑ Metwaly, Ati (2023-05-05). "Sudan's museums, and millenia of heritage, caught in the crossfire". The Africa Report.com. Retrieved 2024-02-06.

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.