In the late nineteenth century, Germans spearheaded a worldwide
effort to preserve the material traces of humanity, designing major
ethnographic museums and building extensive networks of
communication and exchange across the globe. In this groundbreaking
study, Glenn Penny explores the appeal of ethnology in Imperial
Germany and analyzes the motivations of the scientists who created
the ethnographic museums.
Penny shows that German ethnologists were not driven by
imperialist desires or an interest in legitimating putative
biological or racial hierarchies. Overwhelmingly antiracist, they
aspired to generate theories about the essential nature of human
beings through their museums' collections. They gained support in
their efforts from boosters who were enticed by participating in
this international science and who used it to promote the
cosmopolitan character of their cities and themselves. But these
cosmopolitan ideals were eventually overshadowed by the scientists'
more modern, professional, and materialist concerns, which
dramatically altered the science and its goals.
By clarifying German ethnologists' aspirations and focusing on
the market and conflicting interest groups, Penny makes important
contributions to German history, the history of science, and museum
studies.
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