Unnatural Histories

This course is taught by our Potsdam Postcolonial Guest Professor Dr. Katrina Schlunke (University of Tasmania / University of Sydney). It will introduce students to the ways in which ideas of ‘nature’ and ‘history’ have shaped how we have understood the more-than-human world and the museums that display it. Coming together as ‘natural history’ a way of reading the world has emerged which often silences colonial histories and ongoing connections to Indigenous Country while privileging only some strands of the European development of natural history. In a period of time marked by mass extinctions and climate change, understanding the histories and organising discourses that shape the more-than-human (particularly animal) world, is a valuable critical tool.

Our path through the subject will include case studies of displayed more-than-human beings, histories of natural history and stories of alternate ‘natures’ as they appear in literature, museum displays and art. In-class activities will include short written exercises, fieldwork and group work.