Museums in translation : the birth of the museum in colonial India -- Colonial mementos to postcolonial imaginings : the transformation of the Lahore Museum -- Museum archons : the habitual discourse of the Lahore Museum -- Visiting the museum : curiosity about the ajaib ghar -- Nokta Nazar of the Lahore Museum's 'audience'
Summary
Shaila Bhatti's immersive study of the Lahore Museum in Pakistan is one of the first books to offer an in-depth historical and ethnographic analysis of a South Asian museum. Bhatti thus presents an alternative example of visitor experience and museum practice to that of the West, which has been the dominant museological model to date. This examination of the Lahore Museum's objects, staff, and visitors (past and present) provides an informative case study that reveals local perceptions and uses of museums in non-Western societies to be fraught with social, political, and cultural implications
