– A unique exhibition stresses the importance of the Walter Roth Museum
By Subraj Singh
Mr Michael Khan thrilled school students with his Amerindian folk tales. (Ministry of Education photo)
When it was announced that the Walter Roth Museum of Anthropology would be removed from its current home on Main Street and relocated to the National Museum, there was a great hue and cry from the general populace. The response to the planned relocation indicated that people are aware of the value of the Walter Roth Museum and that they understand the importance it has to the Guyanese and, further, that they know why a space containing treasures of such importance to the country deserves its own area and should not be relegated to being subsumed into the National Museum. The Walter Roth Museum, by coincidence, has launched an exhibition that underscores its own importance and worth at a time when the subject of the relocation of the museum has not entirely disappeared from everyone else’s minds. In fact, the exhibition – entitled “Archaeological Discoveries 1966 – 2015, Exhibition and Fair, and Amerindian Myths, Legends and Oral Traditions of Guyana, 2016” – was a multifaceted event, rich with opportunities to learn about and to appreciate both our archaeological and Amerindian heritage. The importance of the Walter Roth Museum has been magnified because of this event, because of all it offers to the people of this country, because the event itself is one of the events designed to highlight our indigenous ancestors and, ironically, the importance of the museum is more visible than ever because this exhibition comes hot on the heels of the government’s attempt to relocate the Walter Roth Museum.
The exhibition and fair ran from September 13-16, and allowed visitors many opportunities to experience the past through the contemporary work being done by the Museum. Of course, the most obvious treat awaiting visitors who came to the exhibition was the opportunity to see the exhibits that are in the museum itself. The shell mounds – huge mounds of leftover shellfish and other debris – that provide tons of information to archaeologists who study pre-Columbian societies in Guyana and the West Indies, the various utensils that give an idea of what life in the Amerindian villages were like, or the weapons that transport the more adventurous back into the forests of the past, and even canoes, slim and sturdy, which place the image in the mind’s eye of oneself shooting over rapids, are among the many items on exhibit within the Walter Roth Museum itself.
Well-known storyteller, Mr. Michael Khan, was also one of the special attractions at the exhibition where he engaged the audience with his indigenous folktales and his spectacular storytelling skills. At the opening of the exhibition, for example, Mr. Khan managed to keep the audience, many of whom were schoolchildren, hooked on to his story from the moment he began to the moment the last word left his mouth. His storytelling style is itself seems to come from the oral folk traditions that can be found in early African, Amerindian and East Indian storytelling traditions. Performance, voice and body are all integral to his particular style of storytelling and he is well aware of how to use these various elements to ensure that his audience never loses interest.
Even his choice in story is interesting and worthy of mentioning. At the exhibition’s opening, for example, he told an Amerindian folktale that was one of several types of indigenous tales – the creation myth – which told of how various aspects of the world as we know it today were created. Mr. Khan’s rendition of the story told of how the rain came to the earth when a large woman who tried to descend to our world got stuck in a hole and began to cry, and also of how death was introduced to the land when she died. Such stories are important because they can tell us of how people view their environment and society.
From the Amerindian tales, for example, such as that particular one told by Mr. Khan, the relationship between the natural environment and man is very pronounced and that is a relationship that is strongly represented in real life Amerindian culture. Stories, most unfortunately, are not like artefacts like spears and jewellery that can be preserved in the earth and then dug up many years later to be studied. Stories rely on being passed on to survive – whether through writing or, as in the case of the early peoples, through oral traditions and retelling them to other people.
This means that if people like Mr. Khan, the storytellers in our communities, are removed or are unable to pass on these tales to other people, then the tales would cease to exist and their lessons, their morals and the characters who teach us about ourselves will all disappear from our culture and from our society.
Therefore, an exhibition such as the one held by the Walter Roth Museum, an exhibition that understood and sought to showcase how oral traditions are as important as items that are excavated and dug up, deserves much applause for attempting to preserve and present this particular aspect of the country’s intangible heritage. There is a special beauty in knowing that someone present at the exhibition, perhaps a schoolchild or one of the cameramen, listened to one of Mr. Khan’s stories and then went on to tell them to someone else and so, helped to extend, a little, the life of a Guyanese folktale.
Another aspect of the exhibition that catered to children involved the making of indigenous feather and body ornaments. Children and adults were also exposed to on methods of conserving archaeological materials, such as pottery reconstruction and the process of documentation. A site test unit was also recreated to allow persons to have a chance to access the unique opportunity to be part of an archaeological dig at the back of the museum. Clearly this event was designed to inculcate a love and further understanding of archaeology and archaeological processes in the hopes of creating future Guyanese archaeologists or even to ensure that people have a more thorough appreciation of how the processes in the field works.
Also present at the opening of the exhibition, and crucial to much of the work being done by the Walter Roth Museum, was Louisa Daggers, Guyana’s first female resident archaeologist. In her presentation to the audience, she noted that archaeology is not only the study of past peoples and cultures based on the artefacts they left behind, but also that archaeology is a public service and that it enables practitioners and academics to inform the public of their past while, at the same time, enabling the public to be involved.
Daggers is also fully aware of the importance of her field and knows that the field can address critical issues such as climate change, resource consumption, the impact of human population on species diversity and human adaptive responses to changing environments. According to Daggers, archaeology can “contribute meaningfully to policy development, tourism, and ultimately foster a sense of belongingness among Guyanese.”
Daggers has also spoken about her excitement for the University of Guyana’s new Archaeology programme, where one can study for an Associate Degree in the field. The university’s programme incorporates Historical Anthropology, Linguistics, Tourism and Anthropology, Biological Anthropology and other courses that contribute towards exposing students to hands-on field and lab work including GIS and data analysis.
While we can agree with Daggers when she says that Guyana lacks the proper infrastructure that supports archaeology, such as proper policy and research facilities, there is no doubt that initiatives such as the exhibition held at the Walter Roth Museum went a long way in sensitizing the public to archaeological processes and introducing them to the artefacts, and the history behind those artefacts, which are, in fact, the public’s own history that has been unearthed and placed in front of them so they can learn from their own past in order to ensure that they are granted a solid future.