About

the conference // March 30-31 2023

The international conference aims to discuss new biographic approaches to research and storytelling – as a part of decolonial practice for ethnographic museums.
Want to re-read our Call for Papers? You can find it here.



the project //


The conference is a result of the research project “Wilhelm Joest and the Intimacies of Colonial Collecting”:
the German ethnographer (1852-1897) was the founding collector of the Rautenstrauch-Joest-Museum in Cologne.

Project funding:
Museumsgesellschaft RJM e.V., from the bequest of the late L. Th. v. Rautenstrauch (2019-2020)
Fritz Thyssen Stiftung (2020-2023)

Conference funding:
Fritz Thyssen Stiftung (2023)
Museumsgesellschaft RJM e.V. (2023)


the books //

The project has resulted in two books that may serve as expressions of the conference’s “researching” and “storytelling” approach: a biography and a critically commented edition of six of Joest’s texts.

Anne Haeming:
Der gesammelte Joest. Biografie eines Ethnologen
(Matthes & Seitz, 05/2023)

Carl Deußen, Anne Haeming (Hgg.):
Von Santa Cruz nach Indien durch die Ethnologie. Fragmente des Forschungsreisenden Wilhelm Joest
(Matthes & Seitz, 05/2023)