Collecting, Ordering, Governing

"Collecting, Ordering, Governing is a book that demands, instantiates, and rewards a sustained rethinking of the history of anthropology, collecting, museums, and liberal governance. Not only is its multiple authorship an innovation, but the book and its combinations push the reader to think in new, sometimes uncomfortable ways. Once-familiar stories and histories—reconsidered, recombined, and reconceptualized in the light of more recent ideas of liberal governmentality—show the contradictions and loose ends in anthropology’s efforts to provide knowledge that might improve, emancipate, or protect those it studies." - Fred R. Myers, author of Painting Culture: The Making of an Aboriginal High Art

"Tacking between colonial peripheries and imperial centers, across oceans and continents, Collecting, Ordering, Governing delivers what its title promises and much more. A magisterial work of breathtaking theoretical richness, this book advances our understanding of the relationship of disciplinary subjects to the disciplining of subjects—and their efforts of self-determination—through material practices of collection, ordering, and display." - Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, Chief Curator, POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews

"This book is a useful addition to the ever-increasing literature exploring the history of the anthropological discipline. Through its examination of particular case studies, it suggests many useful lines of inquiry for anyone exploring the histories of anthropology in different geographical localities." - Alison Petch, Museum Anthropology Review

"This volume can bring useful information to anthropologists, museum specialists, and historians of anthropology. . . . Maybe the most important contribution of this work to the wider academic and social discussions on anthropology and colonialism is its balanced and nuanced approach." - Alexandra Ion, AP: Online Journal in Public Archaeology

“The ambitious range of case studies and their broad time span is impressive and draws on a vast range of resources, making the essays both scholarly and relevant.... Collecting, Ordering, Governing expands the notion of the museum phase of anthropology.” - Karen Jacobs, Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute