Cara Krmpotich

Contact Information
Email: 
cara [dot] krmpotichatutoronto [dot] ca
Phone: 
416-978-7802
Fax: 
416-971-1399
Room: 
BL 631
Prof. Cara Krmpotich
Assistant Professor
Education: 
 
DPhil, University of Oxford, 2008.
 
MA, University of British Columbia, 2004.

BA, Hons., University of Trent, 2001.

Certificate, Museum Management and Curatorship, Sir Sandford Fleming College, 2000.

Biography: 
 
Cara Krmpotich joined the iSchool in July 2010. She teaches Collections Management, Curatorial Practice and Museums and Indigenous Communities, as well as an undergraduate course on Cultural Property in the Anthropology Department. Prior to joining the iSchool, Cara was a post-doctoral researcher at the Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford, as a partner in the research project 'Haida Material Culture in UK Museums: Generating New Forms of Knowledge' funded by the Leverhulme Trust. Cara continues to work with this research network that includes the British Museum and Haida researchers.

Cara has also worked at the National Museum of Scotland, Vancouver Museum, and Haida Gwaii Museum, done research at the Glenbow Museum and been involved in exhibition development at the Museum of Anthropology and Peterborough Centennial Museum and Archives.

She has a long-term research partnership with the Haida Repatriation Committee, Haida Gwaii, British Columbia. 

Honours & awards: 
 
Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, Doctoral Fellowship, 2004-2008 
 
Clarendon Bursary, University of Oxford, 2004-2006

Overseas Research Scholarship, Universities UK, 2004-2006

Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, CGS Master’s Scholarship, 2003-4

Research highlight: 

I am interested in the complex and dynamic relationships between museums and source communities, the interconnections between memory and material culture, theoretical aspects of repatriation, and generating new modes for understanding post-colonialism in the museum context.

Research description: 

Research interests:

  • Museum studies
  • Museum anthropology
  • Repatriation
  • Collections management
  • Indigenous peoples / Source communities
  • Material culture
  • Virtual colonization
My research interests focus on the relationships between museums and indigenous communities, and seek to understand the local significance of museum collections to indigenous communities. My post-doctoral research involved hosting a delegation of 21 members of the Haida Nation at the Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford, to work with their material heritage. This project grew, in part, out of my doctoral work with the Haida that sought to understand the repatriation of Haida ancestral remains locally. Following extensive ethnographic fieldwork on Haida Gwaii, my doctoral dissertation explored the tripartite relationship of material culture, memory and kinship within the repatriation process and in Haida society more generally.

I continue to do field research with the Haida, exploring ideas of embodied memory and cultural transmission as a result of engagements with museum objects.  

My up-coming research looks critically at the ideas of 'post-colonialism' and 'contact zones' in museum contexts, and seeks to understand whether museums are indeed post-colonial, and what post-colonialism might actually look like in both aboriginal-run museum and cultural centres, and majority society museums in Canada.

Selected publications: 
 
Krmpotich, Cara and Laura Peers. 2011 'The Scholar-Practitioner Expanded: An Indigenous and museum research network' in Museum Management and Curatorship 26(5): 421-440.
 
Krmpotich, Cara. 2011. 'Repatriation and the Generation of Material Culture' in Mortality 16(2): 145-160.
 
Butler, Udi (director), Laura Peers & Cara Krmpotich (producers). 2010. Everything was Carved. Pitt Rivers Museum: Oxford. 55 mins. http://www.prm.ox.ac.uk/haida.html

Krmpotich, Cara. 2010. 'Remembering and Repatriation: the production of kinship, memory and respect' in Journal of Material Culture 15(2): 157-179.

Krmpotich, Cara, Joost Fontein and John Harries. 2010. 'The Substance of Bones: the emotive materiality and affective presence of human remains' in Journal of Material Culture, 15(4): 371-384.

DPhil thesis: REPATRIATION AND THE PRODUCTION OF KINSHIP AND MEMORY: Anthropological Perspectives on the Repatriation of Haida Ancestral Remains Institute for Social and Cultural Anthropology, University of Oxford, 2008.

Conference Contributions:

Krmpotich, Cara and Laura Peers. 2010. ‘Movements of Museology: the transnationalism of Canadian Practice’ Taking Stock: Museum Studies and Museum Practices in Canada April 22-24, 2010, University of Toronto.

Conference planning committee member, ‘Seeking Bridges Between Anthropology and Indigenous Studies.’ June 2009, Brookes University, Oxford, UK. Session co-organizer: ‘Decolonizing Museology’; Session organizer: ‘The Senses’.

Krmpotich, Cara. 2009a. ‘Producing Kinship and Memory: Anthropological Perspectives on Haida Repatriation’ Canadian Anthropological Society, Vancouver, B.C., May 13-16, 2009.

Krmpotich, Cara. 2009b. ‘The continued presence of ancestors: the affective presence of human remains.’ Paper presented at the Association of Social Anthropologists 2009 Conference, Bristol, UK, April 7, 2009.

Krmpotich, Cara. 2008a. ‘Ancestral Bones: creating proximity and familiarity, erasing distance and anonymity’ Invited paper presented at ‘What Lies Beneath: the emotive materiality and affective presence of human remains.’ Department of Anthropology, University of Edinburgh, December 4-5, 2008. 

Krmpotich, Cara. 2008b. ‘Closing Remarks: Museums for the Marginalised: representation and empowerment’ Horniman Museum, London, October 25, 2008.

Krmpotich, Cara. 2007. ‘Minimizing Distance: the shared experiences of Haida people and their ancestors’ Paper presented at the American Anthropological Association Meetings in Washington, DC, November 28-Dec 2, 2007.

Krmpotich, Cara. 2004. ‘New Methods, New Messages? Museum Visitors’ Responses to Collaborative Exhibitions’ Paper presented at Canadian Anthropological Society (CASCA) Meetings, London, Ontario, May 5-9, 2004. 

Invited Lectures:

Krmpotich, Cara. 2011a. ‘Narratives of Family, Constructions of Self: Healing, Respect and Identity in the Haida Repatriation Process’ Frost Centre for Canadian Studies and Indigenous Studies, Trent University, February 16, 2011.

Krmpotich, Cara. 2011b. ‘No More Ghosts in the Closet: Inviting a Haida delegation to the Pitt Rivers Museum, Oxford’ Pine Tree Talk, First Peoples House of Learning, Department of Indigenous Studies, Trent University, February 16, 2011.

Supervision: 

Committee member for:

Hannah Turner, iSchool, "Objects, Access and Agency: Aboriginal Knowledge and Digital Cultural Heritage"

Heather Read, OISE, "The Earthenwhere Project"

Affiliations & collaboration: 
 
'Haida Material Culture in UK Museums: Generating New Forms of Knowledge', with Laura Peers (PI), Pitt Rivers Museum, University of Oxford, British Museum, Haida Gwaii Museum and Haida Repatriation Committee.
 
Year joined the iSchool: 
2010