For more than two centuries Maori treasures have been some of the most prized, popular and precious objects held in museums around the world. A new book examines how museum professionals are engaging with indigenous communities, to meet the needs of both those communities alongside the desires of museum visitors.

Museums and Maori: Heritage Professionals, Indigenous Collections, Current Practice by Conal McCarthy is now published by Te Papa Press and provides a contemporary snapshot across the whole range of museum work: mission and governance, management and staffing, collection care and management, exhibition development, education and public programmes, research and training.

From provincial galleries to the international exhibition Te Maori and the iconic national museum Te Papa, initiatives in Aotearoa New Zealand from the last thirty years are providing new models for museums internationally. Museum practice is being transformed through practical engagement with indigenous professionals and community representatives.

Local museum staff have faced new challenges in collecting, caring for and exhibiting the taonga of the Maori people, developing partnerships with iwi, as well as developments involving the repatriation of human remains, the opening of cultural centres, and debates over identity, cultural property and heritage management. The legacies of the resulting ground-breaking initiatives are revealed in this book with interviews, policy documents, images and observations of professionals at work.

Museums and Maori by Conal McCarthy is available to purchase from bookstores nationwide or online at www.tepapastore.co.nz

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Museums and Maori: Heritage Professionals, Indigenous Collections, Current Practice by Conal McCarthy is published by Te Papa Press, May 2011. RRP NZ$69.99 ISBN: 978-1-877385-70-4

Te Papa Press is New Zealand’s unique museum publisher, creating popular non-fiction books about New Zealand’s art, culture, and natural world for museum visitors and readers everywhere. To see our other books visit www.tepapapress.co.nz