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Museums in Austin and San Antonio, Texas, of Interest to Ethnic Historians
ANJU REEJHSINGHANI
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THE AUSTIN-SAN ANTONIO area provides ample opportunities for ethnic historians to explore the rich histories and cultures of Texas's native and immigrant peoples. From folk art to contemporary, archaeological displays to interactive exhibits, the museums here truly offer something for nearly everyone. While most are geared to mainstream adult and teen audiences, a few offer delightful spaces for small children to learn and play. The surprise for this historian has been discovering how truly different—in aims, methodologies, and impacts, as well as in diversity of subject matter—are these eight museums, explored over two weeks in September 2008. |
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In the interest of balance, I reviewed four museums in each city, although more populous San Antonio (1.3 million to Austin's 700,000) is in a higher weight class in terms of cultural offerings. In Austin these were the Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum, the Blanton Museum of Art at the University of Texas-Austin, the George Washington Carver Museum and Cultural Center, and Mexic-Arte Museum. In San Antonio I visited the Institute of Texan Cultures at the University of Texas-San Antonio, the San Antonio Museum of Art, the Witte Museum, and the Museo Alameda. |
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AUSTIN, TX | |
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Although I had passed by the Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum since shortly after its opening in 2001, I had never felt much interest in entering. Judging from its grandiose size—not to mention its dedication to the lieutenant governor who served during George W. Bush's tenure as Texas governor—I felt I knew what would be inside: a politically incorrect, over-the-top paean to the state (or is it republic?) of Texas. And, indeed, there is some (actually, quite a bit) of that. But for the most part, the museum has a more nuanced approach to Texas history than I had imagined. How useful the Bullock will be to ethnic historians, particularly those without a strong interest in Texas, remains to be seen; but its interactive nature may very well serve to inspire the next generation of historians. |
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One need look no further than the museum's URL, www.thestoryoftexas.com, to realize that the Bullock's mission is to unify the various events—and peoples—of Texas into one overarching narrative. (Lest there be any doubt, the second floor exhibit is titled "Building the Lone Star Identity.") It is a narrative that does not shy from detailing moments of shame and humiliation—slavery, disenfranchisement of Tejanos, inequality for women—but that nonetheless ends with unity and triumph, even if that ending, of course, is still being written. |
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The first floor of exhibits, "Encounters on the Land," features intricate three-dimensional models as well as artifacts to recreate encounters between Spanish explorers and American Indians. An interactive exhibit highlights, literally, the routes taken by the early explorers through Texas; pressing a button brings up a string of lights across the United States and Mexico. It is jarring, however, to discover that a true-to-scale model Comanche teepee serves merely as canopy and backdrop for a flat-screen TV airing a film on American Indians. The second floor exhibit, the aforementioned "Building the Lone Star Identity," makes a valiant attempt to incorporate non-Anglo voices into the triumphalist narrative, most notably Juan Seguín, the Mexican-born defender of the Alamo who was elected a Texas senator and the mayor of San Antonio in the Republic period (1836–1845) before fleeing to Mexico. |
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