UBC Museum of Anthropology
卑斯大學人類學博物館(Chinese)

Anthropology is the study of peoples of the world and how they organize and express human experience. The Museum strives:
1. To provide information about and access to cultural objects from around the world, with emphasis on the achievements and concerns of the First Peoples and British Columbia's cultural communities;
2. To stimulate critical thinking and understanding about cross-cultural issues;
3. To pose questions about and develop innovative responses to museological, anthropological, aesthetic, educational, and political challenges.

Every year, more than 170,000 students, researchers, schoolchildren, special delegations, tourists, and other visitors, singly or in groups, from nearby or around the world, visit MOA. Year after year, MOA is selected as one of Vancouver's and Canada's best loved museums on the basis of its spectacular setting, stunning displays of Northwest Coast art, and active programming. In 1989, the Canadian Tourism Commission voted MOA "Tourist Attraction of the Year - Canada" in recognition of its exceptional popularity with local and international audiences.

The Museum of Anthropology currently has a staff of twenty-four permanent employees (six of whom are part-time), as well as a number of student interns appointed to temporary training positions. More than sixty-five Volunteer Associates and Shop Volunteers provide services in all areas of the Museum, both publicly and behind-the-scenes.

History
Since 1927, the University of British Columbia (UBC) has collected ethnographic material. In 1947, this material was brought together to form the founding collections of the new Museum of Anthropology (MOA), which opened in the basement of UBC's main library in 1949. In its early years, MOA was directed by Dr. Harry Hawthorn, the first anthropologist appointed to the University faculty. His wife, Dr. Audrey Hawthorn, served as the first curator. MOA remained in the library until 1976 when it moved to its current location.

Construction of a new museum on the cliffs of Point Grey was made possible by a grant from the Government of Canada, marking the 1971 centennial of British Columbia's entry into Confederation. The University provided matching funds to complete installations and organize the academic components of the Museum.

Outdoor Sculpture Complex
The outdoor sculpture complex includes two Haida Houses and ten totem poles and features the work of some of the finest contemporary First Nations artists of the Northwest Coast.

The Koerner Ceramics Gallery
features a 600 piece collection of 15th to 19th century European ceramics unique to North America, as well as specially commissioned ceramics and textiles by contemporary Vancouver artists.

Potlatches
Potlatches are ceremonial gatherings, usually involving a feast, in which hereditary property is transferred within families, and social status in affirmed in the presence of other families invited as witnesses. Property includes fishing grounds, hunting territory, and other resource sites, as well as names, songs, stories, histories, and the right to use particular crests, often represented on totem poles, headdresses, and masks.

Potlatch hosts give gifts to their guests in return for their guests witnessing and approving the rights displayed or transferred. Though outlawed by the Canadian government from 1884 to 1951, potlatches never ceased entirely and they continue to be important in First Nations societies.

Blankets, fur robes, bentwood boxes, bowls, and spoons were frequent gifts at potlatches, as were Eulachon fish oil, halibut, and later sugar (obtained from Europeans). Ceremonial objects, many commissioned for the occasion, are still an important part of contemporary potlatches, along with modern consumer goods and foods.

Totem Poles
Totem poles display figures from the histories of the families who own them. Figures may be derived from myths but they do not tell a story. Often, the Raven, Bear, Beaver, Frog, Eagle, and Wolf are presented as clan or family crests. Many of the creatures appear partly human, suggesting their ability to transform themselves into other beings.

Poles are carved and raised for a variety of reasons, and usually symbolize the great honour and prestige of the individuals for whom they are raised. Some form an integral part of a building structure the frame, interior supports, or entrance. Others are free-standing memorial poles raised in honour of deceased, high-ranking family members. In the past, some mortuary poles held coffins containing human remains. Sculpted figures, like the one by Joe David outside the Museum entrance at the top of the stairs, were sometimes carved to welcome visitors to community territories.

During the potlatch ban (1884-1951), few new poles were erected. However, since that time, an increasing number of contemporary poles have been raised in Native communities. Many have also been commissioned for display in public places in cities around the world.

House frontal totem pole fragment,
Haida, ca.1870
House Frontal Totem Pole,
Owikeno (Katit Reserve), circa 1890, Cedar and paint,

Canoes
Characteristic of the northern Northwest Coast groups are canoes with high projecting bows and sterns. Cedar dugout canoes were formerly used for travel, fishing, and whaling along the rugged Pacific coast. A wide range of shapes were designed by coastal peoples to meet specialized needs and local sea or river conditions. Canoes continue to be made by First Nations artists today.
Bent Wood Boxes, Bowls & Feast Dishes
Traditionally, bentwood boxes were used for many purposes: for storage, for cooking, as drums and cradles, and as coffins for the dead. Today, a select group of artists continues to make bentwood boxes for personal use, ceremony, and commercial sale. Boxes such as these with fine carving and intricate painted images were likely owned by high-ranking families and used for storing ceremonial regalia.

The boxes are made from a single plank of cedar wood, which is first notched or kerfed to mark three of the four corners. The plank is steamed until the moisture permeates the wood, making it pliable enough to bend. The plank is then carefully bent into shape. Once it has dried, the fourth corner is sewn or pegged together. A bottom may be attached in the same fashion. This woodworking technique is unique in the world. Feast dishes, often made in the form of powerful legendary beings, are used at feasts or potlatches.

Gathering Strength  
This gallery, renewed on the occasion of the Museum of Anthropology's fiftieth anniversary, celebrates a remarkable period in the life and art of Northwest Coast First Nations communities. The period represented here coincides with the museum's own growth since its founding in 1949. Two years later, when the ban on the potlatch was dropped from the federal Indian Act, Northwest Coast people were once again able to practice openly some of their most important ceremonies. These continue to be the occasions for the creation and display of songs, dances, masks, poles, regalia, and other forms of cultural expression.

Visible Storage
The Museum's innovative and extensive Visible Storage galleries makes more than 14,000 objects from the collections accessible to the public. Arranged according to culture and use, these galleries invite individual exploration, comparison, and contrast of materials from cultures from all over the world.

The Museum's extensive open storage system makes more than 14,000 objects from the collections visually accessible to the public. It also encourages research and teaching activities using the collections. Arranged according to cultural origin and use, the objects in Visible Storage invite individual exploration, and comparison of materials and technologies from societies all over the world. To add to the sense of discovery, many objects are stored in cabinets with drawers that slide open to reveal their contents. Information on the objects can be found in special data books nearby.  While over forty percent of the Museum's collections are presented in the galleries and Visible Storage, most of the Museum's extensive textile collection and works on paper remain in closed storage, protected from temperature fluctuations and exposure to light, to which they are extremely sensitive. These items are periodically featured in special exhibitions in Galleries 5, 8, or 10.
In addition to objects from Canadian First Peoples, Visible Storage also houses objects from Africa, Indonesia, China, Oceania, India, Central America, Japan, the Mediterranean, and other parts of the world.
 
Collections from First Nations in B.C. and elsewhere in Canada constitute a substantial portion of Visible Storage. The art of basketry is well represented in the storage sections focusing on cultures of the B.C. interior: Stl'atl'imx, Secwepemc, Nlaka'pamux, Okanagan, Kootenay, Tsilhqot'in, and Dakelh. Material from the northern Dene peoples is presented in adjacent cases.

Rotunda
Haida artist Bill Reid's acclaimed sculpture, The Raven and the First Men, is displayed in this gallery, alongside four exhibit cases featuring a selection of Reid's smaller masterworks in gold, silver, argillite, and wood. Raven and the First Men by Bill Reid, Haida 1980
Yellow cedar, 1888.75 cm length x 192.6 cm diameter

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