Etnography

***While the museum building will close its doors in late 2012 for
renovation, scientific research will continue at Tervuren.***

We study the material and immaterial evidence of the cultural heritage of Saharan Africa. Our aim is to improve the knowledge and understanding of the world of African culture, both past and present. 

We work on the basis of various complementary sources:

• collections of objects, photos and archives of the department and those of other public or private institutions,
• data collected during assignments in the field, essential to contextualise the collections and demonstrate their significance,
• consultation of publications linked to all the fields of research of the department.

Scientific activities:

• masks, dances and techniques of the body in western Africa especially the Ivory Coast,
• critical analysis of the history of collections of ethnographic objects, 
• cultures, transformation, resolution of conflicts and material expression of the herders of eastern Africa, 
• study of the links between the artists of various cultural communities and their influence on the transformation of stylistic expression throughout history and in particular the masks of the DRC, 
• comparative research on the mythology, thought systems, witchcraft, rituals and therapeutic knowledge of central Africa, and in particular in Cameroon and the DRC.  Analysis of this corpus and its contemporary transformation, including the objects, signs and symbols linked to it. 

We work together with African scientific and cultural institutions to develop work on the ground and scientific, museum-linked and publishing cooperation projects. 

The distribution of our work is done through national and international scientific networks, scientific publications, conferences and research programmes. We also contribute to helping organise exhibitions, editing of catalogues and articles in the popular press.