Together with other alumni of the DAAD programme TheMuseumsLab – Tshidy Kamogelo Ngoma (Gaborone), Nneoma Angela Okorie (Lagos) and Noam Gramlich (Berlin), as well as IfEK team member Isabel Bredenbr?ker, are launching a one-year collaborative project that aims to make female, queer, inter* and trans* narratives visible in African museum collections. The project is one of the selected projects of TheMuseumsLab CollabFund, funded by the German Federal Cultural Foundation.

The project team shares insights into their work:

Who is involved in the project? Would you like to introduce yourselves?

We are an interdisciplinary and transcontinental project team based in Europe and Africa, consisting of four alumni of the TheMuseumsLab programme. The project team consists of Thsidy Kamogelo Ngoma (Gaborone), Nneoma Angela Okorie (Lagos), Noam Gramlich (Berlin) and Isabel Bredenbro?ker (Bremen).

What exactly is behind the title A Digital Archive of Alternative Genders in Africa and Africa(n) Collections? Could you introduce the project?

The Digital Archive of Alternative Genders in Africa and Africa(n) Collections provides a digital participatory platform to foster knowledge exchange on alternative genders between European and African colleagues. The archive highlights female, queer, inter*, and trans* stories in Africa(n) museum collections and beyond. Colonialism, Christianity, and Western science have enforced binary hierarchical gender systems and the normativity of heterosexuality. Yet, plural gender expressions existed long before colonization. Cultural belongings and their protocols attest to the presence of marginalized sexualities.

How did the idea for the project come about?

The idea was born during the TheMuseumsLab programme 2024. During the modules, that took place online, in Berlin and in Ghana, several discussions among the fellows addressed the challenge of integrating feminist and female perspectives into postcolonial practices and memory culture. Carrying the theme into the alumni group, we finally became a team of four curators and researchers based in European and African countries.

What are your goals with A Digital Archive of Alternative Genders in Africa and Africa(n) Collections?

We want to create a digital archive that is alive and growing. It will research historical knowledge relating to ‘ethnological’ collections and represent contemporary positions and knowledge practices. The archive focuses on alternative gender identities, which often play no role in ethnological historical collections. Knowledge about the provenance of interesting artefacts is also mostly incomplete. We are working together with collaborating museums, artists, curators and people from queer communities to track things down and see where lost knowledge can be rediscovered or where contemporary artefacts and bodies can help to fill these gaps.

What significance does the project have for society as a whole? (What else would you like to draw attention to with this project?)

By engaging with this little-researched knowledge, museums can promote understanding and inclusivity for queer people in diverse societies while strengthening queer communities. At the same time, the historical-ethnographic collections (in small parts) are being dusted off and connected to the present. This is being done digitally, thus offering accessibility beyond the walls of the museum. At the same time, we are developing a zine that can also be present in places where digital technologies are not a given.

Who else is involved in the project and why?

We will collaborate with individuals, whom we will soon be seeking through an open call and group research, as well as with partner museums that are either part of the TheMuseumsLab network or where team members currently work. The University of Bremen and the Institute for Ethnology and Cultural Studies serve as academic partner institutions. Museums that will be involved in terms of content include the MARKK Museum am Rothenbaum in Hamburg, the Botswana National Museum, the Pitt Rivers Museum in Oxford, the Royal Museum for Central Africa in Tervuren, and the Museum fu?r Naturkunde in Berlin, which is signing the funding agreement with us as a contractual partner. The project is one of the Selected Projects of the initiative by TheMuseumsLab CollabFund, which is funded by the Kulturstiftung des Bundes (German Federal Cultural Foundation).

How do you organize collaboration with your partners?

We will hold an internal team workshop at pIAR (perfoCraze International Artist Residency) in Kumasi, Ghana, to meet in person, review work results, and receive important insights into queer life and activism in Ghana from the residency's operator, Va-Bene Elikem Fiatsi. In addition, the project attaches great importance to climate-neutral collaboration, and we will often network digitally with partners and contributors. At the end, there will be a launch of the digital archive, currently planned to take place at MARKK in Hamburg. The project will run throughout 2026.

An initiative by TheMuseumsLab CollabFund. Funded by the Kulturstiftung des Bundes (German Federal Cultural Foundation). Funded by the Beauftragter der Bundesregierung fu?r Kultur und Medien (German Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media).

You can find more information on TheMuseumsLab website