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Photograph of Paula Ben-Amos Girshick

Paula Ben-Amos Girshick

Professor of Anthropology and African Studies
Affiliate, Center for Archaeology in the Public Interest

(812) 855-5396 | Email | Office Hours
  • Ph.D. in Anthropology & African Studies, Indiana University
  • B.A. in Philosophy, Stanford University

Geographical Areas of Specialization: Africa , especially Nigeria and South Africa

Topical Interests: Monuments, museums, and national identity, history and memory, politics of representation, the art market - collecting, selling, and exhibiting.

Current Courses: E416/E616 The Anthropology of Tourism, E460/E660 Visualizing "The Other"

Selected Publications


Profile:

After working for a number of years in the Benin Kingdom , Nigeria on the history and political role of royal art, I have recently begun research in South Africa . I am currently involved in two projects: the first deals with post-apartheid monuments and national identity and the second focuses on the history of the South African market in "traditional" African art.

 I regularly teach courses on "Art and Commodity," "Exhibiting Cultures: Museums, Exhibitions and Worlds' Fairs," "Theories of Material Culture," "The Anthropology of Tourism," and "The Arts and Anthropology", occasionally taught as "Public Art: Monuments and Memorials".


Selected Publications:

2004 Ncome Museum/Monument: From Reconciliation to Resistance.  Museum Anthropology 27 (1-2): 2536
2002 Civil War in the Kingdom of Benin 1690-1750: Continuity or Political Change? (with John Thornton), Journal of African History, 42,3
2002 Omada at the Crossroads of Colonialisms in Images and Empires, (eds) Paul Landau and Deborah Caspin.  University of California Press
1999 Art, Innovation, and Politics in 18th Century Benin, Indiana University Press.
1995 The Art of Benin. Revised edition.  British Museum Press and Smithsonian Institution.
1994 The Promise of Greatness: Women and Power in a Benin Spirit Possession Cult. In Religion in Africa: Experience and Expression, T.D. Blakely, W.E.A. Van Beek, and D.L. Thomson,Eds. $:James Currey.
1989 African Visual Arts from a Social Perspective [ACLS/SSRC sponsored research overview paper]. African Studies Review 32 (2): 1-53.
1984 Royal Art and Ideology in 18th Century Benin. In Iowa Studies in African Art , I, C. Roy , Ed., pp. 67-86.
1983 Ed. (with Arnold Rubin). The Art of Power/The Power of Art. Studies in Benin Iconography. Los Angeles: Museum of Culture History.
1980 The Art of Benin . London: Thames and Hudson. [Translated: L'art du Benin. Paris: Rive Gauche Productions, 1979. Revised edition: British Museum Press, 1995].
1977 Pidgin Languages and Tourist Arts. Studies in the Anthropology of Visual Communication , IV(2):128-39.
1976 Men and Animals in Benin Art. Man (N.S.) II(2), 243-52. [Reprinted in Richard Anderson, Ed., Art in Small-Scale Societies: a contemporary reader . Prentice Hall, 1992].
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