Unveiling histories in contemporary cultural institutions

From Fiction to Knowledge

European institutions perpetuate a one-dimensional understanding of history, science, and society
while sub-narratives remain invisible and silenced. Based on the life of the Ghanaian philosopher
Anton Wilhelm Amo, who lived and worked as an Enlightenment thinker in eighteenth-century
Germany, and who has been neglected in German philosophical tradition, this article traces how
museums and other cultural organizations continue exerting institutional power by reproducing
dominant narratives and forms of knowledge. The example of Amo underlines remarkably how
history is a construction of those in power. Incorporating anti-racist practices in museums and
other cultural institutions requires a deep analysis of institutional history and its effects today. This
paper draws on theories of, among others, Walter D. Mignolo, Boaventura de Sousa Santos, and
Michel-Rolph Trouillot to uncover the existing racist dynamics and discriminating structures which
persist through the merely superficial treatment of racism as a thematic focus rather than a starting
point for building a fair and equal society for all.