During this past semester, Ms. Pasquantonio’s 8th grade history classes concluded their cultural repatriation research projects with a spirited debate. Cultural repatriation is the act of returning cultural objects to their country of origin. In this project, students worked in teams to debate if the Elgin Marbles, which made up the Parthenon in Athens, or the bust of the Egyptian queen Nefertiti should be returned to their country of origins.
To form strong arguments for the debate, everyone spent time researching information on their objects. This was done by reading books in the Tate Library and using the Tate’s electronic databases as well as the Internet. We made a Chicago-style bibliography to record the numerous sources we used. During the debate, students who weren’t going to debate that day acted as the jury. When the debate ended the jurors discussed the case before coming to a consensus of the winner.
During the project, I enjoyed debating that the Elgin Marbles should stay in the British Museum in London, England. I loved the entire debate as a whole, especially when I made the opening statements for my group. I hope there are similar projects in the future where I can utilize Tate Library’s amazing resources and learn about other issues like cultural repatriation.
