21 November 2024 – Exploring the collection

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Having come to a decision on overarching themes for five different museum displays, we are now beginning to consider objects and archival material that can help us tell these different heritage stories. 

The group visited the museum store to take a look through the collections, exploring objects that relate to our identified themes. In looking at what was in the collection we also considered what was missing, whose voices and experiences are not represented and how can we begin to share wider histories of Rochdale?

Touchstones’ collections were created and organised under colonially-informed ethnographic practices, including a focus on the Western notion of ‘objects’ and featuring items ‘taken’ from other cultures. These collections have limited ability to capture the diverse heritage of Rochdale’s communities today. The community curators are working collectively with Touchstones to try and readdress that balance. As well as looking at collections objects the group talked with collections staff about the process of loaning objects from the community to help our new displays reflect the diverse populations of Rochdale and the Borough’s rich heritage.