The Province of BC recognizes the Royal BC Museum for its work highlighting multiculturalism
November 25, 2015
VICTORIA, BC – BC’s human history is as complex, diverse and dynamic as its ecology, with people from virtually every region of the globe settling in and contributing to the province – even before the province existed as an entity.
To tell the diverse stories of British Columbia, the Royal BC Museum strives to explore and promote historical narratives from (and about) many different cultural groups.
On November 20, the Royal BC Museum’s efforts were recognized at the Province of British Columbia’s 2015 BC Multicultural Awards, where the museum and archives was presented with an award for Multicultural Excellence in Government.
“It was an honour to attend the ceremony and accept the award on behalf of the Royal BC Museum,” said the Royal BC Museum’s Executive Financial Officer, Melissa Sands. “The Royal BC Museum has created outstanding exhibitions, educational programming and outreach initiatives to promote knowledge of BC’s diversity to the public.”
The award recognizes a number of Royal BC Museum initiatives over the past few years.
In 2013, the Royal BC Museum opened the exhibition Tradition in Felicities: Celebrating 155 Years of Victoria’s Chinatown, in partnership with Victoria’s Chinatown community. The exhibition was also showcased in China twice in 2015.
In May 2014, on the centennial anniversary of the Komagata Maru episode, the Royal BC Museum, in partnership with the University of Victoria, hosted a series of events to discuss and reflect upon the lessons learned.
In June 2014, to celebrate BC’s status as a language hotspot (34 First Nations languages are spoken here), the Royal BC Museum created the Our Living Languages: First Peoples’ Voices in BC exhibition in partnership with First Peoples Cultural Council and their advisors from Nations around the province.
In August 2014, the Royal BC Museum joined 13 other Canadian institutions in the Landscapes of Injustice project to conduct research and develop a travelling exhibition about the forced dispossession of homes and properties owned by Japanese Canadian citizens during the Second World War.
In 2015, the Royal BC Museum has developed school outreach kits, website articles and other materials to commemorate the Chinese Historical Wrongs, in support of the BC Government initiative to address the wrongs.
Most recently, the day after the award ceremony, the Royal BC Museum invited members of the Indo Canadian community from the Lower Mainland, the Fraser Valley and Vancouver Island to stage an “intervention” in the Logging Exhibit in the Modern History gallery to reframe the historical record to include their poignant narratives of logging and forestry in British Columbia.
Many of these multicultural stories are shared on the museum and archives’ online Learning Portal (learning.royalbcmuseum.bc.ca), including articles about the Tradition in Felicities and Our Living Languages exhibitions, and two articles about the Chinese Historical Wrongs: “Early Chinese Canadian Experiences in British Columbia” and “Acknowledging Past Wrongs.”
The Royal BC Museum was one of five champions of diversity to receive an award at the 2015 Multicultural Awards ceremony. More information about the award and the other recipients can be found at: https://news.gov.bc.ca/releases/2015MIT0053-001929
This year the Royal BC Museum has won a number of accolades for its work and its visitor service, including a second year as TripAdvisor’s number one museum in Canada, winning the American Alliance of Museums Excellence in Exhibition Competition, and Expedia’s announcement that the Royal BC Museum is one of the five Best Canadian Museums.
