Grace McCann Morley and the national museum of India

Abstract

This chapter examines Grace McCann Morley's earliest interventions at the museum from 1960 to 1966 her attempts to reshape the existing museal modes at the institution, paralleled her commitment to American modern museology with the aspirations of India's new nationalist government. The National Museum had already been founded in 1949 within the Rastrapati Bhavan, the house of the former imperial Viceroy in New Delhi. Uncovering the layered messages in galleries such as thes opens a window into the National Museum as a site for Indian nationalism's experiments with modernity under Jawaharlal Nehru. They also provide an extraordinary introduction to the museum's enigmatic first director who is widely regarded as the ' mataji of Indian museology'—an American woman from Northern California named Grace McCann Morley. In support of the government's push for cultural anthropology at the National Museum, Morley's presentation helped to enable new claims of diversity and inclusiveness on the nationalised Indian body.

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