A guilty pleasure? The Indian museum as a popular backdrop for selfies

Abstract

The following article presents the Madhya Pradesh Tribal Museum Bhopal, India, (Tribal Museum) as an especially popular setting and backdrop for selfies and photographic self-portraits by Indian visitors. In general, museums are not considered ‘cool’ among young people in India. The article discusses why the Tribal Museum is so attractive as a selfie-backdrop and what kind of a relationship this practice establishes between visitors and museum. Thus, the text adopts a different perspective from the prevailing one in literature, which looks at the selfie either (approvingly) as visual ‘word-of-mouth’ advertising for the museum, or (critically) as a source of danger for the exhibited objects. Although clicking selfies is a frequent, and even dominant practice, the article shows that the visitors feel embarrassed and guilty because of their behaviour, and analyses the reasons for this apparent contradiction.

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