Both the museum and community of origin agree it was stolen, why has BBC put ‘stolen’ in quotes? Are they too worried someone might come knocking at the British Museum’s door too?
The museum doesn’t use the word stolen
The museum believes it acted in good faith but now understands that the individual who “sold” it to Barbeau did so “without the cultural, spiritual, or political authority to do so on behalf of the Nisga’a Nation”.
The BBC is very careful about using scare quotes where there isn’t absolutely consensus on language
Ownership without authority is the definition of stolen, museums don’t use the word ‘stolen’. They call it “disputed provenance”, when forced to acknowledge it.
Also BBC didn’t seem too concerned about using the word ‘stolen’ for a story about a different museum returning artefacts, even though the NGA’s media release also doesn’t use the word.
I think BBC might be just a little conservative at the moment about this language though, given the British Museum’s recent internal thefts.
It looks haunted why would we want it back?
