Carolina Valente Cardoso
About Carolina Valente Cardoso
I am a post-doctoral researcher at the School of Global Studies and the Centre for Anthropological Research on Museums and Heritage in Berlin.
I was awarded an International Postdoc grant from the Swedish Research Council to study the decolonial potentialities of parallel/handling collections in ethnographic museums. Investigating different museums of Ethnograhy/World Culture(s) in Europe, I want to understand, first, how are objects construed in parallel collections, and what classification schemes govern their existence and management. I study what conceptions and practices of care are associated with this type of collections, and what is the relationship between such practices of care and the creation of value. The overarching aim of my research is to elaborate on how parallel collections offer a new angle to current trenchant debates on ethnographic museums and explore ways in which they can contribute to more sustainable, just, and inclusive engagements with the public.
As a PhD student in Anthropology in SGS, I wrote a dissertation on North-South migration focusing the case of contemporary Portuguese migrants in Angola. Before starting this postdoctoral project, I took part in research about local responses to the climate crisis also in Angola, together with Ruy Blanes.
My curiosity about what the present does to the past, and the past does to the present, particularly in postcolonial relations, connects the different themes of my work.
I have teaching experience in undergraduate and master levels on topics ranging from postcolonialism and gender, to global politics of heritage and ethnographic methods.