A living museum is a settlement of a specific language group build in such way as it used to be built before the European colonial influence changed the traditional culture. The participants working at the living museums act out the great variety of their original culture. The actors wear traditional clothes reconstructed for the museum and offer activities representing the equivilent past to interested guests with the main focus on the highest possible degree of authenticity.

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Traditional sing and dance groups

A traditional sing and dance group is a group of musicians in reconstructed clothing, which present traditional music and dances of their orginal culture. Clothing, instruments, dances and music are presented as authentical as possible and create an image of the traditional culture before the first European influences.The main difference to the Living museum is that these groups do not have a fixed venue. Flexible performances at different places are possible.

Projects with traditional artists concentrate primarily on individual persons of small groups.The aims of a traditional artist is not so much to represent his/her original culture in such a way as is possible for the living museum. He/she should concentrate more on the presentation of the musical or artistic expectations of his tradition. A traditional artist as part of the cultural network should be able to describe to visitors the central importance of the music or art and crafts for the origins of his culture. Furthermore he should be able to even demonstrate the different periods of the artistic developments.

Information about projects of the Living Culture Foundation Namibia...

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