Mary Rose Museum's Queer Lense

[1stWorldProblems]

I bloody love this musuem & it's one of the few to use tech to enhance its exhibits with the "ghosts" it projects on the hull (as opposed to unnecessary "interactive" displays that 50-somethings are cool and break after a few months but which kids have seen better done on their tablets but that's another thread). This came up on my timeline today - viewing a number of their objects through a queer lens - or going on about 21st century concerns that can only be linked to the said object by tying yourself in knots.

https://maryrose.org/blog/collections/the-collections-team/queering-the-mary-rose-s-collection/

SO tedious - the wreck and the objects found are fascinating without layering on 21st century superfluous info. It's not even interesting or original thoughts - just the usual guff.

It's thought that one of the reasons the ship sank was that the crew didn't necessarily have a common language as the Spanish sailors didn't speak Engish - not sure I buy that but its always interesting to see evidence of migration - although the best one was the skeleton in a Roman cemetry near York that scientific testing suggested was born in China so had presumably travelled the entire SIlk Road and then moved on to Britain.

If anyone from the museum is reading this thread, could you get the intern to write something about the crew's starsigns?

Tia.

You’re right - it’s thought to be Catherine Parr in the engraving, meeting Sir William Paulet. I knew it was one of the Catherines. I wonder if I’ve also got mixed up with Charles Brandon’s wife, as Brandon is also shown in the engraving and he died not long after the Mary Rose sank. I know there’s a story somewhere there just can’t quite remember.

Also not helped by Sir George Carew only having been appointed Vice Admiral the day before, and therefore not having had time to work with the ship’s master and crew before attempting a tricky manoeuvre in a very short time frame and in front of Henry.

The Times has picked this up: https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/97de48ce-3629-11ee-8810-d3022cd752ba?shareToken=483157041049642cfe531320aca70a77

Somewhat unsurprisingly, the LGBTQIA+ word salad is the work of an intern...

That is very funny. Philip Hensher is very much on the Wrong Side of History as well, which makes it even better.

The most notable among hundreds of complaints came from Professor Philip Hensher, the novelist and academic, who is gay. He said: “I am as keen as anyone on gay sex but I have to say to these curators — you’re f*ing mental.”

Say it like it is, Prof Hensher.

Wasn't the Mary Rose also top heavy with too many guns (trying to impress the French) so that when she heeled over with the wind the weight pulled her over and she took on water? Carew's also reported to have said something about 'Knaves I cannot rule,' the theory being they didn't understand the order to close the gunports.

The author places the blog in an international context by saying that other museums are “queering their collections”, including Tate Britain and the Wellcome Collection in London, the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam and the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York.
The Mary Rose Trust defended the blog, stating: “Queering the collection is an approach used by museums around the world

Yes, and that's the problem, isn't it? 'Imaginatively reinterpeting' (to put it kindly) the past to support your own personal prejudices despite the fact there's nothing to support it and it bears no relevance to what you're talking about.

The 17thc ship Vasa, in Sweden, similarly sank and was raised in the 1960s - if anyone gets the chance on a visit to Stockholm, it’s a fantastic museum and the vessel is just staggering in every way - but I wonder if this sort of queering is happening there now too. It wasn’t when I was last there but that was almost 10 years ago.

Very recently they did discover that a crew-member’s skeleton they’d always classified as male was actually female - they used a new and more precise DNA technique. One report I read did speculate that maybe the woman smuggled herself on board by dressing as a man. But here I expect they’d be insisting she was AFAB but enby. And used their nit comb to style their gender-defying short hair while scrutinising theirself critically yet defiantly in their hand-mirror.

One report I read did speculate that maybe the woman smuggled herself on board by dressing as a man

Women were allowed on board British navy ships when they were in port, so perhaps the Vasa sailed and she was still on board for some reason.

Another article I saw more or less said that. There may well have been women on board anyway.

Slightly awkward for them because that skeleton was one they chose to make a facial reconstruction from, calling it 'Gustav' when they thought it was a male (those facial reconstructions were eerily lifelike, I remember being astounded by them when I saw them). But the artist went back and redid it when the remains were reclassified. It’s an interesting read.

Another one who would recommend going to visit the Vasa. It is incredible to see, and quite fascinating in terms of the different approaches to how you raise a shipwreck and the extent to which you restore the ship. (And their displays have now sorted out which skeletons are female).

Not a shipwreck for which there has been archaeology but, in 1512, there was a battle between the English and French fleets (off the French coast). One of the English ships became entangled with I think the French flagships, both caught fire and sank with huge loss of life. However, because the French had been caught somewhat unawares, there were multiple women on board who had been dining on the ship and there was no time to get them off before the battle.

https://www.vam.ac.uk/dundee/articles/queering-the-museum am planning to visit here and I noticed that they also have a definite plan to "queer" the Museum.

That ^ was the Battle of Saint Mathieu, off Brest. The Breton/French ship which exploded was the Marie-la-Cordelière or just Cordelière and the English ship was the Regent.

The crew of the Cordelière had thrown grappling hooks to pull the ships together and board the Regent, a common tactic at the time

The Mary Rose was involved in the engagement, attacking the Petite Louise, the other ship covering the retreat of the French/Breton fleet into Brest.

The article doesn't really match the headline. It seems to cover the perfectly sensible and mainstream idea of uncovering and telling the stories of previously marginalised and silenced groups, such as LGBT people - all good.

The phrase "queering the museum" is awful though. Why not just say improving representarion of LGBT people? Or telling the stories of LGBT people? Maybe it is much instinctive negative reaction to the word queer as I recall it as an awful term of abuse aimed at gay people when I was younger.

Wasn't the Mary Rose also top heavy with too many guns (trying to impress the French) so that when she heeled over with the wind the weight pulled her over and she took on water? Carew's also reported to have said something about 'Knaves I cannot rule,' the theory being they didn't understand the order to close the gunports.

At the time, the Mary Rose was heading north towards Spitbank, which would have grounded her, so the master knew he’d have to turn and quickly. It’s possible that the ship heeled whilst trying to make a sharp turn, which allowed water in through the open gun ports. She may already have been holed by the French earlier in the day on the port side around the waterline, so water might already have accumulated and the extra ingress through the gun ports was enough to destabilise her.

Thank you - I always forget how to spell the name of the French ship!

I remember the story because of Edward Howard who I have always imagine as a swash buckling Errol Flynn type - swearing revenge for his friend's death on the Regent only to die himself in a reckless attack (going down clutching his admiral's whistle of office).

I almost went the other week but didn't, I'll pop up soon and pay a visit.

It seems to cover the perfectly sensible and mainstream idea of uncovering and telling the stories of previously marginalised and silenced groups, such as LGBT people - all good

Because it imposes a random, un-evidenced and unrelated interpretation on an artefact, that's why. We have no idea how many 'marginalised and silenced' LGBT people were on the Mary Rose or if in fact there were any. It's the hijacking of history for a narrow agenda and the problem with it is a lot of people will read it, and take it as true (because a respected museum said so).

The problem with telling the stories of silenced groups lies in the fact that they WERE silenced. You aren't telling their story, you're telling what you think ought to be their story and what you want to be their story. And interpreting everything through that lens, whether it's justified or not. (See comment above about people believing it).

The article doesn't really match the headline. It seems to cover the perfectly sensible and mainstream idea of uncovering and telling the stories of previously marginalised and silenced groups, such as LGBT people - all good.

And how would we know the sexuality of any of the crew of the Mary Rose? As for the T, gender identity wasn't invented until the 1960s at the very earliest.

And how would we know the sexuality of any of the crew of the Mary Rose?

And frankly, why does it matter? the story is fascinating enough without having people's random preoccupations projected onto it.

Fun fact - the admiral of the Mary Rose was married to the daughter of one of Anne Boleyn's alleged lovers.

Why not just say improving representarion of LGBT people? Or telling the stories of LGBT people?

LGBTQ+, you monster!

It is about telling the stories of marginalised and silenced groups at the appropriate museums/historic sites rather than at all of them (by making tenuous connections). It makes sense to talk about connections between Africa, Spain and England and the experiences of black people in Tudor England at the Mary Rose museum because we have evidence that connects those stories to the ship.

Talking about LGBT experiences in Tudor England makes more sense somewhere like Farleigh Hungerford (though that is a far smaller visitor attraction) because Lord Hungerford was executed due to the Tudor Buggery Law.

How I imagine the person who wrote this (but without the blue hair)

From the Scottish design museum piece:

I hope we find a way to do something similar in the gallery, so that all experiences of queerness, whether it’s the working-class men cruising the streets of Glasgow in the early 20th century, or lesbians who were part of the Scottish Women’s Social and Political Union – or more recently in the Trans Pride Marches and resurgent queer literary scene of Scotland, are told. As these lives and histories are important, and no design history is complete without them.

Perhaps they could have some of the misogynistic placards as a display of design excellence? The "Decapitate TERFs" one for instance.