Hostname: page-component-84b7d79bbc-7nlkj Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-07-27T06:17:58.989Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

A Semiotics of Cultural Property Argument

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 September 2007

Alan Audi
Alan Audi
Affiliation:
Attorney, Paris, France.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This article applies the tools of legal semiotics to examine the terms, modalities, and conventions of legal argument in the cultural property context. In a first instance, the author re-enacts Duncan Kennedy's study of recurrent patterns within legal argument to illustrate the highly structured nature of most cultural property argument. This mapping exercise shows how legal concepts draw their meaning in part from their place within a broader linguistic system, and as a result cannot by themselves form an adequate basis for ethical positions. Following this, the pervasive Elgin Marbles controversy is shown to resemble a myth (in Roland Barthes's sense of the term) behind which a series of value judgments and support systems are embedded into cultural property argument. The conclusion presents a number of observations sketching a framework centered on restitution as a starting point for resolution of cultural property disputes.Acknowledgements: I am grateful for the many helpful comments received on previous versions of this piece, especially from Ali Wick, Lama Abu Odeh, and Alex Bauer. A special thank you to Natalia and Sofia for their support.

Type
FEATURE ARTICLE
Information
International Journal of Cultural Property , Volume 14 , Issue 2 , May 2007 , pp. 131 - 156
Copyright
© 2007 International Cultural Property Society

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Anderson, Benedict. Imagined Communities, rev ed. London: Verso, 1991.
Atwood, Roger. Stealing History: Tomb Raiders, Smugglers, and the Looting of the Ancient World. New York: St. Martin's Press, 2004.
Balkin, J.M. “The Crystalline Structure of Legal Thought.” Rutgers Law Review 39 (1986): 1.Google Scholar
Balkin, J.M.. “The Hohfeldian Approach to Law and Semiotics.” University of Miami Law Review 44 (1990): 1117.Google Scholar
Balkin, J.M. “The Promise of Legal Semiotics”, Texas Law Review 69 (1991): 1831.Google Scholar
Barthes, Roland. Mythologies. Paris: Editions du Seuil, 1957.
Bator, Paul M. “An Essay on the International Trade in Art.” Stanford Law Review 34 (1981–1982): 275.Google Scholar
Bauer, Alexander A. “Is What You See All You Get? Recognizing Meaning in Archeology,” Journal of Social Archeology 2 (1) (2002): 37.Google Scholar
Bauer, Alexander, Shanel Linsay, and Stephen Urice, “When Theory, Practice and Policy Collide, or Why Do Archaeologists Support Cultural Property Claims?” In Archaeology and Capitalism: From Ethics to Politics, edited by Yannis Hamilakis and Philip Duke, Walnut Creek, CA: Left Coast Press, 2007.
Bhlen, Celestine. “Major Museums Affirm Right to Keep Long-Held Antiquities.” New York Times, December 11, 2002.
British Museum. Declaration on the Importance and Value of Universal Museums. http://www.thebritishmuseum.ac.uk/newsroom/current2003/universalmuseums.html (accessed on May 18, 2007).
Brodie, Neil, Jennifer Doole, and Colin Renfrew, eds., Trade in Illicit Antiquities: The Destruction of the World's Archaeological Heritage. Cambridge: McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, 1999.
Browning, Robert. “The Parthenon in History.” In The Elgin Marbles: Should They Be Returned to Greece? edited by Christopher Hitchens. London: Verso, 1997.
Candelaria, Maria Aurora Fe. “The Angkor Sites of Cambodia: The Conflicting Values of Sustainable Tourism and State Sovereignty.” Brookings Journal of International Law 31 (2005): 253.Google Scholar
Carman, John. Against Cultural Property: Archeology, Heritage and Ownership. London: Gerald Duckworth, 2005.
Chang, David N. “Stealing Beauty: Stopping the Madness of Illicit Art Trafficking.” Houston Journal of International Law 28 (2006): 829.Google Scholar
Culler, Jonathan. Barthes: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002.CrossRef
Dalí, Salvador. The Secret Life of Salvador Dalí. New York: Dover Publications, 1942.
DuBoff, Leonard D., and Christy O. King. Art Law in a Nutshell, 3rd. ed., St. Paul, MN: West Group, 2000.
Durrans, Brian. “The Future of Ethnographic Exhibitions,” Zeitschrift für Ethnologie 118 (1993).Google Scholar
Fanon, Frantz. The Wretched of the Earth. Trans. Constance Farrington. New York: Grove Press, 1963.
Fiedler, Wilfried, and Stefan Turner. Bibliographie zum Recht des Internationalen Kulturgüterschutzes (Bibliography on the Law of the International Protection of Cultural Property). Berlin: Gruyter, 2003.
Fitz Gibbon, Kate, ed. Who Owns the Past? Cultural Policy, Cultural Property and the Law. Piscataway, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2005.
Fitzpatrick, James F. “Steal UNIDROIT: Is USIA the Villain?” N.Y.U. Journal of International Law and Politics 31 (1998): 47.Google Scholar
George, Tanya Evelyn. “Using Customary International Law to Identify ‘Fetishistic’ Claims to Cultural Property.” New York University Law Review 80 (2005): 1207.Google Scholar
Goldberg, Adam. “Reaffirming McClain: The National Stolen Property Act and the Abiding Trade in Looted Cultural Objects.” UCLA Law Review 53 (2006): 1031.Google Scholar
Handler, Richard. “Cultural Property and Culture Theory.” Journal of Social Archaeology 3 (2003): 355.Google Scholar
Hearing Before the Subcommittee on Criminal Law of the Committee on the Judiciary, U.S. Senate, Ninety-Ninth Congress, First Session, on S.605, A Bill to Amend Sections 2314 and 2315 of Title 18, U.S. Code, Relating to Stolen Archeological Material (May 22, 1985).
Hitchens, Christopher. The Elgin Marbles: Should They Be Returned to Greece? London: Verso, 1987.
Hoffman, Barbara T., ed. Art and Cultural Heritage: Law, Policy and Practice. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, 2005.
International Bureau of the Permanent Court of Arbitration, ed. Peace Palace Papers: Resolution of Cultural Property Disputes 7 (2004).
Kennedy, Duncan. “Form and Substance in Private Law Adjudication.” Harvard Law Review 89 (1976): 1685.Google Scholar
Kennedy, Duncan. “The Structure of Blackstone's Commentaries.” Buffalo Law Review 28 (1979): 205.Google Scholar
Kennedy, Duncan. “A Semiotics of Legal Argument.” Syracuse Law Review 42 (1991): 75.Google Scholar
Kennedy, Duncan. “European Introduction: Four Objections” In Collected Courses of the Academy of European Law, Vol. 3, Book 2. Netherlands: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1994, 317.
Knox, Christine K. “They've Lost Their Marbles: 2002 Universal Museums' Declaration, the Elgin Marbles and the Future of the Repatriation Movement.” Suffolk Transnational Law Review 29 (2006): 315.Google Scholar
Leiris, Michel. L'Afrique fantôme. Paris: Gallimard, 1934.
Marks, Peter. “The Ethics of Art Dealing,” International Journal of Cultural Property 7 (1998): 116.Google Scholar
Mauch Messenger, Phyllis, ed. The Ethics of Collecting Cultural Property: Whose Culture? Whose Property? Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1999.
Merryman, John Henry, “Two Ways of Thinking About Cultural Property.” American Journal of International Law 80 (1986): 831.Google Scholar
Merryman, John Henry, ed. Thinking About the Elgin Marbles: Critical Essays on Cultural Property, Art and Law. Aspen Publishers, 2000.
Merryman, John Henry, ed. Imperialism, Art and Restitution. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
Oyediran, Joanna. Plunder, Destruction and Despoliation: An Analysis of Israel's Violations of the International Law of Cultural Property in the Occupied West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Ramallah: Al Haq, 1997.
Paul, Jeremy. “A Bedtime Story.” Virginia Law Review 74 (1988): 915.Google Scholar
Paul, Jeremy. “The Politics of Legal Semiotics.” Texas Law Review 69 (1991): 1779.Google Scholar
Renfrew, Colin. Loot, Legitimacy and Ownership: The Ethical Crisis in Archeology. London: Gerald Duckworth, 2001.
American Association of Museum Directors. Report of the AAMD (American Association of Museum Directors) Task Force on the Acquisition of Archeological Materials and Ancient Art, June 10, 2004; International Council of Museums Code of Professional Ethics, 1995.
Richman, Jennifer R., and Marion P. Forsyth, eds. Legal Perspectives on Cultural Resources. Landham: Altamira Press, 2004.
Said, Edward. “Representing the Colonized: Anthropology's Interlocutors.” Critical Inquiry 15 (Winter 1989): 213.Google Scholar
Said, Edward. Culture and Imperialism. New York: Vintage Books, 1993.
Salem, Aisha Y. “Finders Keepers? The Repatriation of Egyptian Art.” Journal of Technology Law and Policy 10 (2005): 173.Google Scholar
Sax, Joseph L. Playing Darts with a Rembrandt. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1999.
Shapiro, Daniel. “Repatriation: A Modest Proposal” N.Y.U. Journal of International Law and Policy 31 (1998–1999): 95.Google Scholar
Schlag, Pierre. “Cannibal Moves, An Essay on the Metamorphoses of the Legal Distinction.” Stanford Law Review 40 (1988): 929.Google Scholar
Scigliano, Eric. “Inglorious Restorations: Destroying Old Masterpieces in Order to Save Them.” Harper's, August 1, 2005.
Sebastian, Lynne. “Archeology and the Law.” In Legal Perspectives on Cultural Resources, edited by Jennifer R. Richman and Marion P. Forsyth, Lanham: AltaMira Press, 2004, 3.
Singer, Joseph William, “The Player and the Cards: Nihilism and Legal Theory” The Yale Law Journal 94 (1984).Google Scholar
Stroh, Heidi. “Preserving Fine Art from the Ravages of Art Restoration.” Albany Law Journal of Sciences & Technology 16 (2005–2006): 239.Google Scholar
Warring, Jane. “Underground Debates: The Fundamental Differences of Opinion that Thwart UNESCO's Progress in Fighting the Illicit Trade in Cultural Property.” Emory International Law Review 19 (2005): 227.Google Scholar
Wiersma, Lindsey L. “Indigenous Lands as Cultural Property: A New Approach to Indigenous Land Claims.” Duke Law Journal 54 (2005): 1061.Google Scholar