On October 5th, 2015, the workshop "Museum in Global History" was held at Freie Universität Berlin. It was organized by Yuki Terada, a junior member of the GHC hub at the University of Tokyo who was at Freie Universität Berlin as a 2014 GHC scholarship student. The field of museum studies is flourishing in Berlin. Not only does it have a Museum Island that is UNESCO World Heritage Site, a new cultural facility (Humboldt-Forum) is in the process of being built in the city. The workshop, which hosted scholars from both within and outside of Germany, was organized based on the idea that it is important to create an opportunity to think about world history in terms of museums and aimed to comparatively consider the historical background to the concept of museums spreading throughout the world as well as the ways in which various cultures have been represented.

The workshop began with opening remarks by Professor Sebastian Conrad (Friedrich-Meinecke-Institut), and followed by a video message from The University of Tokyo's Professor Masahi Haneda. A video presentation by Oxford University Professor Gabriella Elgenius (co-editor of National Museums and Nation-Building in Europe 1750-2010) was then shown. Professor Elgenius was one of the coordinators of the European National Museums: Identity Politics, the Uses of the Past and the European Citizen (EUNAMUS 2010-2013), a project organized by the European Commission. In her presentation, she discussed the birth and development of national museums in Europe in terms of “rivalling clusters”, and analyzed the role played by them in the establishment of the nation-state, namely, making its imagined community visible.

Four doctoral course students presented their case studies respectively on various places throughout the world.

Yuki Terada (The University of Tokyo's Graduate School) gave a presentation entitled "Visualizing the 'World' in Museums: Case Studies from Iran," in which she discussed how the concept of museums was introduced to Persia in the latter part of the 19th century and developed while being shaped by internationalization and nationalism. Furthermore, presenting the examples of the National Museum of Iran and the country's art museums, she considered how world cultures are represented in museum spaces as well as changes in how Persian and Iranian culture has been positioned within the cultural map of the world.

In a presentation entitled "Museums: the imagination of Europe vis-à-vis Korea," Ji Young Park (École du Louvre, L’UAPV, L’UQAM) reconsidered the history of Korean museums built under Japan's colonial rule. First, she explained the background to the translation into Korean of the concepts of state/nation, public, and civilization. Then, she analyzed the image and understanding of the modern West represented by museums in the 20th century process of Korea leaving behind Japan's influence and aiming to form an independent and civilized nation-state.

The presentation of Masaki Komori (The University of Tokyo's Graduate School, Temple University) was entitled "Embodying the 1976: Medical Museum and American National Identity in the Bicentennial Tourism in Philadelphia" and considered the example of the Mütter Museum, a medical museum in Philadelphia, USA. Aiming to explain how the act of displaying the human body was received, he discussed the museum's operating policy that was crafted on the bicentennial of the United States' founding (1976), and argued that science and nationalism were important elements that shaped it.

The title of Fabiola Arellano's (Ludwig Maximilians Universität) presentation was "Musealization of Memory. The internal armed conflict in Peru (1980-2000)." Using the example of The Place of Memory, Tolerance and Social Inclusion, a museum made to preserve the memories of the internal armed conflict in Peru, she considered the issue of reparations for victims and exhibiting memory, locating them in the context of global history. Peru's government expressed reservations about the plan to build the museum, but it was eventually realized with support from the German government and international opinion.

Next, Annegret Bergmann (Freie Universität Berlin), an invited commentator who specializes in Japanese theater and cultural policies shared her comments. Bergmann explained how museums were divided into two types in cultural policies from the Meiji Restoration (1868) onwards in Japan: hakubutsukan (history, ethnography, science, etc. museums) and bijutsukan (fine art museums). She then described how while modern and contemporary works of art were on display at the latter, on the other hand pre-Meiji artworks and relics of the past were displayed at Japan's oldest hakubutsukan, the Tokyo National Museum (est. 1872), thereby representing the empire of Japan. The process of history being narrated by objects on display to the general public and tradition being created, said Bergmann, can be found in not only Meiji period Japan but many other countries as well. After her comments concluded, there was time for a general discussion that was open to the floor.

The general discussion primarily centered around a comparative analysis of examples from European countries, Iran, Korea, the United States, Peru, and Japan. Discussion points can be divided roughly into three issues. The first was the history of the acceptance of the concept of "museum." It was confirmed that in the background to many countries adopting museums was their desire to be internationally recognized as independent and acquire the status as a civilized country. It was stated that the perspective of museum's competitive relationships discussed by Professor Elgenius could probably be applied to cases not only in Europe but also those in countries around the world. It was also pointed out that a pattern can be detected in the existence of nationalism-creating exhibits on the one hand and those that encompass all of humanity (British Museum, etc.) on the other. Next, participants exchanged their opinions regarding the scientific assurance and universality of museums. When selected memories and artworks are displayed in the space of a museum, they are understood as scientifically assured realities. Many were of the opinion that there is a need to reconsider the classifications, display methods, and universality created in the nineteenth century. Lastly, there was a discussion of the political messages within the distinctions between things that can be or cannot be exhibited. Participants familiar with the Humboldt-Forum related experimental projects and their outcomes also actively participated in the discussion. It was a fruitful workshop that offered considerable knowledge to its participants.