Epistemological clashes in digital preservation: Virtual "hospitals for objects" Versus online "meeting houses"

Drawing on the Virtual Museum of the Pacific case study, my research explores epistemological differences between Western and Indigenous Pacific cultural systems of understanding and conceptualization of cultural memory and identity. The article critically analyses the digital repatriation and preservation project "The Virtual Museum of the Pacific," developed by the Australian Museum in 2010. The main goal of this research is to identify and explain some major epistemological problems and cross-cultural misunderstandings which emerged as a result of an attempt to preserve in electronic format the largest ethnographic collection of Pacific cultures