The Rautenstrauch Joest Museum is a Cologne ethnography museum. It is the only museum of its kind in the region. It has one of the ten largest and most important ethnographic collections in Germany, with more than 65,000 objects from Oceania, Africa, Asia and America. The core of the collection derives from the legacy of the geographer and ethnologist originally from Cologne Wilhelm Joest (1852-1897): following his untimely death, the family donated their collection to the city, which included over 3,400 artifacts.
The museum itinerary is divided into 10 different thematic sectors: “Encounter and appropriation: crossing borders”, “The disfigured gaze: prejudices”, “The world in the showcase: Museum”, “Questions of opinion? Art , Doors in transition "," Living spaces - forms of life: living "," The body as a stage: clothing and jewelry "," The farewell staged: death and the afterlife "," Diversity of faith: religions "," Between the worlds: rituals ".
This approach, which compares cultures, including European culture, aims to stimulate confrontation with cultures and the reflection and relativization of one's own cultural perspective, which too often we can define as ethnocentric.
