Museums have long been viewed as exclusive, excluding, and as antiseptic to intimacy. In the past few decades, however, humanized experiences—cultivated by curators, educators, artists, activists, ...and marketers alike—have emerged as the reason for being for these cornerstones of community. Such experiences are often possible only in museum settings, where cultural exploration, probing conversation, and safe risk-taking can occur in spaces now becoming sacred through inclusiveness. This book brings together an interdisciplinary collection of essays examining the kinds of human experiences and interactions that have converted the once-sterile museum into a space of enlivenment and enrichment, as well as physical and emotional well-being. The essays focus for the first time on the uniquely human and humanizing experiences to be found in the collections, programs, exhibitions, and spaces of today’s museums.
Museums have long been viewed as exclusive, excluding, and as antiseptic to intimacy. In the past few decades, however, humanized experiences—cultivated by curators, educators, artists, activists, ...and marketers alike—have emerged as the reason for being for these cornerstones of community. Such experiences are often possible only in museum settings, where cultural exploration, probing conversation, and safe risk-taking can occur in spaces now becoming sacred through inclusiveness. This book brings together an interdisciplinary collection of essays examining the kinds of human experiences and interactions that have converted the once-sterile museum into a space of enlivenment and enrichment, as well as physical and emotional well-being. The essays focus for the first time on the uniquely human and humanizing experiences to be found in the collections, programs, exhibitions, and spaces of today’s museums.
Today, most museums in Europe and the United States present themselves as democratic institutions. Meanwhile, scholarly literature puts much emphasis on the democratising potential of social media ...for museum practice. Prompted by the scarcity of factual data on museums' employment of social media, this article presents an empirical study on how art museums use Instagram. Specifically, the research focuses on the extent to, and the ways in which, art museums are harnessing Instagram in order to fulfil their democratic aspirations. Through content analysis, the study shows that Instagram's potential for a more democratic museology is being harnessed to a very limited extent. Museums predominantly use Instagram for more traditional promotional purposes or adopt an authoritative knowledge-telling attitude in their posts. Nevertheless, we present several promising exceptions, that we analyse through close reading. These examples pave the way to a more democratic museum practice on Instagram.
As museums face conflicting demands on maintaining and caring for their collections, opening for visitor engagement, and being more inclusive in their practice, new approaches are needed to museum ...work. This article introduces a democratic and inclusive approach focusing on the relational properties of the artefact - the Method of the Thing (Tigenes Metode). We use interviews with different museum professionals in Sweden. The method allows knowledge to emerge from the convergence of different actors within and outside the museum who negotiate their expertise, (professional) roles and technical infrastructure of the museum by foregrounding the object rather than the curators' story. We use the encoding/decoding model to discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the method where centring the object allows for a process of democratisation and polyvocality to take shape, thus allowing divergent narratives to emerge.
The paper reports the critical-analytical investigation on existent models and processes of enjoyment and use in the field of cultural heritage, combining space perception and experimentation, ...fostering knowledge transfer to a wide audience, multisensory cultural experience and interactive participation with the aim of enhancing the current models. The acquisition of knowledge from different disciplinary cores – design, archaeology, physics, cognitive sciences, computer science, electronics, art history – allowed tracing the ongoing transformations and obtaining an overview of the current models of fruition both nationally and internationally. The challenge will be to give further emphasis to the improvement of current models and to guide the future design of interactive enjoyment and use by bringing together the various aspects analysed in order to return meaningful and customized narratives based on the users' needs, through perceptual, immersive, and multisensory experiences in the spatial dimension of the project, thus engaging the user at multiple levels.
Increased migration has prompted discussions regarding most of the prime functions of museums as societal institutions. When the population and potential users of museums become more heterogeneous ...and diverse, the idea of a shared common national history becomes contested. Immigrant cultures have an important function in history writing and in heritage production. Many museum officials are currently concerned about developing new means to enable museums to face the challenges arising from increased migration. Such societal changes effect both the larger, long established national institutions, and the smaller regional or local museums. Although their means and methods vary significantly, the degree of inventiveness, engagement and resourcefulness is not necessarily proportional to the institution's age or size. In this article, we ask what are the means and approaches that Norwegian museums currently use to involve migrants in museum work and how do they include stories and experiences from modern migrants in their collections.
This article highlights the steps taken by three museums interested in providing programming for adults who are blind or have low vision. While the museums' facilities and collections are very ...different from each other, they found common solutions to providing programmatic access. These case studies will provide guidance for other museums interested in piloting or improving programs for adults who are blind or visually impaired.
The paper analyzes the Total Museum (Museu Integral - Musée Integral) as a core question for debate in the field of Museology, as well as the different approaches and narratives developed around this ...concept. Starting from the idea of Museum as phenomenon, it unveils convergences and divergences between the theoretical matrixes that found the concepts of 'total museum', 'community museum' and 'ecomuseum', and the proposals and realizations of a museum practice devoted to the social sphere. It comments the tendency to consider the Declaration of Santiago as a myth and as an ideological matrix; and proposes a revision of the role and significance of the Santiago Roundtable, as well as of the recommendations consigned in it, for the development of museum theory and practice – analyzing their consequences and applicability in the policies and goals of Museology at global level, specially in Latin America. It emphasizes the need of research and deeper analyses of the relationships between museum theory and practice in Latin America, which may update the mentioned concepts under the light of the contemporary epistème and according to the world key strategies for culture, heritage and development. Finally, it presents the concept of Inclusive Museum – theoretical matrix, synchronized with the ethics and thoughts of Museology in the present days
This paper provides a theoretical perspective on an art museum as an ecosystem, drawing on the ecological perspective described by Gregory Bateson. This perspective views individuals, human ...societies, and nature as interconnected and interdependent through communicative networks. Museums fit nicely into this paradigm in that staff members, departments, collections, mission statements, visitors, and other cultural and educational institutions are linked together, influencing and being influenced by each other. The operational systems of many museums, however, are hierarchical and non-communicative. As a result, knowledge and ideas are not efficiently shared and transformed among museum professionals and the communities they serve. These museum practices have excluded diverse perspectives and neglected the interests of underrepresented people. Through hypothesizing the ecological museum model, I provide an alternative museum management and educational model that sees museums as holistic and ecological institutions as part of their larger communities and societies. By introducing this theoretical model, I hope to influence museum discourse in ways that make museum practices more inclusive.
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