Shaila Bhatti's immersive study of the Lahore Museum in Pakistan is one of the first books to offer an in-depth historical and ethnographic analysis of a South Asian museum. Bhatti thus presents an alternative example of visitor experience and museum practice to that of the West, which has been the dominant museological model to date. This examination of the Lahore Museum's objects, staff, and visitors (past and present) provides an informative case study that reveals local perceptions and uses of museums in non-Western societies to be fraught with social, political, and cultural implications and appropriations. Through Lahore, Bhatti examines the history of exchange between Britian and South Asia and advances our current understanding of what constitutes postcolonial museum interpretation and its public.

In this comparative, international study Marilena Alivizatou investigates the relationship between museums and the new concept of "intangible heritage." She charts the rise of intangible heritage within the global sphere of UN cultural policy and explores its implications both in terms of international politics and with regard to museological practice and critical theory. Using a grounded ethnographic methodology, Alivizatou examines intangible heritage in the local complexities of museum and heritage work in Oceania, the Americas and Europe. This multi-sited, cross-cultural approach highlights key challenges currently faced by cultural institutions worldwide in understanding and presenting this form of heritage.

Eugene Boban began life in humble circumstances in Paris, traveled to the California Gold Rush, and later became a recognized authority on pre-Columbian cultures. He also invented an entire category of archaeological artifact: the Aztec crystal skull. By his own admission, he successfully "palmed off" a number of these crystal skulls on the curators of Europe's leading museums. How could that happen, and who was this man? Detailed are the travels, self-education, and archaeological explorations of Eugene Boban; this book also explores the circumstances that allowed him to sell fakes to museums that would remain undetected for over a century.

The field of cultural heritage is no longer solely dependent on the expertise of art and architectural historians, archaeologists, conservators, curators, and site and museum administrators. It has dramatically expanded across disciplinary boundaries and social contexts, with even the basic definition of what constitutes cultural heritage being widened far beyond the traditional categories of architecture, artifacts, archives, and art. Heritage now includes vernacular architecture, intangible cultural practices, knowledge, and language, performances and rituals, as well as cultural landscapes. Heritage has also become increasingly entangled with the broader social, political, and economic contexts in which heritage is created, managed, transmitted, protected, or even destroyed. Heritage protection now encompasses a growing set of methodological approaches whose objectives are not necessarily focused upon the maintenance of material fabric, which has traditionally been cultural heritage's primary concern. The Oxford Handbook of Public Heritage Theory and Practice charts some of the major sites of convergence between the humanities and the social sciences, where new disciplinary perspectives are being brought to bear on heritage. These convergences have the potential to provide the interdisciplinary expertise needed not only to critique but also to achieve the intertwined intellectual, political, and socioeconomic goals of cultural heritage in the twenty-first century. This volume highlights the potential contributions of development studies, political science, anthropology, management studies, human geography, ecology, psychology, sociology, cognitive studies, and education to heritage studies.

Towards the Museum of the Future explores, through a series of authoritative essays, some of the major developments in European museums as they struggle to adapt in a rapidly changing world. It embraces a wide range of European countries, all types of museums and exhibitions and the needs of different museum audiences, and discusses the museum as communicator and educator in the context of current cultural concerns.

Museums everywhere have the potential to serve as agents of change-bringing people together, contributing to local communities, and changing people's lives. So how can we, as individuals, radically expand the work of museums to live up to this potential? How can we more fiercely recognize the meaningful work that museums are doing to enact change around the relevant issues in our communities? How can we work together to build a stronger culture of equity and care within museums ? Questions like these are increasingly vital for all museum professionals to consider, no matter what your role is within your institution. They are also important questions for all of us to be thinking about more deeply as citizens and community members. This book is about the work we need to do to become changemakers and demand that that our museums take action toward positive social change and bring people together into a more just, equitable, compassionate, and connected society. It is a journey toward tapping the energies within all of us to make change happen and proactively shape a new future.

Gain insight into history organizations of all shapes and sizes in this book, which addresses the opportunities and challenges of public historians' work through the prism of the past, present, and future of our communities and institutions, as well as the public history field itself. Featuring essays from some of the leading thinkers in the profession, this book not only looks at major themes as they relate to historians' work but also inspires creativity in how they approach their work in an institutional and personal sense. The themes themselves are important, but even more important are the articles (presented here as chapters) that amplify the overarching themes. Chapters discuss in-depth and through real-world examples, the work of history organizations. They specifically focus on the challenges and opportunities that are important to any nonprofit (or small business)-entrepreneurship, change, transformation, possibility/opportunity, partnerships-but also those unique to history organizations, leverage the asset of history to: explore place, commemorate the past (and therefore better understand the present), demonstrate how it is people who make history, and discern how to use the past to chart the future. Together, An American Association for State and Local History Guide to Making Public History provides a roadmap of the national discussions the field of history museums and organizations is having regarding its present and the future.

Heritage is all around us, not just in monuments and museums, but in places that matter, in the countryside and in collections and stories. It touches all of us. How do we decide what to preserve? How do we make the case for heritage when there are so many other priorities? Playing with the Past is the first ever action-learning book about heritage. Over eighty creative activities and games encompass the basics of heritage practice, from management and decisionmaking to community engagement and leadership. Although designed to 'train the trainers', the activities in the book are relevant to anyone involved in caring for heritage.

National Museums is the first book to explore the national museum as a cultural institution in a range of contrasting national contexts. Composed of new studies of countries that rarely make a showing in the English-language studies of museums, this book reveals how these national museums have been used to create a sense of national self, place the nation in the arts, deal with the consequences of political change, remake difficult pasts, and confront those issues of nationalism, ethnicity and multiculturalism which have come to the fore in national politics in recent decades.

National Museums combines research from both leading and new researchers in the fields of history, museum studies, cultural studies, sociology, history of art, media studies, science and technology studies, and anthropology. It is an interrogation of the origins, purpose, organisation, politics, narratives and philosophies of national museums.

Growing public interest in environmental sustainability is a gift to historic sites and museums. It is an invitation to use our knowledge, collections, and sites to discuss how human practices and interactions with the environment in past were - and were not - environmentally sustainable. Being green still has a great deal to do with using less energy, buying less stuff, and recycling more, but now sustainability just as important in strategic planning, interpretation and public engagement. Environmental Sustainability at Historic Sites and Museums details how to go green at every level of your organization Why is this important? Because it is no longer a choice; environmental awareness as an amenity has become climate awareness as a necessity. Seas and storms threaten historic coastal communities. Flooding increasingly threatens sites near rivers. What structural precautions, collections care changes, and insurance approaches should you take for the new normal? What self-sufficiencies must you develop? What role do you have in community responses? Let environmental sustainability change the way you operate, engage the community and fulfill your mission. Let this book introduce you to the topic if you're new to it; or take you to the next level of performance if you've been doing this awhile. From one of the leading experts in the sustainability practices in museums, this book explains how engaging in sustainable practices will benefit not only the planet, but also the people you serve, your programs and even your profits. To demonstrate this, Sutton provides case studies from museums at the forefront of the green movement.

MUSEUM THEORY EDITED BY ANDREA WITCOMB AND KYLIE MESSAGE Museum Theory offers critical perspectives drawn from a broad range of disciplinary and intellectual traditions. This volume describes and challenges previous ways of understanding museums and their relationship to society. Essays written by scholars from museology and other disciplines address theoretical reflexivity in the museum, exploring the contextual, theoretical, and pragmatic ways museums work, are understood, and are experienced. Organized around three themes--Thinking about Museums, Disciplines and Politics, and Theory from Practice/Practicing Theory--the text includes discussion and analysis of different kinds of museums from various, primarily contemporary, national and local contexts. Essays consider subjects including the nature of museums as institutions and their role in the public sphere, cutting-edge museum practice and their connections with current global concerns, and the links between museum studies and disciplines such as cultural studies, anthropology, and history.

Arts and Cultural Management: Critical and Primary Sources offers a comprehensive collection of key writings on this relatively new and rapidly growing field. The collected essays draw upon both scholarly and professional literature worldwide and range across the arts in the commercial, not-for-profit and public sectors. Each volume is arranged thematically and separately introduced by the editors. The set includes 84 essays covering the following major tracks: organization, structure and governance; production and distribution of the arts; participation and engagement; resource development and marketing; and policy, advocacy and field development. Together the four volumes of Arts and Cultural Management present a major scholarly resource for the field.

Twenty-first-century views of historical violence have been immeasurably influenced by cultural representations of the Second World War. Within Europe, one of the key sites for such representation has been the vast array of museums and memorials that reflect contemporary ideas of war, the roles of soldiers and civilians, and the self-perception of those who remember. This volume takes a historical perspective on museums covering the Second World War and explores how these institutions came to define political contexts and cultures of public memory in Germany, across Europe, and throughout the world.

This is an innovative interdisciplinary book about objects and people within museums and galleries. It addresses fundamental issues of human sensory, emotional and aesthetic experience of objects. The chapters explore ways and contexts in which things and people mutually interact, and raise questions about how objects carry meaning and feeling, the distinctions between objects and persons, particular qualities of the museum as context for person-object engagements, and the active and embodied role of the museum visitor.

Museum Materialities is divided into three sections Objects, Engagements and Interpretations and includes a foreword by Susan Pearce and an afterword by Howard Morphy. It examines materiality and other perceptual and ontological qualities of objects themselves; embodied sensory and cognitive engagements both personal and across a wider audience spread with particular objects or object types in a museum or gallery setting; notions of aesthetics, affect and wellbeing in museum contexts; and creative and innovative artistic and museum practices that seek to illuminate or critique museum objects and interpretations.

Phenomenological and other approaches to embodied experience in an emphatically material world are current in a number of academic areas, most particularly strands of material culture studies within anthropology and cognate disciplines. Thus far, however, there has been no concerted application of this kind of approach to museum collections and interactions with them by museum visitors, curators, artists and researchers. Bringing together essays by scholars and practitioners from a wide disciplinary and international base, Museum Materialities seeks to make just such a contribution. In so doing it makes a valuable and original addition to the literature of both material culture studies and museum studies.

Classic set of 45 articles from the first decade of the Journal of Museum Education and its predecessor, Roundtable Reports. Articles and essays focus on teaching strategies, introspective glances at the museum education field, reports of program successes and near successes, evaluative studies, and reviews of exhibitions and literature related to object-based learning. This title is sponsored by The Museum Education Roundtable. The Museum Education Roundtable (MER) is a non-profit organization based in Washington, DC, dedicated to enriching and promoting the field of Museum Education.

This book describes the methods of conservation, preservation and restoration of the thousands of artefacts contained within the buildings that house the museums, which also require constant care and attention. The Vatican Museums are enormous, nearly 4 miles of passages through galleries, rooms and internal gardens. A museum system that includes many specific collection types - frescoes, sculptures, metals, textiles, ethnographic, Etruscan and Egyptian artefacts, fine and contemporary art, carriages and cars - that all require expert attention, whilst they are viewed daily by some of the 6 million visitors a year, who all breathe amongst the treasures, and spread dust throughout the buildings. The book will be of great interest and value to anyone involved in, or training to be involved in the professional management of a museum or collection.

Despite the fact that we have a range of senses with which to perceive the world around us, museums and other cultural institutions have traditionally used sight as the main way to convey information. In everyday life, though, we use touch constantly in conjunction with sight. Why, then, does it play so small a role in the study and enjoyment of museum objects? Contributors to this volume explore how the sense of touch can be utilized in cultural institutions to facilitate understanding and learning.

Combining research that stretches across all of the social sciences and international case studies, Elizabeth Crooke here explores the dynamics of the relationship between the community and the museum.

Focusing strongly on areas such as Northern Ireland, South Africa, Australia and North America to highlight the complex issues faced by museums and local groups, Crooke examines one of the museum's primary responsibilities - working with different communities and using collections to encourage people to learn about their own histories, and to understand other people's.

Arguing for a much closer examination of this concept of community, and of the significance of museums to different communities, Museums and Community is a dynamic look at a relationship that has, in modern times, never been more important.

There is a World Heritage Craze in China. China claims to have the longest continuous civilization in the world and is seeking recognition from UNESCO. This book explores three dimensions of the UNESCO World Heritage initiative with particular relevance for China: the universal agenda, the national practices, and the local responses. With a sociological lens, this book offers comprehensive insights into World Heritage, as well as China's deep social, cultural, and political structures.

This comprehensive anthology features 47 selected articles from the Journal of Museum Education plus ten new introductory essays by leaders in museum education and related fields. The articles and essays explore some of the fundamental issues concerning the role of education in museums today, from serving diverse communities to motivating visitors in an informal learning setting. The book is divided into five sections which 1) trace the evolution of the museum education profession; 2) explore the field's theoretical base; 3) consider methods of research used; 4) provide examples of how theory is translated into practice; and 5) summarize issues relating to professional development. Sponsored by the Museum Education Roundtable

Museum and other non-profit professionals have begun to realize that the complete visitor experience is the key to repeat attendance, successful fundraising, and building audience loyalty. Taking lessons learned by successful experience-shapers in the for-profit world, Stephanie Weaver distills this knowledge for museums and other organizations which depend on visitor satisfaction for success. Is your institution welcoming? Are the bathrooms clean? Does the staff communicate well? Are there enough places to sit? These practical matters may mean more to creating a loyal following than any exhibit or program the institution develops. Weaver breaks the visitor experience down to 8 steps and provides practical guidance to museums and related institutions on how to create optimal visitor experiences for each of them. In a workshop-like format, she uses multiple examples, exercises, and resource links to walk the reader through the process.

This collection provides an in-depth and up-to-date examination of the concept of Intangible Cultural Heritage and the issues surrounding its value to society. Critically engaging with the UNESCO 2003 Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage, the book also discusses local-level conceptualizations of living cultural traditions, practices and expressions, and reflects on the efforts that seek to safeguard them. Exploring a global range of case studies, the book considers the diverse perspectives currently involved with intangible cultural heritage and presents a rich picture of the geographic, socioeconomic and political contexts impacting research in this area. With contributions from established and emerging scholars, public servants, professionals, students and community members, this volume is also deeply enhanced by an interdisciplinary approach which draws on the theories and practices of heritage and museum studies, anthropology, folklore studies, ethnomusicology, and the study of cultural policy and related law. The Routledge Companion to Intangible Cultural Heritage undoubtedly broadens the international heritage discourse and is an invaluable learning tool for instructors, students and practitioners in the field.

The 'beauties' - women of note - who were welcomed to the National Portrait Gallery's early collection were those whose lives and portraits were recognized as significant to the 'civil, ecclesiastical and literary history of the nation'. This brief was interpreted to include figures as diverse as the devout Lady Margaret Beaufort, and the entertaining Lady Emma Hamilton. History's Beauties, the first detailed study of this collection, maps a culture of femininity that reframes the Victorian fascination with women's domestic and sentimental presence by locating it within a Parliament-centred 'national' culture. Including an essay on the Gallery's Trustees, the book traces the translation of their governors' culture to a public institution through discussions of three themes in the National Portrait Gallery's collection of women's portraits: portraits of the Royal family and the cult of legitimacy in antiquities and in national identity; the educated woman as model of domestic and national cultivation; and finally the role of female beauty in defining social and artistic power in nineteenth-century Britain. The first monograph study of gender in a major museum, History's Beauties engages themes of gender, national identity, class cultures, and aesthetics in Victorian England to interpret the National Portrait Gallery's fascinating collection.

The last few years has, within museums, witnessed nothing short of a revolution. Worried that the very institution was itself in danger of becoming a dusty, forgotten, culturally irrelevant exhibit, vigorous efforts have been made to reshape the museum mission. Fearing that history was coming to be ignored by modern society, many institutions have instead marketed a de-intellectualised heritage, overly relying on computer technology to captivate a contemporary audience. The theme of this work is that we can do much to reassess the rationale that inspires contemporary collections through a study of seventeenth century museums. England's first museums were quite literally wonderful; founded that is on the disciplined application of the faculty of wonder. The type of wonder employed was not that post-Romantic idea of disbelief, but rather an active form of curiosity developed during the Renaissance, particularly by the individuals who set about gathering objects and founding museums to further their enquiries. The argument put forward in this book is that this museological practice of using objects actually to create, as well as disseminate knowledge makes just as much sense today as it did in the seventeenth century and, further, that the best way of reinvigorating contemporary museums, is to return to that form of wonder. By taking such a comparative approach, this book works both as a scholarly historical text, and as an historically informed analysis of the key issues facing today's museums. As such, it will prove essential reading both for historians of collecting and museums, and for anyone interested in the philosophies of modern museum management.