Post-Critical Museology considers what the role of the public and the experience of audiences means to the everyday work of the art museum. It does this from the perspectives of the art museum itself as well as from the visitors it seeks. Through the analysis of material gathered from a major collaborative research project carried out at Tate Britain in London the book develops a conceptual reconfiguration of the relationship between art, culture and society in which questions abo...

Are Museums Irrelevant?Museums are rarely acknowledged in the global discussion of climate change, environmental degradation, the inevitability of depleted fossil fuels, and the myriad local issues concerning the well-being of particular communities – suggesting the irrelevance of museums as social institutions. At the same time, there is a growing preoccupation among museums with the marketplace, and museums, unwittingly or not, are embracing the values o...

The 35th issue of WEIRDBOOK presents more stories in the Weird Tales tradition! Here are horror and dark fantasy stories set in this world -- and beyond. Included this time are:The Pullulations of the Tribe, by Adrian ColeThe Dead of Night, by Christian RileyMother of My Children, by Bruce L. PriddyThe Man Who Murders Happiness, by John R. FultzA Handful of Dust, by Tom EnglishRevolution à l’Orange, by Paul LubaczewskiFiends of the Southern...

When preserving our history, what do we choose to value, why, and who decides?Honorable Mention for the National Council on Public History Book Award of the National Council on Public HistoryIn 1994, when the National Air and Space Museum announced plans to display the Enola Gay, the B-29 sent to destroy Hiroshima with an atomic bomb, the ensuing political uproar caught the museum's parent Smithsonian Institution entirely unprepared. As the largest...

Museums may not seem at first glance to be engaged in social work. Yet, Lois H. Silverman brings together here relevant visitor studies, trends in international practice, and compelling examples that demonstrate how museums everywhere are using their unique resources to benefit human relationships and, ultimately, to repair the world. In this groundbreaking book, Silverman forges a framework of key social work perspectives to show how museums are evolving a needs-based approach to provide ...

The influence of digital media on the cultural heritage sector has been pervasive and profound. Today museums are reliant on new technology to manage their collections. They collect digital as well as material things. New media is embedded within their exhibition spaces. And their activity online is as important as their physical presence on site.However, ‘digital heritage’ (as an area of practice and as a subject of study) does not exist in one single place. Its evidence base is c...

Where, how, by whom and for what were the first museums of contemporary art created? These are the key questions addressed by J. Pedro Lorente in this new book. In it he explores the concept and history of museums of contemporary art, and the shifting ways in which they have been imagined and presented. Following an introduction that sets out the historiography and considering questions of terminology, the first part of the book then examines the paradigm of the Musée des Artistes Vivants ...

This volume examines the implications and consequences of the idea of ‘intangible heritage’ to current international academic and policy debates about the meaning and nature of cultural heritage and the management processes developed to protect it. It provides an accessible account of the different ways in which intangible cultural heritage has been defined and managed in both national and international contexts, and aims to facilitate international debate about the meaning, nature and val...

Museums and Social Activism is the first study to bring together historical accounts of the African American and later American Indian civil rights-related social and reform movements that took place on the Smithsonian Mall through the 1960s and 1970s in Washington DC with the significant but unknown story about museological transformation and curatorial activism that occurred in the Division of Political and Reform History at the National Museum of American History at this time.

A number of developments in the museum movement during the last few years have forced museums to give greater attention to ethical issues. Members of a profession are increasingly regarded constituting an ethical community. Every person with such a community must have a sense of personal obligation as well as a responsibilty for others to assure ethical achievement. This volume firmly places notions of ethics in the field of action.Museum Ethics considers the theoretical an...

This book considers key ethical questions in museum policy and practice, particularly those related to issues of collection and display. What does a collection signify in the twenty-first century museum? How does an engagement with immateriality challenge museums’ concept of ownership, and how does that immateriality translate into the design of exhibitions and museum space? Are museums still about safeguarding objects, and what does safeguarding mean for diverse individuals and communitie...

**A new edition of the bible of U.S. collections management—now updated for the 21st-century museum professional or Museum Studies student!This is the only comprehensive discussion of the legal questions faced by museums as they acquire, use, and refine their collections.**This fully revised and expanded fourth edition addresses a thorough range of legal developments museums face, including new developments in the digital age and under new repatriation regulations. This app...