Museums & Society 2034: Trends and Potential Futures

What challenges will society and museums face in the next quarter-century? How will the demographic profile of America change between now and 2034? How will energy and infrastructure costs affect the sustainability of museums? What will Web 3.0 -- or 5.0 or 6.0 -- look like? Will the "real" survive the assault of the "virtual"? Will the number of leisure-time alternatives continue to grow? Will the lines between work and leisure, public and private, continue to blur? Most importantly, how will museums face these challenges and shape the future they will have to inhabit?This report, commissioned by the Center for the Future of Museums at the American Association of Museums, projects current social trends to 2034 and suggests how museums can face future challenges while continuing to meet their mission of public service. The report focuses on four major trends: demographic shifts, globalization, the revolution in information and communication technologies, and new cultural assumptions about the primacy of the individual as creator and curator

Conservation of the european mining and metallurgical heritage. Part 2

In the June 1999 issue of the CIM Bulletin an inventory of Mining Museums Across Canada was published. Because museums are an important educational tool and a touristic attraction, it is a pleasure to have professors Octavio Puche Riart and Luis Felipe Mazadiego Martinez respond to our invitation to write about the European mining and metallurgical museums. Part 1 of this article appeared in the May 2000 issue

Demographic Transformation and the Future of Museums

In 2009 the Center for the Future of Museums commissioned Betty Farrell to produce a report to explore in more detail the demographic trends in American society and their implications for museums. The report identifies, synthesizes, and interprets existing research on demographics, cultural consumer attitudes, museum diversity practices, and related topics. It is meant to help the museum field explore the future of museums in a "majority minority" society. Topics of inquiry include national demographic projections for the next 25 years with a focus on the shifting racial and ethnic composition of the United States; current patterns of museum attendance (and cultural participation more generally) by race, ethnicity, cultural origin and other relevant factors; culturally/ethnically specific attitudes towards museums, including perceptual and behavioral barriers to museum attendance; ways that museums currently reach out to diverse audiences; specific models and best practices; and larger trends in societal attitudes towards racial and other classifications

For scientists, for students or for the public? : the shifting roles of natural history museums

This article aims to discuss the main roles of natural history museums and to show how these purposes have evolved and adapted throughout the museums’ history, as a response to the development of natural sciences and societal change, from their creation in the 18th century to the present. It strives to demonstrate how the balance between research, teaching and disseminating knowledge to the public has successively shifted, without ever forsaking any of these functions. It is focused on Portuguese museums, but examining their place within international trends

Visitors' Interpretive Strategies at Wolverhampton Art Gallery

Making Meaning in Art Museums is one of two research projects on the theme of art museums and interpretive communities. The first was published as Making Meaning 1:Visitors' Interpretive Strategies at Wolverhampton Art Gallery (RCMG 2001). Making Meaning in Art Museums 2 is the second of two research projects on the theme of art museums and interpretive communities. The Long Gallery at the Nottingham Castle Museum and Art Gallery was selected as the research site for this second study. Both studies have explored the ways in which visitors talked about their experience of a visit to the art museum-both what they said about the paintings and the whole of the visit.The research questions on which this project is based are: What interpretive strategies and repertories are deployed by art museum visitors? Can distinct interpretive communities be identified? What are the implications for the communication policies within art museums? This research is an ethnographic study, using qualitative methods.This research project was funded through a grant from the Arts and Humanities Research Boar

Museums in former residences: castles, palaces and manor houses

The article concerns former residences in Poland and their contemporary use as museums. The authors present the history of Polish residences, the development of museums in castles, palaces and manor houses, their spatial distribution and the relations between the type of building and that of the museum collection

Antiquities Theft: The Role of the Museum in Modern Symbolic Violence

Humans have been collecting artifacts for centuries, whether it is for their aesthetic value or for the acquisition of knowledge. However, these artifacts have, in most cases, been taken without permission from the countries of origin. Today, museums are struggling with the issue of repatriation and many refuse to return their priceless possessions. Western museums and their supporters are arguing that repatriation will put the artifacts in danger and hurt the chances for humanity to learn from them. The arguments of these museums are an attempt of symbolic violence on non-Western nations, who are seen as unfit or unable to care for their own history

Embedding civil engagement in museums

Initiatives over the last decade on both sides of the Atlantic and beyond have sought to reposition museums at the heart of their communities as agents for civil engagement. This paper explores the principles involved in making the role possible, using the example of urban history museums. It argues that this will take time, commitment and careful planning, and will impact on every aspect of the museum's activities. It is an essential task however, reflecting the direction museums should be taking in society in the 21st century, but will only be achieved if there is a change of culture across the profession