Rowman & Littlefield Publishers / AASLH
Pages: 240
•
Trim: 7½ x 10½
978-1-4422-6945-3 • Hardback • August 2018 • $124.00 • (£95.00)
978-1-4422-6946-0 • Paperback • August 2018 • $56.00 • (£43.00)
978-1-4422-6947-7 • eBook • August 2018 • $53.00 • (£41.00)
Gretchen Buggeln holds the Phyllis and Richard Duesenberg Chair in Christianity and the Arts at Valparaiso University. She previously was associate professor and director of the residential research program at the Winterthur Museum. Buggeln is the author of Temples of Grace: The Material Transformation of Connecticut's Churches, 1970-1840 (2003)and The Suburban Church: Modernism and Community in Postwar America (2015), as well as numerous articles on religious architecture and artifacts, museums, and American religious history. She is co-editor, with Crispin Paine and S. Brent Plate, of Religion in Museums: Global and Multidisciplinary Perspectives (2017).
Barbara Franco has had a long career in American history museums as a curator and administrator and most recently served as Executive Director of the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission and as Founding Director of the Gettysburg Seminary Ridge Museum. She served as a past chairman of the American Association for State and Local History and co-edited Ideas and Images: Developing Interpretive History Exhibits (1992).She has written numerous articles on museum practice and historical interpretation, and currently works as an independent scholar and museum consultant.
Introduction
Acknowledgments
Part I Case Studies
Chapter 1. Religious Sites
Arch Street Meeting House,
Reinterpretation of the Arch Street Meeting House,
Lynne Calamia
California Missions Trail
California Missions,
Elizabeth Kryder-Reid
Ephrata Cloister
Interpreting Religion at Ephrata Cloister
Michael S. Showalter and Nick Siegert
Hancock Shaker Village
Hancock Shaker Village - Training for Staff & Docents Who Interpret Religion,
Todd Burdick
Joseph Smith Farm,
Facilitating a Reverential Experience.
Gary L. Boatright, Jr.
Kirtland Temple
Kirtland Temple: Creating Sacred Space for Pilgrimage
Barbara B. Walden
Mary Baker Eddy Library
Fervent Hearts, Willing Hands: Christian Science in Nineteenth-Century Context
Katherine Connell
Museum at Eldridge Street
Interpreting the Eldridge Street Synagogue: Two DialoguesAmy Stein Milford and Richard Rabinowitz
United States Capitol Visitor Center
“In God We Trust” – Interpreting Religion in the US Capitol
Fred W. Beuttler
Chapter 2. Historic Sites
Andrew Jackson’s Hermitage
Reform and Religion at Andrew Jackson’s Hermitage
Marsha Mullin
Colonial Williamsburg Foundation
Satisfaction Through Honesty
Stephen Seals
Conner Prairie
Religion at Conner Prairie
Catherine Hughes
George Washington’s Mount Vernon
Interpreting Religion in the Life of a Founding Father
Mary V. Thompson
Hawaii Mission Houses Historic Site and Archives
Revisiting the Historical Role of the ABCFM Missionaries in Hawaii
Thomas A. Woods
Gettysburg Seminary Ridge Museum
Talk-Back Boards And Religion,
Josh Howard
Lower East Side Tenement Museum
Interpreting Religion at the Tenement Museum
Annie Polland
Newport World Heritage Commission
Interpreting Tolerance to a Skeptical World: The Case of Colonial Newport and Providence
Ken Yellis
Old Economy Village
Religious Interpretation at Old Economy Village
David Miller
Southeastern Pennsylvania Historic Sites and Houses
Interpreting the Diversity of Pennsylvania German Religion at Historic House Museums
Cynthia G. Falk
Chapter 3. Museum Exhibitions
Abbe Museum
Religious Appropriation Issues and the Abbe Museum
Cinnamon Catlin-Legutko and Geo Soctomah Neptune
American Revolution Museum at Yorktown
Interpreting Religion at The American Revolution Museum at Yorktown
K. Lara Templin
Arab American National Museum
Interpreting Religion at the Arab American National Museum
Petra Alsoofy
Delaware Historical Society
Forging Faith, Building Freedom: African American Faith Experiences in Delaware, 1800-1980
Constance J. Cooper
Jewish Museum of Maryland
Chosen Food: Eggrolls, Oreos and Judaism in the Museum
Karen Falk
Minnesota History Center
Interpreting Religion in Peb Yog Hmoob—We Are Hmong Minnesota
Brian Horrigan
National Museum of African American History and Culture
Black Sacred Objects and the Matter of Religious Meanings: A CaseStudy from the National Museum of African American History & Culture
Eric Lewis Williams
National Museum of American History
Religion in Early America: An Exhibition at the National Museum of American History
David K. Allison
National Museum of the Civil War Soldier at Pamplin Historical Park
Interpreting the Religions Life of Civil War Soldiers at Pamplin Historical Park
A. Wilson Greene
The Rosenbach and the Rare Book Department, Free Library of Philadelphia
Religion on Display: Three Exhibitions at the Free Library of Philadelphia and the Rosenbach
Katherine Haas
Winterthur Museum
Open the Doors and See all the People: Interpreting Pennsylvania German Material Culture and Religion
Lisa Minardi
Part II Essays
Chapter 4. Scholarly Approaches For Religion in History Museums
Gretchen Buggeln
Chapter 5. Issues in Historical Interpretation: Why Interpreting Religion is So Difficult
Barbara Franco
Chapter 6. Religion in Museum Spaces and Places
Gretchen Buggeln
Chapter 7. Strategies and Techniques for Interpreting Religion
Barbara Franco
Chapter 8. Interpreting Religion at Museums and Historic Sites: The Work Ahead
Gretchen Buggeln and Barbara Franco
Bibliography
Contributors
Index
Interpreting Religion is an essential starting point for those who seek to represent religion to the public. It not only will generate ideas for curators and educators, it will serve to stimulate reflection on the slippery beast we name "religion".
— The Public Historian
This book addresses what has been a source of anxiety and concern for many years. This book, a publication of the American Association for State and Local History (AASLH), attempts, through case studies of successful
exhibitions, to suggest ways to approach the interpretation of religious topics for a general audience. The book would certainly be of use to anyone preparing a religious site for public consumption, whether a museum professional or a representative of the religious faith represented.
— Anglican and Episcopal History
A splendid introduction to interpreting religion in museums and historic sites. This very welcome publication, the sixteenth in AASLH's Interpreting History series, demonstrates that the study of religion in museums has come of age: theory has moved on to practice. . . . all in all this is an excellent handbook which marks a big step forward for the interpretation of religion in visitor attractions, and offers inspiration and models to history museums and historic sites of many different types, and in many different countries.— Reading Religion
Interpreting Religion. . . sparks a conversation, suggests a course of action that is both practical and inspiring, and looks to the future of museum interpretation – an ambitious set of goals for a relatively slim volume. No single case study offers a universal prescription for interpreting religious history, but taken together, they provide tools which can be combined to fit any site, secular or overtly religious, large or small, urban or rural. Interpreting Religion’s format allows the editors to demonstrate the diversity of religious experience in America’s past, argue for the importance of its role in interpreting the past in any setting, and offer a variety of tools to museum professionals wishing to deepen their site’s engagement with religious topics. . . . Interpreting Religion at Museums and Historic Sites is a call to action, but it also provides public historians a solid foundation from which to start.— The China Quarterly
I have been waiting for a book like this for a long time. Gretchen Buggeln and Barbara Franco have gathered an impressive collection of essays by museum professionals and public historians who have thought deeply about the place of religion in some of our most important cultural institutions. This is a landmark volume.— John Fea, Chair and Professor of History, Messiah College, author of Why Study History: Reflecting on the Importance of the Past
Interpreting Religion at Museums and Historic Sites is a godsend. Religion has often been taboo in museums and historic sites because of its complexity and potential emotional volatility, but with rare candor and courage, the contributors to Interpreting Religion show why any truthful representation of the American experience demands attention to the ubiquity of religion, religious objects, and religious claims that make up America. With case studies of museum exhibitions and historic site interpretations, along with broader essays on methodology, best practices, and historiography, this book is at once ecumenical and educational in its reach and should become scripture for anyone in the profession contemplating finding the very soul of America.— Randall Miller, The William Dirk Warren `50 Sesquicentennial Chair & Professor of History, Saint Joseph's University