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Engagement and Access

Innovative Approaches for Museums

Edited by Juilee Decker

Engagement and Access: Innovative Approaches for Museums addresses how museums forge two-way communication and engaged participation through the use of community curation, social media, collaboration, and inquiry-based learning. Such approaches demonstrate how museums serve as thriving, central gathering places in communities and offer meaningful, creative educational experiences.

This book addresses how museums forge two-way communication and engaged participation through the use of community curation, social media, collaboration, and inquiry-based learning. The examples of engagement and access in this volume are paradigmatic of a shift in thinking. Each of these case studies advocate for doing and listening. That is to say, these institutions understand the importance of meeting the needs of audiences. And, in the twenty-first century, those audiences are onsite as well as online. While they represent only a handful of initiatives and engaging experiences thriving in museums today, they help us to see engagement and access in terms of virtual collections, the crowd (as in crowdsourcing, crowdfunding, and crowdcrafting), and the onsite experience.

The Innovative Approaches for Museums series offers case studies, written by scholars and practitioners from museums, galleries, and other institutions, that showcase the original, transformative, and sometimes wholly re-invented methods, techniques, systems, theories, and actions that demonstrate innovative work being done in the museum and cultural sector throughout the world. The authors come from a variety of institutions—in size, type, budget, audience, mission, and collection scope. Each volume offers ideas and support to those working in museums while serving as a resource and primer, as much as inspiration, for students and the museum staff and faculty training future professionals who will further develop future innovative approaches.

Contributions by: Charles Chen, Anne Corso, Jan Freedman, William Hennessey, Ashley Hosler, J. Patrick Kociolek, Sarah Lampen, Jennifer L. Lindsay, Margot Note, Stephanie Parrish, Marisa J. Pascucci, Janet Sinclair, Siobhan Starrs, Barbara W. Stauffer, Eric Steen, and Alison Zeidman

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers

Pages: 120 • Trim: 6 x 9

978-1-4422-3875-6 • Paperback • July 2015 • $59.00 • (£45.00)

978-1-4422-3876-3 • eBook • July 2015 • $56.00 • (£43.00)

Series: Innovative Approaches for Museums

Subjects: Business & Economics / Museum Administration & Museology

Engagement and Access

Innovative Approaches for Museums

Paperback

eBook

Summary

Engagement and Access: Innovative Approaches for Museums addresses how museums forge two-way communication and engaged participation through the use of community curation, social media, collaboration, and inquiry-based learning. Such approaches demonstrate how museums serve as thriving, central gathering places in communities and offer meaningful, creative educational experiences.

This book addresses how museums forge two-way communication and engaged participation through the use of community curation, social media, collaboration, and inquiry-based learning. The examples of engagement and access in this volume are paradigmatic of a shift in thinking. Each of these case studies advocate for doing and listening. That is to say, these institutions understand the importance of meeting the needs of audiences. And, in the twenty-first century, those audiences are onsite as well as online. While they represent only a handful of initiatives and engaging experiences thriving in museums today, they help us to see engagement and access in terms of virtual collections, the crowd (as in crowdsourcing, crowdfunding, and crowdcrafting), and the onsite experience.

The Innovative Approaches for Museums series offers case studies, written by scholars and practitioners from museums, galleries, and other institutions, that showcase the original, transformative, and sometimes wholly re-invented methods, techniques, systems, theories, and actions that demonstrate innovative work being done in the museum and cultural sector throughout the world. The authors come from a variety of institutions—in size, type, budget, audience, mission, and collection scope. Each volume offers ideas and support to those working in museums while serving as a resource and primer, as much as inspiration, for students and the museum staff and faculty training future professionals who will further develop future innovative approaches.

Contributions by: Charles Chen, Anne Corso, Jan Freedman, William Hennessey, Ashley Hosler, J. Patrick Kociolek, Sarah Lampen, Jennifer L. Lindsay, Margot Note, Stephanie Parrish, Marisa J. Pascucci, Janet Sinclair, Siobhan Starrs, Barbara W. Stauffer, Eric Steen, and Alison Zeidman

Details

Rowman & Littlefield Publishers

Pages: 120 • Trim: 6 x 9

978-1-4422-3875-6 • Paperback • July 2015 • $59.00 • (£45.00)

978-1-4422-3876-3 • eBook • July 2015 • $56.00 • (£43.00)

Series: Innovative Approaches for Museums

Subjects: Business & Economics / Museum Administration & Museology

Author

Juilee Decker is an associate professor of Museum Studies at Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) where she teaches courses focusing on museums and technology so as to bring theory and praxis together in the classroom environment. Decker earned her Ph.D. from Case Western Reserve University. Her research interests and curation include the construction of public and private collections as well as the subjects of public art, commemoration, and memory. Decker’s recent curatorial activity includes “A Passionate Pursuit: The Milward Collection,” an exhibition addressing the formation of a private collection of more than 1000 works of art (2012); “Reflections on a Louisville Landmark,” a juried show and an exhibition of historic maps, photographs, and texts for the Louisville Visual Art Association; and “Virginia Woolf and the Natural World,” an international exhibition to coincide with the 20th annual Wolf conference (2010). She has worked as a public art consultant and advisor for more than 15 years and has managed several public and private collections of public art. Since 2008, she has served as editor of Collections: A Journal for Museum and Archives Professionals, a peer-reviewed journal published by Rowman and Littlefield.

Table of Contents

Introduction by Juilee Decker

Chapter 1: Listening to our Audiences
William Hennessey and Anne Corso, Chrysler Museum of Art
Chapter 2: Museum Access for All: Engaging Children with Autism Spectrum Disorders
Ashley Hosler, The Walters Art Museum
Chapter 3: STAMP: An Innovative New Program to Engage Teen Audiences
Alison Zeidman, Greater Philadelphia Cultural Alliance
Chapter 4: #CulturalHeritage: Connecting to Audiences through Instagram
Margot Note, World Monuments Fund
Chapter 5: How the Boca Raton Museum of Art Captures Attention and Shifts Perspectives
Marisa J. Pascucci, Boca Raton Museum of Art
Chapter 6: Expanding Family Access and Engagement in an Historic House Museum: A.B.C.D.E.
Janet Sinclair, Stansted Park, UK
Chapter 7: A Natural Solution to Increasing Engagement with Our Local Environment and Museum Collections
Jan Freedman, Plymouth City Museum and Art Gallery, UK
Chapter 8: Closing the Fossil Hall & Opening Fotorama!: Online and Onsite Engagement at the National Museum of Natural History
Charles Chen, Jennifer L. Lindsay, Siobhan Starrs, Barbara W. Stauffer, National Museum of Natural History
Chapter 9: The BioLounge at the University of Colorado Museum of Natural History
J. Patrick Kociolek, University of Colorado
Chapter 10: Art & Beer: The Drunken Cobbler
Sarah Lampen, Stephanie Parrish, and Eric Steen, Portland Art Museum

Index
About the Contributors
About the Editor

Reviews

The museum landscape has already changed. If we wish to remain both relevant and successful we must foster real, meaningful engagement with our audiences. Juilee Decker has done a phenomenal job curating of a set of case studies that focus on substantive, in-the-trenches examples of innovative experimentation in our field. These triumphs, setbacks, and new methodologies are what push us forward. Kudos to Dr. Decker for helping to expedite the process!
— Dustin Growick, Team Lead for Science Content and Programs, Museum Hack

Engagement and Access

Innovative Approaches for Museums

Edited by Juilee Decker

Engagement and Access

Innovative Approaches for Museums

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