Cross cultural education in art museums is an interesting and complex issue. While cultural exhibitions have received attention in research, studies have usually focused on the nature of the exhibitions and have not explored the audience's understanding about culture in relationship to the exhibition. This qualitative study explores how and what First Nations cultures have been mediated by a civic art museum and negotiated by the museum audience, and the relationship between the two. Observations of the exhibition and audience and interviews with 99 adults in the museum were collected and analyzed to identify patterns and relationships. Analysis of the exhibition found the mediation of culture was distinguished by a partnership of the museum and First Nations cultures which reflected both their languages and voices. Audience responses illustrated a range of affective, factual and conceptual responses. Positive affective responses reflected the stimulation and satisfaction with learning which occurred. Visitors indicated enlightenment, exposure and revision of previously held ideas and assumptions, similarities and differences among cultures, and insight into perspectives of others. Partnership between the museum and the exhibition of masks from Northwest First Nations cultures is seen as a complex undertaking requiring reflection and examination of these two cultures. Visitor responses to the exhibition indicates learning, thinking and innumerable ways individuals construct meanings and understanding from art museum experiences.

Cross cultural education in art museums is an interesting and complex issue. While cultural exhibitions have received attention in research, studies have usually focused on the nature of the exhibitions and have not explored the audience's understanding about culture in relationship to the exhibition. This qualitative study explores how and what First Nations cultures have been mediated by a civic art museum and negotiated by the museum audience, and the relationship between the two. Observations of the exhibition and audience and interviews with 99 adults in the museum were collected and analyzed to identify patterns and relationships. Analysis of the exhibition found the mediation of culture was distinguished by a partnership of the museum and First Nations cultures which reflected both their languages and voices. Audience responses illustrated a range of affective, factual and conceptual responses. Positive affective responses reflected the stimulation and satisfaction with learning which occurred. Visitors indicated enlightenment, exposure and revision of previously held ideas and assumptions, similarities and differences among cultures, and insight into perspectives of others. Partnership between the museum and the exhibition of masks from Northwest First Nations cultures is seen as a complex undertaking requiring reflection and examination of these two cultures. Visitor responses to the exhibition indicates learning, thinking and innumerable ways individuals construct meanings and understanding from art museum experiences. / Education, Faculty of / Curriculum and Pedagogy (EDCP), Department of / Graduate

The history of museums in South Africa dates back to 1825 when the South African Museum (SAM) was established in Cape Town. Initially museums in South Africa were established for science and local history was seen as peripheral. Nevertheless, this began to change during the early 1920s as artifacts of historical nature gained popularity, saving them from historical oblivion in museums. Museums themselves broadened their role to become major centres of both scientific and historical knowledge. When museums started to include historical artifacts, they entered a terrain which was influenced by a racist ideology of segregation and then apartheid. Thus, they became centres of political discourse and mirrors of the white domination in South Africa. From the 1920s museums served to propagate certain myths which was based on the subjugation of Africans by white settlers. Museums played a pivotal role in entrenching ideas of white settlement in Natal as a triumph over barbarism, savage and heathenism. Exhibitions within the museums reflected certain identities at the expense of others. It was not until the 1980s that the political scenario forced museums to examine their role and adapt to the new order. This marked the beginning of a new dispensation in the politics and poetics of museum displaying. During the 1990s issues of representation in museums became popular. Historians were among those who became interested in the question of how to represent the South African a turbulent past in a post apartheid South Africa. This era was characterized by new displays which are more accommodative and represent diverse population groups of South Africa. Exhibitions in museums always involve political ramifications and ideas within exhibitions draw reference to the powerful groups in the making of political and social discourse. During the post- apartheid era, KwaZulu-Natal museums reflect new identities which are based on non-racialism and interaction of diverse people of the province. They no longer serve as reference point for white domination and educational programmes are more multidimensional and appeal to all sectors of our society. The thesis adopted in this piece of work is that museums are political institutions and reflect the political identities of the society that they live. They cannot be divorced from their time and circumstances. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of Durban-Westville, 2003.

Doctorat en sciences sociales, politiques et économiques / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

The aim of this investigation is to analyze the effects of incorporating scent-based elements in ethnographic exhibits. Specifically, it attempts to identify changes in patron response to a visual display, with and without a scent element. Groups of patrons were observed throughout their engagement with the exhibit, and interviewed post-engagement to generate data on information retention, opinion on content and empathetic response in relation to the exhibit. Findings suggest that the inclusion of scent did increase memorization of the limited facts reinforced through the scent element. However, there was no detectable difference between the groups on measures of overall comprehension of the subject matter, nor their empathetic responses toward the exhibited culture. The results of the study are discussed as a measure of the observer—observed dichotomy, and the argument is made that multisensory representation in the museum can aid in the facilitation of cross-cultural education. / Includes bibliography. / Thesis (M.A.)--Florida Atlantic University, 2017. / FAU Electronic Theses and Dissertations Collection

This thesis aims at providing a cross-cultural study of how football museums represent and construct identities, both collective and personal. The research is based on a multi-sited ethnography at selected football museums in the UK, Germany, and China, employing participant observation, photographic recording and online research methods. This investigation sharpens an anthropological awareness of constructions of multiple layered identities by examining football museums' exhibiting practices and activity programmes, as well as their built environments and cultural settings. The research also offers a perspective on museum visitors, who consume football museums with diverse personal and collective identity claims. Looking into the largely under-explored terrain of football museums, this research joins continuing anthropological efforts to understand identity work while also exploring continuing tensions inherent in a marriage between museums and football. The thesis contributes to the research field of football/sports museums with an ethnographic emphasis and a cross-cultural range.

19th century dime museums were a North American phenomenon that flourished in urban centres from the mid- to late-1800s. Named thusly due to their low admission cost, dime museums provided democratic entertainment that was promoted to all classes as affordable and respectable. The resulting facilities were crammed with art, artifacts, rarities, living human curiosities, theatre performances, menageries, and technological marvels. The exhibition Dr. Soanes’ Odditorium of Wonders strives to recapture the spirit and aesthetic of the dime museum to invoke wonder in the viewer and to combine art, artifacts, and oddities to provoke questions about the boundary between education and amusement. Both the academic and curatorial texts utilize a mix of methodological approaches appropriate to museology, art history and cultural history: theoretical research into historiographical issues concerning theories of display and spectacle; archival research and discourse analysis of historical documents, and material culture analysis (including the semiotics of display). / iv, 60 leaves : ill. ; 29 cm