Product Description

Museum Studies: An Anthology of Contexts provides a comprehensive interdisciplinary collection of approaches to museums and their relation to history, culture, philosophy and their adoring or combative publics.

• Brings together for the first time a wide array of texts that mix contemporary analysis with historical documentation.
  
• Includes five sections that highlight central themes in museum studies: issue–oriented contexts in museology; states of "nature"; the status of nations; history, memory and other locations; and arts, crafts and visitors.
  
• Addresses the development of museums, the role of the museum in society, and issues central to contemporary museum studies.
  
• Opens with an introductory essay that situates museum studies in a truly interdisciplinary context and includes an opening essay for each section that guides the reader through the selections.
  
• Includes a bibliography and list of resources devoted to museum studies that makes the volume an authoritative guide on the subject.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #111149 in Books
• Published on: 2003-09-03
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 680 pages

Review
"Combining important historical texts, classic critical analyses, and current commentary on the museum, this anthology is a unique resource for Museum Studies. It is especially useful in assembling sophisticated discussions of many kinds of institutions, including museums of art, history, anthropology, and natural history." Bruce Altshuler, New York University

"The rich diversity of contexts and commentaries in this collection reveals the fascination of the museum not only for curators and museologists, but also for anthropologists, architects, politicians, historians, critics, and poets. The breadth of the survey is a timely reminder that the condition of our museums is – and has always been – a barometer of social attitudes and change." Helen Rees Leahy, University of Manchester

From the Back Cover
The explosive popularity of museums has made museum studies one of the most productive and exciting intellectual and pedagogical sites for historians and art historians, anthropologists, archaeologists, and critical theorists. Museum Studies: An Anthology of Contexts provides a comprehensive interdisciplinary collection of approaches to museums and their relation to history, culture, philosophy, and their adoring or combative publics.

An indispensable text for teaching museum studies in today′s classroom, Museum Studies brings together for the first time a wide array of texts that mix contemporary analysis with classic, historical documentation. Offering encyclopedic coverage of the issues critical to the rise and role of the museum – history and development; relation to society; the ethics of classification, exhibition, and exclusion; the representation of cultures; property and ownership; the poetics of display; material culture and historical documentation; tradition, innovation, and self–reflexivity in museum practice – this is the most comprehensive and ambitious volume available on museum studies.The Anthology opens with an introductory essay that provides vital background and situates museum studies in a truly interdisciplinary context. Each section includes an opening essay that guides the reader through the selections while the volume’s bibliography provides a list of resources devoted to museum studies.

About the Author
Bettina Messias Carbonell has recently joined the faculty of the Department of English, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, City University of New York. Prior to this she taught interdisciplinary seminars in visual cultures, museum studies, American studies, aesthetics, and ethics at the Gallatin School of Individualized Study at New York University. She also taught in the Graduate Program in American Studies / Museum and Communities concentration at Trinity College, Hartford, Connecticut.