Museum and Heritage Studies (MHST) 201 LO1
Introduction to Museum and Heritage Studies
Fall 2008
TR 14:00 - 15:15

 

Instructor:	Geraldine Chimirri-Russell
Office Location:	The Nickle Arts Museum
Office Phone:	220-7234
E-Mail:	gechimir@ucalgary.ca
Office Hours:	By appointment

Additional Information

Course Description

In this class, students will gain a global perspective and understanding of the history, purpose, activities, programming, and management of museums and heritage institutions. Topics to be studied include issues relating to: the definition of museum and heritage sites; ethics; conservation; collecting and collections; audience development; intangible heritage; and modern technology. As such, the class introduces students to many of the central issues in contemporary museum and heritage practice.

In addition to lectures and discussions, the class will involve tours of exhibitions and examination of artifacts at The Nickle Arts Museum. These activities are not optional and form an integral part of the course.

Students will be examining museum artifacts and should bring with them to class, a magnifying glass and two-metre tape measure.

Objectives of the Course

• To explore the range and functions of museums and heritage institutions, both internationally and in Canada.

 

• To place museums and heritage institutions in a historical context.

 

• To introduce students to the current literature and new information technologies relating to museums and heritage institutions.

 

• To develop a critical understanding of the issues facing museums and heritage institutions.

 

• To develop and apply skills in writing, analysis and critical thinking.

Textbooks and Readings:

Readings for the class are available online. The readings will be listed on Blackboard and it is the student's responsibility to access these readings. Should students find any difficulty accessing these readings it is their responsibility to notify the instructor immediately.

Please Note: Outlines of required reading will be available on Blackboard at least a week prior to each class. Students are responsible for completing the assigned readings.

Assignments and Evaluation

Thursday 9 October: Quiz 10%.

Thursday 6 November: Quiz 10 %.

Thursday 20 November: Assignment 20% to be handed in.

Tuesday 2 December: Journals, 20%, to be handed in.

Final exam 40%

Total = 100%

Each quiz will consist of 10 to 20 questions relating to the material covered in class and from the assigned readings, and will include written questions and slide identification. Each quiz will require short answers and will be handed in during class.

Students will be required to keep a journal of exhibitions visited and objects examined. Entries in journals should indicate a thoughtful understanding of the relationship between objects, exhibitions and the theoretical concepts introduced in class.

For the assignment students will be required to write a 1000 to 1500 word paper.

It is the student's responsibility to keep a copy of each submitted assignment.
Note: Please hand in your essays directly to your tutor or instructor if possible . If it is not possible to do so, a daytime drop box is available in SS110; a date stamp is provided for your use. A night drop box is also available for after-hours submission. Assignments will be removed the following morning, stamped with the previous day's date, and placed in the instructor's mailbox.

Registrar-scheduled Final Examination: YES

Please note: If your class is held in the evening, the Registrar's Office will make every attempt to schedule the final exam during the evening; however, there is NO guarantee that the exam will NOT be scheduled during the day.

Policy for Late Assignments

Assignments submitted after the deadline may be penalized with the loss of a grade (e.g.: A- to B+) for each day late.

Writing Skills Statement

Faculty policy directs that all written assignments (including, although to a lesser extent, written exam responses) will be assessed at least partly on writing skills. For details see www.comcul.ucalgary.ca/info. Writing skills include not only surface correctness (grammar, punctuation, sentence structure, etc) but also general clarity and organization. Research papers must be properly documented.

If you need help with your writing, you may use the Writing Centre. Visit the website for more details: www.efwr.ucalgary.ca

Grading System

The following grading system is used in the Faculty of Communication and Culture:

(Revised, effective September 2008)

	Grading Scale
A+	96-100
A	90-95.99
A -	85-89.99
B+	80-84.99
B	75-79.99
B-	70-74.99
C+	65-69.99
C	60-64.99
C-	55-59.99
D+	53-54.99
D	50-52.99
F	0-49

 

Where a grade on a particular assignment is expressed as a letter grade, it will normally be converted to a number using the midpoint of the scale.  That is, A- would be converted to 87.5 for calculation purposes.  F will be converted to zero.

Plagiarism

Using any source whatsoever without clearly documenting it is a serious academic offense. Consequences include failure on the assignment, failure in the course and possibly suspension or expulsion from the university.

You must document not only direct quotations but also paraphrases and ideas where they appear in your text. A reference list at the end is insufficient by itself. Readers must be able to tell exactly where your words and ideas end and other people's words and ideas begin. This includes assignments submitted in non-traditional formats such as Web pages or visual media, and material taken from such sources.

Please consult your instructor or the Writing Centre (SS 106, efwr.ucalgary.ca) if you have any questions regarding how to document sources.

Students with Disabilities

If you are a student with a disability who may require academic accommodation, it is your responsibility to register with the Disability Resource Centre (220-8237) and discuss your needs with your instructor no later than fourteen (14) days after the start of the course.

Students' Union

For details about the current Students' Union contacts for the Faculty of Communication and Culture see www.comcul.ucalgary.ca/su

"SAFEWALK" Program -- 220-5333

Campus Security will escort individuals day or night -- call 220-5333 for assistance. Use any campus phone, emergency phone or the yellow phone located at most parking lot booths.

Ethics

Whenever you perform research with human participants (i.e. surveys, interviews, observation) as part of your university studies, you are responsible for following university research ethics guidelines. Your instructor must review and approve of your research plans and supervise your research. For more information about your research ethics responsibilities, see

The Faculty of Communication and Culture Research Ethics site: http://www.comcul.ucalgary.ca/ethics

or the University of Calgary Research Ethics site: http://www.ucalgary.ca/research/compliance/ethics/info/undergrad/

Schedule of Lectures and Readings

MHST 201. FALL 2008

GUIDE TO LECTURES, READINGS AND ACTIVITIES

The following is a guide to the topics to be covered during the term.

The interests and needs of the class might necessitate some adaptations to the schedule of lectures.

Reading assignments are required components of the course.

Questions will be asked on the material covered in the readings in quizzes and examinations.

Relevant concepts introduced in the readings and museum visits and lectures should be incorporated into journal entries.

SEPTEMBER 9, 2008. Tuesday

LECTURE TOPIC: MUSEUM AND HERITAGE STUDIES -

EXPECTING THE UNEXPECTED

Findlen, P. (1989). "The Museum: Its Classical Etymology and Renaissance Genealogy." Journal of the History of Collections 1(1): 59 - 78.

http://jhc.oxfordjournals.org.ezproxy.lib.ucalgary.ca/cgi/reprint/1/1/59

SEPTEMBER 11, Thursday

LECTURE TOPIC: INTRODUCTION TO MUSEUMS

SEPTEMBER 16, Tuesday

LECTURE TOPIC: MUSEUMS AND ARTIFACTS

READING ASSIGNMENT:

Duncan, C. (2005). "The art museum as ritual." Heritage, musuems and galleries. G. Corsane. New York, Routledge: 78 - 88. Chapter 7. (eBook)

SEPTEMBER 18, Thursday

LECTURE TOPIC: COLLECTIONS AND COLLECTORS

READING ASSIGNMENT:

Fisher, P. (1975). "The Future's Past." New Literary History 6(3): 587 - 606.

http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0028-6087%28197521%296%3A3%3C587%3ATFP%3E2.0.CO%3B2-F

SEPTEMBER 23, Tuesday

LECTURE TOPIC: MUSEUMS AND THEIR COLLECTIONS

SEPTEMBER 25, Thursday

LECTURE TOPIC: CONSERVATION

READING ASSIGNMENT:

The Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, Department of Conservation Online

http://www.ashmolean.org/departments/conservation/

SEPTEMBER 30, Tuesday

LECTURE TOPIC: CONSERVATION - MUSEUMS AND HERITAGE SITES

READING ASSIGNMENT:

A Public Trust at Risk: The Heritage Health Index Report on the State of America's Collections

http://www.heritagepreservation.org/hhi/summary.html

OCTOBER 2, Thursday

LECTURE TOPIC: ETHICS

READING ASSIGNMENT:

Crane, S. A. (1997). "Memory, Distortion, and History in the Museum." History and Theory 36(4): 44 - 63.

http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/abs/10.1111/0018-2656.00030

OCTOBER 7, Tuesday

MUSEUM VISIT: THE NICKLE ARTS MUSEUM

OCTOBER 9, Thursday

LECTURE TOPIC: ETHICS IN MUSEUM AND HERITAGE STUDIES

QUIZ

OCTOBER 14, Tuesday

LECTURE TOPIC: THE ROLE OF THE MUSEUM

READING ASSIGNMENT:

Davis, P. (2005). "Places, ‘cultural touchstones' and the ecomuseum." Heritage, musuems and galleries. G. Corsane. New York, Routledge: 365 - 376. Chapter 28. (eBook)

OCTOBER 16, Thursday

LECTURE TOPIC: BEHIND THE SCENES

OCTOBER 21, Tuesday

LECTURE TOPIC: WAR AND HOSTILITIES

READING ASSIGNMENT:

Bugnion, F. (2006). The Origins and development of the legal protection of cultural property in the event of armed conflict. Geneva, International Committee of the Red Cross.

http://www.icrc.org/Web/eng/siteeng0.nsf/html/65SHTJ

OCTOBER 23, Thursday

LECTURE TOPIC: MUSEUM COLLECTIONS AND WAR

LOCATION: THE NICKLE ARTS MUSEUM

READING ASSIGNMENT:

Brodie, N. (2003). "Stolen History: Looting and Illicit Trade." Museum International 55(3 - 4): 10 - 22.

http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1350-0775.2003.00432.x

OCTOBER 28, Tuesday

LECTURE TOPIC: PRIDE, PREJUDICE AND POLITICS IN MUSEUMS

READING ASSIGNMENT:

Macdonald, R.R. (2005). "Tolerance, trust and the meaning of ‘sensation'." Heritage, Museums and Galleries. G. Corsane. New York, Routledge: Chapter 15, 195 - 199. (eBook)

OCTOBER 30, Thursday

LECTURE TOPIC: MUSEUMS AND ETHNOGRAPHIC COLLECTIONS

LOCATION: THE NICKLE ARTS MUSEUM

READING ASSIGNMENT:

Hubert, J. and C. Fforde (2005). "The reburial issue in the twenty-first century." Heritage, Museums and Galleries. G. Corsane. New York, Routledge: Chapter 9, 107 - 121. (eBook)

NOVEMBER 4, Tuesday

LECTURE TOPIC: HERITAGE SITES

READING ASSIGNMENT:

Cossons, N. (1989). "Trends in supplying the market: Heritage tourism - trends and tribulations." Tourism Management 10(3): 192 - 194.

http://www.sciencedirect.com.ezproxy.lib.ucalgary.ca/science/journal/02615177

NOVEMBER 6, Thursday

LECTURE TOPIC: INTANGIBLE HERITAGE - INTRODUCTION

QUIZ

READING ASSIGNMENT:

Kirshenblatt-Gimblett, B. (2004). "Intangible Heritage as Metacultural Production." Museum International 56(1 - 2): 52 - 65.

http://www.blackwell-synergy.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1350-0775.2004.00458.x

NOVEMBER 11, Tuesday

REMEMBRANCE DAY. NO CLASS

NOVEMBER 13, Thursday

LECTURE TOPIC: INTANGIBLE HERITAGE - CONTINUED

NOVEMBER 18, Tuesday

LECTURE TOPIC: NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUMS

READING ASSIGNMENT:

Harrison, J. D. (1994). "Ideas of museums in the 1990s." Museum Management and Curatorship 13(2): 160 - 176.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/journal/02604779

Also published in:

Harrison, J.D. (2005). "Ideas of museums in the 1990s." Heritage, museums and galleries. G. Corsane. New York, Routledge: Chapter 4, 38 - 53. (eBook)

NOVEMBER 20, Thursday

LECTURE TOPIC: NATURAL HISTORY COLLECTIONS

READING ASSIGNMENT:

Suarez (2004). "The Value of Museum Collections for Research and Society." BioScience 54(1): 66 - 74.

http://www.bioone.org/perlserv/?request=get-abstract&doi=10.1641%2F0006-3568(2004)054%5B0066%3ATVOMCF%5D2.0.CO%3B2

NOVEMBER 25, Tuesday

LECTURE TOPIC: ALTERNATIVE MUSEUMS

READING ASSIGNMENT:

Message, K. (2006). "The New Museum." Theory, Culture and Society 23(2 - 3): 603 - 606.

http://tcs.sagepub.com.ezproxy.lib.ucalgary.ca/cgi/reprint/23/2-3/603

NOVEMBER 27, Thursday

LECTURE TOPIC: MARKETING MUSEUMS

READING ASSIGNMENT:

Foley, M. and G. McPherson (2000). "Museums as Leisure." International Journal of Heritage Studies 6(2): 161 - 174.

http://taylorandfrancis.metapress.com/openurl.asp?genre=article&issn=1352-7258&volume=6&issue=2&spage=161

DECEMBER 2, Tuesday

LECTURE TOPIC: THE FUTURE OF MUSEUMS AND HERITAGE

READING ASSIGNMENT:

Steyn, J. (2006). "The Museums' future." Futures 38 606 - 618

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6V65-4HTCW30-4&_user=1067480&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000051253&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=1067480&md5=f099a927c3e2fb446824dfe116e37a39

DECEMBER 4, Thursday

LECTURE TOPIC: AUDIENCE DEVELOPMENT

Other strongly recommended, but not essential readings:

Hooper-Greenhill, E. (2000). "Changing Values in the Art Museum: rethinking communication and learning." International Journal of Heritage Studies 6(1): 9 - 31.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/135272500363715

In changing times older art-museum values are coming under challenge and new emphasis is being placed on museum- audience relationships. The professional development of new communicative approaches in art museums can be seen as a form of action research. Older modernist models for communication based on the transmission of authoritative subject-based facts to a mass of passive receivers are being superseded by new approaches that acknowledge `active audiences', constructivist and interpretist learning theories and the complexities of cultural politics. New roles for art museum professionals, the concept of differentiated audiences, the intervention of new voices and the exposition of new narratives offer possibilities for the reconceptualisation of art museums that are rooted in late 19thcentury modernist culture.

Ames, M. M. (2005). "Museology Interrupted." Museum International 57(3): 44 - 51.

AM1 .M86

http://www.blackwell-synergy.com.ezproxy.lib.ucalgary.ca/toc/muse/57/3

Scholars customarily impose their differentiations upon the world and how it is to be studied, then defend them with vigour: between different sets of subject matter (language, art, artefact, history, culture, nature); between disciplines (history, linguistics, anthropology, art); and between different types of institutions (churches, schools, universities, and those quasi-educational businesses called museums).

The examples presented in the paper are untidy ones because they cross one or more of those guarded boundaries. Academic categories, though firmly institutionalized in modern society (in the Western world, at least), are of course arbitrary divisions of a world more complexly interwoven. These categories therefore tend to be rudely interrupted by alternate orders released through rebellion and decolonization. A review of a few of these categories and their interruptions will serve to highlight changes affecting museums.

UNESCO, S. d. l. C., Section du patrimoine immateriel (2006). Brochure of the Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity. Paris, UNESCO: 108.

http://portal.unesco.org/culture/en/ev.php-URL_ID=32260&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html

UNESCO. Third Proclamation of Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity

http://www.unesco.org/culture/intangible-heritage/index.htm