| CODE | ACA5042 | ||||||||
| TITLE | Education and Community Museums | ||||||||
| UM LEVEL | 05 - Postgraduate Modular Diploma or Degree Course | ||||||||
| MQF LEVEL | 7 | ||||||||
| ECTS CREDITS | 5 | ||||||||
| DEPARTMENT | Arts, Open Communities and Adult Education | ||||||||
| DESCRIPTION | This study-unit will cover the genesis of the community museum from its appearance in the 1970s. The study-unit will look into the ways in which community museums have developed since those early years. The study-unit will examine the principal philosophies and the museum theories that underpin the concept of a community museum and examine issues of 鈥榚ducation鈥� and 鈥榣earning鈥� in a community museum context. The notion of 鈥榗ommunity鈥� will be explored as will issues of 鈥榠dentity鈥�, 鈥榩lace鈥� and 鈥榮pace鈥�. The concept of 鈥榟eritage鈥�, both past and contemporary, will be discussed together with the significance of 鈥榓ffect鈥� and 鈥榥ostalgia鈥�. It will also look at the importance given to ephemeral heritage 鈥� such as personal stories, postcards, family photos and songs - and ways in which it can be 鈥榗aptured鈥�. The key role played by local people: the general public, historians, artisans and artists in creating a community museum. Study-Unit Aims: - To provide students with instruments that will enable them to deconstruct the workings of a community museum, including its semiotic elements, and to thus be able to understand and analyse the kind of education and learning that is taking place. - To distinguish the legitimate didactic elements - objects/legends etc. - from other, equally legitimate, but diverse learning facets of the community museum. - Create an appreciation of local historians, artisans and general public and their role in community museum projects. - To generate an understanding of 鈥榣ive鈥� community engagement in a project and what skills are required to create and keep that project going. - To demonstrate the significance of interpretative communities with reference to visitor satisfaction. - Familiarise students with the difference between a top down and a grassroots approach to heritage appreciation and display. - To provide a knowledge base that will be helpful both for students with a teaching background as well as those from other areas. Learning Outcomes: 1. Knowledge & Understanding: By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: - Recognize the complexity of meanings that can be associated with a community museum. - Identify contested spaces and understand best practice in dealing with them within a community context. - Recognize the fact that learning in a community museum environment can have many diverse facets that can be geared to different visitor sectors i.e. local and from outside the community. - Critically understand the special relationship that there has to be between the museum and its visitors. - Comprehend the dynamics that enable a community museum to be part of a process rather than an end in itself. - Discuss issues of authenticity and memory with regard to community museum exhibits. 2. Skills: By the end of the study-unit the student will be able to: - Use his/her newly acquired knowledge base to compare and contrast and critically examine community museums. - Blend both learning and more didactic elements together on a museum platform in which the visitor becomes an active learner. - Understand and deliver ephemeral content and concepts to an audience. - Recognize good practice in a community museum where the weight of engagement is divided between the provider of information and the visitor. Main Text/s and any supplementary readings: Main Texts: - Sheila Watson, Ed. Museums and their Communities, Routledge, London & New York, 2007. - Bella Dicks, Heritage Place and Community, University of Wales Press, Cardiff, 2000. - Peter Davis, Ecomuseums: A sense of Place, continuum, 2011. - Falk & Dierking, Learning from museums : visitor experiences and the making of meaning, American Association for State and Local History, 2000. Supplementary Readings: - Niamh Moore, Yvonne Whelan Eds., Heritage, memory and the politics of identity : news perspectives on the cultural landscape, 2016. - Laurajane Smith, Uses of Heritage, Routledge, London & UK, 2006. |
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| STUDY-UNIT TYPE | Lecture, Fieldwork and Seminar | ||||||||
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| LECTURER/S | Patricia Camilleri Sandro Debono |
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The University makes every effort to ensure that the published Courses Plans, Programmes of Study and Study-Unit information are complete and up-to-date at the time of publication. The University reserves the right to make changes in case errors are detected after publication.
The availability of optional units may be subject to timetabling constraints. Units not attracting a sufficient number of registrations may be withdrawn without notice. It should be noted that all the information in the description above applies to study-units available during the academic year 2025/6. It may be subject to change in subsequent years. |
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