"This book offers a complex theoretical intervention into rhetorical education and its unrealized potential in regard to engagement with social justice"--

This very practical book guides museums on how to create the highest quality experience possible for their visitors. Creating an environment that supports visitor engagement with collections means examining every stage of the visit, from the initial impetus to go to a particular institution, to front-of-house management, interpretive approach and qualitative analysis afterwards. This holistic approach will be immensely helpful to museums in meeting the needs and expectations of visitors and building their audience. This book features: includes chapter introductions and discussion sections supporting case studies to show how ideas are put into practice a lavish selection of tables, figures and plates to support and illustrate the discussion boxes showing ideas, models and planning suggestions to guide development an up-to-date bibliography of landmark research. The Engaging Museum offers a set of principles that can be adapted to any museum in any location and will be a valuable resource for institutions of every shape and size, as well as a vital addition to the reading lists of museum studies students.

As art museum educators become more involved in curatorial decisions and creating opportunities for community voices to be represented in the galleries of the museum, museum education is shifting from responding to works of art to developing authentic opportunities for engagement with their communities. Current research focuses on museum education experiences and the wide-reaching benefits of including these experiences into art education courses. As more universities add art museum education to their curricula, there is a need for a text to support the topic and offer examples of real-world museum education experiences. Engaging Communities Through Civic Engagement in Art Museum Education deepens knowledge on museum and art education and civic engagement and bridges the gap from theory to practice. The chapters focus on various sectors of this research, including diversity and inclusion in museum experiences, engaging communities through new techniques, and museum and university partnerships. As such, it includes coverage on timely topics that include programs and audience engagement with the LGBTQ+, refugee, disability, and senior communities; socially responsive museum pedagogy; and the use of student workers. This book is ideal for museum educators, museum directors, curators, professionals, practitioners, researchers, academicians, and students who are interested in updated knowledge and research in art education, curriculum development, and civic engagement.

Museums and Anthropology in the Age of Engagement considers changes that have been taking place in museum anthropology as it has been responding to pressures to be more socially relevant, useful, and accountable to diverse communities. Based on the author’s own research and applied work over the past 30 years, the book gives examples of the wide-ranging work being carried out today in museum anthropology as both an academic, scholarly field and variety of applied, public anthropology. While it examines major trends that characterize our current "age of engagement," the book also critically examines the public role of museums and anthropology in colonial and postcolonial contexts, namely in the US, the Netherlands, and Indonesia. Throughout the book, Kreps questions what purposes and interests museums and anthropology serve in these different times and places. Museums and Anthropology in the Age of Engagement is a valuable resource for readers interested in an historical and comparative study of museums and anthropology, and the forms engagement has taken. It should be especially useful to students and instructors looking for a text that provides in one volume a history of museum anthropology and methods for doing critical, reflexive museum ethnography and collaborative work.

Presents reflections on museum philosophy for the 21st century from an international group of contributors.

Case Studies from Animating Democracy Museums and Civic Dialogue features three exhibition projects that demonstrate how museums can function as effective forums for civic dialogue: The Without Sanctuary Project (The Andy Warhol Museum); Gene(sis): Contemporary Art Explores Human Genomics (The Henry Art Gallery); and Mirroring Evil: Nazi Imagery/Recent Art (The Jewish Museum). Case studies examine approaches to curatorial practice, interpretation, and education prompted by civic intent; institutional challenges and changes in practice that occurred in doing this work; and the critical importance of partnerships.