Listening, hearing, and taking authority

Abstract

This is not a special issue, yet nearly every paper in this issue touches on the prickly topic of paying attention to different thoughts, perspectives, and voices to change practice. Authors from around the world have delved into themes of community engagement, authority, inclusion, and adaptability as critical pedagogical challenges. Their work is calling on all museum practitioners to live up to new expectations in an evolving landscape of cultural institutions and civil rights. Each study offers a counterpoint to the one preceding it. Comparing these papers will offer readers an opportunity to reflect on the state and future directions of their museum practice.

Several articles underscore the importance of community-informed approaches to museum design and programming. By blending community engagement with traditional museum practices, the institutions featured in these studies focus attention on whose experiences should be heard, and how authority is conferred. In some cases, focusing on visitors or users, while other papers focus on specific groups, including one paper that focuses on museum laborers as a constituency that is seldom considered an audience. These papers highlight the significance of recognizing and valuing the contributions of all stakeholders, and what it will take to foster a sense of ownership and belonging within museum spaces.

A second theme that we discovered looking across the many papers we have received in the past year was how authority and representation exist in tension with existing collections. The interrogation of authority and representation in curatorial landscapes includes how museums themselves make a place or contend with colonial legacies so entrenched within collections and communication practices that they are now driving critical disruptions to what is considered power. They reveal the difficult work of decolonization and the necessity for root cause analysis as well as public performance. By amplifying historically marginalized voices and engaging in the work of building inclusivity into all practices, museums can foster more equitable and authentic representations of diverse communities. In doing so, museums are able to rethink universal access, not as a monolithic process, but as an intersectional enterprise that can honor diversity and equity while improving access and inclusion. These researchers continue to push the edges of how museums can turn away from a representation of elite control to become welcoming environments that center community voices and promote equity that can redefine what cultural resources are or should be.

Last, in the after-effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, a few scholars have used data collected during that crisis to re-examine curation and how digital platforms can have a durable role in museum engagement. These papers highlight the importance of adaptability and innovation as a perpetual cycle of reinvention for museums.

This collection of articles, while accepted in the order they were received, offers a refreshing overview of the questions of community engagement, how traditional notions of authority are being disrupted, and what appears to be a burgeoning effort to redefine who and how museums serve their public.

We invite readers to engage with these thought-provoking works and look forward to the next generation of work reshaping the future of museum practice.