Micromuseology: An Analysis of Small Independent Museums

Description

How would our understanding of museums change if we used the Vintage Wireless Museum or the Museum of Witchcraft as examples - rather than the British Museum or the Louvre? Although there are thousands of small, independent, single-subject museums in the UK, Europe and North America, the field of museum studies remains focused almost exclusively on major institutions. In this ground-breaking new book, Fiona Candlin reveals how micromuseums challenge preconceived ideas about what museums are and how they operate. Based on extensive fieldwork and analysis of more than fifty micromuseums, she shows how they offer dramatically different models of curation, interpretation and visitor experience, and how their analysis generates new perspectives on subjects such as display, objects, collections, architecture, and the public sphere. The first-ever book dedicated to the subject, Micromuseology provides a platform for radically rethinking key debates within museum studies. Destined to transform the field, it is essential reading for students and researchers in museum studies, anthropology, material culture studies, and visual culture.

Fiona Candlin is Senior Lecturer in Museum Studies at Birkbeck, University of London, UK

We can declare Candlin's experiment in the relevance of micromuseums a success. -- Jack David Eller * Anthropology Review Database * Don't let the modest title fool you. Candlin does not just provide 'an analysis of small independent museums', she prods Museum Studies to rethink its primary object of study. Part travel literature, part ethnography, Candlin's book offers both a new object - what she dubs 'the micromuseum' - and a highly innovative method for its scholarly study, 'micromuseology'. After Micromuseology, one might ask: 'What was Museum Studies?'. -- Raiford Guins, Stony Brook University, USA