Capital Costs: Lottery Funding in Britain and the Consequences for Museums

Funding for London museums has increased enormously in recent years. The lottery has contributed hundreds of millions of pounds for capital developments; central government revenue in the tens of millions goes to funding free admission to the national museums and galleries. The research described in this paper focuses on museums that opened lottery‐funded capital projects in 2000, and on the relationship between this additional funding and museum attendance. The authors found that the extra money led to extra visits—and for the first time attempted to calculate what those visits cost. This research also looks at whether people chose improved museums over other museums, and briefly investigates the impact on attendance of the outbreak of foot and mouth disease and the downturn in tourism following the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001.     

Democracy for Export: Museums Connect Program as a Vehicle of American Cultural Diplomacy

Sponsored by the U.S. Department of State and facilitated by the American Alliance of Museums (AAM) through the Museums Connect program, Identities: Understanding Islam in a Cross‐cultural Context is an exercise of community development and public inclusion from the perspective of cultural diplomacy. The 2009–10 project was a cooperative endeavor between the Museum of History and Holocaust Education (MHHE) at Kennesaw State University, Georgia, USA and the Ben M'sik Community Museum, Hassan II University, Casablanca, Morocco. Drawing on interviews conducted with the AAM managers and project participants, as well as relevant literature, the discussion considers the more important mechanisms of American museum missions and practices as means of achieving American foreign‐policy objectives.     

Reinventing (open) government: State and federal trends

Federal open records laws, executive orders on national security classification, and similar policy instruments in the states require that most records at government agencies be available to the public upon request—subject to exemptions which may entail review. Traditionally, this review has been accomplished by redaction (purging) of hardcopy. Resource limitations and increases in the number of requests demand a rethinking of the process. Offices are experimenting with optical scanning, onscreen purging, and online dissemination. Statutory and common law trends may soon require disclosure of database reports in electronic form, when so requested, rather than printouts. The dissemination of manipulable data of commercial value requires a rationale broader than the “citizenship rights” that justified the Freedom of Information Act. Online publication of agency-controlled records also demands careful planning of information systems and public networks. The issues discussed in this article are central to the establishment of an adequate policy for electronic freedom of information.     

Controversy and Challenge: British Funding Increases Nationally,But Not to National Museums

The United Kingdom's economic backdrop, according to Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown, has never looked better. Massive amounts of new funding are being invested in the National Health Service, Education and Social Services—tens of billions of pounds. Investment in the U.K.'s 10‐year Science and Innovation strategy has risen to over £3 billion per annum. Investment in Arts Council Funding will have increased 69 percent in the eight years since 1997, to over £410 million per annum by 2005–2006. And attendance at national museums and galleries has increased over 60 percent since admission charges were ended in 2001–2002. But in the field of science and technology there is a scattering of less‐well‐known data. More than 30 departments of chemistry and physics have closed at universities around Britain in the last few years. The take‐up rate of students entering science and mathematics, and subjects leading to technological, engineering, and medical degrees, among certain socio‐economic groups, has been falling dramatically. Even wealthy industries such as the oil and gas sector cannot attract young people—especially young women—to engineering, despite the fact that engineers with less than a decade of experience earn an average of U.S. $75,000 a year, and when fully experienced, an average of U.S. $127,000 a year. Overall, it seems that the ability of the public to interrogate issues driven by changes in science and technology, and their level of trust, are effectively decreasing.     

Evaluation, Research and Communities of Practice: Program Evaluation in Museums

Museums present different contexts for learning, particularly when compared with places such as schooos, universities and libraries. They have been described as free-choice learning environments visited by a broad range of people. Museums have the opportunity to shape identities—through access to objects, knowledge and information visitors see themselves and their culture reflected in ways that encourage new connections, meaning making and learning. However, across the world museums are finding themselves competing with other leisure and learning experiences in an increasingly global world. The long history of audience research in the cultural sector demonstrates the interest museums have had in their visitors over time. This paper outlines the development of audience research in museums, the context within which it operates, and describes the processes of audience research through a series of case studies drawn from the work of the Australian Museum Audience Research Centre. It is argued that the shift in museums from mission-led program development to balancing content and audience needs through a transaction approach requires a broader research-focused agenda. While traditional ways of conducting evaluations are necessary and useful, to remain viable audience research needs to be more strategic, working across the sector in new ways and utilising new methods. How programs impact on users and facilitate learning about a wide range of key issues that museums are concerned with is a leadership role that audience research can take across both the cultural sector and other free-choice learning contexts. To achieve this, a communities of practice approach is suggested as a potential framework for audience research in the contemporary museum.     

Visitor Meaning-Making in Museums for a New Age

The concept of meaning-making is generating excitement within the museum community, with good reason. Providing an approach to understanding visitor experiences, the paradigm illuminates the visitor's active role in creating meaning of a museum experience through the context he/she brings, influenced by the factors of self-identity, companions, and leisure motivations. As a result, visitors find personal significance within museums in a range of patterned ways that reflect basic human needs, such as the need for individualism and the need for community. The dynamics of visitor meaning-making indicate the importance of fashioning a better “fit” between people and museums in two critical areas: (1) between human meaning-making and museum methods and (2) between human needs and the purpose of museums in society. Each of these areas illuminates a promising direction for a new age of museums in which we actively support, facilitate, and enhance the many kinds of meaning possible in museums and explicitly incorporate human needs into exhibit goals and institutional missions. Examples of successful strategies are discussed.     

Reinventing a health sciences digital library--organizational impact

What is the organizational impact of becoming a digital library, as well as a physical entity with facilities and collections? Is the digital library an add-on or an integrated component of the overall library package? Librarians see sweeping environmental and technological changes. The staff members feel exhilarated and challenged by the pressures to adapt quickly and effectively. Librarians recognize that a Web presence, like other technology components, must be continuously enhanced and regularly re-engineered. The Health Sciences Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, is reinventing its digital presence to better meet the needs of the community. This paper provides a case study focusing on major changes in planning processes, organizational structure, staffing, budgeting, training, communications, and operations at the Health Sciences Library.     

我国自然博物馆藏品收藏现状与分析

本文介绍了国内外自然博物馆藏品收藏现状,分析我国自然博物馆存在藏品收藏总体不足、各区域自然博物馆之间藏品收藏差距较大、收藏范围较狭窄、藏品来源单一等问题,并进行了原因分析,提出正确认识自然博物馆的研究、收藏与教育的关系,加强对博物馆科研的投入,授予博物馆标本采集权,打破体制机制限制,加强对各方标本资源的利用等建议。     

A Research Vision for Museums

Abstract The museum family in America is in danger, and perhaps other museum families across the globe are, as well. Management has failed our mission by focusing on outputs like attendance numbers, and audience researchers have failed management by not shedding light on the connections between the pleasure of learning and attendance—or, if you will, between individual gains and a museum’s public value. This research vision for museums looks at how you can make that connection and save museums in their hour of need.     

口述历史博物馆化：博物馆学发展新趋势

随着文化价值多元化和信息传媒技术的日益发展，诸多层次不同、需求各异的新型文化消费群体应运而生。他们对博物馆提出了更高要求：进一步强化历史与现实之间的有机联系；通过高科技手段和新信息传媒工具的运用，使观众在获得高雅艺术享受的同时，得到文化休闲和感官愉悦；历史文物的展示更能凸显人的角色地位与活动特征；补充活态的新见材料，更为生动和多维地呼应文物、说明历史，等等。凡此种种，无疑对以文化传播为己任的博物馆构成了巨大挑战。本文拟以口述历史博物馆化为契点，浅析博物馆和博物馆学在因应这一变化趋势方面所做的探索。     

国家达尔文博物馆与俄罗斯自然历史博物馆协会

创建于1907年的国家达尔文博物馆是俄罗斯历史最悠久的自然历史博物馆之一,由亚历山大·科茨等四人共同创办,该馆每年为不同的观众举办50~60个不同主题的展览。在国家达尔文博物馆中设立的俄罗斯自然历史博物馆协会发挥着联系俄罗斯各自然历史博物馆的作用。     

State and regional service strategies for an electronic Federal Depository Library Program

As the Federal Depository Library Program moves toward the increased utilization of electronic technologies to meet the government information needs of the public, libraries must plan how to best take advantage of local, state, and regional resources to make this transition successful. This paper suggests that depository libraries should begin immediately a planning process to develop state or regional service strategies for electronic government information and outlines the steps to develop such plans.