While watching The Walking Dead last night, my husband and I came to the conclusion that, come the zombie apocalypse (and it’s coming), we want to be in a survival group with living history museum staff. Because it’s all well and good to be a Navy Seal commando-type, but the people who can churn butter, cure…
When I began as the Curator of Interpretation with the Fort Collins Museum of Discovery in 2008, my first project was Soapstone Prairie Natural Area. 28 square miles in northern Colorado, Soapstone was purchased by the city of Fort Collins to be a park and conservation area. Along with its attraction as a natural space,…
Last night’s episode of Parks and Recreation had a mini museum scene that definitely felt familiar. Substitute Harrison Bucks for T-Rex Tokens, and you’ve basically summarized my second semester of grad school. (While at the William Henry Harrison Museum) April: I just wanted to say that I really like your museum. It’s weird and sad and unnecessary.…
What happens when living history interpreters allow the lines between the past and present to blur a little? When they don’t break character, but they definitely crack it? I’m always a bit skeptical of living history and (re)enactment experiences. I don’t dislike them by default, but growing up between the Revolutionary War reenactment-happy towns of Lexington…
It’s no secret that I don’t like traditional dioramas. But apparently I do like it when it looks like traditional dioramas have exploded and scattered animals throughout the exhibit. I like it a lot. Last week I visited the National Museum of Scotland. And it was a lovely, if somewhat predictable, experience until I got…
Spotted a top Cramond Island in the Firth of Forth. Rest in peace, interpretive sign. Rest in peace. I’ll be back to blogging after I’m done with my Scottish adventure.
This excellent cartoon via Poorly Drawn Lines.
A few weeks ago, my students and I were talking about what pieces of current pop culture we thought would have sticking power. What references, songs, movies, and taglines from today will people still be using thirty years from now? Will our future be full of YOLOs, hashtags, twerking, and fetch? Just kidding. Fetch is never going…
While working on a new evaluation project with the Freiburg Museum Natur und Mensch, I’ve come across an interesting example of how un-prompted visitor-contributed content can work. In the temporary exhibit “Letzte Ölung Nigerdelta,” one room invites visitors to sit and watch a projected series of photographs exploring the social, economical, and environmental affects of the oil industry…
How much do you bet that the person who wrote this Postsecret postcard also downloaded Taken at the Museum?
Museums Askew 