Unaccompanied Children at the Border: Can Museums Help?

I’ve written a guest post on museums and the unaccompanied children at the border for AAM’s Center for the Future of Museums. 슠Below is the introduction. The theme of the슠Alliance 2015 conference슠is슠Museums and Social Value. Leading up to that meeting in Atlanta, CFM will be hosting a number of guest bloggers addressing various aspects of…

The Empathetic Museum Pop-Up Session: AAM 2014

  A small but enthusiastic group met슠on May 20 in “The Unconference Room” 슠at the American Alliance of Museum’s 2014 meeting in Seattle to continue discussions on The Empathetic Museum that began at AAM’s meeting in Baltimore in 2013: Janeen Bryant VP for Education at the Levine Museum of the New South; Karen Hasselflet, Cultural…

See you in Seattle?

The annual American Alliance of Museums conference will be in Seattle, WA this year May 18-22. Here are two sessions that aren’t on the official program, and one that is. Pop-Up Session on The Empathetic Museum Look for information on the time and place beginning on Saturday, May 17. 슠One can only sign up for…

The Empathetic Museum: Synchronicity

Note to readers: 슠Not sure why my old post on museums in India went out earlier today. Apologies for something your in-box doesn’t need. 슠 Here is current post:슠 Ever notice an idea that you thought was original popping up in a number of places simultaneously?슠 Thats whats happening with the topic of museums and…

Collecting Trayvon Martin’s Hoodie: A Conversation We Need to Have

Now that the 24/7 discussion of the George Zimmerman/Trayvon Martin case has died down, its time to look at the implications of a discussion that flared briefly in the aftermath of the not-guilty verdict for Zimmerman. On July 31, 2013, Lonnie Bunch, Director of the Smithsonians National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC)…

The Empathetic Museum: Connecting through Collections

In early June I posted a summary of a “Pop-Up” session I organized at the recent meeting of the American Alliance of Museums in Baltimore, MD. 슠About ten participants joined in a round-table conversation about what might be meant by “The Empathetic Museum.” 슠Daryl Fischer was part of the discussion, and here are some of…

The Empathetic Museum: Institutional Body Language

Since my last post, on the pop-up discussion about The Empathetic Museum at the American Alliance of Museums conference, Regan Forrest of the blog Interactivate has picked up on this theme and examined it from the perspective of interpretation and design. Her posts are well worth reading, and have generated more widespread discussion on this…