Museum and university mutations: the relationship between museum practices and museum studies in the era of interdisciplinarity, professionalisation, globalisation and new technologies

Encountering the Creative Museum: Museographic creativeness and thebricolageof time materials

“…I would argue this dilemma is by no means unique to museum studies courses, and perhaps there is pedagogic leverage in harnessing this dilemma into a productive tension that can inform reflexive practice as well as a grounded disciplinary knowledge. The challenges-pedagogic, epistemological, and practical-posed by the distinction between disciplinary knowledge and work-based learning and practice, at base, stem from relating to the museum as (one's prospective) workplace and as an object of study (Dubuc, 2011); the two ways of relating require different postures, as it were: immersion and identification, on one hand, and objectification and a critical distance on the other. The perceived privileging of disciplinary codified knowledge (Eraut, 1994) over practice within university-based professional courses is a very common criticisms of various professional courses (e.g.…”

“…teaching, nursing, engineering, social work), one of the major pedagogic challenges for such courses is to reconcile and in a way deconstruct in actu the theory/practice binary (Davis, 2011;Dubuc, 2011;Macleod, 2001;Mason, 2006;Teather, 1991), in an attempt to marry together what Ryle identifies as the two incommensurate modes of knowing: knowing-that and knowing-how (Ryle, 1949(Ryle, /2009. Many museum studies courses seek to address this challenge through incorporating a work-based learning component and 'workplace immersion' (Dubuc, 2011, p. 499) within the courses in the form of accredited placements and internships as well as partnerships with museums in the design and delivery of the courses (Carter et al, 2011;Davis, 2011;Dubuc, 2011;Welsh, 2013). There have been variable degrees of success in achieving some integration of the two modes of knowledge, with '[t]he dilemmas surrounding theory and practice,' as Dubuc (2011, p. 500) notes, still 'unresolved.'…”

“…From within museums themselves, in part due to the external discourses on the museum and in part due to a new post-1968 generation of museum workers (Lorente, 2012, pp. 241-242) keen to reshape the value base of museum work, there has been a great deal of reflexivity-often introspective thinking aloud in written format-about the operational and ethical idiom that underpins museum work, and how the museum can overcome and transcend its inherent limits that follow from its collections that are often seen as, and can be reduced to, a rarefied repository of curiosities, as a simple object of curiosity-including rigorous and scholarly curiosity (Dubuc, 2011;Lorente, 2012;Mason, 2006). All of these dynamics and factors have combined to amount to a salient discursive investment in the museum, turning it into an object of enquiry as well as scrutiny, driven by critical, epistemic, practical, and ethical imperatives.…”

Running with the ball? Making a play for sport heritage archives in Higher Education contexts

“…Although contextually-driven introspection, identity malaise and ideological, managerial and operational shifts affect other sectors of the economy, culture and arts scholars have articulated specific concerns with respect to the industry's political pressures, financial issues, pedagogical functions, broadened community engagement, and reorientation (Boys Boddington and Speight2016;Dubuc 2011;Déom 2008;Janes 2009;McCall and Gray, 2014). Recent changes have entailed moves to better align the industry with current economic climes and commercial influences, consumer reorientations, state and civic rationales vis-à-vis scientific inquiry, cultural symbolism, and education and entertainment (Dubuc 2011).…”

“…In many ways, given their respective pursuits of scientific enquiry and learning, valuable contribution to a knowledge economy, commitment to public enlightenment, and exploration of critical and creative endeavour, a relationship between the sectors makes sense. Unity notwithstanding, the relationships have become increasingly now influenced by (en)forced contextual constraints (e.g., government policy development and intervention, neoliberal market forces, structural and ideological shifts in funding acquisition and allocation, patronage changes and demands, and/or individual political priorities) (Dubuc 2011;McCall and Gray 2014;Watson 2002). Drawing on education and heritage scholarship, and theoretical frameworks of sport culture spaces (Hardy, Loy and Booth 2009; Phillips 2012; Pinson 2017), this paper examines efforts undertaken at one specific Higher Education establishment in the United Kingdom in which institutional agendas (vis-à-vis historical and cultural foci, encouraging 'impactful' academic activity, brand exposure, economic efficiency, and community engagement) have contoured, and become entwined with, an embryonic sport heritage and archive project.…”