I’m currently a visiting faculty member at the University of California Washington Program (UCDC) teaching the course Museums and Politics. This opportunity also allows me unlimited access to Washington, D.C., home to a concentration of museums unparalleled in scope to anywhere else in the world. This makes it the perfect experiential learning location to study how museums serve as an educational resource and a place of entertainment and community engagement. Museums also shape and reflect cultural heritage, identity, and political struggle, and the Smithsonian Institution is currently defending its museums from those who say they have shifted from neutral historical education to partisan political activism and must return to a unifying national narrative.
Exhibitions are at the heart of the museum experience. While the museum’s role is ever-evolving, the physical display and interpretation of objects and archival materials is what makes a museum unique. Museum and Politics uses exhibition making to critically examine museum practices and introduces students to the principles and practices of organizing, developing, and designing museum experiences. Through a combination of short lectures, readings, assignments, activities, guest lectures, and field trips, students will explore the social impact, multifaceted nature, complex narratives, and contentious legacies of museum environments. Designed for learners with a foundational understanding of museology and those with a greater grasp of the field, the course guides students through a structured process to conceptualize an exhibition for a museum on the National Mall or in Washington, D.C.
