Museums Connect: Teaching Public History through Transnational Museum Partnerships

Richard J W Harker

doi:10.5130/phrj.v22i0.4753

Abstract

Museums Connect is a program funded by the US Department of State and administered by the American Alliance of Museums that sponsors transnational museum partnerships. This program provides one model for teaching public history in a transnational context, and this article analyzes the experiences of two university-museums—the Museum of History and Holocaust Education (MHHE) in the United States and the Ben M’sik Community Museum (BMCM) in Morocco—during two grants between 2009 and 2012. In exploring the impact of the program on the staff, faculty, and students involved and by analyzing the experiences and reflections of participants, I argue that this program can generate positive pedagogical experiences. However, in addition to the successes of the MHHE and BMCM during their two grants, the participants encountered significant power differentials that manifested themselves in both the processes and products of the grants. It is the conclusion of this article that both partners in a public history project need to address and confront potential power issues at the outset in order to achieve a more balanced, collaborative partnership.

Highlights

Thrust into an exciting transnational collaboration in the summer of 2011 upon assuming my job as Education and Outreach Manager at the Museum of History and Holocaust Education at Kennesaw State University, I and other colleagues proceeded to facilitate a shared exploration with undergraduate students of what it means to be a Muslim in both the American South and Morocco.[1]
Unlike other international exchange programs funded by Department of State (DOS), and exchanges conducted between academic public history programs, Museums Connect is both the only program focused exclusively on museums and attempts to engage the museums’ and their communities, often school aged or college students, in collaborative transnational projects.[3]
Lewis, who was the driving force behind both grants, freely acknowledged the professional power differential that existed with her Moroccan colleague despite their deep friendship, recalling that she led the project activities because of a professional ‘power imbalance, because Samir had never done this.’[26]. Dickey acknowledged that with the best possible intentions the American professionals attempted to ‘train’ their Moroccan colleague, recalling that throughout the projects they tried ‘to help him [El Azhar] get up to speed in terms of being a museum professional.’[27]. In attempting to correct the power imbalance, the Museum of History and Holocaust Education (MHHE) faculty and staff were inadvertently acting out a form of intellectual colonialism by teaching American public history and museum studies to their Moroccan counterpart.[28]

Summary

Introduction

Thrust into an exciting transnational collaboration in the summer of 2011 upon assuming my job as Education and Outreach Manager at the Museum of History and Holocaust Education at Kennesaw State University, I and other colleagues proceeded to facilitate a shared exploration with undergraduate students of what it means to be a Muslim in both the American South and Morocco.[1].

Results

Conclusion