UK Museums Research Articles

Everyday Constructions of Class-Based Inequality: Field Effects in UK Museum Work

This article contributes to our understanding of how occupational contexts shape everyday constructions of class-based inequality. Using Bourdieu’s concept of field, and UK museum work as a case, we analyse interview, focus group and secondary data. We show how those with a stake in museum work construct three versions of class-based inequality: (1) between individuals; (2) between positions; and (3) between institution and worker. The museum field provides a familiar space that can aid ‘recognition’ of inequality between individuals. Conversely the field generates a logic – here, keeping collections special – which can legitimate structural inequality between positions. It also facilitates a game-playing dynamic that leads to a ‘pragmatic acceptance’ and reinforcement of inequality between institution and worker. Visibility of class-based inequality is shaped by misdirection rather than misrecognition, as well as one’s position in the hierarchy.

Experiencing the divine? Museum presentations of religion in Roman Britain

Religious practice in the Roman world involved diverse rituals and knowledge. Scholarly studies of ancient religion increasingly emphasise the experiential aspects of these practices, highlighting multisensory and embodied approaches to material culture and the dynamic construction of religious experiences and identities. In contrast, museum displays typically frame religious material culture around its iconographic or epigraphic significance. The author analyses 23 UK museum displays to assess how religion in Roman Britain is presented and discusses how museums might use research on ‘lived ancient religion’ to offer more varied and engaging narratives of religious practices that challenge visitors’ perceptions of the period.

UK Museums and Heritage Sustainable Packing Group: Exploring Sustainable Strategies for Soft Wrapping Paintings

ABSTRACT This paper explores methods to improve the sustainability of packing artworks, focusing on soft wrapping of framed paintings. In 2022, the UK Museums and Heritage Sustainable Packing Group was formed. The research described in this paper focuses on one aspect of the group’s activity: seeking to find materials and methods which reduce environmental burdens and comply with conservation standards for soft wrapping two-dimensional artworks for short journeys between display, storage locations and conservators’ studios. The project investigated the physical qualities of recycled content polyethylene (PE), bioplastics and paper-based alternatives, along with common barrier materials such as virgin PE sheet and Bubble Wrap®, to form comparative datasets. Each material’s environmental impact, potential for reuse, interaction with artworks and ability to maintain adequate buffering against environmental changes during transport was researched. Alternative methods were also explored to reduce the quantity of sealing tape and promote its reversibility and reuse. The environmental impacts of the materials were assessed by sustainability specialists at the University of Manchester’s Sustainable Materials Innovation Hub. Reusable and recycled content films offered the most promising alternatives to the PE wrapping most used at present. The use of a tying method, eliminating the need for adhesive tape, also showed potential for further investigation. The low-cost testing methodology should be refined to better control the variables and allow for more repeatable testing, but these preliminary results will help to refine future research directions.

Marketisation and the Public Good: A Typology of Responses among Museum Professionals

Across Western democracies, the public sector has undergone significant changes following successive waves of marketisation. Such changes find material expression in an organisation’s logic and associated vocabulary. While marketisation may be adopted, a growing body of research explains how it is often resisted as public sector professionals reject its logic and vocabulary. We contribute to this debate by detailing additional, theoretically important responses. Rather than simply rejecting or adopting both the logic and vocabulary of marketisation, this article shows how UK museum professionals decouple these. Our analysis shows how museum professionals either fashion generic market vocabulary (e.g. customer, value) to pursue local projects or sustain terms such as public and culture to cling to longer-standing ideals of publicness. Partly because of the nature of cultural goods, we propose the museum sector as a paradigm case to illustrate this phenomenon, but our argument has broader implications for the public sphere.

Representing, Re‐presenting, or Producing the Past? Memory Work amongst Museum Employees

AbstractThough it is widely understood that the past can be an important resource for organizations, less is known about the micro‐level skills and choices that help to materialize different representations of the past. We understand these micro‐level skills and choices as a practice: ‘memory work’ – a banner term gathering various activities that provide the scaffolding for a shared past. Seeking to learn from a context where memory work is central, we share insights from a quasi‐longitudinal study of UK museum employees. We theorize three ideal‐typic regimes of memory work, namely representing, re‐presenting and producing the past, and detail the micro‐practices through which these regimes are enacted. Through explaining the key features of memory work in this context, our paper offers novel, broader insights into the relationship between occupations and memory work, showing how occupations differ in their understanding of memory and how this shapes their memory work.

Tracking Museums’ Online Responses to the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Study in Museum Analytics

The COVID-19 pandemic led to the temporary closure of all museums in the UK, closing buildings and suspending all on-site activities. Museum agencies aim at mitigating and managing these impacts on the sector, in a context of chronic data scarcity. “Museums in the Pandemic” is an interdisciplinary project that utilises content scraped from museums’ websites and social media posts to understand how the UK museum sector, currently comprising more than 3,300 museums, has responded and is currently responding to the pandemic. A major part of the project has been the design of computational techniques to provide the project’s museum studies experts with appropriate data and tools for undertaking this research, leveraging web analytics, natural language processing and machine learning. In this methodological contribution, firstly, we developed techniques to retrieve and identify museum official websites and social media accounts (Facebook and Twitter now X). This supported the automated capture of large-scale online data about the entire UK museum sector. Secondly, we harnessed convolutional neural networks to extract activity indicators from unstructured text to detect museum behaviours, including openings, closures, fundraising and staffing. This dynamic dataset is enabling the museum studies experts in the team to study patterns in the online presence of museums before, during, and after the pandemic, according to museum size, governance, accreditation and location. 1

The prevalence of invertebrate bioerosion on Mesozoic marine reptile bone from the Jurassic and Cretaceous of the United Kingdom: new data and implications for taphonomy and environment

AbstractInvertebrate bioerosion on fossil bone can contribute to reconstructions of benthic taxonomic assemblages and inform us about oxygenation levels, water depth and exposure time on the seafloor prior to burial. However, these traces are not commonly described in the fossil record. To date, there have been only 13 published studies describing a total of 15 instances of invertebrate bioerosion on marine reptile fossil bones from the Mesozoic globally. We surveyed the collections of several UK museums with substantial occurrences of Mesozoic marine reptiles for evidence of invertebrate bioerosion. Here, we document 153 specimens exhibiting 171 newly recorded instances of invertebrate bioerosion on Jurassic and Cretaceous marine reptile bones. Several major bioeroding taxonomic groups are identified. Within the geological strata of the United Kingdom, there is a higher prevalence of bioerosion in the Cretaceous relative to the Jurassic, despite greater sampling of specimens from the Jurassic. Although biotic turnover and food web restructuring might have played a role, potentially pertaining to heightened productivity during the later stages of the Mesozoic Marine Revolution, we consider it more likely that this temporal change corresponds to differences in depositional environment and taphonomic history between the sampled rock units. In particular, the Cretaceous deposits are characterized by heightened oxygenation levels relative to their Jurassic counterparts, as well as reworking, which would have allowed two phases of bioerosion. A spatiotemporally broader dataset on invertebrate bioerosion on vertebrate bone will be important in further testing this and other hypotheses.

Museums, COVID‐19 and the pivot to social media

AbstractThis paper examines social media activity by UK museums during the COVID‐19 pandemic. There is a general perception that as museums closed their doors for extended periods, their digital presence increased to maintain connections with their audiences. However, much of the research conducted in this area is based on small‐scale studies and examples of best practice from large, well‐resourced museums. By contrast, this study utilizes a comprehensive database of over 3300 active UK museums to understand the use of Facebook and Twitter across the sector. Specifically, the paper examines the frequency with which museums posted to these digital platforms as they attempted to engage with their audiences. Our findings indicate that there was no substantial increase in social media use and activity across the UK museum sector during the COVID‐19 pandemic. This research has implications for museologists studying the impact of the pandemic on museums' digital activity, for museum social media professionals, and policymakers responsible for museum digital transformation strategies.

Designing a system to chart the development of the UK museum sector: an iterative approach

PurposeThis paper aims to present the methodology for designing a system providing comprehensive data about the UK’s museums and enabling research into the history, status and long-term development of the entire sector.Design/methodology/approachThe authors have devised and applied an iterative methodology to deliver a knowledge base, web application and website through which these and related resources are publicly accessed, allowing incorporation of the requirements of user stakeholders drawn from across the UK museum sector.FindingsThe methodology has enabled the elicitation of usage scenarios, research questions and feedback from a broad range of user stakeholders, allowing the system to be successfully delivered within the time and staffing constraints of a single publicly-funded research project. Feedback received from external evaluators and users of the system has been overwhelmingly positive.Originality/valueThe system includes the only comprehensive data set of the UK’s museums and is enabling new research by museum studies scholars and museum professionals. The methodology can inform other projects aiming to create specialist knowledge resources involving a wide range of user stakeholders, particularly within constrained time and staffing resources.

Creative Equity in practice: responding to extra-legal claims for the return of Nazi looted art from UK museums

Looted cultural objects taken from Jewish owners during the Nazi Era still reside in museums worldwide. The United Kingdom’s Spoliation Advisory Panel (the Panel) recommends solutions based on the moral strength of the claim where the original owner’s legal title is extinguished. Using the framework of Equity this article argues that the Panel’s work represents a modern, creative form of Equity. The Panel’s work plugs a gap left by the law, much as Equity aimed to do. Despite a wide discretion to recommend just and fair solutions, the Panel is developing settled principles rather than applying inconsistent concepts of morality. This article’s reconceptualisation of this process as firmly grounded in Equity enables the Panel’s work to be more fully appreciated as sui generis. It may also enable the Panel to serve as a model for resolving other disputes about cultural objects.

CONTEXTUALISING THE CONTESTED: XR AS EXPERIMENTAL MUSEOLOGY

Museums are becoming increasingly multi-medial experiences and with the emergence of the metaverse (Coates, 2021), immersive technologies (XR) are projected to form an important part of future museum experiences. With options to provide a multiplicity of non-hierarchical information, support individualised paths through exhibitions, and experiential visits, XR has the potential to help keep visitors engaged around complex and nuanced information (Mulcahy, 2017). Working on devices that most museum visitors already own, XR technologies present a promising move towards more inclusivity, accessibility, and active audience engagement. Contributing to research on the multiple uses of XR in UK museums, this paper focuses on how XR can be operationalised to address contested displays in Western museums. Using an external app for the British Museum as an example, this paper discusses the challenges arising from this intersection, including the entrenchment of immersive technologies in colonial power dichotomies, the risks of performative virtual interventions, and the conflicting agencies museums, companies, and individuals must navigate in this context. The author suggests, as a possible experimental approach, wiki-based XR interactions which engage with non-Eurocentric epistemologies and are co-created by communities commonly disenfranchised in Western museum spaces.

CONTEXTUALISING THE CONTESTED: XR AS EXPERIMENTAL MUSEOLOGY

Museums are becoming increasingly multi-medial experiences and with the emergence of the metaverse (Coates, 2021), immersive technologies (XR) are projected to form an important part of future museum experiences. With options to provide a multiplicity of non-hierarchical information, support individualised paths through exhibitions, and experiential visits, XR has the potential to help keep visitors engaged around complex and nuanced information (Mulcahy, 2017). Working on devices that most museum visitors already own, XR technologies present a promising move towards more inclusivity, accessibility, and active audience engagement. Contributing to research on the multiple uses of XR in UK museums, this paper focuses on how XR can be operationalised to address contested displays in Western museums. Using an external app for the British Museum as an example, this paper discusses the challenges arising from this intersection, including the entrenchment of immersive technologies in colonial power dichotomies, the risks of performative virtual interventions, and the conflicting agencies museums, companies, and individuals must navigate in this context. The author suggests, as a possible experimental approach, wiki-based XR interactions which engage with non-Eurocentric epistemologies and are co-created by communities commonly disenfranchised in Western museum spaces.

Retraction: An Eocene army ant

Retraction: An Eocene army ant

A geography of UK museums

AbstractMuseums are important centres of heritage, culture, education, and tourism. These diverse institutions operate in different ways, reaching different audiences and managing varied collections. Thanks to a novel database of unprecedented completeness produced by the Mapping Museums project, this study provides a quantitative geography of museums in the UK, showing how about half of the sector had not been surveyed before. The presence of museums is mapped across several attributes, including museum size (estimated as yearly visits) and governance (government‐led, independent, or university‐led). Firstly, observing a snapshot of the sector in December 2017, we quantify and interpret the spatial distribution of museums, discussing its implications for access to museums, public service provision, resource allocation, and cultural tourism. Then, in a regional analysis, we study their density in relation to the local population, at the regional and Local Authority District scale, providing new evidence of the extent of spatial inequalities in the cultural sector, particularly relevant to a sector in which funding is mostly allocated at the regional level. At the crossing between human geography and museum studies, this inquiry reveals the centres and peripheries of this cultural sphere, providing fresh evidence of the presences and absences that shape cultural life across the UK.

Social Class in UK Museums: Mark Taylor Interviews Michelle McGrath

ABSTRACT What is the experience of working-class museum professionals in the UK, and what is the Museum as Muck network doing about it? This is a conversation between Michelle McGrath, founder of Museum as Muck, and Mark Taylor, who researches inequalities across cultural and creative industries in the UK. The interview introduces Museum as Muck, which is a network for working-class museum workers, explaining their activism and work. It also discusses broader themes that explain the relative lack of working-class museum workers, including working for free, nepotism, and how entry-level roles are advertised, and moves on to discuss the mechanisms through which class inequality persists even once working-class people have entered the sector. It concludes with a discussion of how current museum professionals and museum educators can influence practice to make museums a more welcoming and supportive environment for working-class people, both in the UK and internationally.

Creating Meaningful Museums: A Model for Museum Exhibition User Experience

Combining existing knowledge of museum exhibition visitor experience with concepts of User Experience (UX), a model for Museum Exhibition User Experience (MEUX) is presented. The model was developed from research interviews and surveys with UK museum professionals and presents the museum exhibition experience from both museum and visitor perspectives. Its use as an evaluation tool for visitor experience is explored at Oxford University Museum of Natural History (OUMNH). In comparing results with those from staff, a disconnect emerged between museum and visitor preferences on motivations for visiting and what outcomes emerge from visits. The incorporation of the theoretical MEUX model into museum practice enables holistic conceptualization of the visitor experience through the pragmatic and hedonic qualities of an exhibition. With the development of further evaluation tools, this framework and methodology accurately captures institutional and visitor preferences and can evaluate how the development decisions of museums influence and impact the visitor experience.

(In)visibility and African Fashion in UK Museums

(In)visibility and African Fashion in UK Museums

Paradise Lost: Encounters with Australia’s Extinct Parrot

The paradise parrot is mainland Australia’s only bird to have become extinct since white settlement. First named by British ornithologists in 1844, the bird has not been seen since 1927, its population declining rapidly due to changes in land-use. This creative-critical article investigates the history of the bird alongside personal encounters with six paradise parrot skins found in the storerooms of three UK museums, questioning whether the presence of such bodies negates our sense of total absence. It looks at changing taxidermy practices, and ongoing curatorial work to protect specimens from decay, refuting Donna Haraway’s notion that taxidermy animals have ‘transcended mortal life, and hold their poses forever.’ This enquiry examines what kind of encounter is generated between the viewer and taxidermy animal, and how this might enable us to bear witness to species loss during an age of mass extinction.

The language of business and the business of language: Exploring hegemonic linguistic performativity in the UK museum sector

Austerity measures and neoliberal policies have deeply affected the UK cultural sector. In particular they have been central to cementing the idea that contemporary cultural institutions should henceforth be regarded as commercial operations. As the language of business and management (B&M language) increasingly frames how organisations of the cultural sector are described, this paper defines the main discursive practices motivating this performative repositioning. Drawing theoretically from the concept of performativity, and building empirically on in-depth interviews with senior staff across the UK museum sector, we argue that the incursion of B&M language has reshaped the ‘reality’ of the sector by materialising new relations. Signally, we advance a concept of performative hegemonic language to describe a range of manifestations of linguistic re-labelling in the world of the museum. Our paper illustrates what happens when an organisation starts to classify activities through B&M language, considering the implications of framing this etymology as transcendent to its cultural counterpart. Relabelling, we contend, re-orients meaning, and this translates into the ascent of what we call the ‘neoliberal museum’. Overall, our paper unpacks the linguistic-material processes underpinning the ideological transformations affecting the cultural sector.

An Abrupt and Brutal Audit: An Analysis of the Crisis Management Response of UK Museums and Heritage Attractions to the Covid-19 Pandemic

In March 2020, museums and heritage sites faced indefinite closure as the United Kingdom government sought to curb the spread of a new virus. Covid-19 brought a new kind of crisis to the heritage sector, but it also brought a learning opportunity. This article outlines a research project, conducted at the height of the pandemic, which sought to assess the museum and heritage sector crisis management response to Covid-19. In the summer of 2020, ten interviews were conducted with managers working in UK museum and heritage sites. In addition, contemporary literature relating to the impact of Covid-19 on the sector was reviewed. Three key themes were identified and explored: Experience and planning; Impact on staff; Coordination and collaboration The study highlighted a range of lessons learned. Firstly, it showed that in the main, the sector was not prepared to deal with a pandemic of this nature. Secondly, it showed that the emotional impact on staff was profound; but also that there were increased efforts to support wellbeing. Thirdly, the research showed that there was a lack of clear information from official channels, and that this impacted decisionmaking at a site level. However, it has also revealed evidence that in the absence of official guidance, sector collaboration was significant and viewed by participants as a key positive outcome of the crisis. The article concludes with recommendations to improve crisis management in the future and offers practical resources as a starting point for greater sector preparedness.