Steven Lubar keynote presentation: Transport and Mobility on Display
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Presentation to the 9th International Conference of the International Association for the History of Transport Traffic and Mobility: Transport and Mobility on Display
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Steven Lubar keynote presentation: Transport and Mobility on Display
- 1. TRANSPORT and MOBILITY ON DISPLAY FIVE BIG QUESTIONS Steven Lubar Brown University Providence, RI USA October 2011
- 3. Who?
- 4. the people in this room, curators, museum educators, interpreters, experts the other, the past, us in the past, the “community”, the object of display the audience, readers, historic site and museum visitors, tourists
- 6. ( ) The first task of every museum is “adding to the happiness, wisdom, and comfort of members of the community.”—John Cotton Dana, Director, Newark Museum, 1917
- 7. ( ) The museum must remain “firmly in the control of a trained elite [to] maintain standards of quality independent of the contingent values of daily life.” Museums “must direct public taste…and not be dictated [to] by it.”— Paul J. Sachs, Director, Harvard Museum Studies Program, 1920s
- 8. ( ) Museums should foster “the ability to live productively in a pluralist society and … contribute to the resolution of the challenges we face as global citizens… In every aspect of their operations and programs, museums must combine a tradition of intellectual rigor with the inclusion of a broader spectrum of our diverse society.” Every aspect of their work should be “supported both by rigorous scholarship and by respect for the many cultural and intellectual viewpoints that museum collections stand for and stimulate.” —American Association of Museum’s Excellence and Equity, 1992
- 9. ( ) “Preserve, interpret and create passion for Auburn, Cord and Duesenberg automobiles and their heritage of innovation, influence, design and competition” Mission statement of the Auburn Cord Dusenberg Automobile Museum
- 10. ( ) “A spotlight on days gone by – reawakening memories, rekindling emotions and conjuring up that typical gurgly chugging sound that a Beetle boxer engine makes.”Volkswagen AutoMuseum
- 11. ( ) “Developing educational materials and conducting programs to increase the public's understanding of, and involvement in, the development of aviation and spaceflight” —from the National Air and Space Museum mission statement
- 12. ( ) “The museum works in collaboration with the Native peoples of the Western Hemisphere to protect and foster their cultures by reaffirming traditions and beliefs, encouraging contemporary artistic expression, and empowering the Indian voice.” National Museum of the American Indian
- 13. “Commitment to produce unparalleled entertainment experiences based on the rich legacy of quality creative content and exceptional storytelling.” Disney
- 14. ( ) “I believe that museums have the potential to undergo a similar (r)evolution as that on the web, to transform from static content authorities to dynamic platforms for content generation and sharing. I believe that visitors can become users, and museums central to social interactions.” Nina Simon, Museum 2.0, 2006
- 19. What? What kind of exhibits? What kind of objects? What kind of context?
- 20. Things… ...or people?
- 21. Things… ...or stories?
- 22. Breadth... ...or depth?
- 23. Makers… ...or users?
- 24. Real... ...or virtual?
- 25. Exciting... ...or contemplative?
- 26. Lecture... ...or dialogue?
- 27. Authentic... ... or accurate?
- 28. Preserved... ...or put to use?
- 29. Exotic... ...or everyday?
- 30. Vehicle... ...or infrastructure? Historic Route Marker
- 31. Context... ...or community?
- 32. Context... ...or collection?
- 35. Yesterday’s News Current day, too recent, for my parents not history yet “ol skool” “Back in the day” Too Old, not relevant, Old of date not interesting Classic Retro d! t o t! ! gh s ol w To Ju ne o ri To
- 36. es te rd a y To da y To m or ro w
- 38. Where?
- 43. Why?
- 44. Useful
- 45. Good for you
- 46. Fun
- 48. Thank you.
Notas do Editor
- Good morning. Thanks to Hans for his invitation to speak today.
- The basic questions - things that museums need to think about as we consider the future, or, for that matter, our work today. Who are we? Who are we doing our work for? Who is our work about? / What is the subject matter of our work, what is its content? / What time period seems to be of interest to us, and to our audiences? / Where do we locate our work? Is it local? Is it in cyberspace? / And why do we do it? Why do our varied funders think this is a good way to spend their money? And why do our audiences participate.
- A simple set of categories for consider the “who” in public history. (show definitions) We need to think about all of these - one of the problems is that we tend to focus on one at a time. And we need to dissect these, complicate them, more than we often do. “us” is complicated - something students have a hard time understanding- not just worksite politics - “community” is my favorite - too easy to make simple assumptions… “Them” for many tranportation museum might be better replaced by “it” - a challenge I’ll get to later.
- Internet meme on “every talk on museums needs a John Cotton Dana quote” - Dana, head of the Newark Museum in the early 20th century, still one of most useful museum theorists. Museum expertise important - but it’s about the audience, in both senses of the word “about” . I want to contrast this with: Sachs
- Sachs - head of the Harvard museum program in the 1920s - it’s all about us - experts. Even “Them” - the subject matter - is really about us. “You,” the audience, is there to listen and learn. (Exaggerated - he was quite good on physical comforts, but museum as lecture)
- In the US, the publication of the AAM report Excellence and Equity publication was a milestone… Clearly a committee publication. A very big tent! But one that welcomed the visitor and the subject matter back into the museum -- moved the museum expert out of the center
- I mentioned at the start that for many transportation museum, “Them” might be replaced by “it”. Hobbyist museums about the objects - but the museum people, and often the audience, and closely connected to those objects. The strengths and weaknesses of these museums is the close connection of the staff, the audience, and the subject matter. Strength in that it allows for focus; weakness, in that it can allow too narrow a focus.
- Again, “them” might be replaced by “it”. The museum’s goal is to sell things by bringing the visit in contact with the object - or in this case, reinforcing memories of the visitor’s past.
- NASM is very much top down: We develop materials to teach you. But the Us and them is pretty close: scientifically trained experts - Audience important but not really part of the story -- CONTRAST This with new models
- New models - NMAI conciously set out to be a collaborative museum - similar to other museums of indigenous peoples in New Zealand and Australia - but can lose the visitor. Interesting implications for other kinds of museums - in some ways, not that different from some of the hobbyist transportation museums - we tell our story, and we don’t worry too much if you care.
- Disney - all about you, the vistor - really no “other,” subject matter - can make it up. The staff is hiding offstage…
- Nina Simon’s work has brought the philosophy of web 2.0 into the museum - visitors become creators, Where does that leave us? Are we off to the side as facilitators? Just watching from below? Are we part of the big happy web 2.0 family? Or are we out of the picture? /// And that brings us to the future - what is likely to happen next?
- ...to our friends us, them and you. Us will certainly shrink (and turn grey)… that’s the budget cuts side of the story.
- You is likely to become even more distracted, more confused
- And our subject matter has to become more diverse, and we need to find more complexity in it. It keeps get more complicated, more confusing - and more intersting. The “other” is speaking for itself now, and we need to acknowledge and encourage that.
- Moving on to What? What’s the subject matter of our field?
- What is the proper subject of the transportation museum? Will present this as a series of questions - they might seem like oppostions, but I mean them more as issues to consider when designing an exhibition or experience, or considering a collecting possibility. The trick is finding, for each project, the right balance.
- This is a fundamental question for museums - are we about the objects in the collections, or about the human history that they represent? The objects survive, the people are mostly gone. But objects, I’d like to suggest, are more interesting when they tell human stories… which brings we to the next balance:
- Start with what kind of exhibits? Stories or things -- realize that a lot of museum exhibits use things to tell stories, and it’s not always a good fit. Things have stories, but they’re often hard to elicit - as museum people like to say, artifacts don’t speak for themselves. And so -- here’s an opposition that I intend rather as a balancing act - we build exhibits around our stories - and end up with mannequins - fake things, telling accurate but fake stories…. The right balance here is the key to good exhibitions
- Especially true in transportation - do you focus on cars, a model, a type, or do you cross modes of transportation?? Even bigger - is it about transportation, or about history, seen through the lens of transportation?
- debate about whether museums become more important because they have the real thing or less important because we’re just showing a picture of it? // The question of course will be the balance of the two… this line will get fuzzier.
- debate about whether museums become more important because they have the real thing or less important because we’re just showing a picture of it? // The question of course will be the balance of the two… this line will get fuzzier.
- Goes to museum 2.0 - this the fundamental question. Do we tell people things they should know, or do we ask them to participate in a conversation? Moving on to what kind of objects?
- Authentic or accurate - original, showing its history, or a reproduction that is like the thing the axe who’s handle has been replaced twice and whose head’s been replaced once… Do we show the survivor from the past, “the pice of the true cross,” even if it’s not very good at telling us about that past - or do we make good reproductions? -- Fascinating that so many historic village museums are going to reproductions
- Sometimes it’s pretty clear -- The Henry Ford has pushed traditional museum style in using objects - charge for a ride a Model T. Historic house museums talk about the “Rembrandt rule” - that everything is equally precious. Transportaion museums have had a more flexible set of rules - locomotives operated, airplanes flown…
- Speaks for itself - is it about the everyday or about the
- Moving on now to context For years the holy grail of museums has been context. Put things back into the setting they came from. Now we say, put them into the community that cares about them today. What balance?
- For years the holy grail of museums has been context. Put things back into the setting they came from by means of labels, or diaramas… . Now, especially in the world of anthropology museums, we say, put them into the community that cares about them today. What balance? .
- they might seem like oppostions, but I mean them more as issues to consider when designing an exhibition or experience, or considering a collecting possibility. The trick is finding, for each project, the right balance.
- We can imagine a time line
- What still seems interesting? What seems relevant? How far back? How recent? Where does history begin? Fascinating to me to think about the number of ways that people can say that history is boring. Length of connections to make. Yesterday's discussion on climate change: do we put a label next to Newcomen's steam engine saying this is the beginning of global warming?
- For transportation museums, the key question is how much we use the past to talk about the present. Too many museums have drawn strict lines between these - kept these apart. I’d like to suggest that we will be better off if we stop drawing these distinctions. The transportation museum should focus on today and tomorrow, and suggest the way the decisions of the past shape them. Need to bring yesterday closer to today (CLICK) and today closer to tomorrow! CLICK
- How do we talk about larger geographies in a particular place? How do we combine these? Local history museums are about local things but are dealing with global issues.
- A challenge for every museum right now. A bit about the evidence: the more your collections are online, the more they’re used. The more the museum is online, the more visitors it gets. Expectations for internet experience drive museum experience… participation, interactivity, social networking…
- Charles Wilson Peale wants the museum to be useful to the nation - and that’s still a very strong urge in much of our work. AOTM: we wanted to help shape transportation policy -na scene from “Going Global” BMW museum - wants to sell cars. Henry Ford Acadmy - part of a large movement in industrial museums to do job training, econony. And then there’s the cultural tourism, the way many small towns think - or thought that a scenic railroad might attract tourists - leading to some interesting challenges to history as they get dependent on tourists. NO PICTURE - but also a sense that historic transportation can help make for better future transportation - streetcar lines, for example…
- Good for you in that it will make you a better person, -- the basic idea of many of the great 19 th century museums - here. The Wagner Free Institute of Science in Philadelphia. Not all that different from the grand hall of the NASM… Good for you in many ways:
- Goes back to the other great root of the museum business - Barnum. What exactly it means to entertain our visitors changes over time - x2… but something we worry a lot about…
- And fun seems a good place to end.. Thank you.