Museums, objects, and collections: A cultural study (Leicester Museum Studies) - Hardcover

Susan M. Pearce

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0718513320 ISBN 13: 9780718513320

Publisher: Leicester University Press, 1992

Synopsis

Museums hold the collected objects that have come to us from the past, and which now constitute one of the most important ways in which we can understand that past. Museums are social phenomena characteristic of the modernist Western tradition, and their collections of both human and natural history material are a significant part of how that tradition has shaped itself. This book explores the nature of museums, of their collections and of the objects which form these collections; the psychological and social reasons why people collect; and the nature of relics, fetishes and systematic assemblages. It considers the nature of the curatorial process and the narratives it produces: collections in store, acquisition and disposal, documentary description and exhibition. It discusses how museum objects operate as signs and symbols, as mediators of a functionalist perspective in a world of goods, and as actors in the process of change. It examines the relationship between museums, museum objects and ideology and concludes with an attempt to define the curatorial project.

About this title

About the Author

Susan M. Pearce is professor of museum studies and director of the department of museum studies at the University of Leicester. She is the editor of Museum Studies in Material Culture (Smithsonian Institution Press, 1992), and the author of Archaeological Curatorship (Smithsonian Institution Press, 1990) and On Collecting (1995).

Review

“Dense and rewarding. Through this study the author intends to explore the philosophies and cultural traditions which underlie museums, their collections, and the objects which make them up, and to see how meaning is created amongst them.”—Arlis-Newssheet

“Profoundly rewarding . . . [Museums, Objects, and Collections] offers one of the most extensive and penetrating analyses of museums you are likely to find anywhere.”—Curator

Edition details

• Publisher: Leicester University Press
• Publication date: 1992
• ISBN 10: 0718513320
• ISBN 13: 9780718513320
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 296