[ecrea] CFP: Museums as Agents of Memory and Change

*Museums as Agents of Memory and Change*

25-26/04/2019, Estonia National Museum, Tartu, Estonia

Organisers: Estonian National Museum, University of Tartu

Keynotes confirmed: Dr Silke Arnold-de Simine (Birkbeck, University of 
London)

*Call for Papers*

Museums have been shifting toward expanding their work from collecting 
and preserving to supporting and educating communities. They are using 
their collections to promote social change in the context of rising 
global demands on history and culture institutions. More than ever, 
dealing with the past is full of impediments and challenges for museums. 
How should they address a ‘global visitor’ who has little or no 
knowledge of the past – local, national or regional – to which the 
museum is dedicated? What stories should they tell and how, what memory 
cultures should they take into account? On the other hand, what have 
museums done and what do they intend to do in order to change the 
established way of remembering the past? What are the characteristics, 
risks and benefits in dealing with the difficult past in museums? What 
problems can museums tackle as they attempt to bring in changes to 
remembering and commemorating the past?

This conference aims to problematise museums as places of memory 
negotiations, and agents of societal change. While increasingly seeking 
to engage themselves in public life, museums are embedded in the fields 
of politics of memory and heritage, diverse, often disparate group 
interests, and power relations. How can a contemporary museum critically 
deal with the past and shape open debate and yet take into account 
diverse stakeholders and the versatility of narratives in play?

We welcome papers that approach the problems and dilemmas as well as 
best practices of contemporary museums as agents of memory and change:

·How do museums position themselves in concurrent policies of memory and 
heritage? What are the roles of the museums in countries with targeted 
history politics? What dilemmas, possibilities and/or obstacles do they 
encounter in ‘memory-laden’ societies?

·How do museums connect to transnational memory processes? What kind of 
new forms of remembrance should museums develop to make visible and/or 
seek to overcome tensions between group-specific, regional national and 
transnational memory?

·How can museum relate historically specific and more abstract and 
structural experiences? Does anthropological universalisation have a 
place in national, regional or group-specific museums? How do museums 
address difference and shared legacy issues?

·How is a transformation of the role of museums manifested in methods of 
visitor involvement? How are trends in recent museology linked to 
museums’ awareness of their role as public history agents? Are there 
specific trends in using media, material collections and oral histories 
to evoke open debate and awareness on memory matters? What topics and 
methods ‘work’ for different audiences, and why?

·How should the issue of authorship and the autonomy of the curator in 
curating difficult histories (initiators, passive players, opposers) be 
addressed? Are curators independent agents in memory processes or do 
they mediate institutional points of view? Are there different practices 
in different types of museum (for example in art museums, cultural 
historical museums)?

We welcome submissions from a variety of disciplines and from museum 
professionals as well as academics (also from media and communication 
studies).

*Please submit your abstract of 300 words for a 20‐minute paper, along 
with a short CV, by October 15, 2018 to: (conference /at/ erm.ee)*

The conference language is English.

The conference fee of 100 EUR covers attendance to all sessions, lunches 
and coffee/tea breaks during the conference, welcome reception, and 
conference materials.

The time and venue of the conference is April 25-26, 2019 at the 
Estonian National Museum, Tartu, Estonia.

Notification of acceptance: November 15, 2018

Deadline for registration and conference fee payment: March 30, 2019

We are expecting to publish an edited collection based on a selection of 
the papers presented at the conference.

Conference organisers:

University of Tartu, Department of Ethnology, and the Estonian National 
Museum

Conference Committee:

Ene Kõresaar, University of Tartu

Kirsti Jõesalu, University of Tartu

Kristel Rattus, Estonian National Museum

Terje Anepaio, Estonian National Museum

Agnes Aljas, Estonian National Museum

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