Topics in Museology

Museology is a relatively new discipline dealing with the study of museums from a variety of perspectives. What is defined as a museum? How does this definition changes with time? What are the common characteristics of all museums and what makes the art museum different from the natural history museum, the historic museum or the ethnographic museum? The course focuses on the different perspectives adopted by scholars in researching this complex organization. Topics which are at the heart of museum praxis as well as the academic research, such as authenticity, canonization, taxonomy, visitor's reactions, nationalism, architecture and design, will be highlighted trough the presentation of case studies, the guideline being a model analyzing the museum as composed by four interacting components:"Collection", "Space", "Display", and "Visitors".