About the Book
The influence of digital media on the cultural heritage sector has been pervasive and profound. Today museums are reliant on new technology to manage their collections. They collect digital as well as material things. New media is embedded within their exhibition spaces. And their activity online is as important as their physical presence on site. However, 'digital heritage' (as an area of practice and as a subject of study) does not exist in one single place. Its evidence base is complex, diverse and distributed, and its content is available through multiple channels, on varied media, in myriad locations, and different genres of writing. It is this diaspora of material and practice that this Reader is intended to address. With over forty chapters (by some fifty authors and co-authors), from around the world, spanning over twenty years of museum practice and research, this volume acts as an aggregator drawing selectively from a notoriously distributed network of content.
Divided into seven parts (on information, space, access, interpretation, objects, production and futures), the book presents a series of cross-sections through the body of digital heritage literature, each revealing how a different aspect of curatorship and museum provision has been informed, shaped or challenged by computing. Museums in a Digital Age is a provocative and inspiring guide for any student or practitioner of digital heritage.
Table of Contents:
1. The practice of digital heritage and the heritage of digital practice, Ross Parry Part 1: Information: data, structure and meaning Introduction to Part 1, Ross Parry 2. A brief history of museum computerisation, David Williams 3. The changing role of information professionals in museums, Andrew Roberts 4. What is information in the museum context? Elizabeth Orna and Charles Pettitt 5. The world of (almost) unique objects, Robert Chenhall and David Vance 6. Standards for networked cultural heritage, David Bearman 7. Database as symbolic form, Lev Manovich 8. The museum as information utility, George Macdonald and Stephen Alsford 9. Museum collections, documentation and shifting knowledge paradigms, Fiona Cameron 10. Semantic dissonance: do we need (and do we understand) the Semantic Web? Ross Parry, Nick Poole and Jon Pratty 11. Building a universal digital memory, Piere Lèvy Part 2: Space: visits, virtuality and distance Introduction to Part 2, Ross Parry 12. On the Origins of the Virtual Museum, Erkki Huhtamo 13. From Malraux's imaginary museum to the virtual museum, Antonio M. Battro 14. Virtual spaces and museums, Andrea Bandelli 15. The virtual visit: towards a new concept for the electronic science centre, Roland Jackson 16. Empowering the remote visitor, Areti Galani and Matthew Chalmers 17. Museums outside walls: mobile phones and the museum of the everyday, Konstantinos Arvanitis Part 3: Access: ability, usability and connectivity Introduction to Part 3, Ross Parry 18. Access to digital heritage in Africa: bridging the digital divide, Lorna Abungu 19. My dream of an accessible Web culture for disabled people, Carey, Kevin 20. My dream of an accessible Web culture for disabled people: a re-evaluation, Carey, Kevin 21. Implementing a holistic approach to e-learning accessibility, Brian Kelly, Lawrite Phipps and Caro Howell 22. Usability Evaluation for Museum Web Sites, Danial Cunliffe, Efmorphia Kritou and Douglas Tudhope 23. Culture as a Driver of Innovation, Ranjit Makkuni Part 4:Interpretation: communication, interactivity and learning Introduction to Part 4, Ross Parry 24. The Web and the Unassailable Voice, Peter Walsh 25. When the object is digital: properties of digital surrogate objects and implications for learning, Olivia C. Frost 26. Learning by doing and learning through play, Maria Roussou 27. Misconstruing Interaction, Christian Heath and Dirk Vom Lehn 28. Visitors’ use of computer exhibits: findings from 5 grueling years of watching visitors getting it wrong, Ben Gammon Part 5:Object: authenticity, authority and trust Introduction to Part 5, Ross Parry 29. Museums and virtuality, Klaus Miller 30. When all you’ve got is ‘The Real Thing’: museums and authenticity in the networked world, Jennifer Trant 31. Authenticity and integrity in the digital environment: an exploratory analysis of the central role of trust, Clifford Lynch 32. Why Museums Matter, Marc Pachter 33. Defining the problem of our vanishing memory: background, current status, models for resolution, Peter Lyman and Howard Besser 34. Curating new media, Matthew Gansallo Part 6: Delivery: production, evaluation and sustainability Introduction to Part 6, Ross Parry 35. Managing new technology projects in Museums and Galleries, Matthew Stiff 36. Rationale for Digitization and Preservation, Paul Conway 37. Speaking for themselves: new media and ‘Making of the Modern World, Frank Colson and Jean Colson 38. The evaluation of museum multimedia applications: lessons from research, Maria Economou 39. A survey on digital cultural heritage initiatives and their sustainability concerns, Diane M. Zorich Part 7: Futures: priorities, approaches and aspirations Introduction to Part 7, Ross Parry 40. Making the total museum possible, Tomislav Šola 41. Museums in the information era: cultural connectors of time and space, Manuel Castells 42. The shape of things to come: museums in the technological landscape, Simon Knell 43. Digital heritage and the rise of theory in museum computing, Ross Parry
About the Author :
Ross Parry is Senior Lecturer in Museum Studies at the University of Leicester, a scholar of digital heritage and a historian of museum media and technology. He is the author of Recoding the Museum: digital heritage and the technologies of change, the first major history of museum computing.
Review :
“Museums in a Digital Age is thus a timely consideration of the role of the digital in the entire spectrum of museum activities…The…volume is…something much more attuned to the digital age which is its basis – a highly diverse, even eclectic, collection of papers broadly centred around the subject of the work.” – Historic Environment
