This is a book about adult education in the sphere of public museums and art galleries. It aims to enrich and expand dialogue and understanding amongst adult and community educators, curators, artists, directors, and cultural activists who work within and beyond the walls of these institutions. The various chapters take up the complex and interconnected pedagogics of subjectivity, identity, meaning making and interpretation, knowledge, authority, prescription, innovation, and creativity. The contributors are a combination of scholars, professors, graduate students, heritage and cultural adult educators, artists, curators and researchers from Canada, United States, Iceland, England, Scotland, Denmark, Portugal, Italy and Malta. Collectively, they challenge us to think about the dialectics of passivity and engagement, didactics and learning, gender neutrality and radicality, and neutrality and risk-taking amongst a collage of artworks and artefacts, poetry and installations, collections and exhibits, illusion and reality, curatorial practice and learning, argument and narrative, and struggle and possibility that define and shape modern day art and culture institutions. The chapters, set amongst the discursive politics of neoliberalism and patriarchy, racism and religious intolerance, institutional neutrality and tradition, capitalism and neo-colonialism, ecological devastation and social injustice, take up the spirit and ideals of the radical and feminist traditions of adult education and their emphases on cultural participation and knowledge democracy, agency and empowerment, justice and equity, intellectual growth and transformation, critical social and self reflection, activism and risk-taking, and a fundamental belief in the power of art, dialogue, reflection, ideological and social critique and imaginative learning.

Aimed at museum educators, Multiculturalism in Art Museums Today seeks to marry museum and multicultural education theories. It reveals how the union of these theories yields more equitable educational practices and guides museum educators to address misrepresentation, exclusivity, accessibility, and educational inequality. This contemporary text is directive; it encourages museum educators to consider the critical multicultural education theoretical framework in their day-to-day functions in order to illuminate and combat shortcomings at the crux of museum education: Museum Educators as Change Agents Inclusion versus Exclusion Collaboration with Diverse Audiences Responsive Pedagogy This book adopts a broad definition of multiculturalism, which names not only race and ethnicity as concerns, but also gender, sexual orientation, religion, ability, age, and class. While focusing on these various facets of identity, the authors demonstrate how museums are social systems that should offer comprehensive, diverse educational experiences not only through exhibitions but through other educational activities. The authors pull from their own research and practical experiences which exemplify how museums have been and can be attentive to these areas of identity. Multiculturalism in Art Museums Today is hopeful and inspiring, as it identifies and commends the positive and effective practices that some museum educators have enacted in an effort to be inclusive. Museum educators are at the front-line interacting with the public on a daily basis. Thus, these educators can be the real vanguard of change, modeling critical multicultural behavior and practices.

The Enlightenment was a period of intense activity devoted to discovery and learning about the natural world, the past and other civilizations. Classification, collecting and deciphering were all important stages on the way to understanding the world and its inhabitants. The King's Library was built to house the books donated from the royal libraries of King George II and his grandson King George III, and they epitomize the interest in the late 18th and early 19th centuries in scholarship and study. Aimed at the general reader and relevant to many academic diciplines, this book explores the ways people acquired new information, organized their ideas and reached their conclusions.

Gain useful practical knowledge of participatory visual methods in adult and continuing education. Bringing together relevant theories and imaginative practices from formal and non-formal adult education contexts, this volume discusses: photo-story, digital storytelling, photovoice, filmmaking, and painting. Also discussed are ways to use fabric, fashion shows as political messages, and engaging adult learners at museums in participatory ways. This sourcebook bridges the theory and practice and seeks ways to provide adult education practitioners with practical insights into the methods of participatory visual approaches. This is the 154th volume of the Jossey Bass series New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education. Noted for its depth of coverage, it explores issues of common interest to instructors, administrators, counselors, and policymakers in a broad range of education settings, such as colleges and universities, extension programs, businesses, libraries, and museums.

Teaching in the Art Museum investigates the mission, history, theory, practice, and future prospects of museum education. In this book Rika Burnham and Elliott Kai-Kee define and articulate a new approach to gallery teaching, one that offers groups of visitors deep and meaningful experiences of interpreting art works through a process of intense, sustained looking and thoughtfully facilitated dialogue.--[book cover].

Feminist Critique and the Museum: Educating for a Critical Consciousness illustrates the potential of feminist adult education and research to critique but equally to encourage imaginative responses to traditionally patriarchal museum exhibition representations and practices.