The End of the Museum
Culture, Colonialism, and Liberation
Published on 8. August 2025
234 pages
978-1-040-40403-4 (ISBN)
Description
This provocative book challenges frequently voiced assertions regarding museums as necessary and valued modern institutions. It raises fundamental, existential questions about contemporary museums as products of the modern colonial world order.
Drawing on practical examples of collecting and exhibiting, theoretical research, and critique from diverse countries across the globe, including Chile, India, Korea, the Netherlands, Nigeria, Palestine, Portugal, Sri Lanka and the United States, this book moves beyond the conventional Eurocentric museological framework. This book synthesizes contemporary critiques of museums, while arguing that societies need the sociocultural examinations that museums are capable of facilitating and that radical transformations of "the museum" are fraught with difficulty, but also possible and necessary. Ultimately, Coffee argues that museums can only be future orientated if they are transformed into agents of social justice and inclusion, divestors of illicit collections, and proponents of a liberatory ethic, opposing neo-colonialism in all of its forms. During that transformative process, as this book demonstrates, museum practice and museum theory must also be transformed.
The End of the Museum: Culture, Colonialism, and Liberation will appeal to students, researchers, and practitioners interested in a critical examination of museum work and theory.
Drawing on practical examples of collecting and exhibiting, theoretical research, and critique from diverse countries across the globe, including Chile, India, Korea, the Netherlands, Nigeria, Palestine, Portugal, Sri Lanka and the United States, this book moves beyond the conventional Eurocentric museological framework. This book synthesizes contemporary critiques of museums, while arguing that societies need the sociocultural examinations that museums are capable of facilitating and that radical transformations of "the museum" are fraught with difficulty, but also possible and necessary. Ultimately, Coffee argues that museums can only be future orientated if they are transformed into agents of social justice and inclusion, divestors of illicit collections, and proponents of a liberatory ethic, opposing neo-colonialism in all of its forms. During that transformative process, as this book demonstrates, museum practice and museum theory must also be transformed.
The End of the Museum: Culture, Colonialism, and Liberation will appeal to students, researchers, and practitioners interested in a critical examination of museum work and theory.
Reviews / Votes
"Kevin Coffee makes a convincing case of what museums traditionally have been and often still are, repositories of and serving the interest of elite culture and opposes it with what museums should be, in a dialectic relationship with the societies they serve, in particular underrepresented and subaltern parts of that societies. A must-read for every museum-practitioner that wants to live up to the promise of the museum having an important social function." ~ Tom van der Molen, curator, Amsterdam Museum"For those individuals who have devoted their working life to museums, this book may be painful. The discomfort emanates from Coffee's highly-informed analysis of the museum world's birthright, grounded as it is in imperialism, extraction, elitism, and, more recently, the commercialization of culture. Coffee is a veteran scholar/practitioner and rigorously challenges the traditional museum practices and assumptions underlying this legacy, knowing full well that the continuation of museums will require unprecedented courage, vulnerability, and foresight. This book is for all those who remain committed to museum work while also experiencing the intensifying uncertainty. Coffee demonstrates that the future of museums is unclear and there is much to do as a result." ~ Robert R. Janes, former museum director, author, editor, and visiting research fellow at the School of Museum Studies at the University of Leicester (UK)
More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Taylor & Francis Ltd
Target group
College/higher education
Professional and scholarly
Illustrations
25 Halftones, black and white; 25 Illustrations, black and white
File size
7,80 MB
ISBN-13
978-1-040-40403-4 (9781040404034)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Book
08/2025
1st Edition
Routledge
€63.60
Shipment within 10-20 days
Book
08/2025
1st Edition
Routledge
€205.50
Shipment within 10-20 days
Book
07/2025
Routledge
Unfortunately, price unknown
Available (delivery time upon request)
Person
Kevin Coffee is a public museologist who has worked with cultural organizations for more than 40 years, including the American Museum of Natural History in New York, the Chicago Academy of Sciences, and the US National Park Service. During that time, he has led and advised scores of organizations and projects in North America, Europe, and Asia. His work engages culture creators and museum users in developing new forms of inclusive and dialogical exhibitions, programs, landscapes, and museums. He resides in the United States.
Content
List of Figures; Acknowledgements; Introduction: An Existential Challenge; Chapter 1: Orientations of Culture; Chapter 2: Consciousness as Culture; Chapter 3: Museums as Culture; Chapter 4: World Heritage as Interdependent System; Chapter 5: Disrupting Museum Practice; Chapter 6: Toward a Liberatory Museology; Afterword: Zones of Proximal Rebellion; Index.
