What Happens to Nordic Culture When you Drop the “Heritage"? : Re-imagining Nordic culture for a new museum.
(2017) The 107th Annual Conference of The Society for the Advancement of Scandinavian Study- Abstract
- In the last decade, museums that were established in the 20th century by immigrants from the five Nordic countries have become increasingly concerned with broadening their audiences and more actively engaging their visitors. Efforts to do this have varied from offering traveling exhibitions produced in the Nordic countries, film programs, festivals, concert series, cocktail hours, culinary conferences, and sauna sessions to appeal to people who may not identify as Nordic or do not think of museums as places to visit. In part, these efforts stem from a growing need for museums to establish that they serve a public benefit, to provide demonstrable and measurable results of how their work supports the value of the wider society. These... (More)
- In the last decade, museums that were established in the 20th century by immigrants from the five Nordic countries have become increasingly concerned with broadening their audiences and more actively engaging their visitors. Efforts to do this have varied from offering traveling exhibitions produced in the Nordic countries, film programs, festivals, concert series, cocktail hours, culinary conferences, and sauna sessions to appeal to people who may not identify as Nordic or do not think of museums as places to visit. In part, these efforts stem from a growing need for museums to establish that they serve a public benefit, to provide demonstrable and measurable results of how their work supports the value of the wider society. These activities also result from an understanding among museum professionals that museums are critical to a civil society, should be socially responsible, create new and more reflexive narratives and promote principles for equity and excellence. Financial sustainability hinge upon the museums’ appeal to their constituency and stakeholders. As heritage is thought to provide the means of satisfying a wide variety of aspirations, interpretations of the concept of cultural heritage takes center stage.
This paper investigates the significance attached to the word “heritage” as interpreted by different groups in the local Seattle community in the wake of the Nordic Heritage Museum’s efforts to move into a new facility and expand their constituency. How is the word “heritage” interpreted? What role is attributed to heritage when the museum aims to engage new cosmopolitan communities in a global economy? How do notions of contemporary Nordic culture (that are at play in the global ecumene) challenge and create new interpretations of Nordic Heritage?
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Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/record/db5a994b-ed97-4626-b3f4-c0f1cea8a044
- author
- O'Dell, Thomas LU and Gradén, Lizette LU
- organization
- publishing date
- 2017
- type
- Contribution to conference
- publication status
- published
- subject
- keywords
- Heritage, Museums, Cultural Economy
- conference name
- The 107th Annual Conference of The Society for the Advancement of Scandinavian Study
- conference location
- Minneapolis, United States
- conference dates
- 2017-05-11 - 2017-05-14
- project
- Understanding the Conditions Facing Heritage in a Hybrid Market
- language
- English
- LU publication?
- yes
- id
- db5a994b-ed97-4626-b3f4-c0f1cea8a044
- date added to LUP
- 2017-12-20 12:07:01
- date last changed
- 2018-11-21 21:36:48
@misc{db5a994b-ed97-4626-b3f4-c0f1cea8a044,
abstract = {{In the last decade, museums that were established in the 20th century by immigrants from the five Nordic countries have become increasingly concerned with broadening their audiences and more actively engaging their visitors. Efforts to do this have varied from offering traveling exhibitions produced in the Nordic countries, film programs, festivals, concert series, cocktail hours, culinary conferences, and sauna sessions to appeal to people who may not identify as Nordic or do not think of museums as places to visit. In part, these efforts stem from a growing need for museums to establish that they serve a public benefit, to provide demonstrable and measurable results of how their work supports the value of the wider society. These activities also result from an understanding among museum professionals that museums are critical to a civil society, should be socially responsible, create new and more reflexive narratives and promote principles for equity and excellence. Financial sustainability hinge upon the museums’ appeal to their constituency and stakeholders. As heritage is thought to provide the means of satisfying a wide variety of aspirations, interpretations of the concept of cultural heritage takes center stage. <br/><br/>This paper investigates the significance attached to the word “heritage” as interpreted by different groups in the local Seattle community in the wake of the Nordic Heritage Museum’s efforts to move into a new facility and expand their constituency. How is the word “heritage” interpreted? What role is attributed to heritage when the museum aims to engage new cosmopolitan communities in a global economy? How do notions of contemporary Nordic culture (that are at play in the global ecumene) challenge and create new interpretations of Nordic Heritage? <br/>}},
author = {{O'Dell, Thomas and Gradén, Lizette}},
keywords = {{Heritage; Museums; Cultural Economy}},
language = {{eng}},
title = {{What Happens to Nordic Culture When you Drop the “Heritage"? : Re-imagining Nordic culture for a new museum.}},
year = {{2017}},
}