ABSTRACT
Traditionally, the study of museums, like museum work itself, has been inwardlooking and anti-theoretical, positing a divide between the practice of museology and academic, theoretical concerns. For a number of reasons this divide is now beginning to break down. Chief among these are the contemporary social, cultural and economic changes which are affecting the contexts within which museums operate. It is not unusual to find many traditional museologists voicing distress as to what is going on in museums-an increasing disrespect for the object, a government bureacracy which questions the value of museums to society and demands accountability, and incomprehension around the political critiques which are mounting against the representations found in museums. And often, the response is to focus even more strongly on collection-management issues-the ‘how to’ of running a museumrather than to answer the critiques themselves. For Eilean Hooper-Greenhill, this type of reaction is politically naive and irresponsible, a reaction which will work against the future existence of museums. Her book, Museums and the Shaping of Knowledge, is in large part, a strategic response to this situation. It involves a recognition that museums are now operating in a vastly different context, a context which, if not understood, may indeed mean the end of the museum. The book is also an argument for the importance of breaking down the theory/practice divide, for using cultural theory within museology, a position which is slowly gaining ground as more cultural critics become interested in museums and a greater proportion of curators come into contact with cultural theory in their undergraduate and postgraduate training (see, for example, Lumley, 1988; Vergo, 1989; Karp and Levine, 1991). Her actual theoretical position is informed by the work of Michel Foucault, particularly his concept of the ‘épisteme’ and his notion of ‘effective’ history (Foucault, 1970, 1974). As she points out, the work of Foucault is particularly appropriate to the study of museums although this was one institution that he did not devote singular attention to. Nevertheless, his concept of the ‘disciplinary’ institution, his interest in archives and in the ways in which knowledge is shaped is particularly applicable to museums.
