Narrative Museum, Museum of Voices

This chapter analyzes the display and interpretation scheme at a small museum of rural culture in Italy: the Museo della Mezzadria Senese, which opened in 2002 in the village of Buonconvento, Tuscany. ¹ This museum challenges the traditional supremacy of written text and the similarity of display tone and style in many folk museums in Italy by using diverse interpretive means and communication strategies. It also demonstrates recent developments in ethnographic museology, representing intangible heritage as well as material culture, and moving from a taxonomic display approach to a narrative and emotional one.