ABSTRACT
The Science Museum is located in the affluent London area of South Kensington. Yet in the late 1980s the press was widely reporting ‘culture clash’, ‘crisis’ and even ‘cultural revolution’ behind the monumental facades. This chapter provides some historical information about the Science Museum as a means both of situating this ethnography and also of highlighting some of the continuities and discontinuities in the Museum’s conceptualisation of its role. Much of South Kensington was developed in the Victorian period, and much of the funding for establishing the museums came from profits raised by Great Exhibition of 1851. The Science Museum building fronting onto Exhibition Road is of a classical design, impressive and elegant in white stone with tall Ionic columns, capturing the traditional and modern dimensions of Museum’s role. Museums have, perhaps, always perceived themselves to be in crisis as Conn suggests. In response, museums went to new lengths to try to market themselves and make themselves attractive to visitors.
