ABSTRACT
In this final chapter, I synthesise observations made throughout this book to illuminate how using social media for social inclusion work is a skilled negotiation between staff’s social inclusion ideals, social media affordances, and user needs. I use the concept of craft to highlight and discuss how these negotiations, as observed through processes of translation and tinkering, are underpinned by certain skills. Significantly, enacting these skills both reflects and continuously builds staff’s knowledge of social media’s elasticities. As observed across staff processes of translation, and tinkering, these skills include staff’s ability to be mindful, experiment, and listen to their users. Therefore, as considered through a lens of ‘craft’, staff’s social media practices are re-centred as skilled and continuously developing through practice, as staff become increasingly familiar with the potentials and limits of social media. This is in opposition to a common perception of social media as an easy way to contribute to – or even automatically contribute to social goals. As such, social media practices for social inclusion work become re-envisioned as an ongoing ethical pursuit, requiring the investment of institutional resources and support that legitimise social media as a museum practice, and sector-wide opportunities for both knowledge exchange and mentorship.
