Museums and memory experiences

The study of "memory" has seen a recent proliferation across a number of disciplines dealing with the past, including archaeology, history, heritage studies, anthropology, and museum studies. Here, it has been stretched beyond a psychological interest in individual cognition to that of public or collective memory, which opemtcs at a broader, communal level. One of the most obvious forums through which this type of remembering is engaged with is that of the museum, a cultural space that is today often referred to as a "site of memory" (Nora 1989) or a "memoryscape." (Edensor 2005). These sit alongside other socially and spatially produced sites of memory, such as memorial sites, war monuments, gmffiti sites, plaques, and historic districts, all of which are public places onto which specific narratives about the past- official and otherwise - are etched. Whether literally or metaphorically, these places embody and speak of the past and, in so doing, push forward messages about identity and belonging in the present.