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CALL FOR PAPERS
CAM General Programme and Meeting 2008 - Museums & Diversity - Guyana

January 23, 2008

Call for Papers

COMMONWEALTH ASSOCIATION OF MUSEUMS
CAM GENERAL PROGRAMME AND MEETING 2008

Museums & Diversity
Part 1 - Museums in Pluralistic Societies
Part 2 - World Watch One: Biodiversity & Conservation
  April 18 to 22, 2008

Hosted by the Ministry of Culture, Youth and Sport
The National Museum of Guyana,
Georgetown, Guyana

5 day Seminar plus excursion to IWOKRAMA to follow for limited number of participants, April 23-26 (To be confirmed)

NOTE: The dates will be confirmed as soon as possible. It is expected that they will not vary significantly from the above but they might affect travel plans.

Museums & Diversity
As institutions of civil society, museums must take into account the increasingly complex natural, social and cultural environment in which we exist.  Not least of this complexity are the multiplicity of ethnic, cultural, religious and economic variations within our larger societies and the task of contributing to healthy communities, inclusive societies and a healthy world.  To ignore the role of museums in civil society is at best to be irrelevant and undermine our requests and rationale for public support and, at worst, to work against peace and harmony and the survival of humanity.

The task involves the values of the Commonwealth often expressed in the declarations from the Heads of Government meetings and elsewhere:  democracy, rule of law, human rights, free press, education for all, and gender equity as well as encouragement of young peoples in all spheres.  Many of these are also topics of the Millennium Goals and concerns of UNESCO.     

It is no longer sufficient for museums to deal with only the traditional past through historical, archaeological, artistic objects and works of art in homogeneous contexts.   Room must be made in publicly funded organizations for both tangible objects and intangible heritage from other cultures and societies relevant to our constituents.  Museums as an assemblage exist to benefit society and exist as a part of civil society.  If our task is the preservation of cultural and natural heritage according to our mandates, then it is important for us to remember that each part of that heritage whether it be in a science centre or technology museum, ethnology, history or art museum, zoo or aquarium, involves different cultural perspectives and a larger context of beliefs, ideas and heritage.  Our method is through material evidence and sensory expressions of intangible heritage and our ultimate aim is knowledge and understanding of ourselves and our environment as well as of the specific artifacts and manifestations of heritage that are the focus of individual museums.  Thus diversity in this programme encompasses how museums deal with

• differences within the museum and heritage community,
• differences in the societies we live in and interact with, 
• differences in our natural heritage, and
• interaction among those differences.

Part 1: Museums in Pluralistic Societies
This session will deal with the issues and challenges of museums in civil societies which are diverse, how individual museums of all kinds find direction for their particular circumstances and mandates, what methods can be or have been successful in creating inclusive and healthy societies.

Part 2: World Watch One
This session is intended to be the first of a series dealing with the human and natural environment of museums in their broadest context - the global perspective.  It is intended as an alert to issues which have huge impact not only on museums but on all other organizations, systems and networks of society.  It features a day in which to focus on one or more related issues along with an opportunity to reflect on what Commonwealth museums can and should consider as high priority concerns.

Part 1 of the conference does address one of the most important global issues but World Watch will take into account other issues and in Guyana one associated with the environment.  In World Watch One, the opportunity to visit Iwokrama, a unique international organization for the preservation of the rain forest and its biodiversity, allows us to see ourselves as part of a larger group of museums including natural history museums and allows us to consider the role of museums in protecting biodiversity and promoting conservation.  By extension, climate change is a factor in maintaining biodiversity and conservation an ingredient in maintaining climate stability.

World Watch sessions will take place from time to time usually in conjunction with other CAM activities to identify and consider action on urgent issues affecting life on earth.

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The meeting is open to all established members of the museum community world-wide and associates and partners.  Travel assistance is open only to members from the Commonwealth developing countries.  CAM will assist others as may be possible to tap alternative sources of funding.
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Call for Papers 

Papers are invited on the topic as a whole or on the topics in Part 1 or Part 2. 

One of the interesting questions that may be addressed is whether museums should cross over from their own subject expertise to assist their audiences in understanding important global issues in other fields especially when there are no museums in the immediate area whose subject expertise deals with it.  For example,

- Does a history museum display an exhibition on climate change?
- Does a natural history museum play a role in promoting respect and understanding of other cultural groups and how?
- Should museums work together to ensure that most important topics are addressed in their geographical areas?

Part 1 – Museums in Pluralistic Societies

Papers are invited related to the any aspect of general theme of the roles of museums in pluralistic societies, e.g.

- what are the roles of museums in civil societies?
- what are the specific means by which museums can address issues of concern?
- can museums make a positive and measurable contribution to a healthy and inclusive society and if so how?
- what are the barriers to making a difference and what advantages do museums have in promoting respect and understanding?
- what is the significance of intangible and tangible heritage in enabling museums to enhance knowledge and understanding?

Part 2 – World Watch One

Papers are invited on the roles of museums in addressing the environmental challenges of the present and the consequences of increasing degradation of the natural environment.  Because of the location of the meeting and the planned excursion, specific concerns relate to museums and:

- conservation of unique ecological environments
- biodiversity and its importance
- underlying issues working against conservation such as climate change, globalization, economic growth and demand

(See other possible questions below.)

Presentations
Presentations for the conference should be limited to 20-25 minutes to allow time for discussion, an important feature of CAM programs. 

An abstract of the planned paper should be submitted by February 28.  The full version of the paper must be available at the time of the conference, preferably in electronic form but at least in hard copy. 

If PowerPoint presentations are used, a fully written paper MUST accompany it to be available to delegates. 

Papers may be longer in the written version.

Submission
An abstract or brief description of the paper must be submitted to the CAM Secretariat by February 28.  Selection of papers will be based on description and relationship to the theme of the program, range of topics, types of museums represented, regional perspectives, practical and theoretical approaches.

CAM Secretariat:

Lois Irvine
Secretary General
Commonwealth Association of Museums
Tel & Fax:  1-403-938-3190
Email:  irvinel@fclc.com

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Other Theme-Related Questions

There are many ways to approach the theme of this very broadly based conference.  While the emphasis is on museums working with cultural diversity and biodiversity there are almost limitless viewpoints and topics within that subject.  Below are a few of the questions that arise and there are many more that can be added.

- What is the role of museums in contributing to respect and understanding?

- What other roles do museums have in diverse societies which contribute to societal health and development?

- How do we carry out these roles?

- What does civil society expect from museums?

- How do we measure the impact of museums in pluralistic societies?

- On what basis are we judged and how can we demonstrate our accountability?

- How do we work with both the responsibility of the "community of museums" and our responsibilities as an individual museum with a specific mandate within that community?

- Can civil society be expected to support museums that only occasionally see themselves as an agent within society or who work with limited audiences?

- Do we recognize constituent subcultures within our environment? Do we acknowledge and work with the dynamic nature of culture and society?

- How can museums go beyond mainstreams and margins to create a climate of understanding and learning from differences and to strengthen common ground?

- Will the governing authorities of museums enable both the preservation of heritage and the building of common heritage?

- Are museums human service organizations and value-driven?  Does this apply to all types of museums?

- How do individual museums of all kinds fit into the needs of society?

- Is it appropriate that our professional and institutional ethical systems are mainly internally driven, or do we reference and draw on a wide "global" morality? 

- Are there special governance implications that need re-examining for museums defined as "human service" organizations?
 
- Are there implications for the recruitment and training of the museum workforce?

- What are the responsibilities for individual museums and personnel to understand other museums and related organizations of all kinds to work together to ensure access to knowledge about important social, natural and scientific issues?

- What is the role of museums and in what ways can museums promote the importance of biodiversity?

- How can museums promote the conservation of natural landscapes and important ecological systems and why should they?

- As members of civil society, what partners should museums seek out if they are going to participate in such activities?  Are museums seen as partners in these endeavours?

- How does community engagement and participation fit into the picture puzzle of addressing issues of importance?