Scholarship & Research
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Item Rural museums: harnessing the power of place to confront silences and revitalize communities(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2023) Moore, Sabre Addington; Co-chairs, Graduate Committee: Alex Harmon and Robert RydellIn the United States, 43 percent of all museums are in rural towns; in Montana, rural towns account for 56.5 percent of museums. Contemporary research has neglected museums based in rural communities. While scholarship on libraries and education in rural communities thrives, there is a gap in research on rural museums. This dissertation acknowledges that gap. It explores how rural museums, like the Carter County Museum in Ekalaka, Montana, can employ the Rural Social Space Model to identify and confront the usual silences about the land and its settlement and explore the ways that power is exercised in the practices of place. Using this framework, this dissertation draws connections between the museum and the areas of environment, social well-being, and economic development, which produce rural social space and contribute to community vitality. This strategy recognizes the value of a physical place, its unique and varied histories, and the diversity of people within and connected to that place, both past and present. Rural communities have distinctive histories embedded within the culture and historical context of a broader region. Rural museums foster the experience of these histories as meaningful and personal, nurturing identity and connection to local places. As such, museums play a vital role in rural community life and provide tools to address equity challenges facing rural places. These museums regularly engage in civic work and can leverage their positions as community congregant spaces and trusted institutions to further civic action, including fostering deliberate discussion, offering volunteer opportunities, hosting public meetings, and engaging visitors in exhibits that explore the connection of past history to present action.Item Green museums waking up the world: indigenous and mainstream approaches to exploring sustainability(Montana State University - Bozeman, College of Letters & Science, 2018) Medicine Horse, Jennifer Neso'eoo'e; Chairperson, Graduate Committee: Robert RydellMainstream and Indigenous Museums are ideally situated, both geographically and culturally, to educate the public about complex twenty-first century environmental issues. The most effective approaches to understanding, addressing, and adapting to these climate changes can be conveyed by museums, incorporating a holistic methodology utilizing the knowledge, observations and ideas of both Western and Indigenous peoples, and directed toward the young people of the world most impacted by climate disruption. This qualitative research was conceptualized iteratively within an Indigenous research methodology, using a combination of Western and Indigenous research approaches to create a hybrid methodology that would satisfy academic requirements, yet foster the community required to successfully answer the research question. Although a formal list of interview questions was developed, the qualitative interviews were primarily conducted in an informal conversational manner, allowing the respondents to tell their stories and include what they felt was relevant. A snowball strategy was employed to generate the potential interviews, as well as scouting potential interviews at the American Alliance of Museums (AAM) and Association of Tribal Archives Libraries and Museums (ATALM) annual conferences during the years 2011-2015. One hundred and three interviews were conducted at ten institutions; all interviews were conducted in-person on-site at the home institutions. Approximately half of the interviews were conducted at the Smithsonian Institution as the result of a Smithsonian Research Fellowship. The interview respondents were forthcoming about their experiences and observations regarding sustainability initiatives at their institutions. The interviews suggest that it is indeed possible for museums to address issues of climate disruption and sustainability efficaciously, utilizing both Western and Indigenous scientific knowledges to educate and engage the public. However, few American museums are currently attempting this task fraught with challenges, although museums are uniquely able to undertake this crucial work. The collaborative work catalyzed by the Cosmic Serpent and Native Universe NSF-funded research projects serves as a tested model to inspire museums to design their own initiatives. Citizen Science initiatives, engaging museums with their constituent youth, provide a promising way of conveying complex environmental information in a palatable manner to youth of various ages and cultural backgrounds.