Object-based learning as academic discipline in museum environment: meaning making through objects

Objects to support communication of troublesome knowledge and help make abstract concepts concrete (decolonising, sustainability)

*troublesome knowledge: intersectionality, global phenomena, theoretical concepts

Digital:

• Material culture analysis: frameworks for reading objects in cultural contexts
• Ludic practice: playful/inspirational – new connections between objects
• Visual analysis: flat art in cultural contexts
• Subject specific: textile-textile students, posters-graphic students, etc.
• Emotional responses to objects, self-awareness
• Thematic: sustainability, cultural appropriation, decolonisation

Online formats:

• Short films (Panopto): close caption option (accessibility*)
• Online interactive tools (Padlet, Miro)
• Object-led activities with non-museum objects (BYO)

*Accessibility: [Judy Willcocks in the Collab chat] your point about digital vs physical accessibility you are absolutely right. We are aware that for some people in some circumstances digital is more accessible and we are trying to maximise this potential (for example using the flipped classroom model so students can access captioned films before they come to the physical museum). And we are still delivering some of our teaching online. My point about physical being more accessible than digital was in reference to sensory engagement with objects. Obviously the web privileges the visual which doesn’t work for everyone. If you are in a classroom with real stuff there are opportunities to engage other senses.

Decolonising the museum:

• Targeted and commissioned collecting
• Further understanding about the current collections
• Providing a platform for artists and makers to tell their story
• Colonial contexts of the current collections

Podcasts:

• Led by students
• 45min: big commitment

Case study:

• 18^th and 19^th century botanical drawings: intersectionality (colonial project and climate crisis)
• Commissioned works from students and alumni

Special Collections and Archives:

• arts.ac.uk/students/library-services/special-collections-and-archives/archives-and-special-collections-centre
• arts.ac.uk/students/library-services/special-collections-and-archives/archives-and-special-collections-centre/collections-at-the-centre
• https://digitalcollections.arts.ac.uk/

Activity:

• Description object 1: Christmas tree ornament in the shape of Jenny by Charles James. Off-white smooth surface, no decorations, inscription ‘MMA 2016’ on the bottom, about 10cm (L). Made in one-piece, painted metal.
• Description object 2: Bowl possibly made of ceramics, irregular earthy tones, slightly stained effect. Round with wide top and narrow base, two stickers on the base: white and yellow. Thin walls.
• Description object 3: La Pavillion d’Amide jacket made of off-white satin decorated with blue moon-shaped embroidery (?). Short sleeves in two layers: outer with scalloped edges and inner of black fabric with landsknecht effect. Round neckline and waist length.
• Reflection: 1) more sensorial, detailed, focused on empirical info. 2) assumptions and generalisations, macro. 3) detailed, familiar = engaging, pre-existing knowledge.
• elischolar.library.yale.edu/jcas/vol3/iss1/3

Chat reflections:

• Is Padlet an object? What is an object?
• Parallels to kinaesthetic learning
• Analogue x digital debate: what’s better? Different contexts and experiences
• Difference between data and evidence? ‘In a way “digital” is kind of more “data” as it is perceptions of an object through a sensor and “analog” is more like “evidence” as it is the object testifying itself in an investigation’ (Toby Chai)

Archive objects and structural biases (Hannah Grout PG Cert research):

• ASCC: mostly white, male, cisgender perspective
• Critical archive studies (Punzalan and Caswell, 2016; Derrida, 1995)
• Critical pedagogy (Freire, 2005; Hooks, 2010)
• Object-based learning (Crooke, 2016)
• Methodology: focus group (Denscombe, 2010); thematic analysis (Braun and Clarke, 2006); autoethnography (Change, 2008)
• Findings: teaching mechanisms
  • how to frame and present objects
  • object selection
  • role of the object beyond evidence
  • self-reflect and positionality
  • tool for communication
  • co-creation
• Findings: practice
  • collaboration for plurality of voices
  • teaching alongside collection practices
• https://www.zotero.org/groups/4560476/critical_cataloguing/library
• academicsupportonline.arts.ac.uk/workshops-tutorials/44794