University of Leicester Open Journals
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The Urbanized Museum
No full textIn the contemporary world of social change, accelerated mobility and plural identities, the creation of open and inclusive environments seems to be a recurrent aim at all levels from cities to buildings and to museums in particular. Through the first-hand study and analysis of current case studies, the paper will argue that museums engage space to express the contemporary museological concepts of accessibility, openness and inclusiveness, and through these to engage visitors in cross cultural informational experiences and social encounters. The spatial nature of the contemporary museum, it is proposed, points to a new concept of the museum, which often aims to be part of the city, both in the sense of how it connects to it and in being internally more like a city, and so a continuation of it
A3 1 Is there a hole in my pocket?
No full textIn this paper, we investigate the plausibility of the Minecraft inventory space collapsing into ablack hole. We used a maximum size of the inventory of 0.1 mm. We found a full inventory of goldwould have a Schwarzchild radius of 10−20 m. We also found how much mass would be needed toform a 0.1 mm radius black hole to be in the order of 1022 kg and compared the number of blocksneeded for this to occur to the number of blocks that can exist in a generated world
P3 1 Energy of the Empire
No full textThis paper seeks to explore the blaster Princess Leia uses in Star Wars: Episode IV - A New Hope during the rescue scene aboard the Death Star. We aim to analyse the energy required to vaporise the grate based on its size and material. We assume the grate is a metal material such as steel and the dimensions are 3 feet by 3 feet. The study explores thermodynamic principles and material properties to estimate the energy delivered by Leia’s blaster, which is calculated to be 22.7 GW
A2 8 From Sandworms to Saplings: Cooling Arrakis with Trees
No full textIn this paper, we investigate the feasibility of terraforming Arrakis through planting trees like how it is done in the Dune Franchise. We have determined that due to the change in albedo, despite the evapotranspirational effect, the temperature of the planet would increase to approximately 325 °C, proving that other methods of terraforming were undertaken but not described
Student-Posed Quecture Questions Can Engage First-in-Family Students with Meaningful Learning
No full textStudents in their first semester at university were asked to pose their own questions, known as quecture questions, for each learning topic. This was as part of their weekly preparation for flipped lectures on two parallel compulsory biology courses. Quecture questions are intended to engage students, particularly those with educational disadvantages who may be unfamiliar with effective learning strategies, in meaningful concept-based learning. The mechanism of posting the questions differed between the two courses in that a forced sequence tool on the virtual learning environment required students to post something on the online board on one course while students could opt not to post on the online board on the other course. Small focus groups and qualitative analysis showed that the students realised both cognitive and metacognitive learning benefits from the quecture strategy. Students that were first-in-family to Higher Education were prioritised as focus group attendees and, although adjustment to the quecture strategy was judged to be more difficult within this group, positive learning benefits were discerned for all these students. The pressure to engage within one course was, on balance, considered to be useful for nudging students towards more effortful engagement with their learning. In this way cognitive and metacognitive benefits were recognised for first-in-family students
Decolonial Museology, Space Travel and the Mineral Cabinet
No full textTaking the Africa Museum’s mineral cabinet as a point of departure, I probe the entanglements of inorganic matter, coloniality, and mining for space travel. Through museum ethnography, and by thinking about minerality as a field that connects intra and extra-terrestrial interests, my research unpacks how colonial logics permeate relationships between earthbound and outer spaces. From this vantage point, I investigate how the calls for decolonial practices that resonate within museums studies relate to futurities that are embroiled in imperial logics of space conquest and mining.
The Museum as a Choir: Visitor Reactions to the Multivocality at the Humboldt Forum’s Berlin Global Exhibition
Get PDFThe contemporary museum has two contradictory agendas. It is supposed to be a place of dialogue, debate, and even conflict – and it is called upon not to shy away from positioning itself in relation to contemporary discussions, which implies engaging in an activist museum practice and advancing social justice. The current article contributes to the debates on this apparent paradox from an audience studies perspective. Adopting Berlin Global, an exhibition in the newly opened Humboldt Forum in Berlin, Germany, as a case study, it describes the exhibition’s embeddedness in the human rights framework as a choir-like, polyphonic multivocality, seen as a type of multiperspectivity in which a diversity of voices ‘sing’ in unison. Employing ethnography as the methodological approach, the authors analyse visitor reactions to the exhibition’s multiperspectivity and positioning. They demonstrate that some visitors perceive Berlin Global as highly political and even ideological. This leads the authors to join the arguments in favour of ‘agonistic interventions’ that not only potentiate a better balance of multivocality with positioning and thus offer a solution to the aforementioned paradox, but also, they contend, increase the chance of engaging those who would otherwise reject the exhibition
From Crafts to Agency: The Legacy of Colonial Discourses in Exhibiting the Ainu in the Tokyo National Museum and National Museum of Ethnology at Osaka between 1977 and 2017
Get PDFThe Ainu are indigenous groups of people found in Hokkaido and northeast Honshu, Japan. During the nineteenth century, their land was integrated into the Japanese empire and the people redefined and assimilated. While intended to erase the Ainu as distinct groups, policies and discourses also showed that Ainu communities were not accepted as belonging to the category of ‘Japanese’, with the notions that they lacked Japanese ingenuity and civilization, were stuck in a prehistoric past, and lived in terra nullius. These discourses influenced the formation of museums’ collections in Japan, such as the Tokyo National Museum (TNM) and the National Museum of Ethnology in Osaka (Minpaku). By offering a reading of exhibitions on the Ainu and their accompanying catalogues between 1977 and 2017, this research sheds light on how colonial legacies continue to be shaped and challenged in representing Ainu communities in museums. The TNM seems unable to challenge tropes of this colonial discourse due to their intricate connection with the government, their notion of political neutrality, and their focus on art that tends to exclude the Ainu from the museum. Minpaku, on the other hand, has tried to introduce notions of cultural relativism and centre cooperation with Ainu communities to facilitate best practices
Dazhiikigaadeg Maanendamowin: Wanichigewin gaye Wiijiiwidiwin gii-ayaag COVID-19 / Transforming Grief: Loss & Togetherness in COVID-19 Exhibition at Fort York in Tkaronto/Toronto, Ontario, Canada, 24 March 2023 - 7 January 2024
No full textThis viewpoint is a participatory reflection and response to the exhibition Dazhiikigaadeg Maanendamowin: Wanichigewin gaye Wiijiiwidiwin gii-ayaag COVID-19 / Transforming Grief: Loss & Togetherness in COVID-19, displayed at Fort York in Tkaronto/Toronto, Ontario, Canada, from March 2023 to January 2024. A graduate class from the University of Toronto visited the exhibition as part of the Winter 2023 ischool Information Management course ‘Museums, Archives and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’, taught by Phillips. This piece includes observations and photographs from the students, as well as details of the process of creating and curating the exhibit from Armando Perla and Raven Spiratos, former-Curator for Toronto History Museums and exhibit curator (respectively). The content from the course discussions, readings, and assignments are put into conversation with this innovative community-based exhibition, giving students a rich understanding of ways to prioritize the needs of communities to activate decolonizing, Indigenizing, and new ways of thinking about museums, galleries, and archives