Dear Claudia:
In the December 1994 issue of Hand to Hand, the quarterly publivation of the
Association of Youth Museums, Marjorie Lefcowitz Schwarzer, formerly of
Chicao Children's Museum, wrote an excellent article entitled "Helping
Visitors in Potent Exhibits." It focused on handling of difficult topics like
AIDS,  homelessness and family violence in children's museum exhibits. If you
want a copy, let me know and I'll send it to you.
A number of children's museums have tackled difficult subjects and, given
their audience, have been particularly scrupulous about how the message is
conveyed. The Children's Museum in Boston did a well-received death and dying
exhibit some time ago.
 Obviously the Holocaust Museum is an excellent source of expertise on the
subject of the successful handling of difficult topics. Kathryn Hill,
director of visitors services there, also write a good article in Hand to
Hand on how they trained their staff to work with visitors in the museum.
Elaine Gurian, formerly on staff there, is available on this network and is
also great source of information on the subject.
Mary Maher, editor
Hand to Hand
609 East Market Street, Siote 102A
Charlottesville, VA 22902
804 295-7603
fax 804 295-5045