Members of the list might be interested in a new book:

"Exhibiting Dilemmas: Issues of Representation at the Smithsonian,"
edited by Amy Henderson and Adrienne L. Kaeppler (Smithsonian
Institution Press, 1997).

Essays include:

 Exhibiting Memories, by Steven Lubar

* For Museum Audiences: The Morning of a New Day, by William
Truettner
* The Hope Diamond: Gem, Jewel, and Icon, by Richard Kurin
* Herbert Ward's "Ethnographic Sculptures" of Africans, by Mary Jo
Arnoldi
*Capable of Flight: The Saga of the 1903 Wright Airplane, by Tom
Crouch
*Crystal Skulls and Other Problems: Or, "Don't Look It in the Eye,"
by Jane Maclaren Walsh
* Curating the Recent Past: The Woolworth  Lunch Counter, Greensboro,
North Carolina, by William Yeingst and Lonnie G. Bunch
* The Unstifled Muse: The "All in the Family" Exhibit and Popular
Culture at the National Museum of American History, by Ellen Roney
Hughes
* Zuni Archangels and Ahayu:da: A Sculpted Chronicle of Power and
Identity, by William Merrill and Richard Ahlborn
* Ambassadors in Sealskins: Exhibiting Eskimos at the Smithsonian, by
William Fitzhugh
* Curators as Agents of Change: An Insect Zoo for the Nineties, by
Sally Love
*And Now for Something Completely Different: Reconstructing Duke
Ellington's "Beggar's Holiday" for Presentation in a Museum Setting,
by Dwight Blocker Bowers


 Michael Kammen sums up the message of the book: "This book is a
courageous and candid affirmation of the educational and interpretive
responsibilities of history museums.... The authors provide eloquent
recognition of the need to negotiate a popular yet thoroughly
professional path between history and memory, celebration and
commemoration."

 Steven Lubar ([log in to unmask])    202-357-2371
 Division of the History of Technology
 National Museum of American History
 Smithsonian Institution