Museums & Social Issues: Vol. 3 (1) Call for Papers
Where is Queer? (working title)
Submission deadlines:
Concept Paragraph - July 9, 2007
Articles - September 2007
Museums & Social Issues is a peer-reviewed journal published by Left Coast
Press, Inc. The journal provides a forum for discourse about social issues
and the engagement of museums in those issues. Each journal includes
theoretical, philosophical, and practical perspectives.
Demographically, gays and lesbians appear to be well represented as museum
visitors and in the ranks of the museum profession. It could even be
postulated that gays and lesbians are disproportionately over represented if
the stereotypes about gender identification hold true. Irrespective of these
stereotypes, the current political climate surrounding LGBT issues has led
to some very public conflicts over access, representation and equity for the
self-identified queer. A dearth of research exists on gays, lesbians,
bisexuals, and transgendered visitors to museums: Who are they? Why do
they attend? What, if anything, makes a visit to a museum different for one
who self-identifies as GLBT?
Vol. 3(1) will explore the issues surrounding LGBT issues in the museum
community. We seek timely articles, research reports, and literature
reviews surrounding how the LGBT community intersects with museums and the
cultural power that these institutions represent. Some of the questions this
issue hopes to explore through provocative submitted papers include:
• A synthesis of major exhibits addressing LGBT issues
• What major LGBT issues should museums be addressing?
• Collections, material culture and the history of the LGBT community
• Is there a “queer identity” that can be described as more likely to
visit or support museums?
• How do GLBTs experience museum representations of families or
relationships?
• What role are museums playing in the conflict over GLBT rights?
• What history do GLBT people have in the world of museums?
• Is there evidence that LGBT employees working in museums
self-discriminate?
• Do some types of museums, such as zoos, aquariums, natural history
museums, science centers, and others that focus on “family” narrowly
construct their representations to exclude the queer community?
• Are there differences in the way LGBT visitors and LGBT museum employees
experience the same museum? Are there tensions surrounding expectations,
behaviors, feelings of comfort, etc. for these two groups in the same
environment?
This issue of Museums and Social Issues seeks to rectify the research
deficit by compiling an important and enduring resource about queer politics
today. The journal seeks to challenge museums to address emerging issues in
our time. This issue seeks to lead the way for scholarship within queer
studies to find its place in museum culture.
Co-editors of Vol. 3(1):
John Fraser, AIA, is Director, Public Research and Evaluation at the
Wildlife Conservation Society Institute and until July 2007, served as the
Vice-President of Programs for the Visitor Studies Association.
([log in to unmask])
Joe E. Heimlich, Ph.D. is Associate Professor, School of Environment and
Natural Resources and Environmental Science Graduate Program at The Ohio
State University and a Senior Research Associate at the Institute for
Learning Innovation. ([log in to unmask])
Prospective authors should contact the co-editors by July 9, 2007.
Denice Blair Leach
MSU Museum Education Division
Museums & Social Issues Journal
103 Museum
East Lansing, MI 48824
[log in to unmask]
517-353-3882
FAX 517-432-2846
"The things of the world cannot be known except through a knowledge of the
places in which they are contained." (Roger Bacon)
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