The End of the Museum

This provocative book challenges frequently voiced assertions regarding museums as necessary and valued modern institutions. It raises fundamental, existential questions about contemporary museums as products of the modern colonial world order.

Drawing on practical examples of collecting and exhibiting, theoretical research, and critique from diverse countries across the globe, including Chile, India, Korea, the Netherlands, Nigeria, Palestine, Portugal, Sri Lanka and the United States, this book moves beyond the conventional Eurocentric museological framework. This book synthesizes contemporary critiques of museums, while arguing that societies need the sociocultural examinations that museums are capable of facilitating and that radical transformations of “the museum” are fraught with difficulty, but also possible and necessary. Ultimately, Coffee argues that museums can only be future orientated if they are transformed into agents of social justice and inclusion, divestors of illicit collections, and proponents of a liberatory ethic, opposing neo-colonialism in all of its forms. During that transformative process, as this book demonstrates, museum practice and museum theory must also be transformed.

The End of the Museum: Culture, Colonialism, and Liberation will appeal to students, researchers, and practitioners interested in a critical examination of museum work and theory.

Author Biography

Kevin Coffee is a public museologist who has worked with cultural organizations for more than 40 years, including the American Museum of Natural History in New York, the Chicago Academy of Sciences, and the US National Park Service. During that time, he has led and advised scores of organizations and projects in North America, Europe, and Asia. His work engages culture creators and museum users in developing new forms of inclusive and dialogical exhibitions, programs, landscapes, and museums. He resides in the United States.