Social Impact

The effect that museums have on the social fabric of their communities and the well-being of the individuals and families who live there.

Innovations in Relevance: A Q&A with Stephen Reily of Remuseum

By Adam Rozan

I first learned about Stephen Reily when he was the director of Speed Art Museum in Louisville, Kentucky, which at the time was making headlines for its Breonna Taylor-themed exhibition Promise, Witness, Remembrance. His name popped up …
Getting Civic with Gen Z: A Q&A with Caroline Klibanoff of Made By Us

By Adam Rozan

As museum staff, our workdays are filled with time-consuming tasks, our to-do lists constantly expanding with emails to write, memos to produce, projects to advance, and programs to put on. In all of this, it’s easy to lose the …
Content Warnings in Museums and Galleries: Taking a Proactive Approach

By Jackie Armstrong

I began writing and speaking about the need for trauma-informed practices in museums several years ago, and while I haven’t seen any big changes in the time since, I have seen small shifts happening that make me hopeful. I’m noticing more …
A Controversy of Monumental Proportions at the Kent State Memorial

By Mindy Farmer

The Kent State memorial commemorating the May 4, 1970, shootings has been polarizing since its inception. This article originally appeared in Museum magazine’s July/August 2024 issue, a benefit of AAM membership. On August 24, 2023, winds …
Every Museum Needs a Civic Strategy. Here’s How to Find Yours.

By Sarah Jencks

In a recent New York Times article, landscape architect and MacArthur Grant winner Walter Hood described museums as “the new civic spaces, where honest conversations can be had.” While this is certainly not always the case—it feels …
What Can Museums Learn from the Connected Learning Framework?

By Joseph O'Neill

How would you try to convince a naysayer of the value of arts education? Maybe you would plead for the value of these subjects in their own right, citing the mind-expanding powers of self-expression, technical exploration, and human …
Help Pioneer Better Measures of Museum Performance

By Elizabeth Merritt

What’s the best way to measure a museum’s success? And by “best,” I mean meaningful and sustainable. “Meaningful” in the form of metrics that will make a community feel it has been well served by the museum and demonstrate to funders and …
Museum as Living Room: A Q&A with Arkansas Museum of Fine Arts’ Victoria Ramirez

By Adam Rozan

I believe museums matter because they serve as vital community spaces, where we can meet, mingle, work, learn, study, daydream, and everything in between. I came to this realization, in part, after reading Ray Oldenburg’s The Great Good …
Reframing the Collection: How a Literary Catalog Experiment Brought New Voices to Interpretation

By Derek (DK) Nnuro

The University of Iowa Stanley Museum of Art (Stanley) is part of the arts ecosystem at the country’s premier university for the study of creative writing. As a curatorial team, we have long been aware of the unique position this puts us …
The Pains and Pleasures of Being a First-Generation Museum Person

By Jojo Galvan

Every few months or so, there’s a family gathering. From a birthday celebration to a family cookout, my family never seems to have a shortage of reasons to gather. At the time of this writing, I am twenty-six years old, making me the right …