Rethinking the Museum

Abstract

Inclusion has become an integral part of the popular parlance for transformations in furthering active citizenship across the world. The Inclusive Museum Research Network positions museums at the forefront as agencies of change. The building of this knowledge community has been consultative and incremental since its foundation in 2008. The annual Inclusive Museum Research Network conference profiles leading thinkers in the cultural domains and provides a platform for young, emerging, and established scholars and professionals. What has been problematized since the beginning is the conceptualization of the community. It is at once culturally and linguistically diverse. The dialectical processes of decolonization and contextualization through the first voice of primary stakeholders has been underlined. In this agenda, cultural, social, economic, and environmental sustainability is on the canvass of holistic approaches to addressing all forms of museums and heritage phenomena in their multiplicity of manifestations. Access for all and ethical engagement of all museological considerations have become central. This contribution is an outcome of the Inclusive Museum Research Network conference in Philadelphia in 2022.