Eleventh International Conference on The Inclusive Museum

Abstract

In an art museum that actively promotes inclusion and wellness, how can we train docents to question dominant narratives and sensitize them to the ways in which their own lived experience shapes their engagement with artworks and museums — and consequently their dialogue with the groups they serve? This paper highlights efforts to introduce critical content into a skills-based training course for prospective volunteer guides in a major Canadian art museum. Over the course of 2017, artists, cultural workers, political activists, and select media challenged the dominant celebratory narrative of Canada’s 150th and Montreal’s 375th in order to underscore the ongoing colonial histories inherent in these anniversaries. Such was the context for revamping previous efforts to situate guiding within broader questions of representation and privilege. The author will describe a training workshop that introduces participants to key concepts such as cultural appropriation, decolonization, cultural literacy, and pluralism. She will also introduce early data findings, assessing the extent to which new guides remain cognizant of the concepts covered in training, welcome and integrate multiple narratives into their dialogues with visitors, use inclusive vocabulary, and choose to facilitate learning with artworks created by traditionally underrepresented artists.