Museums and the Ethics of Care: Realising the Potential of Museums for Well-being and Gender Equality

This proposal seeks to develop a network focussed on exploring the entangled role of museum work and care work. In recognising that the Asian museum often foregrounds values around respect for family, place and ancestors (Were 2022), this proposal brings together a new network of academics working in museums, gender and anthropology alongside key practitioners working in the sector to explore museum practice that are infused with ideals of compassion, empathy and healing. The project’s core ambition is to establish a series of online and face-to-face workshops from which to challenge the way we understand Vietnamese museums by acknowledging their productive nature and their capacity to address societal issues through education, exhibition and research. By framing discussions around the ethics of care, we will discuss ways in which museums act as active agents in addressing social issues in Vietnam around gender identity and aging (Chatterjee & Noble 2013; Morse (2021). A major outcome of the workshops will be the framework for developing a large collaborative grant application to the British Academy. The network will consist of experts in their fields of anthropology, gender and Asian studies – all of whom have conducted long-term research in sites across Asia – to maximise vitality, success and impact. This project will have impact in Asia as it constructs a framework for understanding the future social role of museums which can also be applied in Europe, following campaigns in the UK such as ‘Museums Matter’ which identifies the museum’s role in civil society strengthening.