heritology
 
A contribution to a possible definition of museology ...
ICOFOM symposium "Interdisciplinarity in Museology", Paris, 1982
 

I am fully aware that a name is a matter of convention and it is therefore necessary to determine the differences by defining the contents and the subject of the matter of an activity. In other words, to me it is indifferent whether the theory on functioning of the museum will be named museology or museography, but it is essential to establish what is contained within the agreed and logical compass of such a discipline. However, if we want to cover all the new manifestations (and also those evidently to come) which can only be separated from the phenomenology of the museal activity with difficulty, than we shall to define a very large context, a vast field of activity beyond traditional restrictions of the museum. It will be necessary and possible to assign it into the competence of a single and united scientific discipline. If we can agree that museography sufficiently determines the field of theory and practice of the museum institution, then we could enlarge the definition of museology to such an extent as to successfully handle the overall problems concerning the protection and the treatment of the total heritage. Although I do not consider the terminology essential (from the moment when we know what is meant under a particular term) still I would heretically claim that we should not shrink even introducing new concepts. Why not call such a broad concept of museology i.e. of a discipline which is no longer museum-centred by name of heritology.

 
     
 
Copyright Tomislav Šola 2011
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