REIMAGINING MUSEUMS: PRACTICE IN THE ARABIAN PENINSULA
Edited by Pamela Erskine-Loftus

DEADLINES:
ABSTRACTS: due 7 April CONTRIBUTORS NOTIFIED: by 16 April COMPLETED PAPERS: due 18 June

We invite international submissions to be included in this forthcoming book, being published by MuseumsEtc [www.museumsetc.com] in Autumn 2012.

Although often thought of internationally as a new phenomenon, museums in the Arabian Peninsula have a history dating back to at least the 1950s. Since the emergence of national museums in the early-mid 1970s their numbers have continued to increase, and the last five years have seen a huge growth in the regeneration of existing museums, the founding of new museums and museum organizations, and the creation of international satellites in the region.

However, there is currently a lack of professional, accurate, accessible, up-to-date information on museum practice, issues and developments in the Peninsula for professionals in the region, as well as museum studies students, academics and researchers, and the wide range of consultants, organizations and companies around the world who work with museums in the region.

The purpose of Reimagining Museums is to present and discuss current museum practice in the countries of the Arabian Peninsula – Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, United Arab Emirates,

Oman, Yemen, and Saudi Arabia. This will be the first book to study and examine the emerging museum practice and profession in the region and its implications for museums, national and international. The book aims to be both an introduction to the museum field in the Peninsula as well as an active tool and reference for museum professionals in the region. Ultimately, the contents should inspire museum practice in both the Peninsula and around the world.

This book will be edited by Dr Pamela Erskine-Loftus, who has worked in museums for fifteen years, in the United States (including MoMA, New York), the United Arab Emirates, and Qatar. Pamela holds a doctorate in museology specific to the Peninsula, and a Masters in Museum Studies with a dissertation on the effects of the 1991 Gulf War on art museums in Kuwait and Iraq, and has written and presented on aspects of Peninsula museology.