Beyond museums: religion in other visitor attractions

Abstract

Museums offer three very different things: public entertainment, public education and scholarly research. In all three areas museums have, over the past generation, transformed the ways they understand, use and present religion. This transformation in museums worldwide has forged new correspondences with other kinds of visitor attraction, like places of worship, libraries, pilgrimage centres, theme parks or zoos. The barriers that once separated museums from other institutions that welcome visitors have broken down, perhaps especially in the field of religion. In this short note I shall look briefly at some of the approaches museums have come to share with other attractions that present religion to visitors, and at some of the motives they share.