Interpretation of the ancient past in a museum of archaeology : San Miguel de Azapa Museum of Arcaheology, Arica, Chile
This thesis examines different interpretations of the ancient past in a museum of archaeology. It focuses on the ways people make meanings from the remote past and how prehistoric populations can be known and understood. With the purpose of explaining the interpretation processes experienced in the museum of archaeology, this research scrutinized museum curators, exhibition designers and regular adult visitors. It was through the empathetic understanding of each of these groups' approach to the ancient past that this research could be developed. Philosophical hermeneutics provided the project with its theoretical framework; qualitative research oriented the methodology and furnished the appropriate methods to optimise understanding of the problem. The case study approach provided coherence to all the processes of interpretation involved, within the museum and about the museum, by generating meaningful data from which the research question could be answered. The case study was the San Miguel de Azapa Museum of Archaeology, located in the northernmost part of Chile, South America. This thesis contributes to museology with a corpus of theoretical approaches and methods in order to develop an understanding of
Cordova-Gonzalez, Julia
Interpretation of the ancient past in a museum of archaeology : San Miguel de Azapa Museum of Arcaheology, Arica, Chile. This thesis examines different interpretations of the ancient past in a museum of archaeology. It focuses on the ways people make meanings from the remote past and how prehistoric populations can be known and understood. With the purpose of explaining the interpretation processes experienced in the museum of archaeology, this research scrutinized museum curators, exhibition designers and regular adult visitors. It was through the empathetic understanding of each of these groups' approach to the ancient past that this research could be developed. Philosophical hermeneutics provided the project with its theoretical framework; qualitative research oriented the methodology and furnished the appropriate methods to optimise understanding of the problem. The case study approach provided coherence to all the processes of interpretation involved, within the museum and about the museum, by generating meaningful data from which the research question could be answered. The case study was the San Miguel de Azapa Museum of Archaeology, located in the northernmost part of Chile, South America. This thesis contributes to museology with a corpus of theoretical approaches and methods in order to develop an understanding of
interpretation ancient past museum archaeology museum chile examines different interpretation ancient past museum archaeology focus way_people make meaning remote past prehistoric_population know understood purpose explain interpretation process experience museum archaeology scrutinize museum curator exhibition designer regular adult visitor group ancient past could_develop philosophical_hermeneutics provide project theoretical_framework qualitative orient appropriate method optimise problem case_study provide coherence process interpretation involve within museum museum generate meaningful data question could answer case_study museum archaeology locate part chile south_america contribute corpus theoretical_approach method order develop