Tower of London – England – Nov/2022
Today after lunch, I was studying English – which teachers do AS WELL, if you’re WONDERING why I was doing that haha – and I CAME ACROSS a text about the use of technology in museums.
The text presented two people’s points of view on it. One thinks that the use of technology in museums in DUMBING DOWN the EXHIBITIONS in order to entertain the visitors and it is making museums LOSE SIGHT OF their CORE ROLE, which is to educate the public.
The other person, however, thinks that the use of technological tools is actually positive because they are attracting more people to museums, especially the less educated ones, who couldn’t understand the EXHIBITS before. In that person’s perspective, technological FEATURES have made exhibits more accessible to the GENERAL PUBLIC.
After reading the text, I was trying to understand which opinion I agree with. It was A GOOD EXCUSE to revisit my memories of the trip I took around the UK with my brother and a friend at the end of 2022, because on that trip we visited more than 10 museums.
It was the time in which I visited THE LARGEST NUMBER OF museums in the shortest AMOUNT OF TIME. We were traveling for only 15 days. It was almost like one museum per day. After some reflection, I think that now I know what my opinion on the use of technology in museums is. Read on and see if you agree with me.
One of the very long texts that we STRIVED to read
DESPITE all our enthusiasm to learn as much as possible from our visits to the museums, we couldn’t DENY that it was kind of boring and tiring to read long texts that explained the ARTIFACTS that were ON DISPLAY. There were so many rooms, so many EXHIBITS to see, and so much text to read.
I remember feeling RELIEVED when we entered a room in Edinburgh Castle that had a projector displaying a video on a wall together with a few lines of text about the history of the castle. Watching the video with all the SOUND EFFECTS and VISUAL EFFECTS helped me feel attracted to that content in a way that a PLAIN TEXT and a picture wouldn’t.
My brother, who is 30 years old now (I think haha), had never been to museums before. He never thought it would be fun to visit one. And in our visits to those museums, he learned that museums can be fun. He was only attracted to the exhibits that had objects, images, audio recordings, interactive features, and little text, THOUGH.
My brother is the guy in a red BEANIE and blue jacket, by the FIREPLACE
Based on our group’s RELIEF every time we stepped into a new room with enough sensory features and not that much text, I think I can say that technology has come to change our experience in museums for the better.
It helps us to digest the information in a lighter and more fun way.
However, I do understand that sometimes THERE MIGHT BE an OVERUSE of technology in museums, which might DIVERT the visitors ATTENTION FROM the MAIN GOAL of the exhibits they are interacting with, which is to teach them something. For that reason, I believe it’s important to always have in mind the goal of the exhibit when planning how to set it up.
Museums have a very important ROLE in society. They are there to transfer KNOWLEDGE; to make us aware of where we are coming from, where we are now, and where we’re HEADED TO. However, access to museums has been quite restricted to only adult upper-class individuals for a number of reasons, and among them, the fact that the exhibitions are quite often hard to understand and not fun.
Now, PEOPLE FROM ALL WALKS OF LIFE and ages can find pleasure in visiting museums because of technology. Technology is helping the museums to set up exhibitions that are easier to understand and more interesting and, therefore, more attractive to a WIDER RANGE OF people, especially those who need museums the most and tragically used to be THE LEAST attracted to them, which are the people who have had fewer opportunities of receiving formal education.
Now, I would like to know your OPINION ON the use of technology in museums. Do you think it is FOR THE BETTER or FOR THE WORSE? LET ME KNOW what you think in the comments below.
I hope you enjoyed this post and learned a lot of new expressions and collocations from your reading.
See you in the next one!
Eliana Capiotto
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