After reading the article “Re-configuring Museums” by Peter H. Welsh, I get more understanding of the functions and meanings of museums. I am very impressed by some concepts and ideas that he mentioned in this article. The first thing is that “A general model for museum practice should have three fundamental qualities” (p104) which are incorporating “established modes of theory production, with clear philosophical and epistemological roots and relevance for multiple disciplines.”; “attending to museums’ distinctive qualities without simply replicating functional areas.”; and “generating reasonable explanations for persistence and change in institutional structures.”(p104)
Later, Welsh brings out an attractive and important idea about the “two fundamental dimensions of a meseum—domains and circuits” (p104). If I did not read this article, I will be very confused about the word “domains” here. I may thought domain only as a way to present the location of the a museum or what kind of objects this museum will display. However, Welsh describes “domains” as “the museums’ distinctive areas of concern—encompassing museums’ content, communications, and communities.” (p104) And he describes the domains of museums as materiality, engagement and representation.
According to Welsh, “Materiality is the domain that encompasses the human capacity to physically, emotionally and cognitively modify our surroundings to suit our purposes.”(p105). It is also surprised to know that materiality does not only means the basic objects, “it includes all that is recognized by the senses, as well as
that which is affected by our beings.” (p105). Chinavine, as a free and educational website, does have the domain of materiality. Even though we can not physically experiencing the materiality, we can still experience it in different aspects. People can easily go to the website and get the information which they are interested. We can also post images and personal opinions. In some way, Chinavine allows people to “modify our surroundings to suit our purposes”. Welsh then mentioned that “The domain of engagement, then, has to do with reciprocal relationships between the institution and people with an interest in what the museum does. In particular, it pertains to ways that museums establish relationships with publics.”(p106) From my point of view, Chinavine did a good job in setting up the relationships between the website and its viewers. We can actually experience the culture that Chinavine displays on its colorful website. We can use to map to pick up one destination that we prefer to deeply understand. As we all know that China is a big country which contains many provinces, each province will have their unique features. So, the map can help a lot to go over the locations and regional characteristic cultures. Finally, he states the domains of representation-”Where materiality establishes the objective conditions of museum work, representation highlights the processes by which museums create their subject. Representation explores the scope of information that emerges from the museum institution. Museum workers frequently hope that visitors are ‘Getting It’. “(p105). I really think Chinavine was trying hard to display the culture to visitors. And “Viewing representation as a fundamental domain of the institution is not meant to dismiss or deflect the criticism, but aims to re-frame our awareness of the historical and cultural landscape within which museums have created themselves.”(p105). This can also be applied to Chinavine website. Chinavine is just like a online museum and the workers want to and they really did help viewers to learn more culture from the website. The abundant media streams and articles are showing Chinese culture to more and more people in a mature way.