M USEUMS ’ F ORMATION OF C ULTURAL I DENTITY AND D ESTINATION I MAGE 29

Cultural identity is a sort of shared culture, a collective sense of true self. It is socially situated with respect to people’s ongoing membership in specific communities of practice, and continuously takes shape over time by means of a variety of cultural building materials, such as history, geography and religion (Hall 1996, Castells 1997, Wenger 1998). Although people construct and contest identities through what they do and say, such development and negotiation may be influenced by power relationships among related communities and institutions (Ellenbogen et al. 2007). As it entails endowing places with meanings, cultural identity is also a socio-spatial phenomenon where the representational space is heavily loaded with symbols (Liggett 1995).

Museums in this line act as a bridge connecting the past, present and future. They are capable of manipulating material things, establish relationships and associations to build or affirm identities, according to the surrounding social, economic and political contexts (Barthes 1977, Hooper-Greenhill 1992, Ellenbogen et al. 2007). In another word, this process of interpretation involves what to preserve, how to preserve it, and how to present it to the public (ICOMOS 2007), and power relationships have tended to decide the objects to go or stay, since museums can function as a place of enculturation conveying charged symbolic significance (Pearce 1994, Hanquinet & Savage 2012). In consequence, museums have been utilized as an effective intermediary by many city leaders to build civic pride and consensus, a shared sense of identity, and support for local heritage properties, particularly when there are problems of socio-cultural inclusion and cohesion (Miles 2005). Politics from this perspective can exert a considerable influence in museums’ attitudes, standards and levels of services, which may pose a challenge to historical objectivity and deviate from the personal or collective memory (Lang et al.

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2006, Chhabra 2008, Ivanovic 2008). In some cases, this has turned museums into a battleground of disputation involving various agendas, state ideologies, and globally significant issues (Message 2006).

From the audience stance, due to the uncertainty and fragmentation of postmodern life, museum narratives actually provide the means for individuals “to piece these discrete fragments of experience together into a coherent story that says something about who they are”, underpinning individual as well as collective identities (Richards & Wilson 2006, p. 1214). In addition, because the nation-state has been gradually displaced by the urban region which has become an increasingly fundamental political, social and economic unit, museums on cities may provide rootedness, a sense of community through a diverse range of experiences which juxtapose various aspects of the exhibited themes and therefore allow self-authentication or communal celebration of unique traditions and figures endemic to the area (Miles 2005,Orloff 2008, Morgan et al. 2009, Timothy 2011).

Therefore, it is important that museums are emotionally accessible in addition to their offer of sensory involvement and intellectual understanding. Meanwhile, to look the other way around, the sociocultural identity of a visitor also seems to largely determine what one perceives during an experience and what will be ultimately recalled afterwards (Anderson 2003). Audiences may even contribute to the production and stabilization of shared meanings by active engagement such as repeated performances and enactments (Hanquinet & Savage 2012).

In brief, museums may implicitly yet significantly affect cultural identity at both individual and collective levels, and in turn be influenced by community engagement and institutional forces. This research considers museums’ efforts in this realm are highly relevant to their extent of connections to the local society, manifestation of cultural democracy and future sustainability backed up by communal support. Therefore, its

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investigation into the cases includes this important dimension.

On the other hand, to look into the aspect of destination image, Shaprio and Varian (1999) notice a responding emergence of “economics of attention” where institutions make every conceivable attempt to attract the attention of customers. As the number of alternative attractions and leisure facilities is increasing sharply today, there are growing competitions for media coverage and tourists who have only a limited amount of time and are easily distracted. In order to compete for tourists, a location must become a destination, and to compete with one another, destinations must be distinguishable, which can be termed as “distinctive placeness”, a major factor of catching public’s eye (Kirchenblatt-Gimblett 1998, Van Aalst & Boogaarts 2002, Cohen 2008).

To put it otherwise, tourism needs destinations, and museums are one of the ways through which locations become destinations, a way of producing “hereness”. As museums possess a significant symbolic power to make a powerful statement about a place, they could function as a visible identifier to the public by representing the aesthetic and cultural amenities of that place and transforming the inherited cultural elements into assets with a higher sign value (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development 2009). Therefore, in addition to their role as unique nodes in forming the tourism geography of a region, they may also help such region reinforce positive images or correct negative ones, which can be arguably regarded as a part of the destination branding strategy aiming at drawing in tourists, investors, potential residents and international attention, since nowadays the global city competition rely largely on their images (Kirchenblatt-Gimblett 1998, Prévélakis 2008, Timothy 2011).

Moreover, a museum with the magnitude and reputation can exert significant appeal on its own accord and even function as a representative image of tourism destination product, since tourists have a tendency to associate certain destinations with

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local iconic landmarks and make their travel decisions accordingly (Timothy 2011).

This can be proved by the case of the Guggenheim Bilbao which has brought a huge influx of tourist to the originally unknown Basque city since its establishment. However, such case also reveals a potential issue: though it has successfully drawn in many visitors, that success is only on a temporary basis. In the course of time, its appeal, mainly originating from its avant-garde architecture, has seemed largely dissolved (Van Aalst &

Boogaarts 2002, Granville 2012). This suggests that museum experiences do not constantly add value to tourists’ stay and increase the probability of a return visit to both a museum itself and the place it is situated. The depth and breadth of the software it can present to the public as well as the nature of its relationship with the place matter a lot to the quality and continuality of the destination image. Besides the individual charm a museum has, when clustered with similar attractions, it may form an engaging setting from the perspective of a leisure outing and esthetic environment and therefore have the potential to attract more visitors and higher level of expenditures (Timothy 2011). In this regard, this research would then like to unearth the effect each case casts on the city’s image and whether these effects complement or collide with each other.

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2.5 Research Rationale

This research aims to explore how museum experiences take shapes between different types of museums and their audiences and therefrom evaluate their effects on leisure-decision making, edutainment, cultural identity and destination image in the hope of establishing referential paradigms of the museum experience design. In order to keep the subsequent investigation in focus, it devises the following three research questions based on the suitable theories extracted from the above literature review:

 What kinds of museum experiences are shaped, and how are they perceived as a leisure option?

Basically, the relevant exploration proceeds in such a way below (see Table 2.3):

Table 2.3 The exploration of the first research issue

Research Findings on Checkpoints Theoretical References

The museums’ characters

 Their evolution, exhibitory focus, collection features and approaches of interpretation and presentation.

 Their perceived costs and benefits

 Their spatial design and ancillary

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In order to have a clear picture of how the three cases differentiate from each other in nature, this study firstly examines their evolution, exhibitory focus, collection features and approaches of interpretation and presentation with reference to the constructivist and didactic styles proposed respectively by Hein (1995) and Black (2005). Then it uses Kolter et al.’s (2008) experiential configuration to grasp the most outstanding types of experiences in each museum. As such, the characters of the cases are delineated, which can serve as a fundamental basis for following inquiries into the implications of their experiential offers. On the other side, this research also probes into visitors’ comments on their museum experiences so as to determine how these experiences are negotiated, if a causal relationship exists between both sides and if the perceived quality of experience conforms to the concept of “entrance narrative” argued by Doering (1999).

At this point, it further investigates museums’ status in the leisure market from the angle of leisure-time decision-making discussed by Falk and Dierking (1992), comparing the perceived costs and benefits, spatial design and ancillary facilities between the cases in order to understand how these museums function as a general leisure experience. Meanwhile, the look into the visitors’ motives and perceptions of the museum visits in comparison to other leisure options allows this study to recognize their underlying definitions and expectations for such experiences and how these experiences are positioned in their mind as a leisure outing.

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 How does the concept of ‘edutainment’ manifest in such experiences?

Given that the vast majority of museum visitors are in fact engaging in a leisure activity, the study here concentrates on museums’ informal education rather than formal one. As indicated in Table 2.4 below, the related inquiry starts with an examination of the types of learning information and the corresponding types of learners based on the theories of Falk and Dierking (1992) and Serrell (1996). Then with this understanding of the educational nature of the museums, the research continues to evaluate their entertaining aspect by checking their extent of interactivity and uses of innovative exhibitory techniques, as mentioned by Wright and Lennon (2007), in order to know how they practice the concept of “learning through enjoyment”. Finally, visitors’

feedback on their learning process and perceived personal growth would shed light on the effects of these different combinations of education and entertainment, which are further analyzed through various arguments made by Black (2005) , Kotler et al. (2008),

Richards (2001a) , McIntyre (2009), and Hanquinet and Savage (2012).

Table 2.4 The exploration of the second research issue

Research Findings on Checkpoints Theoretical References

Informal education in museums

 Their offers of learning information

 The corresponding learning styles

The determinants of an entertaining experience proposed by Wright and Lennon (2007)

The perceived value of related combinations

Visitors’ comments on their learning process and perceived personal growth

 Entertainment’s role as a learning tool proposed by Black (2005) and Kotler et al.

(2008)

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 The risks of a pure entertaining design mentioned by Richards (2001a) and McIntyre (2009)

 Museums as a kind of

“educative leisure” proposed by Hanquinet and Savage (2012)

 How do museum experiences affect cultural identity and destination image?

As shown in Table 2.5 below, in the aspect of cultural identity, since the cases all base on important heritage of Liverpool, this research would like to clarify the connections between residents and the museums by looking into the local dimension of their exhibitory contents and their extent of community engagement, referring to the process of interpretation discussed by Black (2005) and ICOMOS (2007). The purpose here is to know who holds the right to speak for these cultural assets of significance and whether local society has the chance to define their own heritage and thereby retain their cultural identity. In the meantime, this study also distinguishes the degree of local identification with the museums, through the exploration into the nature of local identity and local attitudes toward the museums’ effects on their affections for Liverpool, in order to know if the museum interpretation can reinforce local identity and thus obtain the local support. It would evaluate the social function of museums in terms of underpinning cultural identity, as discussed by Miles (2005), Orloff (2008), Morgan et al. (2009) and Timothy (2011).

In the realm of destination image (also see Table 2.5), this research examines the correspondences between Liverpool and the museums by identifying the image attributes of Liverpool presented in the museum contents as well as their functional and physical integrity with the surroundings. Meanwhile, it investigates visitors’

impressions of Liverpool before and after the museum visits in order to know if there is

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any change in the perception of Liverpool, thereby verifying the capability of the museums to rebrand the city’s destination image. The views of OECD (2009), Kirchenblatt-Gimblett (1998), Prévélakis (2008) and Timothy (2011) on cultural attractions’ function in shaping destination image would be referred during the related assessment.

Table 2.5 The exploration of the third research issue

Research Findings on Checkpoints Theoretical References

< Local Cultural Identity>

The process of interpretation proposed by Black (2005) and terms of underpinning cultural identity discussed by Miles (2005),

Cultural attractions’ function as a visible identifier of a place discussed by OECD (2009)

The change in Liverpool’s overall image

Visitors’ impressions of Liverpool before and after the museum visits

Cultural attractions’ function in shaping destination image discussed by Kirchenblatt-Gimblett (1998), Prévélakis (2008) and Timothy (2011)

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