Best Museum Experience (4/10)
I love history and there is this museum in a historic site in Tasmania that I visited some years ago, that did a great job of introducing the history of the site as well as the experiences of the people who had lived there.
Some background info:
The name of the site is Port Arthur, located at the southeastern end of the island of Tasmania. The entire site encompasses over thirty buildings (homes, churches etc), ruins and landscaped grounds but the one I particularly like is the exhibit of Point Puer boys' prison.
Port Arthur began its life as a flour mill and granary, converted later to state prison. At its height, it housed over 480 convicts who were convicted and sentenced both in Britain as well as in the new colonies in Australia. Among them were juvenile convicts - some as young as nine - who were separated from the main convict population and kept on a place call Point Puer. This is the one I like to share.
Upon entering the Point Puer exhibit, each visitor is given an individual number tag. This number corresponds to an identity and life of a boy convict in Point Puer. The information displayed on the panels are organized into chucks that are easily digestable and clearly organized, so that you could read about your life as a 'Point Puer boy'. For example, I read that 'I' was originally from one of the poorest neighbourhood in London, was convicted for stealing toy and sentenced to a X number of years on Port Arthur. Moving along, I learned about my long journey from Britain and arrival to Port Arthur, and what my daily life was like here etc - who my assigned master was, the trade training I was given, and that I had to work alongside the adult, male convicts in the quarries here. I also learned about my good friend and fellow convict's plan to escape and how he was caught and punished. As I continue in the exhibit, I read labels, heard 'orders', flip-opened boxes, tried out some of the hard labor work that 'I' did here in Port Arthur, such as stone cutting and construction. My friend who visited the exhibit with me, got a different number and a different set of stories and details. So we were very interested to compare our life stories and see the similarities and differences. In short, we learned about Point Puer through what our characters went through at a individual level.
There are several things I like about this approach. The first and foremost one is that it personalized the experience. Through reading and indirectly 'living' through the life of my 'given' person, I was able to empathize with the conditions and experiences of a Point Puer convict on a more individual and personal level. It felt real and human. And I was motivated and eager to read and find out more about 'my life'. So instead of imparting loads of factual, faceless information and statistics, I was able to appreciate the history of the place from the life and perspectives of a real, single individual. And from there, appreciate the bigger context and historical background of which the character is a part.
The second feature I like in this exhibit is the way they connect the conditions then to the conditions now. For example, my character was convicted and imprisoned for stealing a toy. The information panels then ask me to compare this to a similar situation now. In doing so, I was subtlely 'guided' to reflect about what is crime exactly, and think about the different ways contemporary society's laws deal with those that break them a hundred and fifty years ago and now. This led to examination of other issues such as capital punishment, juvenile convicts/offenders, trade training in prisons etc. Hence, the whole experience is not just about learning some information of a distant past but also connecting it to our present and in the process, critically examining the issues involved in crime and punishment in society. It provided reflection and connection.
I thought Point Arthur was interesting in that even though it's mostly low tech, the ideas behind their approach were great. And it works!
One last interesting thing: At the end of the trip, I discover that for a small fee, any visitor can request a search in the museum's archives to see if any of their ancestors was either an immate or a warden officer who had served in Point Arthur. I thought that was pretty neat.
Reactions:
Yeong Haur, this sounds like an amazing experience. Sometimes 'living history' museums can seem a little too theatrical- people in costumes and so on. But in your case, you were the one assuming the role, and that seems like it was a powerful way to experience the museum. I knew about Britain's use of this area for convicts, but I have to say I didn't realize that a kid from London might also face this kind of dire punishment. How lucky we are! Even from your retelling of the experience I can see how much empathy this must have built. And in building a foundation of empathy, it seems that maybe you had a better chance of (laying down) and recalling the factual information. Time's up. -Mark BasnageMB
Yeong, I really appreciated how your presented this assignment by first framing the experience you had and then reflecting on why it was valuable for you. It really gave me a full impression of why this was so valuable for you. While reading, I was considering whether someone could have a similar experience in a museum that wasn't walking through the original buildings and structures. I think part of what made the "role-play" so meaningful is that you were really walking in his footsteps. I was also wondering if you got the impression from other visitors that they also walked through the experience in the mentality of "their student" and found that equally valuable as you and your friend did. Thanks for sharing. - Annie Adams
Comments from Greg Warman Hey YH - this seems like and incredible and innovative approach to presenting historical information. I especially enjoyed the link between this approach and the reading on the differences between museums as a joint versus an individual experience. It seems most museums impose an individualistic mindset on visitors with space design regardless of whether or not they came with others. The Port Arthur approach seems like a reasonable contrast to the individualistic standard.