Controversial Heritage, Museums and History Education Challenges and Experiences from Democratic Culture and Critical Intersectionality

Dear Colleagues,

With this special issue, we would like to create a forum for discussion through experiences, theoretical analysis and research based on the representation of dissident narratives and controversial social issues in museums and other heritage interpretation centers, as well as their connection with history education and the critical intersectionality. This approach converges with the educational changes that museums are undergoing, reinterpreting the narratives of their pieces and modifying both the subjects and the narratives themselves. This transformation is connected to new trends in history education that propose teaching history based on historical thinking, the analysis and interpretation of sources and the simulation of the historian's method as well as historical consciousness, reflecting on connections between the past and the present, alternative narratives and controversial heritage. Furthermore, we raise the need to recover collective narratives, linked to historiographical currents that, in the mid-20th century, shifted the focus of study from the political trajectory of institutions or national kings to society. The aim is to showcase research on teaching experiences with students from primary education, secondary education, teacher training and non-formal education in museums or raised in collaboration with museum education teams. With this approach, we specially focus on the following topics:

• Analysis of museum educational programs about the incorporation of critical intersectionality and democratic culture topics.
• Analysis of questionnaires, interviews or focus groups with museum education staff on how they develop educational programs that incorporate critical intersectionality and democratic culture themes.
• Analysis of teacher perceptions and opinions about how to work with museum education staff to raise history education and democratic culture.
• Strong theoretical analyses about the role of museums in history education based on democratic culture competencies.
• Comparative national and international analyses of the transformations raised by museums in the narratives of their collections.
• Research of teaching experiences with the representation of narratives centered on intersectionality topics (race, economic inequality, sexual and gender diversity, functional diversity, etc.) raised in museums or in collaboration with museum education staff.
• Research of teaching experiences with the representation of narratives centered on violence, conflict, migration and the construction of democracy and rights raised in museums or in collaboration with museum education staff.

Dr. Cosme Jesús Gómez-Carrasco
Dr. Belén Castro Fernández
Dr. Álvaro Chaparro-Sainz
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1800 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• heritage education
• museum education
• history education
• historical thinking
• historical consciousness
• critical intersectionality
• democratic culture