British Museum

After visiting the General Archive, I spent some time exploring the British Museum--particularly the areas dealing with the ancient cultures in Egypt, the Middle East, Greece, and Rome. Over the course of my visit, I developed a mild obsession with the signage. When I studied archaeology, I learned a bit about various ancient cultures, and a lot about the complexity of these cultures. Given this, and the difficulty in understanding a culture when all you have to do so is some of their stuff, I wanted to see how the Museum navigated this complex task to present their visitors, most of whom know very little about archaeology or ancient history, a clear picture of the significance of the collections.



I feel this applies to the work of librarians: no matter what setting we work in, we often have to create online library instruction tutorials and informational handouts, and lead library instruction sessions. All these tasks require distilling the very specialized, complex world of library information into its essence, breaking it down into manageable pieces, and presenting these pieces to patrons in such a way that even those who have never used a library before will understand.



There was some variability in the quality of the signage, with the very best belonging to objects included in the "History of the World in 100 Objects" series (for instance, the Rosetta Stone, signage shown here). The signage for Egyptian Life and Death and the objects from Sutton Hoo burial were a very close second.



The success of the signage in these three exhibits was successful for several reasons. First, the signs were large, with the text printed in a font that could be read without stepping right up to the glass. The signs for the Rosetta Stone and Sutton Hoo were made more noticeable by being black with white text, while the Egyptian sign had reproductions of images from the collection to attract visitors' gazes. Second, the signs avoided almost all jargon and explained specialized terms in the rare instances these were used. Each exhibit's signage also included elements that would help readers understand the context and significance of the collections. In the Egyptian gallery, maps were included for context, and key points were repeated on multiple signs. For the Sutton Hoo collection, there were many images reconstructing the someowhat corroded and decayed objects' original appearance and arrangement in the burial. My favorite, though, was the way the "100 objects" signs, like that for the Rosetta Stone, included a short list of contemporary Museum items from other regions for context.

I think several of these techniques can be adopted for signs, handouts, and presentations in the library: avoiding technical language is important if librarians want to avoid driving away the "uninitiated." Also, using eye-catching colors or images is important--signs and handouts are only useful if patrons know they're there! Repetition of main points is a good way to ensure those main points stay with patrons, as is presenting new information in context. Simple things, but doing them well has the potential to put a library in the same league as the British Museum.



Now if only every library could have a lamassu.

British Museum General Archive

Image source: http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/research_facilities/archives.aspx

Today, a group of Library and Information Science students visited the British Museum's General Archive. I am not very familiar with archives, so every chance I get to visit one is a trip into a different world.

Stephanie Clarke, the Museum Archivist, and her assistant Bryony led our tour. There is only one other staff member in the Archive, a woman who worked in administration for many years and has been very valuable in applying her firsthand experience with the Museum to understanding the organizational processes that generated the papers now in the archive collection.

The Archive holds 6 record series. These include Finance Records, Staff Records, Trustee Records, Building Records, and Temporary Exhibitions records. Examples of objects in the General Archive collections include 8,000 photographs taken of the Museum and its collections, stereoscope images of objects in the collections, architectural drawings of the Museum buildings, minutes from meetings of the Board of Trustees, and successful job applications for Museum employees from the 19th century.

One of the major things that sets archives apart from libraries is that they inherit their collections from an outside entity. This means that their collections often reflect the organizational structure of the organization that created the records. Sometimes this arrangement appears quite sensible, other times it is quirky and unexpected. The General Archive is no exception: on one hand, I found it quite logical that, as Clarke explained, each Museum department has its own archival on material in its own permanent collections. On the other, I was very surprised to learn that the General Archive houses the reader's tickets from the British Library. This quirk in the collection is due to the history of the two institutions, Clarke explained. The British Library was originally housed on the British Museum campus, and when it moved to its new location, it left its archive of reader's tickets in the care of the General Archive.

Another surprising object in the collection was an exploded shell that had hit the Museum during Second World War. Clarke showed this to us along with photographs of the damage to the museum during the war. Most of the collections had been moved to underground storage when the war started, which was fortunate because the building was heavily damaged. I was very glad Clarke brought these things out for us; in the US, students learn in history class that London was heavily bombed during the War. Full stop. Period novels are a little better at illustrating the reality of what this entailed, but it wasn't really until I arrived here, and could see the entire Royal Festival Hall--built over an area bombed out in the war--and the entire Barbican, built over an area bombed out in the war--that I finally felt I understood what it meant for London to have been bombed.