Objects in museums: following trajectories, mapping concepts

Abstract

The article proposes to analyze the museum objects from the combination of material culture studies, biographical approach and the concept map technique. Material culture studies approach objects from their symbolic meanings and their physical presence, focusing on mutual relationships between people and things and revealing the ways in which cultural meanings are produced and transmitted. Musealized or not, any object can, in theory, be biographed and mapped. Depending on the sources, the informants, the biographer, the place of speech, the questions posed and the perspective adopted, it is possible to produce an unlimited number of possible biographies and concept maps for the same object.