About Museum

Museum

Museum is the bimonthly membership magazine of the American Alliance of Museums (AAM) — the award-winning publication that addresses the issues and challenges facing museums today, and, in the Alliance's phrase, a must-read for those who work for museums and those who love them. The publication began in 1924 as Museum News and was given its current title in 2008. Issued six times a year, each 48-page issue is built around an overarching theme addressed by four or five feature articles together with an opinion column titled "Point of View." Published from Arlington, Virginia, it is distributed to the Alliance's membership of museum professionals across the country. Its publisher's website is https://www.aam-us.org.

1924: Museum News

The magazine's lineage stretches back to 1924, when it began as Museum News — the bulletin of the American Association of Museums (as the Alliance was then known). For more than eight decades, Museum News chronicled the professionalization of American museums: the rise of accreditation, the development of museum education, the growth of collections stewardship, and the emergence of the museum as a civic institution.

The name served through the association's own evolution — including the 2006 Year of the Museum, which marked the organization's 100th anniversary, and the 2012 change of name to the American Alliance of Museums. In 2008, the publication itself was reborn with its current title: Museum — a name as spare and confident as the institution it serves.

The Thematic Format

Each issue of the 48-page Museum magazine has an overarching theme, addressed by four or five feature articles and the "Point of View" opinion column, plus timely news about museums and museum professionals. Recent themes have focused on engaging new audiences, trends in museum food and drink, salaries for museum employees, and museum accessibility — the practical and philosophical questions occupying the field.

The magazine's editorial guidelines ask its contributors — subject-matter experts and practitioners — for in-depth coverage that addresses cutting-edge issues, offers thought-provoking information or practices, shifts conceptual or methodological approaches, and extends the boundaries of museum practice. Feature articles run 1,500 to 1,800 words; the "Point of View" column, 1,000 to 1,200 words of opinion on issues where consensus has not been reached.

Point of View and Professional Debate

The "Point of View" column is the magazine's debating chamber: opinion on a current issue or event related to the theme, raising awareness, examining causes, suggesting solutions, and encouraging action — sometimes paired with counterpoints when viewpoints diverge. In a field that often prizes consensus, the column creates space for productive disagreement.

The magazine's "First Look" feature highlights new and upcoming museum exhibitions around the country — from the Kelsey Museum of Archaeology's Graffiti as Devotion along the Nile to the traveling exhibitions reshaping the field — giving members an early view of what their peers are producing.

Museum 2040: The Special Issue

In November 2017, the Alliance released a special issue of Museum magazine with an audacious concept: Museum 2040, written as if it were published in the year 2040. The issue marked the tenth anniversary of the Alliance's Center for the Future of Museums and aimed to create an immersive experience — transporting readers to 2040 so they would consider not only what they wanted the future to look like, but what they could do now to start building it.

"One of our major purposes is to help museums envision potential futures because that leads them to creating better and more successful strategies," said Elizabeth Merritt, the Alliance's vice president of strategic foresight and founding director of the Center for the Future of Museums. The special issue integrated the Center's futures work — previously delivered through lectures, workshops, the annual TrendsWatch report, and a weekly e-newsletter — directly into the Alliance's mainstream member communications.

Covering the Field's Big Questions

Museum's pages have addressed the issues defining twenty-first-century museum practice: climate and environmental justice (as in the Summer 2018 feature "The Right Side of History," on museums supporting Native-led climate initiatives), decolonization and the reinterpretation of collections, diversity and accessibility, the economics of the museum business model, and the evolving relationship between museums and their communities.

The magazine's contributors are the field's practitioners — directors, curators, educators, and advocates writing from experience. John Russick of the Chicago History Museum, for instance, contributed "The Museum Inside Out" to the January/February 2020 issue, alongside his work organizing the Alliance's annual Excellence in Exhibition Label Writing Competition.

The Alliance Behind the Magazine

Museum is published by the American Alliance of Museums, the national association representing the American museum community — from art museums and history museums to science centers, zoos, and botanical gardens. The Alliance's work includes accreditation, advocacy, professional development, and research; the magazine is its voice to the membership, translating the association's priorities into journalism.

The Alliance's milestones have often played out in the magazine's pages: the 2003 launch of the Nazi-Era Provenance Internet Portal, the 2009 adoption of the "Spark" strategic plan, and the ongoing work of the Center for the Future of Museums. For museum professionals, the magazine is both a professional resource and a record of the field's institutional life.

Accessibility, Salaries, and the Workforce

Museum's recent thematic issues have taken on the museum workplace itself: salaries for museum employees, accessibility for visitors and staff, and the challenge of engaging new audiences. The salary coverage — a perennially sensitive subject in a field known for underpayment — reflects the magazine's willingness to address the profession's internal problems, not just its public triumphs.

The accessibility theme similarly pushed the field forward, covering the practices — from exhibition design to digital access — that make museums genuinely open to all. For a membership magazine, these issues serve a dual purpose: informing practice and setting professional standards.

Food, Drink, and the Visitor Experience

Among the magazine's more delightful recent themes: trends in museum food and drink. The coverage recognized what every museum director knows — that the café and the restaurant are part of the visit, shaping how visitors feel about the institution as surely as the exhibitions do. The theme exemplified Museum's range: from the philosophical (what museums are for) to the practical (what's for lunch).

It also reflected the magazine's service to the full span of museum work — not just curators and directors, but the visitor-services, retail, and hospitality professionals whose work defines the museum experience.

The Award-Winning Standard

Museum is an award-winning publication — recognized for the editorial quality that has made it the field's essential read. The awards reflect the magazine's distinctive achievement: a membership publication that reads like a journal of ideas, combining the practical guidance professionals need with the big-picture thinking the field requires.

That standard was set early and maintained across a century: from Museum News' chronicles of professionalization to Museum 2040's futures thinking, the publication has always treated museum work as work worth thinking hard about.

A Century of Museum Journalism

From Museum News (1924) to Museum (2008–present), the publication has chronicled a century of American museum history: from the era of the gentleman curator to the modern museum's roles in education, social justice, and community life. Its thematic issues, expert features, and opinion columns have made it the field's journal of record — the place where museum professionals think in public about what museums are for.

For those who work in museums and those who love them, Museum remains the essential read. Its publisher's website is https://www.aam-us.org.