Touch in Museums Policy and Practice in Object Handling [Hardcover]

The value of touch and object handling in museums is little understood, despite the overwhelming weight of anecdotal evidence which confirms the benefits of physical interaction with objects.

Touch in Museums presents a ground-breaking overview of object handling from both historical and scientific perspectives. The book aims to establish a framework for understanding the role of object handling for learning, enjoyment, and health. The broad range of essays included explores the many different contexts for object handling, not only within the museum, but extending beyond it to hospitals, schools and the wider community.

The combination of theoretical analysis, policy assessment and detailed case material make Touch in Museums invaluable reading for students and professionals of museology or cultural heritage.

* PART I: WHAT DO WE MEAN BY TOUCH? * 2. The Class Politics of Touch, Fiona Candlin, Birkbeck, University of London * 3. Weighty Issues in Handling Objects, Alan Wing and Andrew Wimperis, University of Birmingham * 4. Emotional Touch: a neuroscientific overview, Hugo Critchley, Universities of Brighton and Sussex. * 5. Discriminative and Affective Touch are subserved by separate peripheral and central neural systems, Francis McGlone, Cognitive Neuroscience  CSIG, Unilever Research and Development * 6. Multisensory Contributions to 'Touch': Recent findings, Charles Spence, University of Oxford * PART II: NEW TECHNOLOGIES FOR ENHANCING OBJECT INTERPRETATION * 7. The use of Haptic Interfaces in Haptics Research, Christos Giachritsis, University of Birmingham. * 8. A Versatile Large-Scale Multimodal VR System for Cultural Heritage Visualisation, Celine Loscos, University College London. * 9. CONTACT - enhancing artefact teaching by digitising both object and process, Michael Boyd and Roger Doonan, University of Sheffield. * 10. Out of Touch: Utilising 3D Imaging Technologies in the analysis of Ethnographic objects, Graeme Were, University Cls$