Omnium Gatherum: Occasional Papers

Introduction

Welcome to my Omnium Gatherum: Occasional Papers1, a collection of short essays, teaching material, personal fascinations, and meanderings. You are welcome to download and use anything that interests you for your own purposes.

While this is not a blog site with a comment section, I would welcome your thoughts, additions, and suggestions. Write to egurian@egurian.com and I will be sure to respond. I have spent thirty years writing essays, each one taking quite a long time to think through and to research. I wrote no more than two pieces a year giving variations of the paper as lectures throughout that year. The writing, and then multiple deliveries, helped shape and evolve my thinking. My writings, if taken together, cohere. I wish to make museums more accessible and more meaningful to everyone. Now I am interested in writing shorter and less polished pieces, putting them out on the web quickly, and finding out what’s helpful and interesting to others. Each new piece will be listed on the table of contents for ease of finding.

I write this Omnium with two principal audiences in mind — people who need things short, to the point, and close to hand: museum middle management, busy trying to get things done; and museum studies teachers and their students, engaged in preparations for the future of our field. I am always interested in the practical applicability of ideas, where action implements philosophy. But I also believe in not taking myself, or others, too seriously. Hence the name Omnium Gatherum which means “a motley collection of things.” I hope you will find it helpful.

1. 1. A Motley Collection of things: farrago, gallimaufry, hodgepodge, hotchpotch, melange, mingle-mangle, mishmash, oddments, odds and ends, ragbag, assortment, miscellanea, miscellany, mixed bag, motley, potpourri, salmagundi, smorgasbord, variety, mixture -