Museum, Exhibition and Memory: an analysis of the long-term exhibition of the Historical and Artistic Museum of Maranhão
historical museum; museum exhibition; social memory; social museology; cultural policies.
Historical museums created in a colonial perspective, in face of a latent social demand, have been invited to rethink their social role. Organizations like the International Council of Museums (ICOM) and the United Nations for Education, Science and Culture (UNESCO) have coordinated events in countries in the American continent with the goal of creating new paths for the museums. This research presents as the central theme the study of museum, exhibition and memory with the main goal of analyzing the long-term exhibition at the Historical and Artistic Museum of Maranhão (MHAM) its narrative and the possible resignification through heritage education. Within this context, cultural policies for museums are fundamentals to plan actions that promote dialogues and the construction of new knowledge from the relation between museum and society. It is through museum exhibitions that the dialogue with the masses exists, and the museum object, considered as a document, is the generating element of dialogues and reflections. The research is a qualitative approach and of an exploratory character, analyzing normative documents, such as cultural policies within national, state and municipal scope, as well as the MHAM Museum Plan. The data will be collected through direct observation and the applications of a questionnaire with open questions for the workers of MHAM. The technique applied to interpret the answers from the questionnaires will be Content Analysis and its steps, such as pre-analysis, materials exploring, treatment of the collected data and interpretation. The product to be elaborated consists a primer of Patrimonial Education, suggesting activities that promote debates and reflections between long-term exhibitions and society. In the partial considerations, we verified that MHAM is a place of memory, created within a colonial perspective. It needs to be, however, a space of plurality celebration. In the final considerations, we found that the MHAM is a place of memory, with a trajectory marked by several challenges, from its creation to the present day. Created in a colonial perspective, this has a long-term exhibition, with objects that set the mood of a period house from the 19th century. however, it needs to be a space for celebrating plurality.