https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/64684 2026-04-27T04:04:49Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/74555 Title: Grassroots museums : how curators of micro museums interpret and present their community : Mediterranean historical imaginary Abstract: This thesis discusses ways curators of grassroots micro museums interpret and present their communities and the Mediterranean historical imaginary in their roles as curators, something which emerges from the constant re-negotiation of identity with the communities they speak from, for and to. Twenty-three micro museums were studied to find out the practices, approaches and methods curators used to represent communities located in Mediterranean islands. The micro museums studied were situated in the Maltese Islands, Sicily (Italy), Mallorca (Spain), Corfu and Crete (Greece), and Brač and Murter (Croatia). The focus was on micro museums in the Mediterranean because the objective was to find out how this context impacts on the museum model and philosophy adopted by curators. Comparisons were focused between Maltese and Sicilian micro museums owing to historic connections and geographic proximity. An ethnographic approach incorporating visual methodology was used to study curatorial practices connected to the interpretation and presentation of the represented communities. An initial approach was adopted to find out which micro museums represented which community, how the community was presented to the public, which facet of its identity was given importance, and why and how it was interpreted to the public through the information and narratives used. The researcher paid attention to the narratives and information provided, assessed whether this changed according to the audience involved. He also considered with whom negotiation practices were adopted, which sources were referred to and relied upon for the construction of information and narratives presented alongside exhibits, displays and media relaying information about the represented community. Curators were asked to identify practices which they adopted to meet their museum’s objectives and satisfy community-oriented objectives, and whether they participated and acted in matters concerning community debates and issues. Participants were asked whether grassroots micro museums and state/institutional micro museums adopted the same or different techniques, and why if this occurred. This thesis investigated the symbiotic impact different types of museums have on each other, and whether or not grassroots micro museums add to, or investigate subject matters which other bigger museums do not. This means that curators of museums might in one way or another be responding to what other museums might not be doing, underlining an implicit networking between museums, even when this is not acknowledged. Another set of questions concerned the significance, interpretation and presentation of the Mediterranean to represented communities and the Mediterranean historical imaginary held by the community made manifest through the museum’s collection and representations. As underlined above, identities are negotiated and re-interpreted on a collective basis, and hence are never static. A critical social theory approach was adopted in conjunction with ethnography. Critical social theory proved useful in this research because it incorporates some of the issues embraced by Sociomuseology, which is a reflexive type of museology. Different methods tend to be adopted in ethnographies. The study was divided into two phases. In phase one, semi-structured, on site, face-to-face interviews were conducted with curators of the nine participant micro museums on the Maltese Islands and nine in the Ragusan Province (Sicily). In phase two, visual observations at the same Maltese and Sicilian museums were also conducted. This enabled the researcher to collect data on display layouts and how they were linked to community representation. Semiology and ethnographic discourse analysis were used to analyse these layouts. The main issues which emerged from the data gathered from these intensive interviews were guided by a questionnaire which was also sent to five museum curators found on other Mediterranean islands, so that the data could be compared with the data collected from the Maltese and Ragusan museums. In this study two types of grassroots micro museums emerged - independent and private micro museums. On the whole, curators envisioned the micro museum as an effective place for pedagogy, socialising, information dissemination, entertainment, and also as a means of expressing an identity and a way of safeguarding heritage and the knowledge of the community. Above all, curators of independent grassroots micro museums adopted practices which promoted the needs and interests of the community they represented and tended to voice the concerns of their communities both inside and outside the museum with the objective of bringing about social change. Grassroots micro museum curators tended to adopt a bottom-up approach, engaging community members through various activities, giving them the space and voice to re-negotiate representation of the community in which they were embedded. Curatorial roles and practices found at grassroots micro museums tended to be wider than those of the traditional museum curator and carried with them many more responsibilities. This was because the issue were not mainly the artefacts and pedagogy, but the need to bring about the necessary social change within the community the museums speak for, with and from. Curators of micro museums care about presenting ‘authenticity’ and about being consistent. They however found it hard to describe the Mediterranean through their museology. A Mediterranean model and philosophy of museology and curatorial practices however did emerge. The curators of grassroots micro museums tended to adopt a social activist role since their sole aim for the setting up of the museum tended to be the promotion of the welfare of the communities represented by the micro museum. It might have started from the need to safeguard community heritage, but with time it became linked with other issues. Further research needs to be carried out in order to find out whether this museology is adopted by other micro museums across the world. This research also found that curators of grassroots micro museums have more leeway when it came to experimenting with different approaches to museology since a number were self-taught and were not hindered by curatorial traditions deriving from academia. This was evident from the heritage they chose to safeguard, and the imaginaries and images which they adopted. They all departed from traditional types. The final chapter of this thesis discusses a number of recommendations which emerged from this study. Some of the recommendations were generic and others were applicable to individual participant museums. Description: PH.D. 2020-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/67439 Title: The EU's stance towards Islamic NGOS in Tunisia in the wake of the Arab spring Abstract: This dissertation is more than an examination of the relationship between the EU and post-Arab Spring Tunisia. It takes Tunisia as a case study and examines what the EU has been doing in relation to the Islamic-leaning NGOs of its southern neighbour, with which it boasts of having a privileged partnership. Through existing and new empirical data, this study delves into the reality of these NGOs and examines whether the EU is listening to all voices in Tunisian civil society including the important one of these charities. Although the EU claims that it does not make any distinction among civil society actors, in reality the EU is still not engaging with a large number of NGOs in Tunisia. Description: M.A.MEDITERRANEAN STUDIES 2020-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/67436 Title: Climate change strategies, policies and actions of Mediterranean countries with a focus on the two island nation states, Cyprus and Malta Abstract: Climate Change is a global phenomenon that has progressively come to the fore over the last six decades. Strategies and policies evolved over this time that reflected a changing awareness with resultant attitudes by political and community leaders, and the public. The effects of Climate Change require that actions be taken to mitigate them. This thesis aims to analyse and compare which are the drivers that determine the strategies, policies and actions that have been and may be adopted by countries in the Mediterranean, with specific reference to the only two island nation states, Cyprus and Malta. The study looks at these issues initially from global and European perspectives and then focusses on the Mediterranean region, reviews the specific challenges of small island states globally, to arrive at the situation in Cyprus and Malta. This desk study draws much of its information from reports issued by authoritative institutions such as the United Nations, the World Meteorological Organization and the European Union, and their respective organizations, rather than just relying on the works of individual contributors, albeit eminent authors and commentators are also consulted. Comparative analyses are made for the countries of the Mediterranean region and specifically between Cyprus and Malta, seeking to recognize differences and similarities, establishing the reasons for them so as to be able to draw conclusions. It results that there are several and various factors that influence Climate Change strategies, policies and actions. These range from the physical effects of Climate Change, to education levels and the structure of society in the country, to economic factors, as well as local politics and geopolitics. The study concludes that while these factors should be considered, it is ultimately governments within the constraints of their economies and political agendas, that determine the outcomes. Description: M.A.MEDITERRANEAN STUDIES 2020-01-01T00:00:00Z https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/67435 Title: The impact on foodways in the Muslim occupation of Iberia : the case of medieval al-Andalus Abstract: The aim of this dissertation is to assess the impact of the Muslim occupation of medieval Iberia on the way of life of the incumbent population, including culture, and to test if such impact carries traces to this very day. As mentioned previously, this will follow up on Horden and Purcell’s theory of connectivity in the Mediterranean, over both space as well as time. I believe that such work contributes to Mediterranean studies as it would illustrate that the encounter of two cultures from the extremities of the Mediterranean Sea over a thousand years ago, has some reverberations even today. This assessment will be done predominantly through a study of the transfer of foodways, as already mentioned and described. A description of new crops introduced by Muslim Arabs into medieval al-Andalus will be included, together with the impact that such new crops and the relevant new cooking techniques had on generations of Iberians for centuries. Description: M.A.MEDITERRANEAN STUDIES 2020-01-01T00:00:00Z