Museums and American Intellectual Life, 1876-1926 - Softcover

Conn, Steven

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0226114937 ISBN 13: 9780226114934

Publisher: University of Chicago Press, 2000

Synopsis

During the last half of the nineteenth century, many of the country's most celebrated museums were built. In this original and daring study, Steven Conn argues that Americans, endowed with the belief that knowledge resided in objects themselves, built these institutions with the confidence that they could collect, organize, and display the sum of the world's knowledge. Conn discovers how museums gave definition to different bodies of knowledge and how these various museums helped to shape America's intellectual history.

"Conn is an enthusiastic advocate for his subject, an appealing thinker, an imaginative researcher, a scholar at ease with theory and with empirical evidence." —Ann Fabian, Reviews in American History

"Steven Conn's masterly study of late-nineteenth century American museums transports the reader to a strange and wonderful intellectual universe. . . . At the end of the day, Conn reminds us, objects still have the power to fascinate, attract, evoke, and, in the right context, explain." —Christopher Clarke-Hazlett, Journal of American History

About this title

About the Author

Steven Conn is the W. E. Smith Professor of History at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. He is the author of many books, most recently Nothing Succeeds Like Failure: The Sad History of American Business Schools.

From the Back Cover

During the last half of the nineteenth century, many of the country's most celebrated museums were built. In this impressive study, Steven Conn argues that Americans, endowed with the belief that knowledge resided in objects themselves, built these institutions with the confidence that they could collect, organize, and display the sum of the world's knowledge. Conn describes how museums gave definition to different areas of scholarship, and how they occupied a central place in America's intellectual life.

From the Inside Flap

During the last half of the nineteenth century, many of the country's most celebrated museums were built. In this impressive study, Steven Conn argues that Americans, endowed with the belief that knowledge resided in objects themselves, built these institutions with the confidence that they could collect, organize, and display the sum of the world's knowledge. Conn describes how museums gave definition to different areas of scholarship, and how they occupied a central place in America's intellectual life.

Edition details

• Publisher: University of Chicago Press
• Publication date: 2000
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0226114937
• ISBN 13: 9780226114934
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 313