Terminological MUSEOLOGY:

Terminological MUSEOLOGY:

Terminology	Definition
Architecture	-          The relationship of architecture with museums as buildings is defined as the art, science or technique of building restoring and equipping museums. -          Architectural terminology determined the development of the museum notion.  -          Museum buildings are planned and built according to an architectural program established by scientists and administrative staff responsible for the establishment. -          A specific architecture was developed in relation with the preservation, research and communication of collections, particularly through temporary or permanent exhibitions, witnessed by the earliest buildings through to contemporary ones. -          Certain architects have specialized in exhibitions and have become set designers or "exhibition designers”.
Collection	-          Whether material or immaterial, collections are the core of museum activities. A museum's mission is to acquire., preserve and appraise its collections so as to safeguard natural, cultural and scientific heritage”. -          Collections can be defined as “museum objects brought together, acquired or preserved given their illustrative or referential value, or because of their aesthetic or educational importance”. -          The curator or museum staff does not appear as a collectionist since collectionists are relegated to the outside of museums.  -          A collection is deemed to be not only the outcome but also the source of a scientific programme aimed at acquisitions and research through material and immaterial evidences of mankind and his environment.
Communication	-          Communication entails conveying information between one or several emitters and one or several receivers through a given channel. -          Within the context of museums, communication appears, in turn, as the action of making information available as it results from objects which are a part of the collection, and as the presentation of information stemming from research on the latter. -          Communication is not essentially verbal and cannot truly have features in common with the reading of a text, but instead acts through the sensitive presentation of the exhibited objects.
Education	-          Generally speaking, education means putting into practice the appropriate means to ensure training and development of human beings and their skills. Museal education can be defined as a set of values, notions, knowledge and practices with the purpose of ensuring visitors’ development. -          Aimed at providing culture, education is mainly based on pedagogy, development and fullness as well as on the learning of new skills. -          Animation and cultural action, as well as mediation are words currently resorted to so as to characterize work carried out with publics within museum transmission efforts.
Ethics	-          Ethics is a philosophical discipline which discusses the setting of values to guide human behavior, both public and private. -          Ethics within museums can be defined as a debate to determine basic principles and values on which museal work is based.
Exhibition	-          The word "exhibition" means the outcome of the action of showing as well as the set of things shown and the place at which they are displayed. -          As an outcome of the act of displaying, exhibitions are one of the main functions of museums which, according to other definition, “acquire, preserve, analyze, exhibit and also transmit people’s material and immaterial heritage”.
Heritage	-          As from the French Revolution and throughout the 19th century, the word heritage was used mainly to describe immovable and was thus generally confused with the notion of historical monuments. -          Since the middle of the 1950s, the notion of heritage was considerably enhanced so as to progressively integrate the tangible evidence of man and his environment.  In this manner, folk heritage, scientific heritage and, later, industrial heritage were gradually integrated into the notion of heritage. -          The Quebec definition of heritage proves this general trend: Heritage includes all objects or groups, tangible or intangible, renowned and grasped collectively for their value as evidence and historical memory, which deserve to be protected, preserved and upgraded.
Institution	-          Institutions are a diversified set of solutions provided by mankind to problems stemming from natural needs. This word, when linked to the general term “museal” is frequently used as a synonym of the word museum, often times to avoid frequent repetitions. -          "Museal institutions are those non-profit establishments, museums, exhibition centres and interpretation places, which besides the functions of acquisition, conservation, research and management of collections undertaken by some, have in common the fact of being places to disseminate art, history and sciences”.
Management	-          Museum management is currently defined as the action to ensure the handling of the museums' administrative affairs or, more generally speaking, as the set of activities not directly linked to museum specificities (preservation, research and communication).
Museal	-          In some languages the word has two connotations, as an adjective or as a noun. (1) the adjective “museal” is used to qualify all museum/related aspects to differentiate them from other domains (e.g. "the museal world" to describe the universe of museums); (2) as a noun, “museal” describes the field of reference in which creation, development and operation of the museum as an institution take place, as well as the reflection on its foundations and risks.
Musealization	-          operation for extracting a thing, physically or conceptually, from its original, natural or cultural environment, and providing it with museal status, turning it into a muséalium, “museum object” or placing it into the museal field. -          A museum object is not only an object placed within a museum.  Through a change of context and a selection process, through accumulation and presentation, the object changes its status.  An object of worship, a utilitarian or delightful object, an animal or plant, even something insufficiently determined so as to be able to be conceptualized as an object is transformed, within a museum, into material or immaterial evidence of mankind and his environment, a source of study and exhibition, thus acquiring a specific cultural reality.
Museography	-          Currently museography is essentially defined as the practical representation of museology, namely, the set of techniques developed so as to carry out museal functions and, particularly, those related to the refurbishing of museums, conservation, restoration, security and exhibition.  The word was also used a lot together with the term museology to refer to museum-related intellectual or practical activities.
Museology	-          Museology is the “study of museums” and not their practice, which is encompassed in museography. -          Museology is a social science that emerged from documentary and mnemonic scientific disciplines and contributes to understanding mankind within society.
Museum	-          The term “museum” can be used to name an institution as well as an establishment or place generally thought of to select, study and present material and immaterial evidences of mankind and his environment. -          The format and functions of museums have varied considerably throughout the centuries.  Their contents have become diversified, just like their missions, mode of operation and management. -          A museum is a non-profit making, permanent institution in the service of the society and its development, and open to the public, which acquires, conserves, researches, communicates, and exhibits, for purposes of study, education and enjoyment, material evidence of man and his environment.
Object	-          A museum object is a musealized thing, a thing which can be defined as any species of reality in general.  The expression museum object could almost be considered a pleonasm since museums are not only places meant to protect objects but also places whose main mission is to transform things into objects.
Preservation	-          To preserve means to protect a thing or a set of things against different hazards, such as destruction, degradation, dissociation or theft; this protection is especially ensured by collection, safeguarding, security and restoration. -          In museology, preservation includes all functions related to the entry of an object into a museum, that is to say, all transactions for acquisition, recording in the inventory, safeguarding, conservation and, sometimes, restoration.  Generally speaking, preservation of heritage leads to a policy which starts with the acquisition of "tangible and intangible evidence of mankind and his environment” and continues with the management of those things that have been turned into museum objects, and is then followed by conservation.
Profession	-          All professions are defined within a delimited social framework.  In this regard, they are not a part of the theoretical field.  A museologist can firstly be characterized as an art historian or biologist by profession but, in turn, he/she can be considered –socially- a professional museologist. -          In order to exist, a profession needs to be defined as such but it also needs to be known to others, which is not always the case with museums.  There is not one museal profession but several, that is to say, many activities related to museums, either remunerated or not, which allow the identification of individuals (particularly by their civil status) and their classification into social categories. -          Museologists are researchers who study the specific relationship between mankind and reality, characterized as the documentation of the real things by means of a sensitive, direct understanding.  Their field of activities lies essentially on theory and critical reflection within the museal field but they do not necessarily work in a museum, it can be elsewhere such as at universities or research centers.  They are thus different from curators but also from museographers, who must see to the interior arrangement of museums, equipment inherent to security, conservation and restoration, in permanent or temporary exhibition rooms.  Given their technical competencies, museographers have an expert vision on different museum-related activities –preservation, research and communication- and can manage data related both to preventive conservation as well as to information communicated to the different publics.
Public - AUDIENCE	-          Public as an adjective -public museum- depicts the legal relationship between museums and the peoples of a territory in which it is located. In essence, a public museum belongs to the people; it is funded and managed through the people’s representatives, and by delegation of authority of the latter, by its administration board.
Research	-          Research consists of exploring previously defined domains to improve knowledge, and the potential actions to be carried out on them.  At museums, it is the set of intellectual activities and the work targeted to discovery, invention and development of new collection-related knowledge.
Society	-          Society is a more or less consistent group of human beings that establish relationships and exchanges.  The society targeted by a museum can be defined as a community of organized individuals (in a given space and time), with political, economic, legal and cultural institutions of which museums are a part and with which museums set up their activities. -          It is within this spirit that for a few decades two categories of museums developed: society museums and community museums, the purpose of which is to underline the specific bonds they believe they exercise on their public.  These museums, traditionally connected with ethnographic museums, appear as establishments that develop a strong bond with the public, bringing people into the core of their concerns.  Although the nature of their queries brings these different types of museums closer together, their management styles and relationship with the public makes them different. -          The name “society museum” includes “museums which share the same objective: to study the evolution of the social and history-related components of humanity and transmit points of reference so as to understand the diversity of cultures and societies.