Circuits of practice: Narrating modern computing in museum environments

近年来，计算机和数字媒体已经成为英国和全球博物馆收藏中日益突出的元素。仅在英国，国家科学和媒体博物馆（2012年）和科学博物馆（2014年）等已建立的遗产机构就开设了关于信息通信技术历史的新的永久性展览，而新的计算博物馆已在布莱切利公园（2007年）和剑桥（2014年）等地建立。与此同时，数字遗产已经成为以博物馆为基础的研究人员和实践者感兴趣的一个关键主题，计算和数字媒体是媒体历史学家的一个关键对象：在过去的十年里，这些新通信技术的一些基础历史已经出版，数字历史现在是一个充满活力、快速增长的学术领域。这些发展表明，我们正处于学术和公众对这些新技术的叙述形成的关键阶段，这些叙述最终也将决定什么是具有历史意义的，因此什么应该被保存和展示在博物馆环境中。这为对新技术叙事的构建、传播和影响的实践进行反思性调查提供了一个完美的时机，也为产生新的、协作的知识形式提供了一个完美的时机，这些知识形式将能够为博物馆实践和将计算作为历史遗产的一部分的学术辩论提供信息。为了产生这种新知识，该项目将研究博物馆在构建计算机历史叙事中的作用，通过这种叙事，我们社会的过去、现在和未来被想象和文化建构。该项目不采用标准的学术方法，将博物馆作为研究对象，而是将它们视为知识生成的平等伙伴。采用电子电路的比喻，不同组件之间的电气连接使复杂的操作得以执行，该项目将汇集来自英国领先博物馆的策展人（布莱切利公园，计算历史中心，国家计算博物馆，国家科学和媒体博物馆，科学博物馆，维多利亚和阿尔伯特博物馆），领先的国际机构(美国计算机历史博物馆，日本国家新兴科学与创新博物馆“Miraikan”，意大利米兰国家科学与技术博物馆“Leonardo Da Vinci”)，公司合作伙伴（BT集团），以及包括PI Simone Natale， co-I Ross Parry和RA Petrina Foti在内的大学研究人员组成的跨学科团队。利用基于实践社区概念的新兴协作方法，并使用设计思维和行动研究方法的协议，该项目将开展一系列以实践为主导的研究干预措施，以帮助解决三个关键研究问题：RQ1 (TIME)：博物馆如何通过时间叙述计算机的发展？RQ2 (OBJECTS)：博物馆如何利用硬件和软件来讲述现代计算机的历史？RQ3（数据）：博物馆如何叙述信息和数据在计算机历史中的作用？因此，该项目将对文化部门产生变革性影响，提高遗产机构有效收集、保存和展示有关新技术发展和社会影响的相关信息的能力。我们会与研究伙伴合作举办宣传活动，加强公众参与，包括与研究伙伴合作撰写面向公众的研究报告，概述主要项目成果，并就展示和展示计算机遗产的最佳做法提出实用建议。

In recent years, computing and digital media have become an increasingly prominent element of museum collections in the UK and globally. In the UK alone, established heritage institutions such as the National Science and Media Museum (2012) and the Science Museum (2014) have opened new permanent exhibitions about the history of ICT, while new museums of computing have been established in locations such as Bletchley Park (2007) and Cambridge (2014). At the same time, digital heritage has become a key subject of interest to museum-based researchers and practitioners, and computing and digital media a key object for media historians: over the past decade, several foundational histories of these new communication technologies were published, and digital history is now a vibrant, fast-growing scholarly field in its own right. These developments suggest that we are living through a key stage in the formation of both scholarly and public narratives about these new technologies - narratives that will, ultimately, also inform key decisions over what counts as historically significant, and thus what should be preserved and exhibited in museum environments. This offers a perfect moment for a reflective investigation of practices that govern the construction, dissemination and impact of narratives about new technologies, and for the generation of new, collaborative forms of knowledge that will be capable of informing both museum practice and scholarly debates addressing computing as part of historical heritage. To produce this new knowledge, this project will examine the role of museums in constructing narratives about histories of computing through which the past, the present and the future of our societies are imagined and culturally constructed. Rather than adopting a standard scholarly approach that takes museums as objects of study, the project will treat them as equal partners in knowledge generation. Taking up the metaphor of the electronic circuit, where electrical connections between diverse components enable complex operations to be performed, the project will bring together curators from leading museums in the UK (Bletchley Park, the Centre for Computing History, The National Museum of Computing, the National Science and Media Museum, the Science Museum, the Victoria & Albert Museum), leading international institutions (the Computer History Museum in the USA, the National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation "Miraikan" in Japan, the National Museum of Science and Technology "Leonardo Da Vinci" in Milan, Italy), a company partner (BT Group), and an interdisciplinary team of university-based researchers including PI Simone Natale, co-I Ross Parry and RA Petrina Foti. Leveraging emergent collaborative approaches based on the notion of community of practice, and using the protocols of design thinking and action research methods, the project will carry out a series of practice-led research interventions that will help address three key research questions: RQ1 (TIME): How can museums narrate the development of computers through time? RQ2 (OBJECTS): How can hardware and software artefacts be mobilized by museums to narrate histories of modern computing? RQ3 (DATA): How can museums narrate the role of information and data in computing histories?Trough that, the project will enable transformative impact in the cultural sector, enhancing the capacity of heritage institutions to effectively collect, preserve and present relevant information about the development and societal impact of new technologies. Public engagement will be enhanced by dissemination activities conducted in collaboration with research partners, including a public-facing Research Report co-authored with research partners, which will provide a summary of key project findings and practical recommendations for best practices in the presentation and exhibition of computing heritage.