Elaine Heumann Gurian

Elaine Heumann Gurian has long taken the position that museums give off signals of uninterrogated exclusion in areas other than content and that a kind of smug lack of self-reflection mitigate against real welcome. Now she is focused on the importance of national healing by looking at museum habits that seek to simplify, flatten and exclude not only the interests of marginalized cultural peoples but also those who were formerly felt central to the American dialogue. The polarization of our nation requires that we reinstate the value of messy political centrality, the overarching humanity of us all, and methodology that privileges ambiguity, lack of resolution and the embrace of nuance.