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Mining the curriculum: comparing the form and content of the museum exhibit Mine games with other mining curricula

University of British Columbia

In 1993, facing a future of escalating land-use controversies and a less than sympathetic public attitude towards mining, major corporations in the British Columbia mining industry and the provincial government invested in a public education project: Vancouver's Science World's Mine Games exhibit. This thesis will examine two pedagogical highlights of the Mine Games exhibit promoted by Science World and its sponsors. They are the interactivity of the exhibit (as evidenced by the hands-on stations and the computer games) and the decision-making or 'consensus-building' process experienced in the simulated town-meeting, Hotseat! One of the virtues of an exhibition that explicitly makes a case for its merits and attempts to tell an important story is that it encourages debate and makes possible the suggestion of other stories. In this thesis, I critique Mine Games on the claims it has made for itself. The thesis adopts a comparative approach, contrasting the pedagogical goals and content of the Mine Games exhibit with school based mining curriculum. I argue that the narrative and museological conventions of the exhibit reveal the story of Mine Games for what it is — a specific, comedic story that excludes other stories. Hidden under the facade of high-tech displays and computer games is a traditional approach used both in schools and museums to exercise control and deliver a non-threatening message: environmental controversies are resolvable, all it takes is reasoned compromise.

Thesis/Dissertation

application/pdf

2009-02-16

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http://hdl.handle.net/2429/4618

Curriculum Studies

University of British Columbia

UBCV

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