This document discusses issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion for museum workers. It describes how museum workers are organizing collectively through groups like Museum Workers Speak and Museum Hue to advocate for social justice and fair labor practices in the museum sector. The document outlines challenges museums face in giving agency to internal audiences and diverse workers. It also describes how social media and blogging are being used to start difficult conversations and advance thought leadership among emerging museum professionals.

1. Working w People in Museums
Recruit. Retain. Reflect
Monica O. Montgomery,
Strategic Director
Museum Hue @museumhue
Membership & Social Media Lead Organizer
Museum Workers Speak @museumworkers
Including thought leadership from:
Ravon Ruffin, M.A. Candidate, American Studies, The
George Washington University/Brown Girls Museum Blog
"We continue to struggle with issues of inclusion, diversity, and equity in the
nonprofit arts and culture sector because our society continues to struggle with
them.“ – Carlton Turner Alternate ROOTS

2. Breaking Boundaries
What does collective power in
museum practice mean?
Learning to build grassroots
alliances and initiatives
centering diverse workers
and groups in critical
reflection, discussion &
actions.
How are internal audiences being given
agency, autonomy to pursue skills and
career attainment within institutions?
What are non-traditional ways diverse
culture workers are inserting themselves into
museum practice and shifting
conversations?
How museums creating spaces for museum workers
to have a voice beyond the approved channels? Is co
authorship of institutional narratives possible?

3. Who Speaks for Whom
The Museum sector is slowly starting to share authority, inviting
audiences to co-curate public programs, and collaborate in real
time.
But internally there is room for improvement
1)Increase the exchange of ideas
2)Take corrective action on inequities
3)Gain dynamic insight into workers desire to explore the
personal, political and professional on their own terms.
4)Promote diverse perspectives & experiences and people!

4. Radical Blogging
Students are refining their pedagogy
and deepening their practice through
blogging, affording them opportunities to
pilot ideas, critique policies, advocate for
the arts and advance as thought
leaders.

5. Intersections

6. Dialogue to Action
Emerging Museum professionals and
graduate students have birthed a
movement during a recent national AAM
conference, chartering continuing ‘rogue’
discussions around parity, equity and
labor to advance social and economic
justice in the sector.
The Movement evolved into
Museum Workers Speak

7. Museum Workers Speak
#MuseumWorkersSpea
k is a collective of activist
museum workers
interrogating the
relationship between
museums’ stated
commitments to social
value and their internal
labor practices.
It is an action-oriented
platform for social change
at the intersection of
labor, access, and
inclusion.

8. Origin Story

9. Breaking Barriers:
Acknowledge the Relationship between Social Justice + Museum
Labor
Museum Workers Speak Rogue Session
2015 AAM Annual Meeting
April 28, 2015, Atlanta, Georgia

12. Museum Hue

13. Museum Hue Mission & Vision
Mission
MuseumHue advances the visibility &
diversity of people of color in arts,
culture, creative careers & museums.
Vision
Museum Hue, an organization that
works to increase diversity in
patrons, professionals, and cultural
producers in the creative economy,
recognizes the absence of diversity
and inclusion in cultural enclaves.
We use our presence and voice to
counter this reality, foster agency,
and write new narratives for people
of color in culture.

15. We hold space for People of Color, inviting them into
museums as patrons, professionals, stakeholders & boards

16. Museum Hue Testimonials

17. Create Space for Challenging Conversations

18. The Revolution will be Tweeted
• Social media is democratizing the flow of ideas,
while challenging conservatism & conventions.
• Tweetchats have emerged as a touchstone for
equitable mass communication, providing a rapid
feedback loop and wider audience segment that
enjoys challenging hierarchical ways of knowing.

19. Engage Open Forums

20. Gaging the Divide

21. Remapping Community
What’s to gain In the movement
to re-imagine the museums,
intersectionality is often
overlooked, however, community
engagement, labor & careers,
social media, diversity, inclusion,
access and academia have
become topics of importance
and factors of influence in our
changing field.
Create more equitable exchanges to
avoid the echo chamber of ideas
Enrich community among audiences
and museum professionals

22. Partnering at AAM - Collaboration is Key
Brown Girls Museum Blog * Museum Workers Speak * Incluseum Visitors of
Color #MuseumsRespondToFerguson * Empathetic Museum * Museum Hue

23. Gameplan:
What are the three small things you’ll do in service of turning the
social justice lens inward within your organizations to empower
people working in museums?
#MuseumWorkersSpeak #MuseumHue
Stand In Solidarity with Us