Shedding light on many topics of current interest, especially the commodification and globalization of museums, this study makes a lively contribution to museum studies and cultural studies.

Table of Contents

List of Figures
Acknowledgements

Introduction The Impossible Museum
Chapter One Exchanging Values in the Nineteenth-Century Museum Marketplace
Chapter Two Learning to See: Vision, Visuality and Material Culture, 1862-1929
Chapter Three Offering Orientalism: Women and the Gift Economy of the Museum, 1880-1940
Chapter Four Libraries and Museums: Shifting Relationships, 1830-1940
Chapter Five Gendered Professionals: Debating the Ideal Museum Worker during the 1930s and 1940s
Conclusions

Bibliography
Index

Lianne McTavish is a professor in the Department of Art and Design at the University of Alberta.