MHIC - Museu d'Història de la Immigració de Catalunya
Synopsis
The Museum of the History of Immigration in Catalonia (MhiC) is a small local museum with a clear educational vocation for citizens, where the creation of the Heritage Fund is open and participatory. The MhiC is a space of reference in the study and representation of migration through a permanent exhibition divided into 3 areas and the organisation and hosting of different temporary exhibitions on the subject of migration.
The content of the MhiC is articulated around the three areas of its permanent exhibitions: Humans in Movement, Sevillano Barcelona Term and Espai Migrar. Humans in movement presents the migratory processes of human beings through a conceptual and terminological perspective. In Sevillano, the protagonists of internal migrations in Catalonia speak in the first person, accompanying the public on a one-way journey, seated in an original train carriage from 1959. Espai Migrar examines the migrations of the 21st century. Temporary exhibitions created in collaboration with artists, schools and NGOs complement the cultural offer of the MhiC.
Target Audience
- Young people between 13 and 17 years old
- General public interested in migration data
Goals
- Citizens engagement on migration facts and understanding
- Creation of heritage fund on migration
- Educational vocation
- Open culture and participation
- Cooperation with schools, the educational community, the university, migration collectives, associations, NGOs
Skills developed
- Creative thinking and self expression
- Critical thinking
- Education for coexistence and personal development
- Social and emotional engagement
- Respect for the other culture and gender perspective
- Conceptual understanding
Why is it a good practice in the creative area?
MhiC combines study and representation of the migratory fact with leisure and educational activities with local schools and institutes on immigration issues. MhiC has the capacity to transform a complex and articulate concept as the migratory facts in an easy to access educational and cultural experience. MhiC is an institution of reference for its content, a museum, that through a modest perspective and opts to boldly raise questions about a universal reality such as human movements and migrations.
Methodologically, this museum cannot be understood without the participation of schools, the educational community, the university, migration collectives, associations, NGOs and the general public that consolidates the museum’s discourse day by day with its contributions, material donations for the collection, (Catalogue: The memory of the silenced objects) and the frequency of museum in accordance to their needs and emotional ties with it.
Training Team
- Cultural workers (at least two)
- Educators and creators from different cultural and social area depending on the exhibition purpose
Duration proposed
Replicating the experience of some of the educational activities of the museum depends on the topic selected by trainers/youth workers active in the creative and cultural areas but at least two/three months of preparation and execution are requested. See as example some of the temporary exhibitions as “Viñetas migrantes. Comic, immigration and memory” :
https://www.mhic.cat/vinyetes-migrants-comics-migracio-i-memoria/
Training/educational activities carried out with young people by MHIC
The MHIC offers various types of educational activities:
1) Standard activities based on guided tours of the museum, cultural routes associated with migratory processes and guided tours associated with temporary exhibitions.
Espai Educatiu | MhiC
2) Educational projects designed jointly by the educational center and the museum. These are tailor-made projects lasting 8 months in which students document, research, design and are curators and producers of an exhibition project.
Ex: https://agora.xtec.cat/insbarresiones/general/converses-en-conversa/
https://agora.xtec.cat/insbarresiones/general/projecte-artistic-de-3r-deso/
https://agora.xtec.cat/insbarresiones/portada/inauguracio-de-lexposicio-de-solo-andata-al-mhic/
3) Actions and activities carried out by various youth collectives with the aim of generating content for the museum.
Ex: Secondary school students design a blog for the museum:
Històries al cub (barresiones.cat)
Teacher training students. Didàctica Ciències Socials UAB. They design an action in the museum. Performance EL SEVILLANO – Projecte Educatiu | (mhic.cat)
Performed with a group of unaccompanied migrant minors.
Project PODCAST. Cartografies de memòries | MhiC
Cartografies de memòries (Cartographies of memories) | (mhic.cat) Made with a group of unaccompanied migrant minors.
Promoting Organization
MhiC is a project launched within the area of Culture of the Sant Adrià de Besòs Town Hall and is part of the Network of Museums of Ethnology of Catalonia and the Network of Local Museums of the Diputación de Barcelona and is member of ICOM https://icom.museum/en/
Starting Year
2004
Prizes/recognition received
- I Premio Francesc Candel. Fundació Carulla ( 2005)
- Premis Innova. Expodidàctica 2008. I premi Catalunya. Projecte educatiu “Fem un Museu”
