Telling a Story: A Case for Case Studies
In African American literature, my field of study, citation is pivotal practice—one of call and response. Throughout college and graduate school, my African American literature professors would turn toward us, their students, and pause. After a breath, they would all say something to this effect: “Citation is important. Why? Because you are calling on the ancestors, Black thinkers and leaders, before you. Their voices are often left out of the historical record. In your research, you must not forget the voices you have learned from.” Today, as I approach museum work, I take this lesson with me.
In particular, I am interested in how I can support clients in telling stories about the people, especially the communities of color, that have significantly shaped a museum and its surrounding community. I want to recognize people who have often been left out of an organization’s history. There are so many people who have contributed to a museum’s programming, vision, and more. But how do you communicate this legacy to funders and audiences? What strategies do you use to humanize grant proposals and remind people that there are real voices, real people behind museum programs, exhibitions, and more? How do you tell the stories of people who made such change?
One option might be case studies. In my work at Kera Collective, I often turn to “narrative case studies,” “qualitative stud[ies] in which the researcher collects data from an individual or individuals about a specific life event or events that occurred in order to share and retell the story.” Thus, by this definition, narrative case studies retell a museum’s specific story—they closely examine and summarize the complex, intersecting factors that define a museum’s particular event, program, exhibition, or initiative. Moreover, I have found case studies to be helpful for highlighting communities who make a museum or organization what it is. Case studies can help communicate a story of organizational heritage to general audiences, funders, and grant reviewers.
For example, I approach narrative case studies by first beginning with exploratory interviews (i.e., informal interviews). Before pen can be put to paper, I need to know the story behind a museum program. In particular, informal interviews with staff, people who are ingrained in the work, reveal core parts of the program. In these informal staff interviews, I employ questions that draw on Storytelling Evaluation Methodology.
Storytelling Evaluation Methodology, as described by Oxford’s Old Fire Station, is a methodology where researchers collect, analyze, and present stories to evaluate a program’s impact. By telling stories, interviewees (rather than researchers) identify and discuss program outcomes. Through their stories, interviewees reflect on the following questions: After developing or participating in a program, what changed for you? How did this change happen? What do you find most significant about the program? Why is this important? I use questions like these to structure my case study interviews. To further guide interviews, I also ask what makes a museum program unique or different—identifying why a program is unique is essential.
In addition to interviews, I conduct historical research (citation, if you will); I research the history of a museum’s program. I review archival documents of past museum programs, and I identify communities and museum workers who have contributed to a program’s development or story. For me, historical research not only lays the groundwork for a narrative case study; it also connects the past to the present. Such research can also highlight stories of people, especially staff or community members of color, who put in the time and work to make programs flourish.
By combining historical research and interviews, I am able to create a narrative case study that summarizes both the legacy and future of a museum program. Citations and quotes are vital—they help readers understand how a program was shaped over time, by the hands of many contributors.
In the end, the resulting narrative case study reflects a key question that guides my work: how can we, as museum researchers, incorporate the practices of citation and storytelling (especially stories about change and impact) into our work?
