From something to research question

This week I have been trying to pin down my research question. As most master students, I believe, my interest for my chosen subject did not arise from a pointed and specific question or hypothesis, but rather from a vague feeling that there is something here. Something that might be revealed if you dig deeper into it. Something that intrigues you, but you are not sure why.

My originally plan was not to write about museums, but about public libraries. However, I never got this feeling described above, that there was something there, when I thought about libraries. The reason I wanted to write about libraries was that I love them, and think they are essential for good societies, so I thought I could write something about libraries role in the society. I changed my mind last spring when I had an internship at the Karen Blixen Museum, where I, together with another student, were allowed to put up a small exhibition. At the same time I followed a course about intermediality at the University of Copenhagen. This combination gave me the feeling, there is something here. First of all, I loved working with the exhibition, the planning, the generating of ideas, the reading, the writing, the practical building, the marketing, everything. I decided that this was something I would like to have as a proper job.

During my time at the university I have read some museology, but the theory never affected me much. All the focus on objects did not engage me, and it did not help me understand the special feeling of being inside a museum. The intermediality course gave me the key to understand why I am so fascinated by museums, and what is the right way for me to theoretically approach exhibitions. I have as long I can remember been enchanted by multimedial art and culture, like film, theatre, musicals, dance and exhibitions. The intermediality course gave me some tools to talk about, think about and understand this phenomena, which woke the idea that this was master's thesis content. A master's thesis about the intermediality of museums exhibitions would give me the opportunity to combine my background in media and communication studies with my interest in culture, and hopefully competence that can provide more chances of making exhibitions in the future.

What I have came down to this week is that I want to find out how Lars Elleström's media model, a model that tries to explain the relations between different media, can be useful for the way we understand the role of media in exhibitions and the intermediality in exhibitions.