Characteristics of Danish Museum Websites

Within the last decades the overall museum sector has undergone major changes. Some would say that museums have transformed from ivory towers to museums open to the community. To what extent is this transformation reflected in the museums’ websites?

The aim of the project is to provide an overview of what characterises Danish museum websites and how Danish museum websites have developed. Focus is on the state owned and state approved museums (statsanerkendte museer).

The following research questions will guide the study:

What characterizes the relations between Danish museums websites and external websites, and how have these relations developed over time?
How do museums communicate with the public on their websites, and how has this communication developed over time?
To what extent does content on museum websites reflect the five main obligations (collection, registration, preservation, research and education) described in the Danish Museum Act?
The methods applied in this study comprise two generic methods. For the first research question we will use link analysis to describe how museums are linked to each other and to websites outside of the museum domain. We will use the link analysis to identify the characteristics of the links in the domain. Furthermore we are interested in identifying, to which extent the museum domain has become more open over time in digital terms.

For the second and third research question, we will do text analysis, possibly in the form of named entities, to become able to study how the choice of language and terminology have developed over time. Also, text analysis will be used along with qualitative assessment to understand to what extent the museums meets the requirements of the museum act and how this have possibly in the period. For both analyses, we will focus on specific years.