A Participatory Museum for Intercultural Development: Innovative Fruition of South-Asian Art Collections in Italy

Museums are becoming aware of their role as facilitators of social inclusion processes. Recently the paradigm of the participatory museum has been spreading; it envisages the involvement of source communities as co-protagonists in the production of value: they thus become agents of intercultural dialogue. New technologies offer tools both for user profiling, to improve visitor experiences and educational activities, and for practices of re-appropriation of the narrative. Nevertheless, it is necessary to investigate to what extent innovative ways of heritage fruition and education centered on practices of co-design within the museum context, characterised by strong use of new technologies, can implement social inclusion and well-being of marginalised communities and the development of digital skills (and, therefore, critical thinking) fruitful to developing active citizenship according to the lifelong learning paradigm. The purpose of this paper is to illustrate the theoretical framework and the methodological premises for the development of a new paradigm of fruition of the South-Asian art collections in Italy, centered on the use of new technologies and through the involvement of the local source communities.