The National Football Museum and Sporting Heritage

This paper will discuss the National Football Museum as a case study for sport heritage, now located at the Urbis building in Manchester city centre; originally found in Preston, but moved to Manchester city centre in 2012. The topics related too in this paper, are the types of heritage and identity represented by the museum, since the National Football Museum was founded to preserve, conserve and interpret numerous significant collections of football memorabilia and collectables from the sport of football. It is also connected to the identities of many individuals, groups and nations displaying its prominence on a global scale. Therefore is seems apparent that the topic concerned is by nature widespread. Furthermore, this paper will consider whether the content of the museum is appealing and accessible to all, since the National Football Museum makes an essential contribution to research, concerning our understanding of football and its role in society. But in order be more concise in my method this paper will reference certain collections in the museum, such as the ‘Hall of Fame’, and particularly its relationship with the identities this collection represents and how it is displayed to others. This topic is relevant to recent trends within the field of museum studies and therefore also of modern interest. It touches up on numerous essential museum issues, for instance questions related to sport not always being perceived as real heritage and furthermore its recent inclusion in academic discussion, due to until fairly recently sport was not being considered as a topic to be part of academic discourse. This essay is also relevant to one of the main considerations in the museum world today regarding the public element; where “the ...

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