The ‘Observatoire des Politiques Culturelles’ conducted a study in April 2011 on distribution and support for the creation of performing arts within the cultural centres of the Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles. The first part of this study showed that 82 % of the cultural centres of the Fédération Wallonie-Bruxelles felt that the impact of ‘Art et Vie’ was ‘important’ (41 %) or ‘very important’ (41 %) to their programming choices.
5.4. Cultural and social barriers – Barriers of codes and communication Probably the most important barrier to access and participation in culture – which is also the hardest to tackle – is the social and cultural one; in short, the feeling among some audiences that the cultural offer is not ‘for the likes of us’. This may be linked to interests, priorities and life choices, but also to a fear or dislike of the institutional atmosphere, and by the perception of cultural institutions as exclusivist. Often, in fact, the fruition of cultural content is accompanied by codes of behaviour that may be intimidating for inexperienced users, and whose main raison d’être is often purely symbolic – a sign of initiation and belonging: how to dress, when to clap, etc. The barriers may also be linguistic – both for people speaking different languages and for native speakers who may have difficulties with the academic language used in some institutional settings. While the issue of social and cultural barriers is closely linked to the following section on audience development, here we may recall some measures that may be taken to make the codes more explicit, language more understandable and communication more direct, and to create a different, more welcoming atmosphere.
EXAMPLE
Italy – Revision of communication strategies in museums The Ministry of Culture, when creating a department for the ‘valorization’, or promotion, of cultural heritage in 2009, identified as a key challenge the question of how to initiate a new, closer relationship with diverse audiences. They developed a set of strategies to improve the accessibility, comfort, quality of experience and cultural supply in state heritage institutions through better orientation systems, information services (from panels and captions to audioguides), and ad hoc services for special audiences, etc. Communication in museums is being evaluated. Guidelines to improve the quality of museums’ communication tools are being developed and tested (guidelines for accessible communication and information systems in heritage institutions, and guidelines for projects aimed at promoting cultural access in national museums and heritage sites). This is accompanied by research on visitors’ needs and on non visitors. A survey in 2011 demostrated that the attendance of museums by young people decreased by half in 10 years, so significant efforts focus on how to remove cultural barriers for the digital generation through the project ‘Our culture week’, developed with the ThinkTagSmart platform, aimed at building cultural content in collaborative manner.
Open method of coordination (OMC) Working group of EU Member States’ experts on better access to and wider participation in culture
OMC
53