The Girlhood (It’s Complicated) opened at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History (NMAH) in 2020. It is a temporary exhibit that is currently traveling to other museums around the US. The exhibit is revolutionary in the museum world as it focuses on girlhood and young girls who significantly impacted American history. This topic has not been widely discussed in museum exhibits around the world. I visited the exhibit a few times while it was at NMAH. Though I enjoyed my experience walking through the exhibition, I didn’t feel this exhibit was curated for young girls. Why create an exhibit that highlights young girls in a way that is not engaging to young girls? This article will explore how Girlhood (It’s Complicated) is not an exhibit meant for young girls, how engaging displays can affect young girls, and how staff could have made the exhibit more engaging to young girls.
The Girlhood (It’s Complicated) exhibit has five different sections: Education (Being Schooled), Wellness (Body Talk), Work (Hey, Where’s my Girlhood?), and Fashion (Girl’s Remix). The exhibit features 200 objects from the Smithsonian collection, which include Helen Keller’s watch from 1865 and Minnijean Brown’s graduation dress from 1959. The exhibit also features seven biographic stories and custom murals by artist Krystal Quiles. Overall, I found the exhibit great for visitors above 13 years old. I had no issues with how the topics were explained in the exhibit, and I felt the objects fit well with the exhibit’s mission. It was also easy to understand the exhibit’s significance. However, children under 13 cannot comprehend the long labels for the objects, the section text, and the biographic stories. The exhibit was more suitable for adult women to reflect on girlhood. In the exhibit, I saw that young girls were most interested in the interactive, which asked visitors to write their thoughts on the importance of girls and stick them to the wall. As a society, we have told girls that their voices matter. We don’t highlight them as significant in museums, the media, or everyday life. This interactive allowed young girls who can’t read to draw pictures of girl superheroes. This fulfilled the interactive prompt in a way that is best suited to their stage of life. Unfortunately, this is the only place where I felt that young girls could engage with the exhibit. This was disappointing to see, especially since, according to a video created by the Smithsonian on the exhibit, this exhibition was curated for young girls to engage and learn about girlhood and the impact that young girls have had on American history.
Children learn first through the act of play. It is vital to their development until they can read and write. Growing up, I loved visiting museums and historic houses. I did not enjoy trips where I had to listen to a tour guide explain the significance of the objects behind the glass cases. I wanted to engage with the objects by playing with them. I learned early on why objects are kept in glass display cases. I have never understood why history museums don’t have more displays meant to engage young children. One of my favorite museum trips was when my 4th-grade class visited a historical museum in a local schoolhouse from the 1800s.
The museum is a functional schoolhouse with reproductions of the original seats, tables, and other objects that would have been found in the schoolhouse during the 1800s when it was in use. There were also a few of the original objects in glass cases around the perimeter of the main room. This provided space for staff to create activities that allowed visitors to assimilate what life was like for children of the 1800s who had attended the schoolhouse. It has been more than 20 years since this trip, and I can still remember every detail from the various exhibits in the schoolhouse. The reason is that children learn by doing, not by looking at objects behind a glass display case.
I understand that NMAH differs greatly from the schoolhouse museum, which I shared as my example of a museum created for children. It is a great example to highlight the significance of exhibits created for young children. Fashion is a major part of Girlhood (It’s Complicated), as clothing is a powerful aspect of one’s identity, especially for girls. Many objects displayed in the exhibit were girls’ clothing items that changed history. I think there should have been an interactive that allowed girls to play with the reproduction of the fashion items featured in the exhibit. Through this blog series, I will uncover museum exhibits curated to engage young girls and the issue with children’s rooms that many museums create for visitors under 14 years old.
Lindsay Guarnieri
Junior Girl
Girl Museum Inc.