Ask the Curators Anything: Taiwan's First Civic Engagement Movement for Enhancing Urban Cultural Soft Power

Ask the Curators Anything" uses a combination of oral history, text, and illustrations to document a city-wide cultural movement centered on civic participation. The book argues that culture and art are a city's spiritual assets, and that training curators is not just about developing professional talent, but a way to transform a city's cultural confidence and sense of public engagement.

In an accessible and readable format, the book introduces the role of curators, the logic of working on-site in cultural settings, and the formation process of urban cultural soft power. It transforms seemingly specialized museum and exhibition work into a public learning movement where citizens can ask questions, understand, and participate, demonstrating how cultural governance moves from institutions into the hearts of the people.

Key Highlights

• Explains the relationship between curator training and urban cultural confidence.

• Introduces the public nature of culture, art, and museum work from the perspective of civic participation.

• Lowers professional barriers through oral history and graphic formats.

• Shows how urban cultural soft power can be collectively driven by the public.

Target Audience

Cultural administrators, museum educators, urban culture promoters, community college and civic engagement curriculum planners, and anyone interested in understanding the work of curators.

This book possesses the characteristics of a local gazetteer, cultural heritage record, and museum planning text. It not only reviews the history and architectural language of Xianguang Second Village but also looks at international migration museum cases to propose an ecomuseum strategy where "all of Taoyuan is a migration museum." Readers can understand how the preservation of military dependents' villages transcends nostalgia to become a public cultural project facing diverse ethnic groups and the next generation.

Key Highlights

• Records the history, architecture, villager stories, and cultural heritage value of Xianguang Second Village.

• Connects Taoyuan's diverse immigrant society with the vision of a migration museum.

• Includes community engagement, artist residencies, and local participation actions.

• Proposes ecomuseum strategies with reference to international migration museum cases.

Target Audience

Cultural heritage professionals, military dependents' village preservation teams, museum planners, local government cultural administrators, and researchers in migration and urban culture.