Museums have grown exponentially in China in the span of approximately 110 years. How does one design an exhibit for a better-informed public? What kind of interpretive space is needed to engage the public? How do museums function as sites of public history? This article traces the genealogy of museum development in China, and argues that the birth of the modern museum in China is a product of the radicalism of the late nineteenth and the early twentieth centuries. Embedded in the subsequent one hundred years of development are a changing definition of “public,” a remodeled idea of “history,” and an evolving relationship between museums and their public. Within this context, the “Museums and the Public: Urban Landscape and Memory” project explores how the public interprets history and landscapes through exhibits, and if or how the exhibits reflect their memories. The analysis raises three possibilities for museums in China.

From July 18 to July 30, 2014, sixteen participants from faculties around China gathered in Shanghai for the First Public History Faculty Training Program funded by the Center for Public History at Shanghai Normal University. The key objective was to introduce participants to public history, conceptually, practically, and pedagogically. For the second part of the program, a group from Princeton University joined the Chinese scholars for a cross-cultural exploration of how public history is interpreted differently in two cultures.

This article explores urban preservation in the Chinese context. Using three historic districts across China, the author analyzes the gap between insiders' and outsiders' understanding of authenticity and of collective memory and its spatial representations. The article argues that what is needed is a culturally sensitive narrative approach which incorporates the public history perspective into urban preservation.