EMPATHY: The action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of either the past or present without having the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner.

–Merriam-Webster Dictionary

The Case for Empathy

Visitor-centered. Civic-minded. Diverse.
​Inclusive. Welcoming. Responsive. Participatory. ​​

The qualities of 21st century museums are impossible without an inner core of institutional empathy: the intention of the museum to be, and be perceived as, deeply connected with its community. 

But how?

Assuming an empathetic institutional stance has little to do with sentimentality or inappropriate emotionalism. Instead, just as empathetic individuals must have a clear sense of their own identities in order to perceive and respond effectively to the experience of others, the empathetic museum must have a clear vision of its role as a public institution within its community. From this vision flow process and policy decisions about every aspect of the museum- audience, staffing, collections, exhibitions and programming, social media, emergency responses – all the ways in which a museum engages with its community(ies).

Institutional empathy must live at the core of our museum practice –exhibition and new media design; inclusive and diverse exhibition design and programming in terms of race, ethnicity, accessibility, and sexual orientation; immediate and effective responses to crises in the local community.

Who We Are

We are educators, exhibit designers, interpretive planners, and administrators—advocates and allies—committed to institutional change and open dialog about the challenges facing museums. ​

The Empathetic Museum represents the collective work of museum professionals dedicated to a more inclusive future for the museum industry. We value and advocate for diversity of thought and authentic integration of empathy in museum practice.

Our collaboration grew out of a series of informal conversations and an AAM Unconference Session in 2014. How could we, as an industry, approach the need for greater equality and representation using empathy as our lens?

Are you ready to embrace empathetic practice?
We’d love to hear from you. 

Janeen Bryant

Active Member

Non-profit & community leader, advocate and organizer ​
Janeen Bryant is an advocate and catalyst for building organizational capacity and an inter-sectional educator, facilitator, and community engagement consultant. One of the founding members of the Empathetic Museum, Janeen is the Founder and Principal Consultant for Facilitate Movement, LLC. She and her team specialize in crafting proactive strategies that guide institutions to address shifting demographics with responsive leadership to strengthen long-term vision, cultural competency, and empathy. Janeen also served as a liaison and Community Catalyst Coach for twelve communities in the Southeast through her work with My Brother’s Keeper Alliance, an initiative of the Obama Foundation. She serves on the boards of MeckEd and the Brenda H. Tapia Family Foundation. Janeen Bryant serves as the Executive Director of Community Building Initiative (CBI) in Charlotte, North Carolina. 

Ryan Hill

Active Member

Educator
Ryan Hill is an educator, community partner, and administrative leader. His experience working in five very different museums over the last twenty years has strengthened his commitment to institutional change and growth. His past education programs have been studied as a national model for serving local communities. During his almost ten years at the Hirshhorn Museum, his innovative digital center for local teens was awarded the Smithsonian Innovation in Education award. Ryan has led professional workshops at a variety of institutions, including the Baltimore Museum of Art, the Walker Art Center, Museum of Modern Art, Guggenheim Las Vegas and Bilboa, many Smithsonian museums and KOFAC in Seoul, Korea.  He has presented on and contributed writing to journals and books on museum education, professional practices, and queer performance art. Ryan is invested in helping institutions to embrace a range of perspectives, accessible thought, and civic action. 

Stacey Mann

Active Member

​​Learning Strategist for exhibitions, programs, & partnerships
Stacey Mann is an experience designer and learning scientist specializing ​in interpretive planning, content development, and digital strategy for museums and informal learning environments. She collaborates with educators, curators, designers, technologists, and diverse community stakeholders to design cohesive interpretive strategies that maximize learning potential and amplify the impact of museums and cultural institutions both onsite and online. Her award-winning  work in exhibition, program, resource, digital, and pedagogical design targets history, science, civics, arts and culture, media literacy, social justice, and human rights. She is also a Senior Lecturer in Digital Interpretation at the University of the Arts.  As the founding director of strategic initiatives for UNSILENCE, Stacey directs content development,learning experience design, and strategic planning for this human rights education non-profit based in Chicago, IL. Through her active involvement with industry-wide initiatives including The Empathetic Museum and Museums & Race, she advocates for diversity, equity, accessibility, and inclusion in museum practice. 

Jackie Peterson

Active Member

​Exhibit Content Developer, Writer, and Interpretive Planner
Jackie Peterson (any respectful pronouns) is a life-long learner led by a curiosity about the unknown parts of the human experience, including her own. She came to museums through a desire to work in a field that aspires to fill in those gaps in our collective understanding through public-facing informal learning and creative expression. Currently, Jackie is an independent museum consultant specializing in exhibit development, curation, and writing for history museums, historic sites, and other cultural institutions. With over fifteen years of exhibits experience, she has worked nationally with museums, communities, and stakeholders to uncover and illuminate meaningful stories and create authentic, truthful, and enlightening exhibitions. Jackie leverages the power of language and narrative to create interpretive experiences that attest to the nuances of our human experience, spark conversation, and bring people together. Much of Jackie’s independent work has focused on storytelling through exhibitions highlighting the experiences and lives of African Americans in the Pacific Northwest, and around the country. Jackie is passionate about equity in the museum field and grounds her work in the framework of diversity, access, equity, and inclusion (DEAI). In addition to the Empathetic Museum, she serves on the steering committee for Museums & Race, an initiative that seeks equity and justice for people of color in the museum field.

Nayeli Zepeda

Active Member

Educator & Researcher
Originally from Mexico City, Nayeli is a museum educator and researcher in critical museology. Her practice involves supporting the education departments of institutions through a pragmatic dissent approach, while also exploring possibilities for institutional change in her independent work. She has collaborated with public and private institutions in Mexico, Spain, and the United States, including the Mexican Secretariat of Culture, the FEMSA Cultural Program, the Contemporary Art Museum of Monterrey, the Complutense University of Madrid, Art21, and the Bellevue Arts Museum. Nayeli also serves as a guest lecturer in professional development programs at universities and regional networks.

Gretchen Jennings

​Founding Member Emerita

Museum Consultant and author of Museum Commons
Gretchen Jennings has worked in museums for over 30 years.  She was a project director on traveling exhibitions Psychology and Invention at Play, both of which received AAM awards of excellence. She has been editor in chief of The Journal of Museum Education and Exhibition.Currently she offers classes and workshops for university museum studies programs, including the National Council of Science Museums in India; edits museum publications; and collaborates on projects contributing to social justice in the museum field. She blogs at Museum Commons, and is a member of the Museums & Race and MASSAction initiatives. She is also a member of The Museum Group, an organization of museum consultants.  

Kayleigh Bryant-Greenwell

Member Emerita

Museum Educator​
Kayleigh Bryant-Greenwell, is a Washington, D.C. native and cultural planner with over 10 years of museum and gallery experience, devoted to exploring ways to cultivate marginalized audiences through art, museum, and social justice practice. As Head of Public Programs with Smithsonian American Art Museum and the Renwick Gallery she is responsible for an extensive calendar of programs across two museums, leading new outreach and inclusion initiatives towards developing new audiences and cultivating public engagement. She serves on the Board of Washington Project for the Arts, and on the Artist Selection Committee of Halcyon Arts Lab and VisArts in Rockville, MD. She received her Bachelor of Art in Art History from the University of Maryland, College Park and Master of Art in Museum Studies from George Washington University.

Jim Cullen

Member Emeritus

​Consultant in HR management, facilitation & strategic planning for non-profits
A Chartered Professional in Human Resources (Canada), Jim Cullen’s career spans three decades in human resources and general management in the corporate and non-profit sectors.  He has consulted in strategic and business planning with a specialty in museums and non-profits, workshop facilitation and human resources management since 2003 and ​has led many strategic and business plans with non-profit and heritage organizations.  A long-time volunteer and member of several non-profit boards, Jim holds an Honors Business degree with distinction (University of Western Ontario), a Master’s Degree in Museum Studies (University of Leicester) and completed the Getty’s Museum Management Institute program. Jim also created the concept of the Empathetic Museum Maturity Model.

Charlette Hove

Member Emerita

Exhibition Designer
Charlette is currently working as an Exhibit Designer and is focused on integrating DEAI principles into all aspects of development and design. She has an MFA in Museum Exhibition Planning & Design from the University of the Arts, Philadelphia.

Are you you interested to know about our team and how we work?
Send us a message via our contact form. 

We owe thanks and gratitude to our colleagues who have contributed to  the discussion and development of the Empathetic Museum framework, in particular Rainey Tisdale and Elissa Frankle. 

More about us ​