Examination of the documentation of Uganda Martyrs Museum collections

Abstract

This study sought to establish the status of the documentation of Uganda martyr’s museum collections. Documentation of collections in many museums in the world is still poorly organized, inconsistent and sometimes non-existent. This is a significant threat as collections poorly inventoried can disappear and cannot be used properly. In addition, the absence of official records hinders appropriate actions in case of theft or illicit trafficking. New technologies offer many advantages for improvements of museum documentation. The use of computerized documentation systems allows the comparison of many different sources. They also facilitate museum managerial work but also research, preparation of exhibitions, publications and proper public access to collections. The purpose of this research centers on examination of the documentation of Uganda martyr’s museum collections. The researcher visited the UMMN incorporated her findings into the work. A qualitative design was employed by the study and purposive sampling was used to select the study respondents. Data was collected using interview method where the top management and museum staff were interviewed, questionnaire for the researchers/visitors and document review was also used in this study where reports, budgets and development plans were consulted to verify the data collected from the respondents. Data was analyzed and presented using qualitative content analysis in relation to the study objectives. This Dissertation presents a contextual framework and practices for documentation of collections at the Uganda Martyrs Museum, Namugongo. This is to be used as a means and a system to direct and guide the Museum in documenting its collections. Therefore, a number of research works were undertaken considering the Collections of the Museum, to develop the parameters for the proposed best practices for the documentation of collections. The scope of this research involves the process of proper organization as well as documentation of the UMMN collections so as to create possible relationships between the available different types of collections and information regarding the collections. With the aim of reaching a wider clientele by the museum with its collections, the researcher sought to address various ways of providing access to the relevant information on the World Wide Web as well as taking into consideration the professional way of capturing information concerning the collections i.e., documentation of the collections.