In the past decade, several museums focusing on migration have opened around Europe. What they all have in common is the goal to increase awareness on the role of migrations for the respective country or city where they are based. They advocate for understanding emigration, and/or, immigration as crucial elements shaping the contemporary society, and as phenomenona that should gain more importance in the collective memory narratives.
Even though the stories told are usually about international migration, these museums are based around national or more local stories: of emigrations, immigrations from a particular nation-state (Emigration Museum in Poland, Migration Museum for Britain), less frequently a city (Migratie Museum Migration in Brussels). How are the stories that these museums promote constructed differently? Why are they dissimilar if the overall goal seems to be the same? To whom are the stories directed? Apart from addressing these questions, this paper will investigate the factors influencing how the stories about migration are constructed by the museums. This research will advance the understanding of the 'boom' in the migration museums in Europe in early 21stcentury and situate these institutions in a wider landscape of museums that seek to contribute to collective memory narratives on the local, national and transnational level.
