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Housed in a bright red shipping container in a parking lot southwest of Atlanta, The Dignity Museum doesn’t look like most museums.
But this travelling exhibition created by the charity LoveBeyondWallscarries an important message about poverty and homelessness in the United States. Putting a human face to the stories and giving a sense of how complex the causes and challenges of homelessness are.
In a city with an estimated 7,000 rough sleepers, The Dignity Museum shares the stories of those who were born into poverty, those who became homeless as adults, the kids holding cardboard signs at the stoplight, and their collective fight to beat their circumstances.
Through interactive technology, research, storytelling, exhibits, and thought-provoking questions, visitors will confront their ideas of homelessness and what it takes to escape it.
The museum aims to build empathy in its visitors, hoping that they will take action to become an ally in the fight against homelessness.
The Dignity Museum offers a fully guided tour with leaders committed to social change. The tour is a social learning experience as a way of gaining deeper insights into the issues of poverty and homelessness.
The tour fee will be used to build a fully curated center and social hub to mobilize people around the country. Additionally, when you tour the museum it will empower us to host a group of students to visit our museum for free.
The Dignity Museum is unique in that it is housed in a shipping container, and has the flexibility of being transported to various places around the city or country. LoveBeyondWalls hope to partner with like-hearted organizations and persons to bring it to unique spaces to educate people on the go.
It’s possible that a similar museum could eventually open in the U.K., where a group called the Museum of Homelessness has staged a series of events, but doesn’t yet have a building of its own.
Jessica Khatri is an arts blogger based in Cincinnati. She writes extensively about how cultural organizations are embracing their communities and creating works with a social justice element.
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