The valuable role of risky histories: exhibiting disability, race and reproduction in medical museums

Over the last few years medical museums have entered a particularly productive period of renewal and expansion, including renovations of major museums in Austria, Denmark, Norway and the UK, the launch of new insti tutions in Croatia, Germany and Latvia, and proposals for others under development in Belgium and Spain.[1] In the Netherlands a lone (where I am based), the Museum Vrol ik reopened in 2012; the Ri jksmuseum Boerhaave in Leiden launched a new suite of permanent gal leries in December 2017; and the Dolhuys Museum of the Mind in Haarlem is currently completing i ts second major renovation in s ix years .