Textile Craft as Empowerment: Shared Research and Craft Activities Around Textiles in Museums in Denmark

Focusing on museums, this article illustrates how textile crafts can become a source for scholarly
inquiry and can enhance more inclusive practices at museums. The empirical data comprises four
museum-related projects conducted since 2017 focusing on textile craft and creativity with women
in Denmark, particularly women of refugee, migrant, or second-generation migrant background.
Through these cases, we unravel the potential of textile crafts as a medium and encounter for
engagement in museums within a societal context, both as a professional outlook, an education, a
cultural heritage, an object of research, and a pastime for pleasure and socializing. The common
thread—our academic quest—is how, when, and why textile craft is entwined with female
empowerment, and how textile craft, as a shared community action, can empower and represent
an opportunity for museums to reach new audiences as well as use the museum space in new
ways.