O Museu do Amanhã e o fim do mundo: uma análise política

Abstract

This work analyzes the perspective of environmental catastrophe presented by the Museum of Tomorrow — a science museum planned as an icon of the urban reforms for the 2016 Olympic Games, which intensified the valorization of the city of Rio de Janeiro in the global market. The Museum's narrative is analyzed through the main exhibition and its article publications, identifying that the cause of the Anthropocene is naturalized through the accountability of population growth and consumption, as if these were a natural consequence of human evolution. As a palliative solution, the Museum proposes individual awareness, technological advances and environmental management. Throughout the work, from a diverse literature and interviews with two professors who worked as consultants at the Museum, the limitation of the Museum‘s perspective is observed — which lacks the intervention of human and social sciences. Despite bringing a discourse of innovation, change and opening of possibilities, the Museum's narrative does not contribute to the understanding of the social structure and naturalizes it, producing the defense of its perpetuation.