EJWS https://doi.org/10.1177/1350506819856648 European Journal of Women’s Studies 2019, Vol. 26(3) 274–292 © The Author(s) 2019 Article reuse guidelines: sagepub.com/journals-permissions DOI: 10.1177/1350506819856648 journals.sagepub.com/home/ejw Moving gender: Home museums and the construction of their inhabitants Vered Vinitzky-Seroussi Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel Irit Dekel Friedrich Schiller University, Germany Abstract Home museums in Israel and Germany produce a representational space in which the public figure, usually a ‘great man,’ is effectively ‘dragged home’ to the so-called private sphere so as to make the domestic worthy of musealization. Based on three years of ethnographic research in nine such museums (four in Israel and five in Germany), this article shows that when the sphere most identified with women is represented through the life and work of the men who lived there, the place of the wife and children is sidelined, belittled, and at times concealed. In representing famous persons through material space and objects in the private abode, museal techniques determine which specific domestic areas, such as the kitchen and the bedroom, become the prime location of telling stories about women who lived in the house. They provide a shared perspective for visitors who find the stories about the wives endearing, recognizing home through them. Keywords Collective memory, gender in museums, home museums, museum visitors, museums in Israel and Germany, private sphere In an interview conducted walking through the David and Paula Ben-Gurion home museum in Tel Aviv, the director stated that the room she likes the most is Paula’s bed- room : ‘the uniqueness of the room’ the director said ‘is that here, Ben-Gurion lost Corresponding author: Vered Vinitzky-Seroussi, Department of Sociology, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Mount Socpus, Jerusalem, 91905, Israel. Email: vered@mail.huji.ac.il 856648EJW 0 0 10.1177/1350506819856648European Journal of Women’s StudiesVinitzky-Seroussi and Dekel research-article 2019 Article