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Producing these International Handbooks of Museum Studies has probably been a bigger and more demanding project than any of us had anticipated at the outset. Assembling together so many authors across four different volumes, and accommodating so many different timetables, work dynamics, styles, and sensitivities has been a major task over more years than we like to recall for both us as general editors, and even more especially for the editors of our four volumes: Andrea Witcomb, Kylie Message, Conal McCarthy, Michelle Henning, Annie E. Coombes, and Ruth B. Phillips. As general editors, our first thanks must be to the volume editors, who have done a remarkable task of identifying and eliciting so many insightful and illuminating contributions from such a wide field, and of working with authors – not all of whom were experienced in academic writing and many of whom were already grappling with hectic schedules – to coax the best possible chapters from them. We thank our volume editors too for working with us and what may sometimes have seemed overly interventionist assistance on our part in our push to make the volumes work together, as well as individually, and for all contributions, as well as the International Handbooks as a whole, to be a substantial contribution to the field. We also thank our volume editors for sharing so much good humor and so many cheering messages along the way, turning what sometimes felt like relentless chasing and head-aching over deadlines into something much more human and enjoyable. All of the contributors also deserve immense thanks too, of course, for joining the convoy and staying the journey. We hope that it feels well worth it for all concerned. Without you – editors and contributors – it couldn’t have happened.

There is also somebody else without whom it couldn’t have happened. This is Gill Whitley. Gill joined the project in 2012 as Project Editor. In short, she transformed our lives through her impeccable organization and skillful diplomacy, directly contacting contributors to extract chapters from them, setting up systems to keep us all on track with where things were up to, and securing many of the picture permissions. She has been a pleasure to work with and we are immensely grateful to her.

The idea for a series of International Handbooks of Museum Studies came from Jayne Fargnoli at Wiley Blackwell and we are grateful to her for this and being such a great cheerleader for the project. She read a good deal of the work as it came in and knowing that this only increased her enthusiasm for the project boosted everyone’s energy as we chased deadlines. We also thank other staff at Wiley Blackwell for their role in the production processes, including, most recently, Jake Opie, for helping to at last allow us to bring out the individual volumes in paperback format.

Because of its extended nature and because things don’t always happen according to initial timetables, editorial work like this often has to be fitted into what might otherwise be leisure time or time allocated for other things. Luckily, both of our Mikes (Mike Beaney and Mike Leahy) were sympathetic, not least as both have deeply occupying work of their own; and we thank them for being there for us when we needed them.

Lastly, we would like to thank each other. We have each benefited from the other’s complementary expertise and networks, from the confidence of having that insightful second opinion, and from the sharing of the load. Having somebody else with whom to experience the frustrations and joys, the tribulations and amusements, has made it so much more fun. Not only has this helped to keep us relatively sane, but it has also made The International Handbooks of Museum Studies so much better than they would otherwise have been.

Sharon Macdonald and Helen Rees Leahy

August 2014 and July 2019