The globalization process, impacts of which are felt in every field, has led to many changes and transformations in economic, social, spatial, administrative and cultural fields. While the effects of the process are felt intensely in the cities, the cities offering new life styles and spaces changing together with local values within the context of globalization and localization are indications of this change and transformation. As the cities are considered as places where modern life is offered, the approaches bringing local values to the fore have started to make the traditional and local cultural spaces attractive. In this period, in which cultural industries are on the rapid rise, it is also seen that the museums gain increasing significance. The museums where these values are exhibited are spaces which enhance the interaction between past and future generations and reflect and preserve the common cultural heritage of societies. In this study, it is discussed that rural areas which are addressed as representatives of the traditional and the modern are on the rise with the globalization process along with their local values, the importance of rural areas and rural way of life is increasing and the reasons of the emulations for the rural life in this period in which rural-urban relations are being consolidated are explained. Open air museums which aim to introduce the rural life to the urban is the subject of this study. By departing from a conceptual discussion on different museum approaches in international and national literature, the study firstly attempts to explain these spaces where rural life is presented, and evaluate these spaces, which have started to be amongst the contemporary changing cultural activities within the preferences of the urban users, through the sample of Ankara Metropolitan City “Altınköy Open-Air Museum”.
Keywords: Museum, Open Air Museum, Rural Life, Urbanism, Ankara