#100museumhours

2 years 100 chats on 100 subjects Two Hosts: @tehm and @sospot 46 Guest Hosts 22.1K Tweets (all time) 130-140K Impressions per month 4-5K Impressions per day ~25-100 Engagements per Tweet It’s a very simple enterprise, light weight but high energy and without any constrictions of institutionalism or stakeholder expectation. It’s free and for all-comers.… Continue reading #100museumhours

What Cornish National Minority Status means for Museums (and Arts and Culture organisations)

The decision to recognise the unique identity of the Cornish, now affords them the same status under the European Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities as the UK’s other Celtic people, the Scots, the Welsh and the Irish. Barely a ripple ran through the cultural sector nationally or here in Cornwall when, on 24… Continue reading What Cornish National Minority Status means for Museums (and Arts and Culture organisations)

#migration and #museums

A migration story at the NZ Maritime Museum in Auckland.

How do museums represent, present and interpret migrant stories? Museumhour from 25 January 2016. I was inspired to host this topic following my visit to museums in New Zealand in Auckland (National Maritime Museum of New Zealand) and Wellington (Wellington Museum and Te Papa National Museum). All these museums featured the stories of migrants heavily.… Continue reading #migration and #museums

Museums and the UK General Election 2015

  Culture and museums find themselves off the menu this election. This is a summary of excerpts from the policies and manifestos of political parties standing candidates in the UK General Election on 7 May 2015. Monday 4 May at 20:00 in the UK will see a #GE2015 election special #museumhour so please do come and join… Continue reading Museums and the UK General Election 2015

#museumhour

#Follow @museumhour Mondays 7-8pm UST (UK time). #museumhour is (yet another) new UK-based museum movement which took 24 hours to set up by Sophie Ballinger (@sospot) and me (@tehm). Sophie had a while back posed the question of whether a #museumhour existed in Twitterverse and received the sound of tumbleweed in return. I was travelling back to Cornwall… Continue reading #museumhour

Mediterranean material culture from prehistory to now

In this scene I examine a finger ring, reusing a late Roman agate seal, from southern Italy, late 7th century in the Museo Nazionale Archeologico di Napoli. In the next scene, the custodian of the stores tried it on and asked if it suited her (not pictured).

Back in March my chapter on material culture for the Wiley-Blackwell Companion to Mediterranean History came out. It was a challenging exercise to condense into 8000 words the essence of the study of material culture in a Mediterranean geo-historical context and also to represent all periods of human history at the same time. I have… Continue reading Mediterranean material culture from prehistory to now

Top ten for heritage digitisation projects

Originally written and published in 2010 on Past Thinking. Republished here for archival purposes. Digitisation usually refers to making collections data, including images and other media, available online. But it may also refer to making any quantitative (e.g. historical datasets) or qualitative information (exhibition and learning resources) available and discoverable via the web. A digital… Continue reading Top ten for heritage digitisation projects

Why close the Textile Conservation Centre?

Conservation has been high in my thoughts recently. Largely through my current work with ICOMOS-UK (International Council on Monuments and Sites UK) I have been exposed to the vicissitudes that affect the preservation and interpretation of our heritage, whether they are the result of inappropriate development, lack of funds or lack of collective and political… Continue reading Why close the Textile Conservation Centre?