Warwick Museum Studies Network
In the Autumn of 2024 a bunch of Warwick academics got together and said:
We love museums! We love researching museums, their purpose, design, impact, past, present, and future, in the UK and all over the world. We think they are hugely significant, especially in helping us to transform cultural attitudes and constraints. For example, we love what the Pitt Rivers Museum (Oxford) have been doing to decolonise their collections, but also to reimagine the purpose of an anthropology collection with people from all over the world. We love how the Herbert in Coventry engages with local communities of all kinds, and has been a welcoming place to help orient people moving to the City from all over the world. We love these museums, and want to do more in applying our academic disciplines to them, and in enriching our academic work with them - especially in engaging our students with museums.
But at Warwick we haven't got a Museum Studies department. We have lots of people doing lots of interesting things, from many different perspectives, across the whole University. So we want to establish something more "Warwick" - a lively interdisciplinary community, open to all in and beyond the University. The small group began by sharing the work they already do with museums, which was impressive just for a few people. We then discovered that there are people all over Warwick already doing great work with museums. So we came up with a plan to bring them together and to establish the network:
- Send out an invitation to all Warwick members and museum contacts to join the network - with a form that they can use to register their interest - COMPLETE THE FORM HERE.
- Create an online community forum open to all (including non-Warwick members).
- Start a podcast series and blog, exploring our relationships with museums.
- Run a symposium on Museums and the University, around the time of the International Museums Day, May 18th.
- Create a special edition of the IAS Exchanges journal on Museums and the University (we have met with Gareth from IAS).
- Identify funding opportunities and sources.
- Create URSS projects and recruit students.
Register
Complete this form to join the network - open to all.
Contact
Dr Robert O'Toole (network coordinator, museum design, and technology)
Museums Nearby (selection)
University Art Collection
Mead Gallery (Warwick University Arts Centre)
Herbert Art Gallery and MuseumLink opens in a new window
Coventry Transport Museum
Coventry Toy Museum
West Midlands Police Museum
Coventry Watch Museum
Coventry Toy Museum
Weavers House
The Coventry Music Museum
Lunt Roman Fort
Midland Air Museum
Kenilworth Castle
Kenilworth Abbey Barn Museum
Leamington Art Gallery and Museum