Category Archives: New Audiences

AHRC: Glastonbury Revealed

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How do you interpret a site which is best known for its myths? The University of Reading is being featured on the AHRC website today in a film which examines a recent research project with Glastonbury Abbey, Somerset, UK. Find out more about how Professor Roberta Gilchrist (Department of Archaeology, University of Reading) and a team of experts disentangled a complex web of archival documents and stored objects related to historic excavations at the site (1904 – 1979). Museum Studies Programme Director Dr Rhi Smith appears in the video, talking about her collaboration with the Abbey and the challenges of developing an interpretation strategy which respected the complex history and spiritual significance of the site.

The AHRC have provided the following information on the project:

“The site of Glastonbury Abbey is one of the important ancient heritage sites in the UK.

A focus for many people who value the spiritual and historical resonances of the place, it is best known for its legendary reputation as the burial place of King Arthur and as the earliest Christian foundation in Britain, allegedly founded by Joseph of Arimathea, the great-uncle of Christ, in AD 63.

A team of AHRC-funded researchers, led by Professor Roberta Gilchrist of Reading University, has re-evaluated the history of Glastonbury Abbey and its environs and disentangled the rich but not always accurate myth from historical reality.

Among the findings are: fresh evidence to confirm that the abbey site was indeed occupied in the 5th or 6th century, before the foundation of the Saxon monastery; identification of an early timber building with large post pits associated with fragments of imported Roman amphorae, dated c AD 450-550 and often associated with very high status secular (ie royal) settlement; analysis of glass and metal fragments suggesting that the glass-working furnaces at Glastonbury represent the earliest evidence for significant glass production in Saxon England; and a great deal more.

The project has worked closely with local groups and the general public and outreach activities have been crucial to its work and its findings.

This film examines the new evidence unearthed by the project and how researchers have worked with the Abbey Museum, conservators and the public to explore the history of this rich and extraordinary site.”

Life after Reading #2 Katy Jackson (Wiener Library)

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Welcome Week begins today for our new students so it seems like a good time to celebrate the excellent work being done by former students. Katy trained as tour guide with us ages ago and was put back in contact a few weeks back. She is now Community and Outreach Officer at the Wiener Library for the Study of the Holocaust and Genocide and kindly agreed to write a blog post in our ‘Life after Reading’ series.

Katy at the Wiener Library

Katy at the Wiener Library

What are you doing now?

I am the Community and Outreach Officer at the Wiener Library for the Study of the Holocaust and Genocide[1] based in Russell Square, London. I am responsible for the overall community and outreach strategy at the Library in line with a four year Heritage Lottery Fund project which is focused on widening audience engagement with the Library and its collections. I enjoy the diversity of my role; one day I can be networking at a foreign embassy, another day I can be running an exhibition project with an activist group. My other key responsibilities include events management, volunteer management, partnership brokering and social media PR and marketing.

How did your time at Reading prepare you for this line of work?

Academically, my time at Reading gave me transferable skills which I use every day in my job. I regularly give presentations and speak in public where I also put to use the historical knowledge I gained in my degree. A large part of my day to day work is research based whether it’s finding speakers for an event, looking for potential partner organisations, contacting community groups or researching content for an exhibition.

Reading gave me the opportunity to gain professional experience outside of my degree. I volunteered as a tour guide and family learning assistant at the Museum of English Rural Life[2]. Additionally, I volunteered as an assistant archivist at the REME Museum of Technology[3] during my second year and was offered a temporary paid position for September 2009, before I began my third year. Both these opportunities offered me the chance to learn about working in museum environments and confirmed my aspiration to work in the museum sector.

What training/experience did you get after leaving Reading?

Prior to beginning at Reading I had volunteered at Portsmouth Records Office and City Museum[4], which included a short stint at Portsmouth D-Day Museum[5], so in addition to my volunteering work in Reading I had already built up my practical experience. After finishing my BA I knew that I wasn’t finished with studying and I was torn between doing an MA in Museum Studies or an MA related to the area of history I was interested in (20th century conflict). Despite wanting to work in the museum sector, I decided that having a more specialised masters in history would make me stand out and so I chose the MA War, Culture and History at the University of Manchester[6]. During my MA I had the opportunity to apply for work placement, which I was lucky enough to get, at the Imperial War Museum North[7] on a community outreach project. The combination of my work experience and my degrees meant that I was well placed to work at an institution like the Wiener Library.

If you could give just one piece of advice for current students what would it be?

My advice for current students is this: do everything. Take every opportunity to volunteer, network and get your name known. Build up a professional profile using social media, Twitter is particularly good for that as you can interact with organisations. Don’t forget to use your initiative, just because an organisation isn’t advertising for volunteers or work placements it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t ask anyway. Don’t forget it’s also important to do things that aren’t necessarily related to your career like joining sports clubs or societies – it will make you a more rounded person. Social skills are equally as important as anything else.

I know the question asked for one piece of advice but I just want to finish with this one point: do what you love. No one ever worked in museums to become a millionaire, but we do usually have a high level of job satisfaction. As Confucius said, ‘Choose a job you love, and you will never have to work a day in your life’.

The Wiener Library holds Britain’s largest archives relating to the Holocaust and Nazi era. Follow the @wienerlibrary for updates on events, exhibitions and more.

Follow @Katy_WL for day to day community and outreaching as well as other museumy stuff.

The Nerd and the Museum 1#

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“nerds like us are allowed to be unironically enthusiastic about stuff… Nerds are allowed to love stuff, like jump-up-and-down-in-the-chair-can’t-control-yourself love it. Hank, when people call people nerds, mostly what they’re saying is ‘you like stuff.’ Which is just not a good insult at all. Like, ‘you are too enthusiastic about the miracle of human consciousness’”

– John Green

At the Society of Museum Archaeologists’ Conference in Manchester 2012 Dr Nick Merriman suggested that museums need to reach out to the geek audience. Museums have always struggled to bring in young people, so marketing and programming for an ‘unironically enthusiastic’ audience might be just what is needed.

Studies of visitor figures from around the world show that, as a general rule, you stop going to museums when your parents and school teachers stop taking you. You start going again when you have kids of your own. So what is going to make you come in while you are a ‘young person’? This is something which really troubles me as somebody teaching mostly 18-30 year olds from within a museum of rural life.

I went to a fantastic ‘Steampunk’ exhibition at the Museum of the History of Science in Oxford a few years ago which was packed with people in the 18-30 bracket. More recently I found myself as part of a Nerdfighter gathering, in which I was one of the oldest people, at the STEAM Museum in Swindon. I was there to see John and Hank Green, who have found a variety of ways to get young people interested in history, science and culture online. Not all young people are geeks but thinking and marketing geeky clearly expands your audience from the perspective of age. It can also be the catalyst for new questions and displays of creativity.

As somebody marching on through their 30’s I am sad to say that I am no longer in the ‘young person’ demographic. However, I would define myself as a bit of a geek.  In light of this I thought that I would combine my two passions and write a series of posts about things which link the geeky and the museological. Next post on Nerdfighters and Brainscoop.