Graduate Student, School of History and Cultures
AHRC Collaborative Doctoral Researcher
History Dept at the University of Birmingham and the Shakespeare Institute
Thesis Title: The Material Culture and Cultural Heritage of Shakespeare's England
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Dr Tara Hamling
Prof Richard Cust |
About
The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust has a large internationally important collection of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century material culture, consisting of objects, buildings and manuscripts. As a doctoral researcher, I am generating new information about the collections, as well as developing a new 'creative cataloguing' system which will provide the public and scholars with better access to this important resource.
I am developing my own object-based analysis methodology, which, it is hoped, may be adopted by historians who wish to engage with objects as evidence. I am particularly interested in the connections between artisanal culture (the 'little tradition') and material culture, and more specifically the folkloric qualities of the materials that compose crafted objects.
I am also interested in the process of museum collections research, institutional perceptions of the public (and scholars), the decay and durability of objects, and how these factors combine to create exhibitions. I shall be curating a series of object-studies displayed throughout the five properties owned by the SBT in Stratford-upon-Avon during 2012-2013.
pdhx@yahoo.com
pdh091@bham.ac.uk
