Events

Public programs facilitate dialogue between academics and professionals, informing scholarship and strengthening practice.

Multiple day conferences, year-long colloquia, individual lectures, “conversations” between individuals, hands-on workshops, and Museums at Noon talks featuring our graduate students all contribute to the remarkable richness of MSP offerings.

Video recordings of some MSP lectures are archived for viewing in our Media Gallery.

Book Signing: Object Lessons and the Formation of Knowledge

Kelsey Museum of Archaeology 434 South State Street, Ann Arbor, MI

Authors and UM professors Kerstin Barndt and Carla Sinopoli will be at the Kelsey Museum signing copies of their new book, 'Object Lessons & the Formation of Knowledge.' Learn about the dynamic history of the museums at the University of Michigan as part of the...

Bicentennial book launch/panel discussion

Hatcher Graduate Library

The book Object Lessons and the Formation of Knowledge: The University of Michigan Museums, Libraries, and Collections 1817–2017 presents a full color journey through the treasures of the University’s collections. A panel discussion with a focus on items from library collections will occur on Sept 26...

Growing Protocols: Documenting the Collaborative Process within the Heritage Seeds for Sustainable Lifeways Project

U-M Museum of Art, Helmut Stern Auditorium 525 S. State St., Ann Arbor, MI, United States

Presentation by Elspeth Geiger, PhD candidate, Anthropology Friday, September 29 from 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm, UM Museum of Art auditorium   Growing Protocols: Documenting the Collaborative Process within the Heritage Seeds for Sustainable Lifeways Project Collaboration between museums and Native American communities has...

Object Lessons: Recollecting Museum Histories at Michigan

Curated by Kerstin Barndt in collaboration with Richard Barnes and Amanda Krugliak, with original commissioned artwork by Richard Barnes The history of the modern research university is unthinkable without collecting. At the University Michigan, the first objects brought to campus in the late 1830s...

Exhibition – Excavating Archaeology at U-M: 1817‐2017

Kelsey Museum of Archaeology 434 South State Street, Ann Arbor, MI

This exhibition explores the history of archaeology and museums at the University of Michigan for the past 200 years and looks forward to the future of archaeology and museums at Michigan in the coming century. The exhibition relies on carefully chosen objects, archival documents...

Curatorial Dilemmas: Representing Africa at UMMA with Mary (Polly) Nooter-Roberts

U-M Museum of Art, Helmut Stern Auditorium 525 S. State St., Ann Arbor, MI, United States

A series of talks by leading curators and thinkers in African art will launch a reimagining process for the forthcoming reinstallation of the University of Michigan Museum of Art’s Robert and Lillian Montalto Bohlen Gallery of African Art. Mary (Polly) Nooter-Roberts, Professor of World Arts and Cultures at UCLA, will...

The Museum Further Afield: Conservation, Art, and Archaeology

U-M Museum of Art, Helmut Stern Auditorium 525 S. State St., Ann Arbor, MI, United States

Presentation by Suzanne Davis, Associate Curator, Kelsey Museum of Archaeology. Friday, October 20 from 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm, UM Museum of Art auditorium   The Museum Further Afield: Conservation, Art, and Archaeology When we think and talk about museums, we are often focused...

University Natural History Museums: Portals of Discovery in the Anthropocene

Rackham Graduate School 915 E. Washington Street, Ann Arbor, MI, United States

A conversation between: James Hanken - Director, Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University Diarmaid O Foighil - Chair, Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, U-M   Many of the world's great universities have natural history museums founded in the late 19th and early 20th centuries....

Curatorial Dilemmas: Representing Africa at UMMA with Pamela McClusky

U-M Museum of Art, Helmut Stern Auditorium 525 S. State St., Ann Arbor, MI, United States

A series of talks by leading curators and thinkers in African art will launch a reimagining process for the forthcoming reinstallation of the University of Michigan Museum of Art’s Robert and Lillian Montalto Bohlen Gallery of African Art. Pamela McClusky, Curator of African and Oceanic Art, Seattle Art Museum, will...

What Happens When a Museum Is Something Other than a Museum?

Presentation by Zachary Kopin, PhD, History Friday, November 3 from 12:00 pm - 1:00 pm, UM Museum of Art auditorium   What Happens When a Museum Is Something Other than a Museum? Constitution Hill was once a notorious prison in colonial and apartheid South...