Museum Cultures with Collections Management MA

Birkbeck, University of London

Our MA Museum Cultures with Collections Management combines study of the history and cultural significance of museums with opportunities for you to gain professional museum experience. You will explore the processes that lie at the heart of collections management by which museums ascribe value and meaning to objects, and the ideas, values and ethics which underpin these. Why choose this course? This MA gives you the chance to acquire key foundational skills in collections management and a solid grasp of the related issues, learning from leading scholars in the field. It also offers you the chance to undertake a work placement in a museum, gallery or archive. You will visit leading London museums and galleries and meet a range of collections management experts to discuss their work, as well as engaging in hands-on activities relating to documentation, object handling and care. This course benefits from our close links, in teaching and research, with numerous museums, galleries, archives and heritage organisations across London and beyond. What you will learn You will master the wide range of methods and sources, including archives, collections, historical and contemporary texts, needed to understand how museums operate and how their role - and the role of the collections manager - is shifting in the twenty-first century. You will also draw upon museum theory and sector guidelines to document a bequest to museum accreditation standard and critically reflect on this process. This will give you advanced skills, much desired by many employers, in analysis, argument and communication.