University of Maryland and Smithsonian Institution
Certificate Program in Museum Scholarship and Material Culture
The Certificate Program in Museum Scholarship and Material Culture augments graduate
work in American Studies, Anthropology, Historic Preservation, and History by training
students to understand the particular challenges, issues, and opportunities encountered
when conducting and presenting material culture scholarship in the museum
environment. The program takes advantage of close collaboration with the world’s
largest museum establishment, the Smithsonian Institution. Core courses are taken at the
Smithsonian with the participation of Smithsonian staff. The certificate aims to equip
students with skills for research, scholarship, and presentation that are appropriate to
museums of history, culture, and material life. It is not directed toward museum
administration or care of collections, nor does it deal directly with issues specifically
pertaining to art or natural science museums.
Students in this five course program will begin with a required core of three courses. The
first is an introductory seminar at the Smithsonian, in which general issues of historical
and material culture scholarship in museums are discussed through readings,
investigative projects, and site visits to specific exhibitions. This course is followed by a
research seminar in which students select research topics drawing on museum resources
at the Smithsonian or other appropriate institutions, and prepare and present an extended
study. The third museum-based course is the program’s practicum in which students
work closely with a museum curator or specialist on a research project that demonstrates
the student’s mastery of museum materials and approaches.
The fourth course will train students to be conversant with applications of information
technology to research and presentation of scholarship in a museum environment.
Students will select from a limited number of existing course offerings on this subject in
History, Art History, American Studies, and Anthropology. The final course for the
certificate is a seminar in the student’s home department that deals with major scholarly
issues in material culture, as approached by the home discipline. This may include
seminars in American material culture, the history of technology, cultural resource
management, ethnology, or cultural analysis.
HIST 610/AMST 655: Introduction to Museum Scholarship (3 hrs.)
Introduction to key issues involved in the study of history and material culture in
museums, taught at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History. Topics
include the history of museums, the theory of collections, exhibition strategies, and
artifact-based research and controversies, both public and scholarly, involving museumbased scholarship and presentation.
HIST 810/AMST 856: Museum Research Seminar (3 hrs.)
Prerequisite: Introduction to Museum Scholarship or permission of instructor
In consultation with seminar leaders from UMCP and SI, students will select
research topics that investigate key issues in museum-based scholarship and demonstrate
their ability to research and prepare an extended research project. The project will be
presented publicly at the completion of the seminar.
HIST 8XX/AMST 857: Museum Scholarship Practicum (3-6 hrs.)
Prerequisite: Museum Research Seminar or permission of instructor
Students will devise and carry out a research program using collections at the
Smithsonian or another approved institution, and will work under joint supervision of a
Smithsonian staff member and UMCP faculty member.
Students already in the program should arrange the practicum with a museum
professional in consultation with their certificate program advisor.
The fourth course will emphasize the application of information technologies to
scholarship in the museum setting and may be selected from the following existing
courses: AMST 418P (Electronic Publications and Virtual Exhibitions); AMST 602
(Interdisciplinary Research Strategies and Bibliographic Instruction); ARTH 758 (Art
History and the New Technologies); ANTH 689D (Computer Mapping and GIS); HIST
619D (Seminar in Public History and Historical Method); and LBSC 670 (Information
Structure).
The fifth course will focus on material culture or closely-related studies as pursued by the
student’s host discipline. Examples include: ANTH 448P/689P (Theories of the Past);
AMST 650 (Material Culture Studies Theory); AMST 851 (Interpretation of Cultural
Landscapes); HISP 600 (History, Theory & Contemporary Issues in Historic
Preservation); HIST 406 (History of Technology); HIST 407 (Technology and Social
Change in History); or appropriate offerings of HIST 609 in history of technology).
For more information, contact Dr. Mary Corbin Sies, Associate Professor of American
Studies, at ms128@umail.umd.edu or Dr. Robert Friedel, Professor of History, at
friedel@umd.edu.