Curating Human Remains in the UK MEG seminar

When: Wednesday 20th January 2016 9.30 - 4.30
Where: University of Bristol, Wills Memorial Building, Queens Road, Bristol, BS8 1RL

Held jointly by the Natural Science Collections Association (NatSCA), the Society of Museum Archaeology (SMA) and the Museum Ethnographers Group (MEG) in association with the Human Remains SSN.

The Curating Human Remains in UK Museums workshop held in 2014 highlighted a need within the sector and professional interest in building confidence in curating human remains. In response to this need NatSCA, MEG and SMA are hosting a day of talks and case studies relating to working with human remains,

The aim of the seminar is to address current legislation of the Human Tissue Act in relation to institutions that care for, display, research and store human remains. The seminar will include examples of best practice and recent case studies.

Provisional Programme:

9.30 - 10.00 Coffee and registration

10.00 - 11.00 Case studies of good practice
Carina Phillips (Royal College of Surgeons) - how to approach the documentation/collections management, display and research use for the RCS human remains collections.

11.00 - 12.00 How to handle and store human remains
Heather Bonney (Natural History Museum) tbc

12.00 - 12.30 Lunch, not provided

13.30 - 14.30 Up to date legislation
Myra Geisen (University of Newcastle) - the ethics and legislation in caring for human remains
Caroline Browne (Human Tissue Act)

14.30 - 17.30 Case studies of osteological reviews
Rose Drew - Contextualised Remains: educational display versus public voyeurism: the crew of the Mary Rose
Subhadra Das  - A review of UCL's pathology collections
Lauren Leith (University of Exeter/RAMM) - Skulls in Discovering Worlds: how a designation-funded project has opened up a recent study of Melanesian modified crania at the Royal Albert Memorial Museum, Exeter
Sue Giles and Lisa Graves (Bristol Museum & Art Gallery) - Death and the Human Tissue Act (HTA): presenting their experience of using human remains in a temporary exhibition on death at Bristol Museum and Art Gallery and how they found the process of applying for HTA license and its impact on the museum

Tickets can be purchased until 19.01.2016.
Ticket prices are as follows:
£30 NatSCA/MEG/SMA members (organisation members should use the promotional code 'R3main5' for discount)
£20 students
£45 non members

Please book online