Bio
Over more than fifteen years, through my research, writing and teaching, I have reinvigorated and redefined the field of museum ethics globally. In my work as Assistant Professor of Museum Studies/Founding Director of the Institute of Museum Ethics at Seton Hall University, South Orange, New Jersey (2005-2010), subsequently as Assistant and Associate Professor in the School of Museum Studies at the University of Leicester, UK (2010-2019) and now as an independent scholar and consultant, I have established a robust research trajectory analyzing ethics topics from museum transparency to curatorial self-censorship to artists’ interventions as drivers for ethical change. To support this research, conducted internationally, in the US, UK, Europe, mainland China and Hong Kong, I have received grants from the Institute for Museum and Library Services (US), the Arts and Humanities Research Council (UK) and the British Academy. In 2018 I was a Senior Research Fellow at Fudan University in Shanghai. I have been first supervisor to 14 Ph.D. students (six completed), many of whom have developed innovative museum ethics research of their own.
I work collaboratively with museums and museum studies researchers on pressing ethical issues. I have done ethics consulting with institutions from the National September 11 Memorial Museum—on collections policy—to the Royal Air Force Museum—on sponsorship. I have advised on the development of an ethics vision statement and ethical practice for a seven-year Concordia University-based international research project, Thinking Through the Museum, funded by the Canadian Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. I have also led ethics workshops and seminars for practitioners worldwide, including the National Trust (UK), Glasgow Museums, Shanghai Museum, Siao-Long Cultural Park (Taiwan), the Association of Danish Museums and the Norwegian Museums Association, among others. I have served on advisory boards for the UK’s National Holocaust Centre and Museum and EU-funded research project Transmitting Contentious Cultural Heritage with the Arts: From Intervention to Co-Production. Further, as a member of the UK Museums Association Ethics Committee from 2014-2019, I directly impacted their approach; I led on the 2015 rewriting of the ethics code which shapes professional practice across the United Kingdom. From 2019 through 2020 I sat on the Leadership Team of the Museum Studies Network at the American Alliance of Museums as well as AAM’s Editorial Review Team.
I have outstanding project management skills, as reflected both by my major research projects and by my administrative roles, including, at the School of Museum Studies at Leicester, Deputy Head of School, Academic Director of the School and Chair, Diversity, Equality and Inclusion Working Group.
Earlier in my career, I taught art history at Bowdoin College in Maine and at Central Washington University in Washington State. I also curated exhibitions for university museums and galleries. I received my Ph.D. in Art History from the University of Pittsburgh and was awarded a pre-doctoral fellowship from the Smithsonian American Art Museum. In 2017 I returned to the University of Pittsburgh to give the annual Distinguished Alumni lecture for the Department of the History of Art and Architecture.
