Research Institute

NEH Summer Institute - Home
Dear Colleague Letter
Application Instructions
Scope of the Institute
Content
Faculty
Housing and BGC Resources
Schedule
Contact

We are delighted to be hosting this four week summer institute in July of 2011 for 18 college teachers and other participants in the study of American Material Culture: Nineteenth-Century New York.  Our goal is to bring this exciting field into wider use for teaching and research in the humanities.  The institute will focus on the material culture of nineteenth century and use New York as its case study because of its role as a national center for fashioning cultural commodities and promoting consumer tastes. We will study significant texts in the scholarship of material culture together as well as in tandem with visiting some of the wonderful collections in and around New York City for our hands-on work with artifacts. The city will be our laboratory to explore some of the important issues of broad impact that go well beyond New York.

We are most fortunate in having a wealth of leading scholars and practitioners in this interdisciplinary field of study to join us as faculty. Please see our list of scholars and institutions below.  We welcome applications from faculty and others with some experience doing object-based work, as well as those who have never taught or studied material culture.  This website will offer a brief overview of our goals and plans for the institute along with other information on logistical matters such as housing.

For more information, please contact: Dean Elena Simon, Bard Graduate Center, 38 West 86th Street, New York, NY 10024, 212/501-3057, nehinstitute@bgc.bard.edu

Faculty
David Jaffee, Bard Graduate Center (Director)
Kenneth L. Ames, Bard Graduate Center
Debra Schmidt-Bach, New-York Historical Society
Joshua Brown, Graduate Center, CUNY
Edward S. Cooke, Jr., Yale University
Katherine C. Grier, University of Delaware
Bernard L. Herman, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
Kimon Keramidas, Bard Graduate Center
Amelia Peck, Metropolitan Museum of Art
John Kuo Wei Tchen, New York University
Diana di Zerega Wall, City College and Graduate Center, CUNY
Catherine Whalen, Bard Graduate Center

Institutions
African Burial Ground 
American Folk Art Museum 
Glenview, Hudson River Museum   
Lyndhurst 
The Lower East Side Tenement Museum 
The Merchant’s House Museum 
The Metropolitan Museum of Art 
Museum of Chinese in America 
The National Museum of the American Indian, George Gustav Heye Center 
New-York Historical Society
New York Public Library 
Yale University Art Gallery

The National Endowment for the Humanities has designated this institute as part of its “We the People” initiative, designed to encourage and enhance the teaching, study, and understanding of American history, culture, and democratic principles.

Any views, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this program do not necessarily reflect those of the National Endowment for the Humanities.