We the Museum Better Lemon Creative Audio

What’s it like working in museums in Iceland? Katie Teeter is American, but she’s been living in Iceland for ten years. She works at two museums, one private and one public, and is finishing up a Master’s in Museum Studies at the University of Iceland. I chatted with Katie about her career and learned some cool facts about the Icelandic museum field.

We the Museum is currently in-between seasons, This is a bonus episode, which may become an occasional series about museum work around the world. This episode is sponsored by Landslide Creative. Show Notes & Transcript: WeTheMuseum.com

The 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence is almost here. How can museums and history organizations use the Semiquincentennial to promote a fuller story of American history, practice ethical commemoration, increase visitation, and boost funding for the field? In this episode, I discuss these questions with Madeleine Rosenberg, Pomeroy Foundation Semiquincentennial Manager at the American Association for State and Local History. Transcript & Show Notes: wethemuseum.com

Baltimore City Public Schools wanted to honor their food service workers, who plate up 88,000 free school meals a day and fed their community daily through pandemic closures. The Baltimore Museum of Industry wanted a project to foster social resilience. They collaborated to create Food for Thought, an exhibition featuring food service workers' portraits and voices alongside powerful facts about school nutrition. I spoke to BCPS’ Anne Rosenthal and BMI’s Beth Maloney about this partnership and what museums can learn from it. Show Notes/Transcript: wethemuseum.com

Whitney Plantation is the only former plantation site in Louisiana with an exclusive focus on slavery. In this episode, their Director of Education, Amber Mitchell, shares how two audio projects are helping educate even more people about the history and legacy of slavery. In 2021, they launched their first audio tour, a cutting-edge production that lets even more people visit the site. They also produced a limited series podcast called Tilling the Soil that Amber describes as a love letter to Black public history. Show Notes & Transcript: wethemuseum.com

Jared Jones still has trouble wrapping his head around the fact that the TikTok account he started at Sacramento History Museum has become possibly the most followed museum account on the entire platform, with over 2.4 million followers. In this episode, Jared shares with me the museum’s TikTok journey, how docent Howard became a minor celebrity, and what real-life impacts this engagement has had on the museum. Transcript & Show Notes: WeTheMuseum.com

To paraphrase Adam Rizzo: museums won’t do the right thing by their workers just because we ask nicely. In a field rife with labor issues, museum workers are increasingly turning to unions. In this episode, Adam Rizzo of the Philadelphia Museum of Art Union shares their multi-year journey from hushed initial conversations to a three-week strike that was ultimately successful. He walked me through the unionization process and reflected on why unions will make this field stronger. This episode was sponsored by Landslide Creative. Transcript & show notes: wethemuseum.com