Hello-

I’m organising a conference in Manchester next April (11-12), on museums and climate change. This is aimed at helping museums, academic, and agencies unleash the potential of museums (of all kinds, not just natural heritage or science museums) to engage people effectively and constructively around the global challenge of climate change. How can we enable people to take part in the climate challenge? What responsibilities do we have to do so? What positions can we, and do we want to, take in terms of providing challenge and support for our visitors, stakeholders and partners? How can we draw on our resources to meet the challenge constructively? What support do each of us, and all of us, need, for our museums to contribute meaningfully and impactfully to the challenge? How can we help people imagine, debate and enact the future they want, for themselves and others?

So, if you believe that museums are not neutral and should at least try to do the right thing; that museum experiences (of all kinds) can be transformational; that museums exist to connect people with the world, not just their preserved collections; and that we can support people’s ongoing engagement with climate change, in terms of constructive thinking, feeling and doing, then this conference is for you. It is not about blinding people with science or graphs, but about looking at connecting personal, and collective action with the local and global challenges. It is absolutely not about polar bears on ice floes slowly sinking into a melting Arctic ocean depressing us all. It is about collaboration, excitement, and turning the best quality academic thinking on engagement into action.

The conference will be a combination of presentations from academics, networks/agencies leading on climate change engagement (internationally), and on the Tokyo Protocol, Paris Agreement and Sustainable Development Goals, followed by workshops that are aimed at helping people explore how they, and their organisations, can connect with these international initiatives to transform our world [for the better]. Raising awareness of the SDGs and Tokyo Protocol is really important, as is looking at how to turn that into personally meaningful, inspiring, and impactful activities for the public, and the conference will help everyone to connect their work with this global agenda, working at both local and global levels.

I’m trying to work out the level of demand for this (and of course if anyone is interested in doing a presentation), so please let me know if you think this could be for you. It will be on the 11-12^th April next year, and is likely to cost c.£100-150 for attendance (although that depends on numbers etc etc). Also, let me know what you would most like to get out of it, to try to work that into the programme.

Very best wishes,

Henry

Henry McGhie BSc MA AMA | Head of Collections and Curator of Zoology | Manchester Museum | The University of Manchester | Oxford Road | Manchester | M13 9PL |  0161 275 2482 | www.manchester.ac.uk/museum |

This year I am promoting biodiversity for the good of the environment and for people's well-being