Katherine Ott, Smithsonian Institution
Rutgers University-Camden, Oral History in the Mid-Atlantic Region (OHMAR), and Mid-Atlantic Regional Center for the Humanities (MARCH)
Time: Reception starts at 5 p.m., Lecture begins at 6 p.m.
Location: Rutgers-Camden Campus Center, Camden, NJ
Public history unleashes the imagination through chance encounters in places such as museums, archives, and parks. Objects open up sensory worlds that function outside of language and grammar. Within this world of objects and unanticipated experiences, the historical presence of people with disabilities is often found. Dr. Ott’s talk will traverse the history of disability to recover the lives of people, their bodily experiences, and how objects mark difference.
Katherine Ott is a public historian and curator at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of American History. Ott earned her Ph.D. at Temple University, where she studied the history of medicine and took the archives class taught by Fred Miller. Ott is the author or co-editor of three books, an OAH Distinguished Lecturer, and is in the midst of program planning for the 25th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act this July.
The Miller Lecture honors the life and legacy of Fredric M. Miller, the curator of the Urban Archives at Temple University from 1973 to 1989 and a program officer of the National Endowment for the Humanities from 1989 to 1998. Since 1999, Miller's peers have lectured on a variety of topics related to public history and the humanities. The 2015 Miller Lecture will be the culminating lecture in the series.
To register for this free event, please visit the Miller Lecture Eventbrite page.
The Miller Lecture in Public History is co-sponsored this year by the Oral History in the Mid-Atlantic Region (OHMAR) and the Mid-Atlantic Regional Center for the Humanities (MARCH)