The H-Net Network on Material Culture and Vernacular Landscapes and Artifact Preservation will promote and support the study of objects, buildings, sites, structures, landscapes and other material cultural productions as part of the visual record of life.

We are currently seeking reviewers for a large backlog of books on material culture! Please consider becoming a reviewer for H-Material Culture by visiting this page and filling out the form to be included in our reviewer database.

We welcome announcements, CFP's, queries, contributions, and discussions of all things material! To add yours, click the orange "Start a Discussion" button above this text. 

Interested in writing for our Occasional Objects blog?  Reach out to the editorial team using the link on the right.  We also welcome totally new projects. If you have an idea for a new on-going feature or a one time resource for the field, let us know.  If you've got a grand idea, we have people who can help make it happen. Podcasts? Video tours? Image galleries? Digitization projects? We can do those, and more! Let us know what you're thinking.

And we tweet, too! https://twitter.com/H_Mat_Culture

Recent Announcements and other activity appear below. All CFP's posted to the site can be found in the links on the right, as can Jobs in Material Culture Studies.

Recent Announcements

Discussion published by Catherine Whalen on Wednesday, November 13, 2019

Deadline Nov. 15: Bard Graduate Center Research Fellowship - Fields of the Future Initiative

Bard Graduate Center welcomes applications for a funded research fellowship and mentorship program aimed at promoting diversity and inclusion in the advanced study of the material world. The 2020-2021 research theme is "How Do We Know." Applications are due Nov. 15, 2019.

Discussion published by Tim Urban on Tuesday, October 8, 2019

Project Presentation: Jacopo Strada's 'Magnum ac Novum Opus'. A Renaissance Corpus of Ancient Numismatics (Florence, 15 October 2019)

Jacopo Strada's 'Magnum ac Novum Opus'. A Renaissance Corpus of Ancient Numismatics
Project Presentation

Florence, Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz
15 October 2019

Recent Discussions

Discussion published by Linda Levitt on Monday, February 4, 2019

Snow Globes: From Art to Kitsch

Snow globes are childhood’s wintery dreamlands, so powerful an allegory that they appear in films, television series, and commercials to carry spectators into a holiday happily-ever-after. During the holiday season, should a snow globe not be readily available from a nearby toy chest or shelf, you can download a snowglobe app for both iPhone and Android, transforming your quotidian emails and social media sites. The ongoing popularity of these iconic pop culture objects, now transformed to the digital realm, gives pause to ask: why snow globes?

Occasional Objects series

The scrolling images to left are from H-Material-Culture's "Occasional Objects" series--a periodic informal examination of objects sent in by our subscribers. View the full collection, read the essays, and add your contribution here in Occasional Objects.

Recent Queries

Discussion published by John McCarthy on Monday, January 8, 2018

Confidentiality of Site Locations vs Public Interpretation

Archaeologists, having seen lots of destruction of sites due to looting, some of a commercial (rather than hobbyist) scale, tend to want to hold all information about archaeological sites (location, contents, etc.) as confidential, actually, as secret.  While this is somewhat understandable, this presents a significant challenge to public education and interpretation on archaeologial topics where often “place” and site content are key aspects of a site’s interpretive value.