Dr Samuel Alberti

Honorary Professor

History University of Stirling, Stirling, FK9 4LA

Dr Samuel Alberti

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About me

Samuel JMM Alberti PhD FRSE is Director of Collections at National Museums Scotland. He trained in the history of science and medicine and wrote a thesis on late Victorian science at the universities of Leeds and Sheffield. He became interested in museums as the focus of historical study before working in them – first at the Manchester Museum, then as Director of Museums and Archives at the Royal College of Surgeons of England (which includes the Hunterian Museum).

Sam is an Honorary Professor at the University of Stirling Centre for Environment, Heritage and Policy. Previously he was Visiting Professor at the University of Edinburgh College of Medicine and Veterinary Medicine. He has curated exhibitions on race, museum history, and the First World War; his books include Nature and Culture: Objects, Disciplines and the Manchester Museum (MUP, 2009) and Morbid Curiosities: Medical Museums in Nineteenth-Century Britain (OUP, 2011). His book on science and technology collections will be published in 2022.

Sam's research has focussed on the history of collections, in particular the trajectories and meanings of scientific, medical and natural objects in Britain since 1800. His current museum practice focuses on Cold War heritage and on museums and climate change.

Research programmes