Weekly What's On: 24th Feb to 2nd March
You can find full details of all our forthcoming events and activities in our What’s On and MERL Families guides, which are now available from the Museum or to download from our website You can also see all events on our online calendar
MERL Seminar series: Untouchable England
Sounds familiar? Exploring British accents and dialects
Jonnie Robinson, Lead Curator of Sociolinguistics, British Library
Tuesday 25th February, 1pm
This talk will introduce the Library’s audio collections, resources and services and present examples from the LIbrary’s sound archives that document British English accents.
Followed by the chance to hear a rare recording of the celebrated bowl turner George Lailey being interviewed by the BBC in the 1940s.
For full details of the series, visit our website
Guided tour
Wednesdays, Saturdays and Sundays, 3-3.45pm
Free, booking advisable
Let our fully trained tour guides tell you the stories behind the objects on display and visit the object store to see MERL’s hidden treasures.
Rural Reads book club
Thursday, 27th February, 5.30-7pm
Free, drop-in (£1.50 for tea & biscuits)
Join us to discuss this month’s book ‘The Last Runaway’ by Tracy Chevalier and bring along your suggestions for our next ‘rural read’
For details visit the Rural Reads web page
Toddler time
Friday 28th February, 10-11am,
£2 per child, drop-in
Suitable for families with children aged 2-4
Come along to the Museum with your little ones and enjoy rhymes, songs and craft activities.
Italy at war: a selection from the archives
Tuesday 11th February to 30th March
Staircase hall, MERL
Free, drop-in, normal museum opening times
Highlights from the University’s fascinating records relating to Italian history.
Collecting the countryside: 20th century rural cultures
Until Autumn 2014
Temporary exhibition space
Free, drop in, normal museum opening times
Since 2008 the Museum of English Rural Life has been adding even more objects to its collection, with support from the Heritage Lottery Fund’s Collecting Cultures programme, in order to represent each decade of the last century. (Find out more in Curator, Isabel Hughes’ recent post) This exhibition gives a taste of what has been acquired and challenges visitors to suggest the modern-day objects that the Museum needs to collect for the future. The exhibition will help the Museum to explore how to incorporate more recent histories and representations of the English countryside into its displays as part of the new Our Country Lives project.