Research and Collaboration

The University of Birmingham has established an ongoing relationship with the new National Public Housing Museum in Chicago.

During 2012, a team of researchers from the Institute of Archaeology and Antiquities visited the museum to carry out laser scanning of the building, to preserve a record of the historic site as it stood before further development for perpetuity. Not only does this demonstrate the cutting-edge technologies available to Birmingham scholars and the novel ways in which they can be used, but it also shows the University's commitment to participate in all aspects of Chicago's public life in a positive and supportive fashion.

The completed Laser Scan was presented to the National Public Housing Museum by the University of Birmingham in October 2012. 

As part of the University’s Greater Chicago Initiative, the Ironbridge Institute is forging links with the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC) who have developed a highly successful inter-disciplinary Centre focusing on Cultural Heritage - Collaborative for Cultural Heritage Management and Policy (CHAMP). This mirrors the University's own International Centre for Heritage, with its own focus on the management and investigation of heritage sites.

In December 2012, a Memorandum of Understanding was signed between the Ironbridge Institute and CHAMP to encourage greater research cooperation between the two institutions.

The University's Shakespeare Institute, based in Shakespeare's hometown of Stratford-upon-Avon, is recognised as one of the premier global centres of studying Shakespeare and his milieu. It has long had a tradition of associating with the premier organisations concerned with performing the Bard's plays, most notably the Royal Shakespeare Company.

These links have now been extended to Chicago, where a close relationship between the Shakespeare Institute and the Chicago Shakespeare Theater has developed. Along with the exchange of staff and information incumbent in any such relationship, the Chicago Shakespeare Theater has kindly agreed to host summer interns under the University's Global Challenge programme, offering the experience of working with prominent American Shakespeareans to University of Birmingham students.