Dr Susan Ashley

Associate Professor

Department: Arts

Susan Ashley is now retired from her position as Associate Professor in the MA programme Creative and Cultural Industries Management. She has been a cultural studies scholar interested in the democratisation of public culture, with a focus on activism in culture and heritage by black and global majority organisations in the UK.

Susan will still be involved in "HERE North East", a cultural hub and archive with the community-led Steering Group, supported through four regional universities' seed funding. She recently completed a National Archives Testbed project plus the AHRC project "(Multi)Cultural Organisational Archives", and is past AHRC Leadership Fellow for "(Multi)Cultural Heritage: New Perspectives on Public Culture, Identity and Citizenship".

Dr Ashley holds a PhD in Communication and Culture from York University, Toronto. Her research on heritage and its relation to subjectivity, representation and citizenship has been published in books by Routledge and Ashgate, and in peer-reviewed journals such as Organization, International Journal of Cultural Policy, Museum & Society and International Journal of Heritage Studies. Her monograph "A Museum in Public: Revisioning Canada’s Royal Ontario Museum" was published by Routledge in 2019. Her latest book, co-edited with Degna Stone, is "Whose Heritage? Challenging Race and Identity in Stuart Hall’s Post-nation Britain" with Routledge 2023.

Dr. Ashley also has 20 years of consultancy and government work coordinating projects for culture and heritage sites across Canada. This work included policy, planning and developments related to heritage commemorations, disabled access, and diverse events, media and programs. She also has a background in journalism editing, writing and production for several community newspapers in Canada.

https://northumbria.academia.edu/SusanAshley

Email Susan

Research Themes and Scholarly Interests

My research has been aimed at the democratisation of public culture; promoting social equality by challenging and improving cultural institutional practices, and contributing to social justice in relation to challenges of neoliberalism, globalisation and migration.

Key Publications

Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
Whose Heritage? Challenging Race and Identity in Stuart Hall’s Post-nation Britain, Ashley, S., Stone, D. 16 Feb 2023
A Museum in Public: Revisioning Canada’s Royal Ontario Museum, Ashley, S. 20 Aug 2019
Heritage-making, borderwork and (multi) cultural organisations in the north of England, Ashley, S. 21 Jul 2020, Migrant, Multicultural and Diasporic Heritage, London, Taylor & Francis
Introduction: Critical Heritage Studies in Canada, Ashley, S., Terry, A. 2018, In: Journal of Canadian Studies/Revue d'etudes canadiennes
Acts of Heritage, Acts of Value: Memorializing at the Chattri Indian Memorial, UK, Ashley, S. 4 Apr 2016, In: International Journal of Heritage Studies
Recognition and repentance in Canadian multicultural heritage: The Community Historical Recognition Program and Italian Canadian memorializing, Gordon-Walker, C., Alvarez Hernandez, A., Ashley, S. 2018, In: Journal of Canadian Studies/Revue d'etudes canadiennes
Diverse Spaces: Identity, heritage and community in Canadian public culture, Ashley, S. Nov 2013
State Authority and the Public Sphere: Ideas on the Changing Role of the Museum as a Canadian Social Institution, Ashley, S. 14 Nov 2019, Museum Studies, Taylor & Francis
‘Engage the World’: examining conflicts of engagement in public museums, Ashley, S. May 2014, In: International Journal of Cultural Policy
Introduction: Heritage-Outside-In, Ashley, S., Frank, S. 8 Aug 2016, In: International Journal of Heritage Studies

Current and Recent Projects

Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
(Multi)Cultural Heritage: New Perspectives on Public Culture, Identity and Citizenship, Ashley, S. (Principal Investigator), Arts & Humanities Research Council, 12/06/17 - 11/06/19, £173,548.00
Memorializing as valuation: Examining public culture at the Chattri Sikh Memorial, Brighton, Ashley, S. (Principal Investigator), Arts & Humanities Research Council, 02/09/13 - 31/05/14, £29,577.00
(Multi)Cultural organisational Archives, Ashley, S. (Principal Investigator), Arts & Humanities Research Council, 01/05/20 - 31/03/22, 0.00

Professional Activity

Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
Organising a conference, workshop, ...: Chair, Whose Heritage? symposium 2019
Other: Execultive Member, Association of Critical Heritage Studies 2016
Other: Chair, Association for Critical Heritage Studies - Canadian Chapter 2019
Other: Website (Multi)Cultural Heritage 2019
Editorial work: Journal of Canadian Studies/Revue d'etudes canadiennes (Journal) 2018

PGR Supervision

Leonie Wieser History-making in an unequal present: Three perspectives on migration pasts in the North East of England Start Date: 07/10/2014 End Date: 31/10/2019
Degna Stone Examining visibility and expression in African and Asian diaspora arts and heritage in the north of England. Start Date: 18/01/2021 End Date: 10/01/2023
Frances Guy Here You Are: examining the uses and impacts of contemporary participatory art commissions in heritagescapes Start Date: 01/10/2016
Kathleen Boodhai Indian Heritage-ness in Diaspora: Transnational Case Studies Start Date: 01/10/2017
Joan Buchanan Valorising Cornish minority heritage: UNESCO and Performative Heritage Start Date: 01/10/2016 End Date: 21/01/2021

Qualifications

Cultural Studies PhD June 30 2011
Fellow (FHEA) Higher Education Academy (HEA) 2015

Northumbria Open Days

Open Days are a great way for you to get a feel of the University, the city of Newcastle upon Tyne and the course(s) you are interested in.

Research at Northumbria

Research is the life blood of a University and at Northumbria University we pride ourselves on research that makes a difference; research that has application and affects people's lives.