Jennie Coleman - Director
My academic qualifications, PhD, M Mus (Ethnomusicology), Post Graduate Diploma (Tertiary Teaching), Mus B(Hons), reflect a diversity of skills, interests and professional activities. As a researcher, writer and educator, I place immense value on learning and strive to maintain consistently high standards of presentation in sharing the understandings of that learning.
I'm passionate about history, particularly New Zealand history. And one of my grandfathers, the late Harry Coleman, is largely responsible for that. From the time I was old enough to follow him around the family farm, Grandad told me stories - his stories of 'the old days'. He made history dance with such energy and colour through the lives of people and places, events and activities, investing in them an enduring life force. What a privilege - and so my passion was nurtured, all the way to a PhD at the University of Otago and beyond ... [see publications & research papers]
As a fifth generation New Zealander I discovered an identity enriched by descent from Cornish, Scots, Irish and Huguenot cultures. Beyond the simple facts of births, deaths and marriages, our forebears in this country forged real lives. Too often we know too little about those real lives. Mostly, we are not to blame for that but it does create questions whose answers are not always easy to find.
Throughout my own research experiences in archives, libraries, museums and the like (otherwise known as repositories) in cities, small towns and country districts, I continue to share at first hand the problems and frustrations encountered in the effort to find answers to those questions. Sometimes it feels like one step forwards and two back, then a couple more in sideways directions - simultaneously! Such is the nature of the enquiry process.