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Research
Theatres of the Cosmos - Planetarium History Research
My PhD research, funded by the Northern Bridge Consortium, is a Collaborative Doctoral Award between Armagh Observatory and Planetarium and Queen’s University Belfast. My subject is the geographies of the Armagh Planetarium, as a site of performance of science, and spectacle. In particular, I am focused on the period between 1937 and 1995, which contains both the planetarium as a built environment, but also the thirty one years it spent as an imagined space. I use archival resources, as well as a oral history, to build our understanding of the human networks that were essential to the project. How does a planetarium acquire cultural capital? How does it acquire the authority to speak on scientific matters? How do the technical capabilities of the planetarium impact the performances, and why does it matter? How does a planetarium operate in a divided society? These are some of the essential questions I will be answering in my research.
Brass and Glass - Astronomical Heritage Research
I also continue to research the history of astronomy on the Island of Ireland, with a particular focus on the material culture of scientific instruments. I have published work on the Troughton Equatorial Telescope (1795) and am currently working on papers focused on the history of the Grubb 10-Inch refractor (1885), and the Markree Grubb (1834). I have responsibility for the maintenance of the historical collection and this includes a number of Georgian astronomical regulators, and because of this I am very interested in the human-instrument networks which dominate telescope domes.