A Clean Mess

Dr Tiffany Jenkins is a thoughtful and incisive cultural historian and writer whose work explores the complex relationship between society, art, and institutions. She is the author of the widely praised Keeping Their Marbles: How Treasures of the Past Ended Up in Museums and Why They Should Stay There—hailed by The Sunday Times as “an outstanding achievement, clear-headed, wide-ranging and incisive.”

Her most recent book, Strangers and Intimates: The Rise and Fall of Private Life, continues her deep engagement with how cultural norms evolve, focusing on the shifting boundaries of personal and public life. Jenkins has also authored Contesting Human Remains in Museum Collections: The Crisis of Cultural Authority and edited Political Culture: Soft Interventions and Nation Building, contributing to contemporary debates about cultural heritage and institutional authority.

A trustee of the British Museum, Dr Jenkins has held academic positions as an honorary fellow in the History of Art at the University of Edinburgh and as a visiting fellow in the Department of Law at the London School of Economics. Her academic journey spans a BA in art history and a PhD in sociology, giving her a unique interdisciplinary voice.

Beyond her writing, Jenkins brings cultural conversations to the airwaves. She wrote and presented the BBC Radio 4 series A History of Secrecy and Contracts of Silence, which examined the growing use of non-disclosure agreements. She’s a familiar voice on Saturday Review and Front Row, and currently hosts the Behind the Scenes at the Museum podcast, offering listeners a deeper look into the inner workings of the cultural world.

Her opinion essays have appeared in The Guardian, The Observer, the Financial Times, The Spectator, and The Scotsman, where she once held a regular column, enriching public discourse with her sharp insights and cultural analysis.