Appointment period: 1/4/2026 – 31/3/2029

Neil Silberman is an author and heritage scholar who has participated in heritage projects in the US, Europe, China, South Korea, Latin America, the Caribbean, and the Middle East. He specializes in heritage theory and policy and has published extensively on the impact of cultural heritage on contemporary society.

From 2004 to 2007, Silberman was director of the Ename Center for Public Archaeology and Heritage Presentation in Belgium, where he oversaw the implementation of a number of EU heritage initiatives. He served for a decade (2003-2013) as the founding president of the International Scientific Committee on Interpretation and Presentation (ICIP) of the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS) and was chief editor of the 2008 ICOMOS Charter for the Interpretation and Presentation of Cultural Heritage Sites. He was named a lifetime fellow of US/ICOMOS in 2015 and has served as a senior advisor to the UNESCO Centre for the Interpretation and Presentation of World Heritage.

He has taught both graduate and undergraduate online courses in International Heritage Policy and Theory at Johns Hopkins University, the University of Maryland, and Haifa University.

His books and edited volumes on Heritage, Archaeology, and their impact on contemporary understandings of the past include: The Oxford Handbook of Public Heritage Method and Theory (2018), The Oxford Companion to Archaeology (2012); The Future of Heritage (2008); Who Owns the Past? (2007); Memory and Identity (2007); Heavenly Powers (1998); The Message and the Kingdom (1997); Invisible America (1995); The Hidden Scrolls (1994); A Prophet from Amongst You: The Life of Yigael Yadin (1993); Between Past and Present (1989); and Digging for God & Country (1982). He co-authored David and Solomon (2006) and The Bible Unearthed (2001) with Professor Israel Finkelstein.

In 2008, he joined the faculty of the Department of Anthropology of the University of Massachusetts Amherst and became one of the founders of its Center for Heritage and Society. He also served as co-editor of its journal Heritage & Society (2008-2014). He is a member of the editorial boards of the International Journal of Cultural Property and the Journal of Eastern Mediterranean Archaeology and Heritage Studies.

Email: neil.silberman@gmail.com