Research Visits and Teaching Support
Thank you for your interest in working with the Hearst Museum. The Museum gallery will reopen to the public, and for UC Berkeley class visits, starting September 4, 2026. Access to collections for teaching and research remains limited at this time, while staff and resources are prioritized toward supporting repatriation activities. Please contact us via one of the mechanisms below, and we will do our best to accommodate you.
Media Permissions
If you have a Media permissions request, please review the additional information on our Media Permissions page, and submit your request using the form at the bottom of that page. For Native American audio requests, please submit your request to the California Language Archive (CLA) using the CLA request submission form.
Visits to the Gallery
UC Berkeley faculty and instructors can schedule class visits to the Museum gallery outside of public opening hours during the academic year. Please visit this page for more information.
For information on public opening hours, please go to our Visit page.
We are able to accommodate UC Berkeley-connected group tours on a limited basis. Please contact pahma-gallery@berkeley.edu for more information.
We are not able to accommodate K-12 visits at this time.
Research & Teaching Support
The Museum is currently able to accommodate limited access to its global collections for purposes of research and teaching. At this time we are able to accommodate requests from members of the UC Berkeley community and Berkeley affiliates, and from descendant communities. We are not able to accommodate requests from other individuals or institutions at this time due to staffing constraints.
Requests will be reviewed on a rolling basis, and scheduled as staffing and space resources permit. We will seek to accommodate as many requests as possible, but may need to decline, or defer some decisions to a later review date.
Visits from Tribal Communities
Native American tribes and tribal communities seeking information or access to collections, including under NAGPRA or CalNAGPRA, should contact the UC Berkeley NAGPRA team. Visits will be coordinated by the NAGPRA team, or by Hearst Museum staff. More information about UC Berkeley’s Native American repatriation efforts can be found on the UC Berkeley NAGPRA website.
Descendant communities from other parts of the world should contact Hearst Museum staff using the collections access process, described below. Communities wishing to discuss possible repatriation of objects or belongings within the Museum collections are encouraged to reach out to the Hearst Museum Executive Director at pahma-execdirector@berkeley.edu.
How to Submit a Collections Access Request
Currently, we are able to consider research and teaching requests from members of the UC Berkeley community, UC Berkeley affiliates, individuals affiliated with tribal communities from the US and Canada, and other descendant communities.
To submit a request for research, teaching, or tribal visits, please complete this Collections Access Request Form. Please submit your access request form as far in advance as possible.
Please note that as in years past, visits may occasionally need to be postponed, relocated, shortened, or even canceled, including on short notice, if staff, space, or other resources are needed for NAGPRA/CalNAGPRA- and/or repatriation-related work. We will do our best to notify you as far in advance as possible if rescheduling or cancellation is required. Any risk of financial loss (e.g., from changes to hotel or flight bookings) due to cancellation or rescheduling will be borne solely by the researcher.
How and when will my request be considered?
Requests will be reviewed on a rolling basis, and scheduled as staffing and space resources permit. Please allow two weeks for a reply after you submit your request form (above).
The Museum will seek to accommodate as many requests as possible within their stated time frames. If your request has a flexible time frame, please let us know on the request form.
- Research priority will be given to time sensitive requests, for example final research necessary to complete a dissertation or meet a publication deadline. Priority will be given to those requests that can be handled with lesser impact on staffing and space.
- Priority for both research and teaching visits will be given to requests involving a smaller number of visits and staff time to pull objects.
- Requestors are asked to be as flexible as possible in the dates of their requests.
- We are not able to support individual undergraduate student projects at this time, unless they are related to an undergraduate senior thesis.
- All student researchers must provide a letter of support from a UC Berkeley faculty member who is familiar with their research.
Note: Although we will work to avoid conflicts, there is a chance that scheduling may need to change at the last minute to accommodate tribal visits under NAGPRA/CalNAGPRA and UC NAGPRA Policy. We will do our best to notify affected groups with as much lead time as possible.
