Watch: Twenty Questions to Ask an Object

What do you get when you combine a hotel ballroom full of material culture scholars (they have their own caucus, now two decades strong) and the classic game of twenty questions? A Princeton-meets-Antiques Roadshow-style workshop that is almost as fun to watch as it was to participate in. Spend an inquisitive six minutes with the below video and then consider the finer points of the exercise, including the full list of questions with which you can pepper friends and family at holiday gatherings.