Canna Lecture 2025

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Dr Martin Macgregor's interests lie in the history of the Scottish Highlands and Islands - to be more precise, Gaelic-speaking Scotland or 'Gaelic Scotland' - in all periods from around 1266 to the present, with special emphasis upon 1328 to 1625. He is interested in most human aspects, including:

• Politics: relations with the Scottish crown/government; relationships with Gaelic Ireland/Ireland; other external relationships; regional and local governance
• Society: structure and hierarchy; clans and kinship; chiefship; specific social groupings
• Culture: all types of cultural activity including relationships between 'high' and 'popular culture'; language, orality and literacy; the social roles of culture and cultural practitioners; education
• Religion: Catholicism and relationships with the papacy; the impact of Protestantism; religious personnel; devotion, commemoration and spirituality
• Economy: resources of land, sea and air; land use and economic organisation; trade and commerce
• Gender: the role, status and lives of women; masculinities and femininities
• Warfare: causation, prosecution and social significance
• Ethos and Identity: language, ethnicity, location in time (relationship to the past)and space (relationship to the environment)

He also has strong interests in theoretical and methodological issues:

• Paradigms governing approaches to Highland history: 'Highlands and Lowlands'; the 'Highland line' and 'Highland problem'; 'Greater Gaeldom' or the 'Gaelic world'; stasis, change, progression and agency; 'Internal Colonialism'; ideological stereotyping and 'Othering'; the ideological uses of the Highlands
• Gaelic and Gaelic-orientated sources within Highland history, especially poetry/song, and oral tradition: their value and significance relative to documentary sources

Please note that this is a free, in-person event held on the University of Edinburgh campus. It will not be live streamed - tickets are for access to the venue. However, the event may be photographed and added to LLC and the Writer in Residence's social media afterwards. If you would prefer not to appear in any photographs, please contact us in advance or speak to us on the day. It's not a problem.

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