• A photograph of a drawing of a crowd watching a theatrical performance inside a nineteenth-century style theatre hall

St Andrew’s Day celebrations in Asia

By Tanja Bueltmann As St Andrew’s Day nears Scots all around the world are preparing to celebrate it in style. From New York in the United States to Dunedin in New Zealand, St Andrew’s Day celebrations are now a truly…

Emigration from Aberdeenshire and Banffshire

By Marjory Harper In February 1983, just as I was finishing my PhD, I gave my first conference paper in the slightly intimidating surroundings of Marischal College at the University of Aberdeen. The event, organised jointly by two university departments…

View of Cathcart Castle tower after collapse, December 1979

1980-81 Excavations of Cathcart Castle, Glasgow

An extract from Open Access article, Cathcart Castle, Glasgow – Excavations 1980–81, by Brian Kerr et. al. Published in the Scottish Archaeological Journal, Volume 38 Issue supplement, Page 1-100, ISSN 1471-5767 Available Online Oct 2016 ‘The castle of Cathcart is…

A century of temperance in alcohol policy and licensing law

By Stuart MacLennan “Crackdowns” on alcohol my well be de rigueur, but they are most certainly not novel. The early 20th century provides the genesis for many contemporary alcohol restrictions, with the temperance movement having achieved considerable influence over public…

When conservation is not enough

By Dominic Hinde In its nine years in power, Scotland’s Scottish National Party (SNP) government has sought to redefine many areas of how the country is governed. In many fields, from healthcare to education, the party has attempted to create…

David Hume and Scottish Philosophy

By Gordon Graham Not so very long ago, it was quite widely accepted that Britain’s most significant contribution to the development of philosophy was ‘empiricism’ and that its great exponents were the Englishman John Locke, the Irishman George Berkeley, and…