Blogs & Exhibitions

New Connections Virtual Museum content New Connections

New Connections Virtual Museum

Welcome aboard! This is the main portal of the “New Connections Across the Northern Isles” virtual museum of maritime pasts, presents and futures.

This virtual museum was created with people across the Northern Isles of Scotland as part of our SGSAH-supported PhD project on 'Curating Heritage for Sustainable Communities in Highly Vulnerable Environments: The Case of Scotland’s Northern Isles'

Displaying the Past: Museum Studies, student work content flying bird over water

Displaying the Past: Museum Studies, student work

Each year, the Culture and Heritage degree programme offers a module Displaying the Past: Museum Studies.  The final piece of work in this module is to create an online exhibition with a central theme.  You can find these exhibitions here. 

 

Mimir's Well content Mimir's Well

Mimir's Well

Mimir's Well is a newspaper column in The Orcadian, run by the Institute for Northern Studies. In a light-hearted way, it explores topics relating to Orkney history, dialect, literature, and culture, which have come up in our daily work at the Institute.  Institute for Northern Studies staff are responsible for this column, MLitt and Doctoral students and invited guest writers are often invited to contribute to it.

Viking Burials in Scotland, Dr Shane McLeod content Dr Shane McLeod 2

Viking Burials in Scotland, Dr Shane McLeod

Launched in 2015 Dr Shane McLeod's blog comprises a list of culturally Scandinavian Viking Age burial (and therefore funeral) sites in modern-day Scotland. Most of the burials included grave-goods and are dated c. 850-950. 

Lynn Campbell's Blog content The Role of the Kirk in Orkney

Lynn Campbell's Blog

Orkney has never been regarded as an overly religious set of islands, and yet any reading of historical texts will tell you that the Kirk had a strong hand in creating our history.

Did the Kirk actually steering our history in one direction or another?  Why do we not have the same religious affiliations as our Western Islands cousins?  Was the Kirk at all powerful in Orkney?

Changescapes of Recovery Exhibition content Bay of Skaill

Changescapes of Recovery Exhibition

The organisers of the Changescapes of Recovery Art, Writing, Music & Craft Competition were astounded by the number of high-quality entries. It was incredible to see the amazing range of work produced by people around Orkney over such a challenging year. Judging was very difficult and there were a huge number of entries which could have made it to the final places.

Rebecca Ford's Blog content Words and waves blog

Rebecca Ford's Blog

Rebecca Ford is working on a PhD with the title “Words and Waves: A Dialogical Approach to Discourse, Community, and Marine Renewable Energy in Orkney”. The project is based at the Institute for Northern Studies with additional supervision from the Anthropology Department within the University of Aberdeen's School of Social Science.  In this blog, Rebecca discusses her research into the impact of Marine Renewable Energy in Orkney, and her experience of carrying out research in the community in which she grew up, and still lives.

Andrea Freund's Blog content Orkney Runes Blog

Andrea Freund's Blog

Andrea Freund obtained her PhD with the title “Runic writing in the diaspora: Expression of a Norse identity?”. The project was based at the Institute for Northern Studies with additional supervision at the Centre for Scandinavian Studies in Aberdeen and Orkney Museum. It was funded through an Applied Research Collaborative Studentship from the Scottish Graduate School for Arts and Humanities.  In this blog, Andrea discusses her research and anything to do with runes.