Popular Mapping Identities Conference was a Great Success

The UHI Institute for Northern Studies Mapping Identities: Visual Depictions of Scotland Conference, hosted at UHI Perth on 10th February 2026, was an outstanding success and received much positive feedback from attendees.

The Mapping Identities project, developed by Dr. Andrew Lind and Dr. Oisin Plumb at UHI INS, was completed in partnership with the National Library of Scotland and the Landscape Research Group. It received funding from a generous RSE Research Collaboration Grant. This conference united scholars from various disciplines to explore how maps have been and continue to be used to interpret and shape Scotland's understanding of its present, past, and future.

Building on themes identified in three workshops held in 2025, the final hybrid conference highlighted the exciting research being conducted across Scotland in historical map interpretation.

The extremely full day was divided into four separate panels. The first panel focused on ‘Memory, Meaning, and Modernity’. The second panel addressed ‘Landscape, Community, and Nature’. After an excellent keynote lecture by Chris Fleet from the National Library of Scotland, titled ‘Shaping Scotland: Maps, History, and Identity,’ the afternoon panels explored ‘Early Mapping’ and ‘Mapping the Early Modern’.

The lectures were delivered either in person or online. During the first panel, the discussion focused on maps as communication systems, a project aimed at establishing local resources, and the challenges that arise from this – who would have thought that some locally produced estate maps could be as large as a carpet! Additionally, the conversation included the examination of literary maps across the centuries, including those produced from the works of Lewis Grassic Gibbon and Walter Scott.

During a coffee break, the delegates had the opportunity to discuss, network, and prepare for Panel Two. This panel focused on Scotland’s wild areas, digital mapping, and the evolving identities of the Scottish people. Following this, there was an engaging lecture on mapping in documentaries, which highlighted community involvement in The John O’ Groats Trail, which stretches from Inverness to the northern tip of Caithness.

Panel 3 covered a diverse range of topics, including Norse identity in late medieval Unst, changing geographical landscapes in the late medieval period, reconstructing how early maps were surveyed, and an examination of knowledge streams and power networks through the study of maps of northern Britain prior to the seventeenth century.

The conference concluded with Panel 4, which focused on ‘Mapping the Early Modern’. This session presented a range of research topics, including the examination of identities within the material collections held by the National Museum of Scotland, knowledge of Scotland in the early modern Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the mapping of events related to the witch trials in Scotland, and the ways in which maps influenced the post-Jacobite rehabilitation of Scottish identity.

Dr. Andrew Lind stated, “The Mapping Identities Conference attracted an impressive lineup of speakers from around the world, all showcasing their outstanding research related to the four themes we established during our initial workshops last year. We were overwhelmed by the response to our call for papers, and the large turnout—both in person and online—highlighting the success of this project. Thank you to everyone who attended, and a special thanks to all the speakers who generously took time out of their day to present their research and the team at UHI Perth who helped make it all happen”.

Dr. Oisin Plumb said, “We were delighted by the quality and variety of the papers at the conference. It was great to see such excellent discussions emerge from the papers. Already we have begun to see new links and collaborations emerge between researchers, which is what RSE research collaboration grants are all about. We are looking forward to the next stage of the project- showcasing research on mapping in Scotland in public talks and a banner exhibition in locations throughout the country”.

The conference was chaired by Dr Andrew Lind and Dr Oisin Plumb of UHI Institute for Northern Studies.