Image Of Scotland Research Articles

The making and the portrayal of Scottish distinctiveness: How does the narrative create its audience?

AbstractHow do states present themselves as inclusive towards migrants and their citizens? This article traces the discourse‐to‐audience framework through an analysis of the Scottish government's rhetoric on Scottish distinctiveness and its effect on how young migrants see Scotland. In order, we examine how the discourse of Scottish distinctiveness is constructed and conveyed through a close examination of Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon's public speeches. Through the examples given, we see how an image of Scotland as open, inclusive and outward‐looking is invoked. We then examine how the discourse fosters its audiences through narrative interviews conducted with young adult migrants living in Scotland. We operationalize Foucault's theory of governmentality to this extent and argue that the macro narrative of distinctiveness directs the ‘conduct of conduct’ of young migrants in Scottish society.

Придумати Шотландію: шотландська література другої половини ХХ – початку ХХІ століття від націоналізму до космополітизму

The paper studies the tendencies of contemporary Scottish prose in the recent three decades (starting from 1980s and up to now). Scotland is seen as an imaginary construct produced in the result of both literary and political discourses that are extremely interwoven. The research’s starting point is the problem of devolution, Scottish nationalism and their apparitions in literary texts. Alasdair Gray, James Kelman, and Irvine Welsh’s novels represent the ground for experiments with an idea of both national literature, and national identity. Scottish devolution and the apparitions of Scotland are seen through the predominantly fading white male masculinity within the context of class and self-identification. The motifs of loss, disorientation, instability, and macabre rebellion in the novels of devolution writers are inherently representational of the political scene at the time. The problem of identity is studied via the new narrative techniques introduced by Kelman and developed later by Welsh. Defying Standard English as a means of narrator’s control over characters’ discourses Kelman is thus trying to overthrow not only literary hierarchies, but also class and national ones. Kelman’s Glasgow Patter becomes a turning point in revealing the breeches in hierarchies within the institutions called the Great Britain and British literature. The scandal caused by Kelman’s novel How Late It Was, How Late that won Man Booker Prize in 1996 voiced not only literary, but also linguistic, national, and self-identification incongruities inscribed into the anglocentric political and literary hegemony. Moreover, paper concentrates on the humanist and ethic turn that Scottish prose takes closer to fin de siècle. Predominantly, this research deals with the texts of A. L. Kennedy and Jackie Kay. The issues of solipsism in a vibrant postmodern world, as well as the problems of policing race, gender, marriage come to the front of Scottish prose at the beginning of the epoch of naughts. The new images of Scotland are projected through the myriads of subjective mirrors of consciousnesses belonging to the unstable and quite exhausted individuals of any race, class, or sexuality. The cosmopolitan and inclusive Scotland arises from the pages of contemporary Scottish novels. At times, this is the Scotland that never calls itself as such, or mentions itself, let alone pondering on any national issues rather than the issue of common human cause of survival.

From Mary Queen of Scots to the Scottish Capuchins: Scotland as a symbol of Protestant persecution in seventeenth-century Italian literature

Italian authors of the seventeenth century produced a myriad of historical texts, tragedies, oratorios and poems that dealt with the events of Mary Stuart's life. The tremendous outcry that her story caused all over Europe made Scotland one of the most powerful symbols of persecution of Catholics by Protestants. It was the image of Scotland as a land of martyrdom that possibly prompted the publication of two seventeenth-century Italian ‘biographies’, narrating the vicissitudes of the lives of two Scottish capuchins, and which ran to multiple editions down to the eighteenth century. This article explores the literary reception of Mary Queen of Scots in seventeenth-century Italian literature and, in so doing, opens up religious, cultural, and political implications, pointing to links between Scottish Catholic and European intellectuals, and the publishing networks of sympathetic Marian writing.

‘The Image of Scotland which We Cherish in Our Hearts’: Burns Anniversary Celebrations in Colonial Otago

Scottish migrants fostered a range of cultural activities in the new worlds in which they settled, thereby identifying themselves as a distinct ethnic group. Celebrations of Scotland's national bard, Robert Burns, were the one recurring theme within all sites of settlement. The iconic figure of Burns is, in fact, central to the formulation, expression and commemoration of a Scottish cultural identity around the world. The present article explores the function of Burns celebrations in colonial Otago, the Scottish heartland of New Zealand. The celebrations were a key part of the Scots' associational culture in Otago, serving as an important social occasion within the Scottish community bounds and in wider Otago society. Moreover, the celebrations were effective sites of memory, employing familiar memory narratives and practices; these framed events and provided the initial common denominator that bound Scots and non-Scots together.

Fluid Boundaries of Belonging: ‘Locals’ and ‘Incomers’ in the Scottish Highlands

The Scottish Highlands have been described as the 'face 9 that shows the rest of the world (see Chapman 1978). David McCrone suggests that: ' the Scotland of our imaginations remains not only rural but largely Highland, replete with tartanry and clans. Ordinary does not figure much' (2001, p . 6). For the sake of tourist iconography, the heritage, culture, and location of 'Highland' people (whoever they might be) is recognizable world­ wide. This article focuses on the 'ordinary 9 that 'does not figure much': everyday interactions of locals and incomers in the Sutherland region. If the Highlands are an image of Scotland, this article delves into what 'Scottishness' means in the Highlands. As villages and towns are increasingly populated by incomers from England, I explore how local/incomer encounters

“Scottishness,”“Britishness,” and Scottish Tourism, 1770–1914

AbstractThis article examines the cultural significance of Scotland for the legions of English tourists who headed north in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and provides an overview of several scholarly debates that are currently taking place in the fields of tourism and of British national identity. The image of Scotland was refashioned in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, the result of changing cultural fashions and new political developments. Because the industry of tourism and the idea of Scotland developed alongside each other, Scotland played a disproportionately important role in the history of tourism, and tourism a disproportionately important role in the history of modern Scotland. The image of Scotland, for both Scots and foreigners, did not evolve in isolation. It developed simultaneously with the descent upon Scotland of masses of tourists, lured by a certain type of advertising, and armed with guidebooks and preconceived expectations of what they would find. Prompted by promotional materials, the comments of previous travelers, and literature, tourists claimed a sense of mastery over Scotland and its people. However, the tourist image of Scotland was not hegemonic. Thoughtful tourists were challenged by what they found in Scotland, discovering that they could not always make the country fit their expectations.

On comparing multifractal and classical features in minimum distance classification of AVHRR imagery

The ability to distinguish between different types of surfaces is the strength of texture descriptors in the analysis of satellite imagery. Although the most common analytical means are based on co‐occurrence analysis, considerable progress has been made in understanding the role of fractal and multifractal analysis in remote sensing. After indicating the limitations of using fractal dimensions as the only texture descriptor and introducing the concept of multifractal geometry, we consider the effectiveness of using multifractal and second‐order fractal features in image classification. In particular, we present the results of comparing two supervised classifications of an Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) image of Scotland using classical texture features and multifractal second‐order fractal ones. In terms of percentage correct and Khat statistics, this study provides evidence, with a confidence limit of 95%, that classifications using multifractal and second‐order fractal features are more accurate than those using classical features. The classification algorithm used for this study is a typical minimum distance classifier.

Selling the Spectre: Ghost Stories and Tourism in Modern Scotland

For a long time, Scotland has been associated in the international imaginary with ghosts, ghouls and other forms of spectral phenomena. To a large extent, tourism has been responsible for the development of a set of images of Scotland which emphasise the mysterious and numinous aspects of the country's terrain. This paper traces out the ways in which tourism and the ghostly have been inextricably interwoven in Scotland over the last two hundred and fifty years. To this end the paper examines a number of literary forms, from poetry and novels through to tourist promotion literature in catalogues and websites, all of which are oriented around constructing a sense of Scotland as a land literally haunted by its past. The paper considers the historical development of these literary forms, the reasons for their genesis, and the often strange mutations they are undergoing in the present day.

Nationality and children's drawings — pictures ‘about Scotland’ by primary school children in Edinburgh, Scotland and Syracuse, New York State

The way that children perceive and understand places and locations is an area of geographical research that had an intermittent history until the 1990s saw a sustained interest in ‘children's geographies’. Here I build upon these studies and those of spatial cognition, developmental psychology, constructions of nation and nationality, by asking children to draw pictures about a nation. I review this methodology and analyse drawings collected from work with children in Edinburgh, Scotland, and Syracuse, New York State. I obtained 127 pictures ‘about Scotland’ drawn by six to nine year olds. These drawings reveal a range of stereotypical images of Scotland that are learned, both nationally and internationally, by this early age. They also suggest that knowledge and experience of Scotland varies by school district in each location and that these children often intertwine personal and national narratives when representing Scotland.

Profane Pastimes and the Reformed Community: The Persistence of Popular Festivities in Early Modern Scotland

The Reformed Kirk of Scotland has a reputation for vigorous repression of festivity hardly to be surpassed by any other Protestant church. From 1560 on, the authorities of the kirk from local session to General Assembly waged a stern and unremitting campaign against the celebration of Yule, Easter, May Day, Midsummer, and saints' days; against feasting, whether at marriages or wakes; against Sunday sports and dancing and guising—in short, against anything that might distract newly Reformed laity from the central Protestant focus on the sermon, the Bible, and the godly life of moral discipline and prayer. Their goals were both negative and positive. They were intent on quashing popish superstition in part because they were convinced that its persistence helped to explain the recurrence of plague, famine, and other divine judgments on the land. In a more positive sense, they were trying to clear the way for construction of a new vision of the good life—one that exalted word over image and discipline over ritual, and in which community cohesion was achieved by a shared Protestant identity and the common goal of a devout and orderly society. Modern observers generally credit their campaign with remarkable success; certainly the popular image of Scotland after the Reformation is grim and joyless—and with some reason. Days of fasting and humiliation under presbyterian rule came close to outnumbering the old saints' days, and they vastly outnumbered new days of thanksgiving. Official policy on the matter of festivity was exemplary for a Reformed nation.

ROBIN JACKSON and SYDNEY WOOD (eds), Images of Scotland: The Journal of Scottish Education, Occasional Paper, Number One Dundee, Northern College, 1997, pp.62, Pbk. £6.50

ROBIN JACKSON and SYDNEY WOOD (eds), <i>Images of Scotland: The Journal of Scottish Education</i>, Occasional Paper, Number One Dundee, Northern College, 1997, pp.62, Pbk. £6.50

ROBIN JACKSON and SYDNEY WOOD (eds),Images of Scotland: The Journal of Scottish Education, Occasional Paper, Number One Dundee, Northern College, 1997, pp.62, Pbk. £6.50

ROBIN JACKSON and SYDNEY WOOD (eds),<i>Images of Scotland: The Journal of Scottish Education</i>, Occasional Paper, Number One Dundee, Northern College, 1997, pp.62, Pbk. £6.50

Scotland as a place: An analysis of the SNP's 1992 party political broadcasts

Abstract The study explores Scotland's place image as presented by the Scottish National Party in their 1992 general election broadcasts. I explore the SNP's contemporary image of Scotland using qualitative techniques, and an interview with the producer of the later broadcasts, Pete Martin. These are compared to the stereotypical image of Scotland which has evolved over centuries. The conclusions suggest Scottish consciousness of place is still structured around the discourses of Tartanry, Kailyard and Clydesidism, a trio the SNP struggled to overcome.

Rise and Be a Broadcaster Again?

In a small country like Scotland, our film and television industry is especially important to us because, as well as bringing the world to us, they provide us with the most powerful contemporary means for expressing our own identity to the world, whether in Scotland, the rest of the UK, or beyond. The image that we project of ourselves is important. By encouraging the growth and exposure of talent... and by ensuring strong broadcasting and film institutions... we are investing in Scotland's future excellence in broadcasting and film, and raising the image of Scotland around the world.

The National Drama

The National Drama was a nineteenth-century dramatic genre unique to Scotland, dealing with Scottish characters in Scottish settings. It has been neglected this century by scholars of theatre and of Scottish history in general. This is a curious oversight given the importance of the National Drama in the development of the Scottish theatre and to the image of Scotland as a nation at home and abroad. The omission may have been the result of a too close association with Sir Walter Scott in the minds of many for whom the phrase ‘High Tory Romanticism’ summed up Scott's career and influence. But, the National Drama is worthy of fresh consideration because, although it is true that dramatizations of some of Scott's Scottish works formed the core of the national repertoire, the National Drama comprised a wide variety of pieces from a range of sources and its influence over the Scottish theatre was considerable.

New Images of Scotland

New Images of Scotland