Royal Society of Edinburgh award for 'The Matter of Slavery in Scotland' project

The School of History, Classics and Archaeology and the Scottish Centre for Diaspora Studies is delighted to announce that the Royal Society of Edinburgh has awarded funding to the project, The Matter of Slavery in Scotland.

The project under Professor Nuala Zahedieh, in collaboration with Dr Sarah Laurenson at the National Museum of Scotland, aims to raise public awareness and understanding of the difficult, and long-neglected, topic of Scotland's historic connections with the Atlantic slave system. The subject has not been fully explored in existing scholarship or public representation of the past and through a series of workshops the project aims to develop strategies and methodologies to fill this gap, and to bring together university researchers, curators, teachers, and charities.

Objects from eight categories will be chosen from Scottish collections and examined through the lens of slavery in order to build tools for integrating the topic into museum displays and public history narratives, and so shift understandings of the role of slavery in Scottish history. Public events will drive further discussions about slavery in Scotland's past.

Professor Zahedieh said, 'I am delighted that the Royal Society of Edinburgh has awarded funding for The Matter of Slavery in Scotland which will allow the Scottish Centre for Diaspora Studies and the National Museum of Scotland to combine to build on the successful workshop, 'Slavery and the Scottish Country House', held last July. Taking a material culture approach, this workshop programme will allow researchers in the university, museum, and heritage sectors to collaborate in developing practical strategies for helping the pulic understand what is a problematic subject in Scotland’s history'.

Professor Nuala Zahedieh's staff profile

Scottish Centre for Diaspora Studies

Website for the workshop 'Slavery and the Scottish Country House'