Charles William John Withers, FBA , FRSE , FAcSS , FRSGS (born 6 December 1954) is a British historical geographer and academic. He has been the Geographer Royal for Scotland since 2015, and held the Ogilvie Chair of Geography at the University of Edinburgh from 1994 to 2019.
Withers was born on 6 December 1954. [1] He was educated at Daniel Stewart's College, an all-boys private school in Edinburgh. He studied at the University of St Andrews (BSc), and Downing College, Cambridge (PhD). [2]
Withers joined the University of Edinburgh as Professor of Historical Geography in 1994. He was Head of its Institute of Geography from 2006 to 2009, and held the Ogilvie Chair of Geography from 2010 to 2019. [1] [3]
In September 2015, Withers was appointed Geographer Royal for Scotland: the first such appointment since 1897. [4]
The Highlands is a historical region of Scotland. Culturally, the Highlands and the Lowlands diverged from the Late Middle Ages into the modern period, when Lowland Scots language replaced Scottish Gaelic throughout most of the Lowlands. The term is also used for the area north and west of the Highland Boundary Fault, although the exact boundaries are not clearly defined, particularly to the east. The Great Glen divides the Grampian Mountains to the southeast from the Northwest Highlands. The Scottish Gaelic name of A' Ghàidhealtachd literally means "the place of the Gaels" and traditionally, from a Gaelic-speaking point of view, includes both the Western Isles and the Highlands.
The Scottish Enlightenment was the period in 18th- and early-19th-century Scotland characterised by an outpouring of intellectual and scientific accomplishments. By the eighteenth century, Scotland had a network of parish schools in the Scottish Lowlands and five universities. The Enlightenment culture was based on close readings of new books, and intense discussions which took place daily at such intellectual gathering places in Edinburgh as The Select Society and, later, The Poker Club, as well as within Scotland's ancient universities.
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Adam Ferguson,, also known as Ferguson of Raith, was a Scottish philosopher and historian of the Scottish Enlightenment.
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Scottish literature in the nineteenth century includes all written and published works in Scotland or by Scottish writers in the period. It includes literature written in English, Scottish Gaelic and Scots in forms including poetry, novels, drama and the short story.
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Scottish Gaelic, is a Celtic language native to Scotland. A member of the Goidelic branch of the Celtic languages, Scottish Gaelic, like Modern Irish and Manx, developed out of Middle Irish. Most of modern Scotland was once Gaelic-speaking, as evidenced especially by Gaelic-language placenames.
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