Highland 2007 was a year-long celebration of Highland culture which took place from January until December 2007. It involved local communities throughout the Scottish Highlands and Islands as well as people across Scotland, the UK and beyond.
Highland 2007 was a year-long celebration of Highland culture which took place from January until December 2007. It involved local communities throughout the Scottish Highlands and Islands as well as people across Scotland, the UK and beyond.
The concept of 2007 as 'Scotland's Year of Highland Culture' was suggested by then First Minister of the Scottish Parliament, Jack McConnell. During the Convention of the Highlands and Islands in 2003, he declared that he was so impressed by the momentum built up by the failed Inverness/Highlands bid to be European Capital of Culture 2008, that he would back a celebration of Highland culture in 2007.
Its proponents had claimed that Highland 2007 would bring significant economic and social benefits which would endure well beyond the celebrations themselves. However, an evaluation report stated that there were "Criticisms from some promoters about aspects of the funding process and from within the Gaelic community about its failure to capitalise more on the opportunities on offer." [1]
The Inverness Museum and Art Gallery was re-designed in time for Highland 2007, opening after six months of closure to allow a £1.3m makeover. [2]
The programme of events developed for Highland 2007 encompassed the Arts, the Environment, Heritage, Language, Science and Sport. Street Parties, a rededication of Culloden Battlefield, a homecoming for expatriate Orcadians, a marathon in Inverness and a showcase of Gaelic Song with Anne Lorne Gilles were planned. Rock band Runrig played at Drumnadrochit. The programme also included The Vital Spark Interpretation Conference - an event which saw heritage interpreters from across the world meeting for three days in Aviemore.
Events began on 12 January 2007 with a street party held in Inverness. Bad weather was to curtail the street party. A reenactment of the historic shinty match between Strathglass Shinty Club and Glenurquhart Shinty Club was planned to take place at the Bught Park earlier that day, but a waterlogged pitch cause the shinty match to be put off until 2008, [3] when it was then cancelled again.
Fort William is a town in Lochaber in the Scottish Highlands, located on the eastern shore of Loch Linnhe. At the 2011 census, Fort William had a population of 10,459, making it the second largest settlement in both the Highland council area, and the whole of the Scottish Highlands; only the city of Inverness has a larger population.
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.
Shinty is a team sport played with sticks and a ball. Shinty is now played mainly in the Scottish Highlands and among Highland migrants to the big cities of Scotland, but it was formerly more widespread in Scotland, and was even played in Northern England into the second half of the 20th century and other areas in the world where Scottish Highlanders migrated.
Inverness is a city in the Scottish Highlands, having been granted city status in 2000. It is the administrative centre for The Highland Council and is regarded as the capital of the Highlands.
Gairloch is a village, civil parish and community on the shores of Loch Gairloch in Wester Ross, in the North-West Highlands of Scotland. A tourist destination in the summer months, Gairloch has a golf course, a museum, several hotels, a variety of shops, takeaway restaurants, a community centre, a leisure centre with sports facilities, a local radio station, beaches and nearby mountains. Gairloch is one of the principal villages on the North Coast 500 route.
The Royal National Mòd is an Eisteddfod-inspired international Celtic festival focusing upon Scottish Gaelic literature, traditional music, and culture which is held annually in Scotland. It is the largest of several major Scottish Mòds and is often referred to simply as the Mòd.
BBC Radio nan Gàidheal is a Scottish Gaelic language radio station owned and operated by BBC Scotland, a division of the BBC. The station was launched in 1985 and broadcasts Gaelic-language programming with the simulcast of BBC Radio Scotland. Its headquarters is located on Seaforth Road, Stornoway along with BBC Alba and MG Alba.
Eleanor Roberta Scott is a Scottish politician and physician. She was Scottish Greens Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) for the Highlands and Islands from 2003–2007, then female co-convener of the party from 2008–2011 with Patrick Harvie.
Merkinch is an area of the city of Inverness in the Highland council area of Scotland. One of the oldest neighbourhoods in Inverness, it's situated in the city's north-west flanked by the Caledonian Canal to its west and River Ness to its east. It is a traditionally working-class area.
The Highlands and Islands is an area of Scotland broadly covering the Scottish Highlands, plus Orkney, Shetland, and the Outer Hebrides.
The University of the Highlands and Islands (UHI) is an integrated, tertiary institution encompassing both further and higher education. It is composed of 12 colleges and research institutions spread around the Highlands and Islands, Moray and Perthshire regions of Scotland. UHI offers further education, undergraduate, postgraduate and research programmes which can be studied at a range of locations across the area and online. It has 31,000 students, including 19,779 further education students and 11,210 higher education students.
The Hebridean Celtic Festival or HebCelt is an international Scottish music festival, which takes place annually in Stornoway on Lewis, in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland. Headliners to date include Runrig, Van Morrison, Deacon Blue, The Fratellis, The Levellers and KT Tunstall. Many other acts take part in the event, including visiting international artists, solo artists and local musicians. The festival regularly attracts over 16,000 attendees and provides significant economic and cultural benefits for its host area.
Strathglass Shinty Club or "Comunn Camanachd Straghlais" in Scottish Gaelic is a shinty club from Cannich, Inverness-shire. The club was founded in 1879, and played a major role in the development of the rules of the sport. The first team plays in National Division One but played in the Marine Harvest Premier Division after two successive promotions from the old North Division One from 2006 to 2008. The club restarted its second team in 2017, and there is a successful women's team, started in 2006.
The Highland Folk Museum is a museum and an open-air visitor attraction in Newtonmore in Badenoch and Strathspey in the Scottish Highlands, United Kingdom.
BBC Alba is a Scottish Gaelic-language free-to-air public broadcast television channel jointly owned by the BBC and MG Alba. The channel was launched on 19 September 2008 and is on-air for up to seven hours a day. The name Alba is the Scottish Gaelic name for Scotland. The station is unique in that it is the first channel to be delivered under a BBC licence by a partnership and was also the first multi-genre channel to come entirely from Scotland with almost all of its programmes made in Scotland.
The Mod Cup, also known as the Aviemore Cup1995 - Royal National Mòd Programmes and fringe events > Royal National Mòd Programmes > [Mod / Mòd Naìseanta Rìoghail - An Comunn Gaidhealach - National Library of Scotland] is a trophy in the sport of shinty first competed for in 1969, traditionally played for by the two teams who are based closest to the host venue of the Royal National Mod. The current holders are Aberdour.(2022)
The Isle of Skye, or simply Skye, is the largest and northernmost of the major islands in the Inner Hebrides of Scotland. The island's peninsulas radiate from a mountainous hub dominated by the Cuillin, the rocky slopes of which provide some of the most dramatic mountain scenery in the country. Although Sgitheanach has been suggested to describe a winged shape, no definitive agreement exists as to the name's origins.
Jean Urquhart is a Scottish politician. She was formerly a Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP), first elected in 2011 for the Highlands and Islands region as a Scottish National Party (SNP) member, then continuing to sit as an independent after she left the SNP in October 2012. She had been an SNP councillor at the Highland Council from 2003 to 2011.
John Bradford Finnie is a Scottish Greens politician. He was the Green Member of the Scottish Parliament (MSP) for the Highlands and Islands region from 2016 up until 2021, having previously sat as a Scottish National Party (SNP) member from 2011 to 2012 then as an independent from 2012 to 2016.
Inverness Museum and Art Gallery is a museum and gallery on Castle Wynd in Inverness in the Highlands of Scotland. Admission is free. The collection and facilities are managed by High Life Highland on behalf of Highland Council.
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