Speaker:
Prof Murray Pittock
Bio:
Since 2007, Murray Pittock has been Bradley Professor at the University of Glasgow and successively Dean, Vice-Principal and Pro Vice Principal at the University. In 2022, he was declared Scotland’s Knowledge Exchange Champion of the Year for work on economic impact of culture, placemaking and the Kelvin Hall development. Outside the University, he serves on the National Trust for Scotland Board (2019-27) and Investment Committee, as well as acting as Co-chair of the Scottish Arts and Humanities Alliance, on the Governance Board of the Scottish Council on Global Affairs, and member of the Board of the European Alliance for Social Science and Humanities and BiCC Council. He is also a member of the institutional panel of the REF 2025 People, Culture and Environment pilot.
Murray’s academic work in the words of a recent UK Research and Innovation report is ‘world-leading and field-defining’, reflected in some 30 books: most recently, Scotland: the Global History. His research has been published or discussed in Braille, Catalan, French, Gaelic, German, Hebrew, Italian, Mandarin, Portuguese and Slovak. He is currently (2023-26) co-investigator on the £6.25M Museums in the Metaverse Innovation Accelerator and has led some 25 grants in his career. In 2013, he planned and secured agreement for the development of a national graduate school of arts and humanities in Scotland (SGSAH) and the following year founded the first International Association for the Study of Scottish Literatures. In 2023, he was a senior member of the Centre for Robert Burns Studies Queen’s Anniversary Prizewinning team and author of the only economic impact study of a single writer in the UK; he is also a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh and a Member of Academia Europaea and has been awarded or shortlisted for numerous prizes. He is one of few academics to have given a prize lecture at both the Royal Society of Edinburgh and the British Academy, where he gave the Chatterton lecture in poetry in 2002.
Murray’s academic work in the words of a recent UK Research and Innovation report is ‘world-leading and field-defining’, reflected in some 30 books: most recently, Scotland: the Global History. His research has been published or discussed in Braille, Catalan, French, Gaelic, German, Hebrew, Italian, Mandarin, Portuguese and Slovak. He is currently (2023-26) co-investigator on the £6.25M Museums in the Metaverse Innovation Accelerator and has led some 25 grants in his career. In 2013, he planned and secured agreement for the development of a national graduate school of arts and humanities in Scotland (SGSAH) and the following year founded the first International Association for the Study of Scottish Literatures. In 2023, he was a senior member of the Centre for Robert Burns Studies Queen’s Anniversary Prizewinning team and author of the only economic impact study of a single writer in the UK; he is also a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh and a Member of Academia Europaea and has been awarded or shortlisted for numerous prizes. He is one of few academics to have given a prize lecture at both the Royal Society of Edinburgh and the British Academy, where he gave the Chatterton lecture in poetry in 2002.
Topic:
Date:
28 January 2026
Time:
7:30pm – 9:00pm
Add to your calendar
28 January 2026 19:30
28 January 2026 21:00
Europe/London
Lecture: Prof Murray Pittock
Summary
Global Scotland
This lecture will provide an overview of Scotland’s global connexions between 1600 and the twentieth century. It will examine three major themes with one case study:
- Power and the Sea: Scotland’s imperial ambitions and their failure
- Medicine and Botany: how the Scottish gardeners of France transmuted into an engine of British horticulture and pharmacy worldwide
- Universities, technology and business: how a distinctive Scottish higher education system created the conditions for transformational technological change and trade growth worldwide
- Modernizing an Empire: Glover, Kelvin and Japan
Further reading: Murray Pittock, Scotland: the Global History (Yale University Press, £27 hardback, £13 paperback, £6 Kindle).
