World’s first academic institute of Irish and Scottish Studies launched...
The President of Ireland, Mary McAleese, will be awarded the Honorary Degree of Doctor of Laws and will officially open the world’s first academic institute dedicated to Irish and Scottish research when she visits the University of Aberdeen on St Andrew’s Day (Tuesday, November 30).
The visit to the University will mark both her first state visit to Scotland since she was elected President of Ireland in 1997, and the last St Andrew’s Day before the new Millennium.
Some 200 invited guests, including Secretary of State for Scotland John Reid and the Lord Advocate Lord Hardie, will attend the special ceremony at King’s Chapel in Old Aberdeen, which will be followed by the inauguration of the Research Institute of Irish and Scottish Studies (RIISS) at King’s Conference Centre.
A civic dinner, hosted by the Lord Provost Margaret Smith, will be held in honour of the President at the Beach Ballroom that evening.
The President will be accompanied by her husband Dr Martin McAleese, the Irish Ambassador in London Edward Barrington, the Irish Consul General in Scotland Daniel Mulhall, and senior officials from Áras an Uachtaráin (the President’s Office), the Department of the Taoiseach (Prime Minister) and the Department of Foreign Affairs.
The Irish party will arrive at the University at around 11.30am, with the Lord Provost, where Chancellor of the University Lord Wilson, and Principal C Duncan Rice will meet them. President McAleese will then be introduced to the Scottish Secretary John Reid, Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Divinity Dr Graeme Roberts, and RIISS Director Professor Tom Devine.
Professor Devine’s latest book, The Scottish Nation 1700-2000, was the best-selling book in Scotland during November.
The graduation ceremony will start at noon, when Professor Rice will read the laureation address before inviting Lord Wilson to confer the honorary degree on the President. The President will then give a short speech before the procession moves to King’s Conference Centre for the inauguration of the new Research Institute of Irish and Scottish Studies.
The inauguration will begin at 12.50pm when the President will give another short speech and unveil a glass sculptural plaque, designed by Scottish designer Leonard Smith, based at Gray’s School of Art in Aberdeen.
Both ceremonies will include a wide range music and poetry readings, by leading Scottish performers, including singer and broadcaster Fiona Kennedy, Gaelic singer Christine Primrose and harpist Alison Kinnaird. University writer-in-residence Alan Spence will read two pieces, as will writer and broadcaster Bernard Mac Laverty, and Cathal O’Hainle, Professor of Irish at Trinity College, Dublin. Alan Spence and Bernard Mac Laverty will conclude with a poem, A Pleasant Flyting, by Edwin Morgan, poet and member of the RIISS advisory board. The poem was commissioned by the Scotsman to mark the inauguration of the ceremony.
Several students and graduates of the University, including piper Euan MacCrimmon, who appeared recently at the Edinburgh International Festival and is a winner of the Dunvegan Medal in Skye, will also be performing at the event.
The Research Institute is the first academic institute of its kind in the world for the graduate study and research of the history, language, literature and culture of both Scotland and Ireland. It is also the first centre to offer a masters degree programme (MLitt) in Irish and Scottish Studies.
Aberdeen has more than 80 academic staff with Irish and Scottish research interests – believed to be the largest concentration of such expertise of any university in Europe.