Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities

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Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities

Motto	Ideas Grow
Established	1969; 55 years ago (1969)
Founders	John MacQueen, C. H. Waddington
Affiliation	University of Edinburgh
Director	Lesley McAra
Administrative staff	3
Location	Edinburgh , Scotland
Website	www.iash.ed.ac.uk

The Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities (IASH, University of Edinburgh) was founded in 1969^[1] at the University of Edinburgh, for visiting fellows to engage in study and research in the arts, humanities and social sciences. The current Director (since 2022) is Lesley McAra. Other Directors have included David Daiches, Susan Manning, Jo Shaw and Steve Yearley.^[2][3]

Since 1969, IASH has received visits from over 1,500 fellows.^[4] Up to 25 Fellows are in residence at any one time, and visits last between two months and ten months. Each year IASH hosts the University of Edinburgh's annual Fulbright-Scotland Visiting Professorship.^[5] Notable former Fellows^[6] include Marianne Boruch, William C. Dowling, Sébastien Fath, Ruth Barcan Marcus, Edward Mendelson, Garry Wills, and Charles W.J. Withers.

IASH hosts or organises over 100 events per year.^[7]

The IASH Advisory Board ^[8] includes Rosi Braidotti and Allan Little. It is chaired by Sarah Prescott.

IASH's premises are located in Hope Park Square off Meadow Lane in Edinburgh.^[9]

While there is not a fixed date of conception, IASH was formally launched in 1969, and remains the only Institute for Advanced Study in Scotland.^[10]

The proposal for IASH was made by John MacQueen, professor of Scottish literature and oral tradition (1955–80) and Conrad Hal Waddington, professor of animal genetics (1947–75) in 1967. This time saw an expansion of universities, academic specialization, and the desire for reform in teaching and research with greater interdisciplinarity.^[11] The founders had been inspired by the Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies and the Princeton IAS and aimed to create a similar institute at Edinburgh.^[12] However, from the outset, IASH diverged significantly from its predecessors and was entirely devoted to scholarly integration, wanting to provide a bridge between the then sparingly connected arts faculties and the newly emerging social sciences.

In 1970, the first fellows were elected and expected to conduct their research and give lectures and seminars to attract outside interest, and, once their fellowship ended, to move on: a pragmatic approach from IASH’s cofounder, Professor MacQueen. ^[13]

During the ‘social turn’ of academia in the 1960s and 1970s, the variety of subjects at IASH and the elevated level of academic position allowed the Institute to capitalise on its interdisciplinarity. A project on the bicentenary of the birth of Sir Walter Scott, as well as the Institute Project on the Scottish Enlightenment (IPSE ’86), which produced the exhibition ‘A Hotbed of Genius’ shown in the Royal Museum of Scotland (now the National Museum of Scotland) led to its reputation in Scottish Studies. ^[14] However, other fields of study for IASH were pursued, such as the Renaissance and Indo-European and Northern studies. Visiting speakers in the 1970s included Edwin Morgan, A. J. P. Taylor, Harriet Harvey Wood, Hugh Trevor-Roper and Eric Hobsbawm.

Endowments in 1984 and 1987 from Sophie Gifford, the wife of the late T. J. Carlyle Gifford, formerly chancellor's assessor of Edinburgh and the founder of Baillie Gifford in Edinburgh, made it possible for the Institute to independently and continuously fund fellowships, increasing its geographic diversity, for example with scholars from former eastern bloc nations and non-European nations, such as Argentina, Singapore, and India. Through the establishment of international links to other academic institutions, for example the Humanities Research Center in Canberra, and the Charles Wallace India Trust, IASH established new fellowships and adopted a broader and more diverse intellectual reach.^[15]

Between 1991 and 1995, IASH launched its third Institute Project, Scots at War, funded by the Scots at War Trust, establishing research to collate information about Scots who served in the armed and civilian services in the twentieth century. The project attracted much public and academic response, especially through the patronage of HRH Prince Philip the Duke of Edinburgh and the support of Sir David Smith, principal of the University of Edinburgh (1987–1994).^[16]

In 2000, IASH was incorporated into the newly created College of Humanities and Social Science at the University of Edinburgh. In 2005, Susan Manning was appointed as director, the first woman to do so.^[17] Manning continued the Institute’s international traditions, while also increasing its interdisciplinarity through the Institute Project titled The Science of Man.

IASH’s role changed drastically between 2000 and 2013. The nature of IASH fellows shifted from older, established male academics to supporting postdoctoral researchers and early career academics. By 2013, the number of female fellows had risen to 47 per cent.^[18]

The 1000th Fellow was Dr Matthew Bampton in 2015.

Since 2015, IASH has presented lectures by Wole Soyinka, Lord Stern, David Miliband and Michael Ignatieff. Recent Institute Projects include the Dangerous Women Project (2016-17) and the Institute Project on Decoloniality (2021-24).

• http://www.iash.ed.ac.uk/

55°56′32″N 3°11′10″W / 55.9422°N 3.1860°W / 55.9422; -3.1860