British Academy: The UK's National Academy for the Humanities and Social Sciences

Professor Charles Withers
Professor of Historical Geography, University of Edinburgh

Year elected: 2006

He is one of Britain's leading historical geographers. His work falls into two distinct fields: the historical geography of language and identity, and the history of cultures of geographical knowledge. He has focused on the cultural representation of Highland and Gaelic Scotland, with an emphasis on language, mapping and memory; and on the different analytic spaces in which geographical knowledge was constructed, received and debated in the 18th century. His work displays meticulous scholarship and conceptual innovation.