School of History, Classics and Archaeology
Staff

Sir William Fraser Professor of Scottish History and Palaeography, Director of the Scottish Centre of Diaspora Studies and Head of School

T.M.Devine@ed.ac.uk
0131 650 4029
Rm 140, William Robertson Building

He is a graduate of Strathclyde University and holds honorary doctorates from his alma mater, The Queen's University, Belfast and the University of Abertay, Dundee. At Strathclyde he rose through the academic ranks from assistant lecturer to Professor of Scottish History (in 1988), Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences and, finally, Deputy Principal of the University from 1994 to 1998. From 1999 to 2004 he was a member of staff at Aberdeen University, being successively University Research Professor in Scottish History, Director of the AHRC Research Centre in Irish and Scottish Studies and Glucksman Research Chair of Irish and Scottish Studies. He joined Edinburgh University in January, 2006. In addition to these appointments in the UK, he holds Honorary Professorships across the Atlantic at North Carolina (USA) and Guelph (Canada). Between 1992 and 1993 he was a British Academy/Leverhulme Trust Senior Research Fellow.

Among Professor Devine's current and recent university and public appointments have been:


• Member and Vice-Chair, RAE Assessment Panels in History, 1992 &1996
• Trustee, National Museums of Scotland, 1998-2002
• Member of Council, British Academy, 2000-2003
• Convenor, Irish-Scottish Academic Initiative, 1993-9
• Advisory Board, ESRC Devolution and Constitutional Change Programme
• Research Awards Advisory Committee, Leverhulme Trust, Adviser on all History applications to the Trust, 2001-9
• Trustee, Edinburgh UNESCO World City of Literature

Tom Devine has won several awards, fellowships and prizes in recognition of his scholarship and research achievements including:

• Senior Hume Brown Prize in Scottish History (1976)
• Saltire Prize for Scottish Historical Research (1992)
• Henry Duncan Prize and Lectureship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (1993)
• Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (elected 1992)
• Fellow of the British Academy (elected 1994)
• Hon Member of the Royal Irish Academy (elected 2001); one of only three UK-based historians so honoured
• Hon Fellow, University of the West of Scotland for services to cultural life in Scotland (2005)
• Inaugural John Aitkenhead Award of the Institute of Contemporary Scotland for services to Scottish education and admission to the Academy of Merit (2006).

Over the last six years, while at Aberdeen and Edinburgh University Tom Devine raised £4.5 million from research councils (primarily the AHRC) and external bodies for advanced research in Scottish history and Irish-Scottish Studies. In 2001 he was presented by HM the Queen with the Royal Gold Medal, Scotland's supreme academic accolade, and appointed OBE in the New Year Honours List 2005 for services to Scottish history. He is the only historian elected to all three national academies within the British Isles.

Tom Devine has published 28 books and over 100 academic articles on such varied subjects as Scottish transatlantic trade, urban élites, rural society - in Highlands and Lowlands, sectarianism, the Irish in Scotland, Scotland and empire, the Anglo-Scottish Union, Irish - Scottish historical comparisons, emigration and famine.

See School Theses Archive

• Scotland and America, 1603-1914
  
• The Irish in Scotland since 1800
  
• The Scottish Highlands, 1350-1850: Imagery, Violence and Romance