A place apart? : debating landscapes and identities in the Shetland Islands

This thesis explores a number of contemporary debates with abearing on landscapes and identities in the Shetland Islands ? anarchipelago caught between the Atlantic and the North Sea ? andwhich physical location often seems notoriously difficult to ?pindown? by outsiders. Meanwhile, islanders too ma [...]
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This thesis explores a number of contemporary debates with abearing on landscapes and identities in the Shetland Islands ? anarchipelago caught between the Atlantic and the North Sea ? andwhich physical location often seems notoriously difficult to ?pindown? by outsiders. Meanwhile, islanders too may sometimes seemat a loss, not so much in terms of where they are as who they are,whether Scottish, or Scandinavian, or something that is neither ofthe two.Geographical and cultural location, belonging and tensions betweenlocal and national interests are discussed by the author in relationto several contested issues, ranging from landscape managementand nature conservation to place branding and island stereotypes,with the overall purpose of investigating where people in this groupof islands currently ?are? in relation to questions of landscape andidentity. In this context, the thesis also highlights some aspects ofthe interconnectedness of these concepts from different theoreticalperspectives as well as when expressed and enacted in the course ofeveryday life.The present study, which is distinctly place specific in character, isset against a backdrop of devolved power structures, nation buildingand the upcoming referendum on Scottish independence.