Shetland

I blame the map makers! But this fascinating article does have some important substance about how stereotyping some rural places can do them no good. It tells us:

Shetland is more than 100 miles away from the Scottish mainland, as the crow flies. It takes 12 hours to get there from the mainland on a ferry. It is, by any measure, quite far away.

But looking at a lot of maps, that might not be immediately clear. Often as not, Shetland might show up enclosed in a box in the Moray Firth or in the North Sea off Aberdeenshire.

This isn’t a new thing. The National Library of Scotland’s map collection includes various examples dating back to the middle of the 17th Century where Shetland – and indeed Orkney – are corralled into boxes.

Examples abound, from bank notes to the covers of government reports. But one representative of the islands fears that such maps are not properly representative of the islands.

Tavish Scott, the Lib Dem MSP for Shetland, says that putting the islands in a box causes people to forget about the challenges they face on account of their remote location.

He said: “The logistics of getting to and from Shetland are all too often forgotten, and this has had an impact on the crucial economies of the islands, for instance the movement of oil, gas and seafood.

“Recognising where Shetland is located would go a long way to understanding the challenges we face as an island.”