A debate entitled ‘Is British Culture a Myth?’, commissioned by the AHRC to mark its 10th anniversary, takes place on Tuesday 1 March at the Byre Theatre (6-8pm). The speakers are the literary critic and writer Marina Warner, the poet and critic Robert Crawford, and leading academics Ali Ansari and Murray Pittock.
Ali Ansari is Professor of History at the University of St Andrews. His research interests include the development of the State in Iran in the modern era, with a particular focus on nationalism, mythology and the use (and abuse) of history.
Robert Crawford studied and taught at Glasgow and Oxford, moving to the University of St Andrews in 1989 where he is Professor of English. He has published six collections of poetry and over two dozen other books.
Murray Pittock is Professor of English Literature at the University of Glasgow. He previously worked at the universities of Manchester (where he was the first professor of Scottish literature at an English university), Edinburgh, Oxford, Aberdeen and Strathclyde.
Dame Marina Sarah Warner FRSL, FBA is a British novelist, short story writer, historian, academic and mythographer.