Avenue Summer 2018

The General Council Paper A: Report by the Principal

On 22 February, I had the great pleasure of travelling to Buckingham Palace to receive the Queen’s Anniversary Prize for Higher Education for the Historical Thesaurus of English. I was accompanied by the Chancellor, Professor Sir Kenneth Calman; Professor Roibeard Ó Maolalaigh, Vice-Principal and Head of the College of Arts; Professor Marc Alexander, Director of the Historical Thesaurus; Dean of Research Professor Catherine Steel and students involved in the project. The Queen’s Anniversary Prize is the highest accolade for any academic institution and it’s the fourth time the University has won it, having previously received the prize in 1994, 1998 and 2013.

We’ve covered the background to this remarkable piece of scholarship in previous editions of Avenue but it’s worth recalling something of the scale and span of the work. It is the result of over 50 years of scholarship at Glasgow, involving more than 230 linguists, and now consists of nearly 800,000 words arranged by their meaning, spanning more than 1,000 years. It thus reveals the roots and development of the English language.   

A remarkable resource

The project has been described as “a unique resource for scholarship, education and creativity”. Like all great research it has multiple applications and has captured the academic and public imagination alike. Those leading the project also wanted to make this rich resource accessible and available, and so to mark its 50th anniversary in 2015, an enhanced digital Thesaurus was made available online.  

We also recognise, while celebrating the success of the Thesaurus, that it is important to avoid the temptation to sit back and rest on our laurels but to maintain and support the outstanding scholarship necessary to build on its success. For this reason, and in conjunction with the award, we agreed to invest more than £400,000 over the next five years in the second edition of the Thesaurus and in the creation of a new Lectureship in Historical Thesaurus Studies. This edition will benefit from new research and allow updates on around 35% of the current entries, as well as the addition of 20,000 new words.   

On top of this new funding, the royalties received from the printed Thesaurus are reinvested in the project principally through undergraduate and postgraduate prizes and scholarships.

As a University we are continually striving to build and support the kind of environment that is a catalyst for great research. The success of the Thesaurus reinforces certain key messages around what creates research excellence and the impact it can have. The Thesaurus began with the vision and leadership of Professor Michael Samuels all those years ago and it has maintained that strong leadership and vision through Professor Christian Kay and now Professor Alexander. It relied on a community of excellent scholars intent not on quick wins but on maintaining intellectual integrity. 

Showcasing our research

We continue to strive to invest in our staff and encourage progression through such schemes as Early Career Development Programmes, research and leadership training, recognition and reward, and promotion opportunities. The development of the Research Hub at the centre of our new campus is intended to draw great researchers together, building interdisciplinary communities to generate new ideas and new, exciting programmes of research. Like the Thesaurus, we want, and work, to “exploit” the potential applications of our research, which means sharing what we do across the public, private and third sectors, and this is also why we are encouraging business and industry onto our campus development. It’s important too that we encourage public engagement, which is one reason behind the development of our Research Beacons – six broad research themes which capture the key areas of our work in a clear and understandable way. It’s also why we are planning to make our new campus more open to the public with pathways through our grounds, connecting the community around us, with easy access to the Research Hub and displays of what our academics are doing. And just as the Thesaurus harnesses great research to deliver new resources for teaching and education, so we continue to value as highly as possible teaching that is research-led. We believe that this is what has the potential to inspire the next generation of scholars, the next generation of people who will want to apply their talents to address the world’s great challenges.

Above all else, gaining the Queen’s Anniversary Prize, and the recognition it brings, is a huge boost to our colleagues, staff and students, in English Language and the College of Arts, and a great encouragement to the University and our research agenda.