Dr Pauline Mackay

  • Senior Lecturer (Scottish Literature)

telephone: 01413308176
email: Pauline.Mackay@glasgow.ac.uk

Room 409, Scottish Literature, 7 University Gardens, Glasgow G12 8QH

Import to contacts

ORCID iDhttps://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432

Biography

Pauline Mackay is the Lecturer in Robert Burns Studies, and Associate Director of the Centre for Robert Burns Studies. She is based in the Scottish Literature subject area. Pauline is the Chair of Burns Scotland: the national Robert Burns Collection, recognised by Museums Galleries Scotland (formerly the DNBC). She was a member of the steering group that organised the first World Congress of Scottish Literatures (held at the University of Glasgow in 2014), and helped to establish the International Association for the Study of Scottish Literatures (IASSL) for which she is Treasurer.

Pauline is  CI and Co-Editor on the major AHRC-funded project, 'Editing Robert Burns's Poetry and Correspondence' (PI: Gerard Carruthers). In addition to her ongoing work as part of the 'Editing Robert Burns for the 21st Century' project team, Pauline is currently writing a monograph about the bawdy song and verse of Robert Burns (1759 - 1796). Beyond this, she has led two research projects which consider Scottish bawdry more generally: 'Eighteenth-Century Scottish Bawdry and Erotica' (funded by the Carnegie trust for the Universities of Scotland), and 'Bawdry in Scottish Chapbooks' (funded by the University of Glasgow Chancellor's Fund). Pauline has published widely in Burns studies - her most recent book publication is Burns for Every Day of the Year (Edinburgh: Black & White Publishing, 2021). She has carried out research at several major Burns collections in the UK and abroad, and in 2010 she was the recipient of the W. Ormiston Roy Memorial Fellowship for Research in the area of Robert Burns and Scottish Poetry at the University of South Carolina. 

Following her first academic post as Research Assistant on the AHRC-funded project, ‘Robert Burns: Inventing Tradition and Securing Memory, 1796-1909’ (PI: Murray Pittock, 2010), Pauline’s research interests extend to Burns’s legacy and cultural commemoration, particularly through material culture, location and digital resources. In 2021 Pauline’s success in the Edify ‘Win a Lab’ competition led to the creation of the first ever Robert Burns VR experience, and 'Burns Beyond Reality' launched online on the 30th of January to a worldwide audience of over 300 people.  Edify’s immersive learning technology enabled a host of relevant VR objects from disparate locations to be brought together and examined in the context of Burns’s most iconic poem, ‘Tam o’ Shanter’, in a VR environment inspired by Alloway Auld Kirk. This environment has primarily been designed as a virtual classroom for the ‘Memorialising Scottish Literature and Culture’ course; an innovative Honours course with culture and heritage placement, convened and developed by Pauline along with Dr Rhona Brown. Pauline is interested in the use of VR/XR for the composition of, and access to, virtual literary ‘sites of memory’, particularly in the context of ‘the land of Burns’. She is a member of the University of Glasgow’s XR Strategy Board.

Regularly invited to deliver public talks about her research in the UK and abroad, Pauline has an established relationship with the UK Media, appearing on Radio 4’s ‘PM’ with Eddie Mair, BBC1's 'Countryfile' with John Craven, 'Reporting Scotland', and on several TV and radio documentaries for STV and the BBC. Pauline also undertakes outreach activities as part of the Royal Society of Edinburgh @ Schools programme.

In recent years Pauline has acted as a consultant for the Scottish government's ‘Scottish Winter Festivals’ programme. Activities include hosting the ‘Tae The Bard’ podcast series (2019), a ‘Facebook takeover’ (22000 subscribers worldwide), guest curator for the government's @Scotland Twitter feed, 'The Burning Questions' video for 'Year of the Young People 2018' (accessible to over 500k social media users worldwide), and the production of a new interactive timeline for the government’s Robert Burns App, launched in January 2015 and downloaded by over 15000 people internationally.

In 2017, Pauline along with colleagues from the Centre for Robert Burns Studies, Scottish History and LEADS, was a recipient of the College of Arts and University-Wide Teaching Excellence Award for her part in developing and teaching 'Robert Burns Online' MOOC, BOLD and distance-taught courses.

Research interests

Research Interests

  • Scottish Literature from the 15th Century to the 21st Century
  • Robert Burns
  • Literature and Bawdry
  • Literature and Censorship
  • Literature, Culture and Heritage
  • Literary Tourism
  • Material Culture and the Commemoration of Literary Figures
  • Publishing and Book History
  • Scotland & Romanticism
  • Textual Editing 
  • Digital Humanities

 

Publications

List by: Type | Date

Jump to: 2024 | 2023 | 2022 | 2021 | 2018 | 2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 | 2013 | 2012 | 2011 | 2010 | 2009 | 2007 | 2005
Number of items: 28.

2024

Brown, Rhona ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0073-8227, Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 and Young, Ronnie ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1345-8187 (2024) Formalising feeling: Robert Burns's punctuation. In: Bonapfel, Elizabeth M., Faulkner, Mark, Gutierrez, Jeffrey and Lennard, John (eds.) A History of Punctuation in English Literature. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge. (Accepted for Publication)

2023

Carruthers, Gerard ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7188-9797 and Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2023) A newly discovered manuscript: ‘Twa Neebor-Wives Upon a Time’. Burns Chronicle, 132(2), pp. 229-234. (doi: 10.3366/burns.2023.0089)

2022

Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2022) Burns and Bawdry. In: Carruthers, Gerard (ed.) The Oxford Handbook of Robert Burns. Oxford University Press. (In Press)

2021

Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2021) Burns for Every Day of the Year. Black and White Publishing: Edinburgh. ISBN 9781785302985

2018

Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2018) 'In Bawdy Policy Well-Gifted': Allan Ramsay, Bawdry and the Reformation of Manners. Scottish Literary Review, 10(1), pp. 73-94.

2017

Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2017) Robert Burns. In: Oxford Bibliographies Online. Oxford University Press.

2016

Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2016) “Low, tame, and loathsome ribaldry”: Bawdry in Romantic Scotland. European Romantic Review, 27(4), pp. 433-448. (doi: 10.1080/10509585.2016.1190086)

2015

Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432, Henderson, Jonathan and McIntyre, Pamela (2015) ‘Epitaph' on Grizzel Grim: a newly-discovered manuscript in the hand of Robert Burns. Studies in Scottish Literature, 41(1), pp. 253-258.

2014

Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2014) Timeline of the European reception of Robert Burns, 1796–2013. In: Pittock, Murray (ed.) The Reception of Robert Burns in Europe. Series: The Reception of British and Irish Authors in Europe. Bloomsbury Academic: London, xxiii-lxvii. ISBN 9781441170316

2013

Carruthers, G. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7188-9797 and Mackay, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2013) Re-reading James Currie: Robert Burns's first editor. John Clare Society Journal(32), pp. 73-84.

Carruthers, G. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7188-9797 and Mackay, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2013) The missing manuscript of Robert Burns's 'Patriarch' letter. Studies in Scottish Literature, 39(1), pp. 227-232.

2012

Mackay, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2012) Objects of desire: Robert Burns the 'Man's Man' and material culture. Anglistik, 23(2), pp. 27-39.

Mackay, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 and Pittock, M. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1567-998X (2012) Highland Mary: objects and memories. Romanticism, 18(2), pp. 191-203. (doi: 10.3366/rom.2012.0084)

2011

Pittock, M. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1567-998X and Mackay, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2011) Beyond text: Burns, Byron and their material cultural afterlife. Byron Journal, 39(2), pp. 149-162. (doi: 10.3828/bj.2011.18)

Mackay, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2011) Robert Burns beyond text: introducing a new resource for Robert Burns research. Burns Chronicle, Spring, pp. 42-43.

Mackay, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2011) Twentieth century Burns scholars: theories, discoveries and 'The Merry Muses of Caledonia' (1799). Burns Chronicle, Spring, pp. 13-16.

Mackay, P.A. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2011) Enlightened religion and enlightened sex: Robert Burns and his French contemporaries. In: Pittock, M. (ed.) Robert Burns in Global Culture. Bucknell University Press: Lewisburg, PA, pp. 123-138. ISBN 9781611480306

Mackay, P.A. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 and Pittock, M. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1567-998X (2011) Robert Burns Beyond Text. [Exhibitions]

Mackay, P.A. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 and Pittock, M. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1567-998X (2011) Robert Burns Beyond Text. [Exhibitions]

Mackay, P.A. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 and Pittock, M. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1567-998X (2011) Robert Burns Beyond Text: Treasure of the Month Exhibition. [Exhibitions]

Pittock, Murray ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1567-998X, Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 and Whatley, Christopher (2011) Robert Burns: Inventing Tradition and Securing Memory, 1796-1909. [Website]

2010

Mackay, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2010) Robert Burns: bawdy language. Drouth(38),

2009

Carruthers, G. and Gray, P.A. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (Eds.) (2009) The Fornicators Court by Robert Burns. Abbotsford Library Project Trust & The Faculty of Advocates: Edinburgh, UK. ISBN 9780956129109

Carruthers, G. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7188-9797 and Gray, P.A. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2009) Introduction. In: Carruthers, G. and Gray, P.A. (eds.) The Fornicators Court by Robert Burns. Abbotsford Library Project Trust & The Faculty of Advocates: Edinburgh, UK, pp. 3-13. ISBN 9780956129109

Gray, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2009) Robert Burns and gender: is a woman a woman for a’ that? In: Further from the frontiers: cross-currents in Irish and Scottish Studies. AHRC Centre for Irish and Scottish Studies: Aberdeen, pp. 33-40.

Gray, P.A. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2009) Sex and social commentary: Robert Burns's merry musing. In: Rodger, J. and Carruthers, G. (eds.) Fickle Man: Robert Burns in the 21st Century. Sandstone Press: Dingwall, UK, pp. 132-144. ISBN 9781905207275

2007

Gray, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2007) Prudes, pirates and bills of suspension: the correspondence of Burns and "Clarinda". Burns Chronicle, Autumn, pp. 9-13.

2005

Gray, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2005) Burns's "O Saw Ye My Maggie". Burns Chronicle, 2005(Spring), pp. 11-14.

This list was generated on Fri Jul 11 18:07:30 2025 BST.
Jump to: Articles | Books | Book Sections | Edited Books | Exhibitions | Website
Number of items: 28.

Articles

Carruthers, Gerard ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7188-9797 and Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2023) A newly discovered manuscript: ‘Twa Neebor-Wives Upon a Time’. Burns Chronicle, 132(2), pp. 229-234. (doi: 10.3366/burns.2023.0089)

Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2018) 'In Bawdy Policy Well-Gifted': Allan Ramsay, Bawdry and the Reformation of Manners. Scottish Literary Review, 10(1), pp. 73-94.

Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2016) “Low, tame, and loathsome ribaldry”: Bawdry in Romantic Scotland. European Romantic Review, 27(4), pp. 433-448. (doi: 10.1080/10509585.2016.1190086)

Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432, Henderson, Jonathan and McIntyre, Pamela (2015) ‘Epitaph' on Grizzel Grim: a newly-discovered manuscript in the hand of Robert Burns. Studies in Scottish Literature, 41(1), pp. 253-258.

Carruthers, G. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7188-9797 and Mackay, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2013) Re-reading James Currie: Robert Burns's first editor. John Clare Society Journal(32), pp. 73-84.

Carruthers, G. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7188-9797 and Mackay, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2013) The missing manuscript of Robert Burns's 'Patriarch' letter. Studies in Scottish Literature, 39(1), pp. 227-232.

Mackay, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2012) Objects of desire: Robert Burns the 'Man's Man' and material culture. Anglistik, 23(2), pp. 27-39.

Mackay, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 and Pittock, M. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1567-998X (2012) Highland Mary: objects and memories. Romanticism, 18(2), pp. 191-203. (doi: 10.3366/rom.2012.0084)

Pittock, M. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1567-998X and Mackay, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2011) Beyond text: Burns, Byron and their material cultural afterlife. Byron Journal, 39(2), pp. 149-162. (doi: 10.3828/bj.2011.18)

Mackay, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2011) Robert Burns beyond text: introducing a new resource for Robert Burns research. Burns Chronicle, Spring, pp. 42-43.

Mackay, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2011) Twentieth century Burns scholars: theories, discoveries and 'The Merry Muses of Caledonia' (1799). Burns Chronicle, Spring, pp. 13-16.

Mackay, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2010) Robert Burns: bawdy language. Drouth(38),

Gray, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2007) Prudes, pirates and bills of suspension: the correspondence of Burns and "Clarinda". Burns Chronicle, Autumn, pp. 9-13.

Gray, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2005) Burns's "O Saw Ye My Maggie". Burns Chronicle, 2005(Spring), pp. 11-14.

Books

Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2021) Burns for Every Day of the Year. Black and White Publishing: Edinburgh. ISBN 9781785302985

Book Sections

Brown, Rhona ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0073-8227, Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 and Young, Ronnie ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1345-8187 (2024) Formalising feeling: Robert Burns's punctuation. In: Bonapfel, Elizabeth M., Faulkner, Mark, Gutierrez, Jeffrey and Lennard, John (eds.) A History of Punctuation in English Literature. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge. (Accepted for Publication)

Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2022) Burns and Bawdry. In: Carruthers, Gerard (ed.) The Oxford Handbook of Robert Burns. Oxford University Press. (In Press)

Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2017) Robert Burns. In: Oxford Bibliographies Online. Oxford University Press.

Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2014) Timeline of the European reception of Robert Burns, 1796–2013. In: Pittock, Murray (ed.) The Reception of Robert Burns in Europe. Series: The Reception of British and Irish Authors in Europe. Bloomsbury Academic: London, xxiii-lxvii. ISBN 9781441170316

Mackay, P.A. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2011) Enlightened religion and enlightened sex: Robert Burns and his French contemporaries. In: Pittock, M. (ed.) Robert Burns in Global Culture. Bucknell University Press: Lewisburg, PA, pp. 123-138. ISBN 9781611480306

Carruthers, G. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7188-9797 and Gray, P.A. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2009) Introduction. In: Carruthers, G. and Gray, P.A. (eds.) The Fornicators Court by Robert Burns. Abbotsford Library Project Trust & The Faculty of Advocates: Edinburgh, UK, pp. 3-13. ISBN 9780956129109

Gray, P. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2009) Robert Burns and gender: is a woman a woman for a’ that? In: Further from the frontiers: cross-currents in Irish and Scottish Studies. AHRC Centre for Irish and Scottish Studies: Aberdeen, pp. 33-40.

Gray, P.A. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (2009) Sex and social commentary: Robert Burns's merry musing. In: Rodger, J. and Carruthers, G. (eds.) Fickle Man: Robert Burns in the 21st Century. Sandstone Press: Dingwall, UK, pp. 132-144. ISBN 9781905207275

Edited Books

Carruthers, G. and Gray, P.A. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 (Eds.) (2009) The Fornicators Court by Robert Burns. Abbotsford Library Project Trust & The Faculty of Advocates: Edinburgh, UK. ISBN 9780956129109

Exhibitions

Mackay, P.A. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 and Pittock, M. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1567-998X (2011) Robert Burns Beyond Text. [Exhibitions]

Mackay, P.A. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 and Pittock, M. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1567-998X (2011) Robert Burns Beyond Text. [Exhibitions]

Mackay, P.A. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 and Pittock, M. ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1567-998X (2011) Robert Burns Beyond Text: Treasure of the Month Exhibition. [Exhibitions]

Website

Pittock, Murray ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1567-998X, Mackay, Pauline ORCID logoORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4585-3432 and Whatley, Christopher (2011) Robert Burns: Inventing Tradition and Securing Memory, 1796-1909. [Website]

This list was generated on Fri Jul 11 18:07:30 2025 BST.

Grants

  • 2017 - Present: Co - Investigator (CI)

       Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC)
       Project: 'Editing Robert Burns's Poetry and Correpondence'

  • 2015 - Principal Investigator (PI)

Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland: Research Incentives
Project: 'Eighteenth-Century Scottish Bawdry and Erotica'

  • 2014 - Principal Investigator (PI)

University of Glasgow Chancellor's Fund
Project: 'Bawdry in Scottish Chapbooks'

 

Supervision

  • Watson, John
    Literature and the Scottish Landscape: the Textual Phenomenology of Place

Teaching

  • Convenor:

Memorialising Scottish Culture & Literature - Scottish Literature (Hons)
Popular Literary Enlightenment, 1710-1790 - Scottish Literature (Hons)

  • Lecturer:

Level 1 Scottish Literature
Level 2 Scottish Literature
Robert Burns Online (BOLD) - Scottish Literature (Hons)
Robert Burns Online (Online/Distance Taught)
Robert Burns: Poems, Songs and Legacy (MOOC) - Online via Futurelearn
The Scottish Highland Clans: Origins, Decline and Transformation (MOOC) - Online via Futurelearn
Scottish Journeys - Scottish Literature (Hons)
Textual Editing - Scottish Literature (Hons)

*Pauline has previously taught on Level 3/Honours 'Irish & Scottish Literature', and the Honours English Literature Course, 'Romantic Literature from 1780-1840'.

Additional information

 

University Roles

  • Board Member, XR strategy Group (2021 - Present)
  • Postgraduate Convenor, School of Critical Studies (2017-2019)
  • Academic Co-Lead, External Collaboration Workstream, Project Development Board, College of Arts (2017 - 2019)
  • Placements Officer, College of Arts (2014 - 2017)

External Roles