Dr Sarah Leith

Dr Sarah Leith

Associate Lecturer in the History of Scotland and the Wider World, c.1707-c.1914

Honorary Research Fellow

Researcher profile

Email
sjhl@st-andrews.ac.uk

 

Biography

An historian of modern Scotland, I am especially interested in cultural history, political history and the history of ideas. My research lies at the intersection of politics and culture, and I focus upon Scottish identity, print culture and environmental thought.

Place, Culture and Scottish Nationalism: Agnes Mure Mackenzie and Modern Scotland, my first monograph, is forthcoming with Edinburgh University Press. The book explores cultural and political left-nationalisms in modern Scotland, considering the intellectual thought of the writers of Scotland's twentieth-century 'Long Renaissance'. At its heart, the book is a reevaluation of the intellectual thought of Muriel Mackenzie, a Scottish Nationalist thinker, writer, historical novelist and founding member of the Saltire Society. I received my AHRC-funded PhD from the University of St Andrews in 2021.

My articles have been published within Burns Chronicle, Northern Scotland, Studies in Scottish Literature and Scottish Literary Review, while my book reviews have appeared within Northern Scotland and The Scottish Historical Review. I have also contributed pieces to edited collections and to the forthcoming Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedia of Scottish Literature, including entries about organisations (Saltire Society and Scottish PEN), Scottish institutions (law, church and university) and writers (for example, Willa Muir, Neil Gunn and William Hutchison Murray.) 

Between 2024 and 2025, I was co-investigator for a Royal Society of Edinburgh-funded Small Research Grant project entitled 'A History of the Saltire Society: Setting and Achieving National Cultural Priorities'. My chapter about the women of the Saltire Society which results from this project is forthcoming. Additionally, I am a member of the Steering Group of the AHRC-funded Scottish Magazines Network.

From 2018 to 2025, I was Communications Manager for the Institute of Scottish Historical Research. As Communications Officer for the School of History, I was the editor of the 2023 and 2024 editions of the School's alumni magazine, The St Andrews Historian.

Previously, I have been employed as a Lecturer and Research Assistant at the University of Glasgow, working within its School of Critical Studies and its Centre for Robert Burns Studies. I have also been a Research Assistant for the University of St Andrews School of History's St Andrews and the Legacies of Empire and Women Historians of St Andrews projects. My blog posts for these St Andrews projects may be read via the previous links, while contributions to other projects may be found at Scottish Magazines Network, Scottish Critical Heritage and the Institute of Scottish Historical Research. 

As well as editing magazines and writing blog posts, my public engagement activities have included talks given at the Advocates Library (2025), the Saltire Society (2025) and the Royal and Ancient Golf Club's World Golf Musuem (National Sporting Heritage Day Lecture 2024). I have also been heavily involved with the School of History's Women's History Month, co-organising 2024's 'Changing Experiences: Early-career Women Historians at St Andrews, from the 1920s to now', amongst other activities. In 2024, I also co-organised ‘IHR @ St Andrews: Telling and Sharing Stories’, a collaboration between the School of History at the University of St Andrews and the Institute of Historical Research at the University of London.

Teaching

Sub-honours

MO1008: Themes in Late Modern History (c.1776-2001)

HI1801: Scotland's History: Kingdom, Nation, People

MO2008: Scotland, Britain and Empire, c.1707-2000

HI2001: History as a Discipline: Development and Key Concepts

Honours

MO3264: Microhistories of a Global Nation: Scotland, c.1707-c.1843 (module co-ordinator)

HI4101: Communication in History (module co-ordinator)

HI4999: Honours Dissertation in History

HI4998: Honours Project in History

Postgraduate

MSt (Res) (primary supervisor)

IH5005: Current Controversies in Intellectual History

IH5006: Turning Points in the History of Ideas

SC5204: Building Britain: The Construction and Deconstruction of Britishness, 1707-2000

MO5153: Global Times Plural Spaces

MO5152: Global Times - Plural Spaces 2

MO5602: Directed Reading in Modern History

HI5107: Directed Reading in Transnational History

MO5999: Dissertation for MLitt Programmes

Postgraduate Certificate in Academic Practice (PGCAP) [in progress]: I have completed ID5106: Supporting Student Learning.

Selected publications

  • Place, culture and Scottish nationalism: Agnes Mure Mackenzie and modern Scotland

    Leith, S., 2026, (Accepted/In press) Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

    Research output: Book/Report › Book

  • Scottish Legal History Group report 2025

    Dodd, L., Broun, D., Cairns, R., Finlay, J., Leith, S. & Sherrard, H., 30 Mar 2026, In: Journal of Legal History. 47, 1, p. 124-127

    Research output: Contribution to journal › Abstract › peer-review

  • Women and the Saltire Society, from the 1930s to the 1950s

    Leith, S., 15 Jul 2026, (Accepted/In press) Towards a New History of the Saltire Society: Two Essays by Sarah Leith and Scott Lyall. Carruthers, G. (ed.). University of South Carolina Press, USA

    Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter

  • Agnes Mure Mackenzie (1891-1955)

    Leith, S., 28 Mar 2025, (Accepted/In press) Wiley Blackwell encyclopedia of Scottish literature. Carruthers, G. & Hansen, M. (eds.). Wiley-Blackwell

    Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Entry for encyclopedia/dictionary

  • Open access

    'And on one toils, into the hill': working and walking in Nan Shepherd's North East

    Leith, S. J. H., 19 Oct 2025, In: Studies in Scottish Literature. 50, 1, p. 24-36

    Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

  • Brands of nationalism, c.1945 to c.1975

    Leith, S., 9 Sept 2025, (In preparation) Wiley companion to post-War British and Irish literature and culture. Bradford, R., De Ornellas , K. & Howells, D. (eds.). Wiley-Blackwell

    Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Chapter

  • Edwin Muir (1887-1959)

    Leith, S., 3 Nov 2025, (Accepted/In press) Wiley Blackwell encyclopedia of Scottish literature. Carruthers, G. & Hansen, M. (eds.). Wiley-Blackwell

    Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Entry for encyclopedia/dictionary

  • Burns Chronicle reports of manuscript forgery from c.1892 to c.1978

    Leith, S. J. H., 10 Nov 2025, In: Burns Chronicle. 134, 2, p. 188-204

    Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

  • Institutions, organisations and prizes (including law, church and university)

    Leith, S. J. H., 28 Mar 2025, (Accepted/In press) Wiley Blackwell encyclopedia of Scottish literature. Carruthers, G. & Hansen, M. (eds.). Wiley-Blackwell

    Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Entry for encyclopedia/dictionary

  • Isobel Wylie Hutchison (1889-1982)

    Leith, S., 3 Nov 2025, (Accepted/In press) Wiley Blackwell encyclopedia of Scottish literature. Carruthers, G. & Hansen, M. (eds.). Wiley-Blackwell

    Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Entry for encyclopedia/dictionary

 

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