Former curators, from a historian to a musician, look back on the past 10 years of the Highlands and Islands Voices social media account.
Every week, a new curator takes over the HI Voices X (formerly known as Twitter) account.
Anyone who lives in or has a strong connection to the Highlands and Islands can sign up to take a turn – and so far, over 500 people have stepped up to tell their own story of life in the area.
With the account celebrating its 10th anniversary this month, past curators are looking back at what makes it so special.
‘Really supportive’
One of the earliest curators was Glasgow-born musician Mary Ann Kennedy. She is based in Ardgour, where she makes award-winning music in her first language, Gaelic.
It was “very early days” when she took over the account, she says.
“I really did not understand how to make a hosted account work!”
She was helped along, though, by the admins, who were “really supportive”.
“They realised that we were all trying to find our way around this, and that we all had the same aspiration – to tell a story about a special part of the world.”
‘Lovely twists and turns’
Mary Ann remained a loyal fan of HI Voices, and last month returned to the curating side of things, this time as part of a group: the team behind the short film ‘Never Again’.
No matter how many years go by, one of Mary Ann’s favourite things about the account is the way that each curator’s story flows into one another.
Curators ‘hand over’ the account at the end of each week, often to people they’ve recruited themselves.
“It takes such lovely twists and turns,” Mary Ann says. “You can end up following [someone] thinking, ‘does that have something to do with me?'”
“But actually it does, because we’re all in that same part of the world.”
One particular expert in that part of the world is David Worthington, a professor of history at the University of the Highlands and Islands (UHI).
For him, curating HI Voices was a way to share his passion for the history of Scotland’s highlands and islands.
“History is vital because it gives you a perspective on what can seem like chronic issues, like depopulation,” he says. “Well, historically, there was a time when the highlands and islands weren’t depopulated.”
While history can teach us about the “horror” of events such as the Highland Clearances, David focused on sharing stories that showed “a more positive way of thinking about the region”.
David worried that his historical posts might be seen as “boring” – but before long, HI Voices’ followers were joining in the conversation.
“People were really quite candid,” he says. “Some of the points people were sharing were very moving.”
‘It connected you to a community’
HI Voices isn’t just curated by people currently living in the Highlands and Islands.
Alex Ogilvie was born in Fort William, but currently lives in London, where he is a trustee for the Highland Society of London.
The Society helps support arts across the Highlands, and funds events such as the annual Highland Book Prize.
It was in the run-up to 2019’s Prize that Alex took the reigns of HI Voices.
“It was brilliant, because it connected you to a community,” Alex says.
He was able to spread the word about the Highland Book Prize, and the account’s followers were eager to help.
‘Interested in anything’
The Prize’s longlist is “shaped” by volunteer readers.
“We have readers from all over the world, but the majority of them are based in the Highlands and Islands. And a lot of them have come to us through HI Voices.”
Part of why HI Voices works so well, Alex says, is that it allows curators to share their interests with a wide circle outside of their usual followers.
Some of the readers of HI Voices when Alex was curating the account would have already been interested in literature.
“But,” he says, “there’s a broader subset who are interested in anything.”
‘Every week is something completely new and completely different’
If there was one word that each of the past curators chose to describe HI Voices’ power, it was ‘diversity’.
“It’s such a diverse selection of voices,” Alex says. “Every week is something completely new and completely different.”
“But in some ways, they’re all connected.”
David says that both the “diversity of people” and “diversity of location” of HI Voices is powerful.
“I noticed that the person who took over from me was doing it from Bute. That’s hundreds of miles away from [me], but still technically in the Highlands and Islands.”
‘Eye-opener’
HI Voices is “an eye-opener”, he says, to just how varied the area is in landscape, culture, and geography.
That means, over the past decade, it has brought together everyone with an interest in the Highlands and Islands — from people who live there and want to see the diversity of the area represented, to people from across the world who want to learn more.
“[The account] looks like a small thing, but actually it has much greater power,” Mary Ann says. “In a world where we’re constantly being presented with ‘divide and conquer’, […] this is the kind of platform that allows people to find common cause.”
“It doesn’t matter where they come from, there’s a place for them, and that’s what I love about it.”
More local reporting from the Western Isles:
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