Royal Geographical Society

Today I got the wonderful news that I have been selected as a Fellow with the Royal Geographical Society. The Society was founded in 1830 as an institution to promote the advacement of geographical science. It's an honor I'm really excited about and will use the affiliation to promote the conservation and ecotourism projects with whom I'm working.

The history of the Society was closely allied for many of its earlier years with ‘colonial’ exploration in Africa, the Indian subcontinent, the polar regions, and central Asia especially. It enshrines such famous names as Livingstone, Stanley, Scott, Shackleton, Hunt and Hillary. The Society also devoted much attention to education and was responsible for both the incorporation of the study of geography in schools at the turn of the 20th century and for the first university positions in the discipline.

With the advent of a more systematic study of geography, the Institute of British Geographers was formed in the 1933, by some Society fellows, as a sister body to the Society. The RGS and IBG co-existed for 60 years until, after several years of discussion, they merged in January 1995 to create the new Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers).

Today, with 15,000 members, the Society is the largest and most active of the scholarly geographical societies. It advances geography through supporting geographical research, education and outdoor learning, public engagement and policy. rgs.org