Structure of SIRFA

The process of developing this regional research framework began in 2019 with the first SIRFA Symposium, a three-day event held in Lochmaddy in North Uist. This event was followed by SIRFA Symposium Shetland in Lerwick later in 2019 and SIRFA Symposium Orkney held in Kirkwall in 2023. These three events brought together a wide range of stakeholders involved in, and concerned with, archaeological research across the three regions who collectively submitted, discussed, refined and agreed on key research gaps and questions.

To further widen participation, people were invited to submit questions in advance for consideration. This invitation was open and available to everyone regardless of professional or academic background, and promoted via various social media platforms. The outcome was representation and input from almost all heritage sectors – academic researchers, amateur archaeologists, museum professionals, historic environment managers, commercial archaeologists, community heritage organisations and members of the public. Every question submitted was given full consideration. The outputs included hundreds of question submissions, contributions from 300 symposia participants and 42 workshop session chairs, 19 individual thematic and period-based workshops, more than 150 hours of recordings, and approximately 20,000 words of notes.

Running in parallel was a series of resources assessments for the Outer Hebrides, Shetland and Orkney carried out by Dr Emily Gal, Dr Samantha Dennis and Dr Ellie Graham respectively. To allow comparisons with the National ScARF, SIRFA maintains a similar chronological structure. The following chronological periods are used throughout the framework:

The framework is also structured around key themes, which were developed in consultation with various stakeholders at the UHI Our Islands Our Past conference in Orkney in 2017.