Edinburgh Mathematical Society

Learned society devoted mathematics

Edinburgh Mathematical Society

Abbreviation| EMS
Formation| 1883; 141 years ago (1883)
Type| Mathematical society
Location|

* Scotland

President

| Tara E. Brendle
Award(s)| Sir Edmund Whittaker Memorial Prize
Website| www.ems.ac.uk

The Edinburgh Mathematical Society is a mathematical society for academics in Scotland.

## History

[edit]

The Society was founded in 1883 by a group of Edinburgh school teachers and academics, on the initiative of Alexander Yule Fraser FRSE and Andrew Jeffrey Gunion Barclay FRSE,[1][2] both maths teachers at George Watson's College, and Cargill Gilston Knott, the assistant of Peter Guthrie Tait, professor of physics at the University of Edinburgh.[3] The first president, elected at first meeting on 2 February 1883, was J.S. Mackay, the head mathematics master at the Edinburgh Academy.[3]

The Society was founded at a time when mathematics societies were being created around the world, but it was unusual in being founded by school teachers rather than university lecturers.[3] This was because, due to the very small number of mathematical academic positions in Scotland at the time, many skilled mathematics graduates chose to become schoolteachers instead.[4] The fifty five founding members contained teachers, ministers and students, as well as a number of academics from the University of Cambridge.[2] The proportion of teachers remained high compared to other mathematical societies, and by 1926 university members made up only one-third of the total members.[5] However, the dominance of teachers in the numbers of the society declined towards the 1930s, and between 1930 and 1935 no papers were presented in the Proceedings by teachers.[4] This was due to an increase in the number of academic positions available and the new requirement for teachers to undergo an additional year of vocational training.[4]

The Edinburgh Mathematical Society is now mainly for academics.[4]

## Activity

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The Society organises and funds meetings and other research events throughout Scotland. There are normally eight meetings a year, at which talks are presented by mathematicians.[6]

Every four years it awards the Sir Edmund Whittaker Memorial Prize to an outstanding mathematician with a Scottish connection.[7] The Society is a corporate member of the European Mathematical Society,[8] and in 2008 it became a member of the Council for the Mathematical Sciences.[6]

## Journals

[edit]

The society releases an academic journal, the Proceedings of the Edinburgh Mathematical Society, published by Cambridge University Press (ISSN 0013–0915.)[9] The Proceedings were first published in 1884, and are issued three times a year, covering a range of pure and applied mathematics subjects.[6]

Between 1909 and 1961, the Society also published the Edinburgh Mathematical Notes, on the suggestion of George Alexander Gibson, a professor at the University of Glasgow, who wished to remove the more elementary or pedagogical articles from the Proceedings.[10]

## See also

[edit]

* List of Mathematical Societies

## References

[edit]

1. ^ Biographical Index of Former Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh 1783–2002 (PDF). The Royal Society of Edinburgh. July 2006. ISBN 0-902-198-84-X.
2. ^ a b "EMS Founder Members". Maths History. Retrieved 23 June 2022.
3. ^ a b c "The Edinburgh Mathematical Society". mcs.st-and.ac.uk. Retrieved 16 September 2014.
4. ^ a b c d Marit Hartveit (December 2009). "Death of a Schoolmaster" (PDF). EMS Newsletter: 27–30. Archived from the original (PDF) on 4 March 2016.
5. ^ Flood, Raymond; Rice, Adrian; Wilson, Robin (29 September 2011). Mathematics in Victorian Britain. Oxford University Press. p. 172\. ISBN 978-0-19-162794-1.
6. ^ a b c "About the Edinburgh Mathematical Society". ems.ac.uk. Archived from the original on 12 November 2014. Retrieved 16 September 2014.
7. ^ "Whittaker Prize". ems.ac.uk. Archived from the original on 17 September 2014. Retrieved 16 September 2014.
8. ^ "Member Societies". euro-math-soc.eu. Archived from the original on 17 September 2014. Retrieved 16 September 2014.
9. ^ "Proceedings of the Edinburgh Mathematical Society". journals.cambridge.org. Retrieved 16 September 2014.
10. ^ "Edinburgh Mathematical Notes". mcs.st-and.ac.uk. Retrieved 16 September 2014.

## External links

[edit]

* Official website

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Mathematics in the United Kingdom

Organizations and Projects|

* International Centre for Mathematical Sciences
* Advisory Committee on Mathematics Education
* Association of Teachers of Mathematics
* British Society for Research into Learning Mathematics
* Council for the Mathematical Sciences
* Count On
* Edinburgh Mathematical Society
* HoDoMS
* Institute of Mathematics and its Applications
* Isaac Newton Institute
* United Kingdom Mathematics Trust
* Joint Mathematical Council
* Kent Mathematics Project
* London Mathematical Society
* Making Mathematics Count
* Mathematical Association
* Mathematics and Computing College
* Mathematics in Education and Industry
* Megamaths
* Millennium Mathematics Project
* More Maths Grads
* National Centre for Excellence in the Teaching of Mathematics
* National Numeracy
* National Numeracy Strategy
* El Nombre
* Numbertime
* Oxford University Invariant Society
* School Mathematics Project
* Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics Network
* Sentinus

Maths schools|

* Exeter Mathematics School
* King's College London Mathematics School
* Lancaster University School of Mathematics
* University of Liverpool Mathematics School

Journals|

* Compositio Mathematica
* Eureka
* Forum of Mathematics
* Glasgow Mathematical Journal
* The Mathematical Gazette
* Philosophy of Mathematics Education Journal
* Plus Magazine

Competitions|

* British Mathematical Olympiad
* British Mathematical Olympiad Subtrust
* National Cipher Challenge

Awards|

* Chartered Mathematician
* Smith's Prize
* Adams Prize
* Thomas Bond Sprague Prize
* Rollo Davidson Prize

* v
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The European Mathematical Society

International member societies|

* European Society for Mathematical and Theoretical Biology

National member societies|

* Armenia
* Austria
* Belgium
* Bosnia and Herzegovina
* Bulgaria
* Croatia
* Cyprus
* Czech Republic
* Denmark
* Estonia
* Finland
* France
* Mathematical Society of France
* SMAI
* SFdS
* Georgia
* Germany
* German Mathematical Society
* GAMM
* Greece
* Hungary
* Iceland
* Ireland
* Israel
* Italy
* Italian Mathematical Union
* SIMAI
* AMASES
* Kosovo
* Latvia
* Lithuania
* Luxembourg
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* Netherlands
* Norway
* Norwegian Mathematical Society
* NSF
* Poland
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* Romania
* Russia
* Moscow Mathematical Society
* St. Petersburg Mathematical Society
* Serbia
* Slovakia
* Slovenia
* DMFA
* SDAMS
* Spain
* Catalan Mathematical Society
* RSMS
* SEIO
* SEMA
* Sweden
* Switzerland
* Turkey
* Ukraine
* United Kingdom
* Edinburgh Mathematical Society
* IMA
* London Mathematical Society

Institutional Members|

* Abdus Salam International Centre for Theoretical Physics
* Centre de Recerca Matemàtica
* Centre International de Rencontres Mathématiques
* Centrum voor Wiskunde en Informatica
* Erwin Schrödinger International Institute for Mathematical Physics
* EURANDOM
* Faculty of Mathematics at the University of Barcelona
* Institut des Hautes Études Scientifiques
* Institut Henri Poincaré
* Institut Mittag-Leffler
* Institute for Mathematical Research
* International Centre for Mathematical Sciences
* Isaac Newton Institute for Mathematical Sciences
* Mathematisches Forschungsinstitut Oberwolfach
* Max Planck Institute for Mathematics in the Sciences
* Stefan Banach International Mathematical Center
* Thomas Stieltjes Institute for Mathematics

Authority control databases

International|

* ISNI
* VIAF

National|

* United States
* Israel

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