The British Society for Geomorphology hosts an annual conference each year, where we explore all facets of geomorphology through talks from members across the society.  This ranges from academic research to applied geomorphology case studies and learning.  A conference dinner is held with an Awards ceremony.

2023 British Society for Geomorphology Annual Meeting

This years meeting will be held in Edingburgh.  Find all the details below or in the BSG Annual Conference Information Pack.  Check out the highlights from 2022 further down the page.

The British Society for Geomorphology annual conference will take place at the University of Edinburgh from Monday 4th to Wednesday 6th September 2023. It will include a mix of oral and poster presentations delivered by geomorphologists from all career stages, who will share the latest exciting developments in geomorphological science and its application.

A workshop organised by the BSG’s Professional Geomorphology and an Early Career workshop will be held on the morning of Monday 4th, before the main conference programme begins (details on how to register for these will be released soon). Registration costs have been kept to a minimum to promote participation, and thanks to the generous financial support of the BSG and its associated journal, Earth Surface Processes and Landforms, edited by Wiley.

Provisional Programme:

Monday 4th September:

  • 10:00-12:00: Early Career workshop and Professional Geomorphology workshop (Textbooks vs. Intuition: Challenging Geomorphological Theory)
  • 12:00: Registration opens.
  • 13:30-17:30: Cuchlaine King Symposium (see below) – keynote talks, posters and discussion.
  • 18:00-20:00: Drinks reception and awards.

Tuesday 5th September:

  • 9:00-17:00: oral and poster sessions, including keynote talks.

Wednesday 6th September:

  • 9:00-12:00: oral and poster sessions, including keynote talks.
  • 12:30-14:30: AGM. Close at 14:30.

This year will see the launch of the Cuchlaine King Symposium, a half-day symposium on atim ely geomorphology-related topic, with keynote speakers and lively discussion on the Monday afternoon (4th September), that will lead to a special issue in Earth Surface Processes and Landforms. The general theme is “novel approaches to quantify landscape changes” and
our current speakers include (there may be one or two additions):

  • Alison Duvall, University of Washington
  • Liran Goren, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev
  • Laure Guerit, Geosciences Rennes
  • Shasta Marrero, Cardiff University
  • Duna Roda-Boluda, VU Amsterdam
  • Veerle Vanacker, Universite Catholique de Louvain

Who was Cuchlaine King?

The new symposium is named after the first female UK professor of geomorphology:
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2020/feb/17/cuchlaine-king-obituary

The conference will take place at the John McIntyre Conference Centre at the University of Edinburgh’s Pollock Halls (https://www.uoecollection.com/conferences-events/venue-hubs/pollock-estate/john-mcintyre-conference-centre/), at the feet of Arthur’s Seat (Edinburgh’s extinct volcano). Attendees will have access to the University’s accommodation
with a 15% discount, but may equally find suitable hotels and B&B in the nearby vibrant city centre.

Registration fees include access to conference, buffet lunches, tea/coffee breaks and snacks, welcome reception on Monday night (no dinner), plus retrospective access to session recordings.

To become a member of the BSG and enjoy a multitude of benefits, including reduced registration fees, go to https://www.geomorphology.org.uk/home/about-us/bsg-membership/. The membership fee is £30 per year for full membership, £12 per year for students, and £40 for four years for students and early career academics and practitioners.

Online attendance to the conference will be free. Subsidies will be offered to support attendance to the conference for students with limited budget.

We will be running three field trips.  Deadline to register for field trips is 14th July, via the conference registration website. If you need special adjustments to attenda trip, please contact us (see contacts below).

  • 1-day trip, East Lothian (cost £30 pp), Sunday 3rd September: An East Lothian coastal field trip looking at markers of postglacial isostatic rebound (raised beaches, knickpoints) and Storegga tsunami deposits.
  • 1-day trip, Eddleston Water (cost £30pp), Sunday 3rd September: Visit of the Eddleston Water which has just been designated a UNESCO global Ecohydrology demonstraction site (https://www.dundee.ac.uk/stories/environmental-project-gains-unesco-recognition).
  • 2-day trip, Glencoe / Cairngorms, with one overnight stay (cost £150 pp including transport and accommodation in double room; cost £200pp for single room option), Saturday 2nd – Sunday 3rd September: Post-glacial geomorphology trip. The aim of the trip is to visit key locations that illustrate the glacial imprint on landscapes, and the processes involved in post-glacial readjustment. Provisional locations include Rannoch Mohr (where the ice cap was focused during the Loch Lommond / Younger Dryas readvance), Glen Coe, the parallel roads of Glen Roy (https://www.scottishgeology.com/best-places/parallel-roads-glen-roy/), and possibly the Cairngorms.

The BSG will offer grants to support postgraduate student attendance to the annual meeting in Edinburgh. Deadline for application is 14th July 2023, with outcomes announced by the 26th July. Note that the abstract submission deadline is also the 14th July: if you are planning on attending but your attendance is dependent on securing the grant, we recommend that you submit an abstract before the deadline; you may withdraw the abstract afterwards if you
are not able to attend.

Applicants must be members of the BSG. They should note that the BSG will normally restrict support to £500 for conferences within the applicant’s continent, and to £750 for conferences outside of the applicant’s continent. In exceptional circumstances, up to £1000 can be awarded.

Applicants should take care to outline the full costs of attending the meeting, taking care to fully justify (not merely list) any resources requested from the BSG, for instance by giving indicative travel or accommodation costs. The BSG is unlikely to support requests for subsistence expenses. Applicants should provide details of how any additional costs (i.e. those not requested from the BSG) will be met. If you are in receipt of a funded studentship, you must explain why these costs are not being met as part of this.

The BSG recognizes that the climate emergency is one of the greatest threats to the planet and to people, and that the geomorphological work we do creates GHG emissions. The BSG will continue to advance scientific knowledge and application of that knowledge while reducing our GHG emissions in a way that ensures fair and equitable treatment for all members. Our main sources of emissions are from flying or other travel (for data collection, fieldwork, meetings or collaboration). We therefore want to encourage BSG members to minimise the environmental impacts of their activities and/or maximise the scientific/professional benefits from any travel undertaken. As such we ask that in each grant application you consider how this can be done and include a statement on this in your application form.

In your application, you will be asked to outline your research, as well as how the attendance to the conference will support your research and career. We do this so we can evaluate the quality of the research, as well as overall value for money, when determining whether to offer funding. We are particularly interested to understand how attendance to the conference will help support the development of the grant-holders PhD and/or career. In general, preference will be given to attendance by postgraduates who are in a position to present substantive research findings; a core aim of this scheme is to enable postgraduates to disseminate their work. Preference may also be given to applicants who do not have access to funded studentships.

To apply, use the following form: https://tinyurl.com/4572v4m8. You will be asked to fill in a series of text boxes including: proposal to support your application (3000 characters maximum), statement on minimizing the environmental impact of your research activities (e.g., taking the train instead of flying – 500 characters maximum), breakdown of eligible costs and breakdown of additional costs. Our funds are limited and we will likely not be able to support all applicants. We wish you good luck with your application.

For registration-related queries: BSGregistration@ed.ac.uk

Get in touch with Mikael Attal or Simon Mudd:
mikael.attal@ed.ac.uk and simon.m.mudd@ed.ac.uk

The 2022 BSG Annual Conference was held in Northumbria.  Check out the highlights below and view a blog post from our Postgraduate Sub-Committe Chair Marina.

Pre-conference Fieldtrip

The pre-conference fieldtrip took place on Sunday 4th September. Participants headed to a series of remote Northumberland sites of geomorphological interest, with a primary focus on sites that were part of active or planned river restoration projects, and/or where river channels and their floodplains have been subject to recent extreme geomorphological perturbations linked to historical intervention. The trip was led by professional geomorphologists from the Environment Agency.

Postgraduate Workshop - Grants, Geomorph Jobs and Beyond

The postgraduate workshop provided a forum to discuss and plan an individuals future in Geomorphology.  The workshop discussed all things grants and funding related with a great panel of academics.

Professional Workshop - To Model or Not to Model

The professional workshop held a discussion around the benefits and disadvantages of modelling of applied geomorphological projects.

Conference presentations and talks

The conference took place from Monday afternoon to Wednesday afternoon, covering a wide range of topics including fluvial, glacial, coastal, desert and planetary geomorphology.

Poster Presentation and Networking Event

On the Tuesday evening a networking event was held in the impressive Wylam Brewery, set in the beautiful grounds of Exhibition Park.  A wide variety of posters were presented covering the latest research in the field of geomorphology as well as practical case studies from the applied/professional geomorphology attendees.

Feedback from this years attendees:

‘I would like to point out the amazing British geomorphology community that attended the event. From industries, professors, to Phd students, the friendship and network that I created during the event was unique. I will definitely attend the next events.’ (Gustavo Nagel, Southampton University)

‘The BSG 2022 Conference fieldtrip was a fantastic opportunity to see applied geomorphology in action. We visited two upland river sites which have been historically modified and are the focus of planned river restoration activities. It was great to hear and discuss river science, options and challenges for restoraiton in the field with a diverse group of practitioners and researchers. The trip highlighted the importance of linking research with practice on the ground. I enjoyed the trip and would recommend any one with an interest in geomorphology to join future BSG fieldtrips’  (Hannah Joyce, River Restoration Centre)