Communities were cleared from their lands by an empire that mostly turned those evicted into labourers working at the furnace of empire’s factories in Glasgow, or into colonisers sent from the quaysides to evict other communities from their lands elsewhere.

For example in the 1880s the British government sent troops to Tiree to quell land-related protest, while women led resistance to evictions on Skye. Meanwhile British colonisers forcibly evicted communities from their lands across Africa, Australasia, the Americas and much of Asia. For the most part, the ‘end of colonisation’ just replaced one set of overlords with another, while economic and cultural colonisation remains to this day.

In the hills and the cities, in the global north and global south, how do we reclaim lands and buildings that were stolen and are now used to make some extremely wealthy and others to struggle? How do we reclaim our past and future, through our actions in the present? How do we build trust and solidarity across our differences, so that we can finally end the system of domination?

We want to make sure that everyone is welcome to join for whichever part they wish. Let us know if you are interested, and for what part. On most days we’ll aim to walk between 3 and 5 hours. Apart from the route out of Knoydart, we aim to have our sleeping and other gear carried in a van, but some of the walk will be rough and hilly, so please say if that will be hard for you and we’ll do our best to help you  join in.

We’ll share stories, songs, poetry and anything else as we go, and aim to listen well to everyone we meet, and to compost what we learn as we go.

Possible route (but its early days!): Skye to Knoydart to Glenfinnan, then on to the Corran Ferry, Ballachulish and Glen Coe, then West Highland Way to the Craigallian fire, Milngavie and on to the Clyde - the Broomielaw

We are trying to reach out to folk in places we are passing through. If you’d like to get involved or know folk who would like to in any of those places, we’d love it if you’d get in touch: engagedlistening@gmail.com

The walk has many streams, many origins, flowing into it, including the 2024 gatherings of deep listening. The idea took shape in the evening of the Land Moot at GalGael in November 2024 where everyone was welcome to share a story, song or poem, no one was prioritised, and everyone was heard. The resourcefulness of who we can be when we act together was clear. What do we choose to do?