Seventy percent of the islanders speak Gaelic, the language is taught in the schools, all road signs and other public notices are bilingual. This vibrant survival of the language is an indication of the relative isolation of Lewis from the mainland. Sundays on Lewis are strictly observed with the predominant church being the Free Church of Scotland, the Church of Scotland and the Free Presbyterian being the other main churches. There is a strong, some say suffocating, sense of community in Lewis, which holds the islanders together but can be a factor that discourages the return of the young educated islanders. The standard of education on Lewis is high and many young people go to university on the mainland. Many don’t return to the island because of the lack of job opportunities with fish farms and tweet weaving in decline. The population of the island is getting older and less women than men return home to work, so there is a gender imbalance.
The major industry of the island for many years was the production of tweed but the trade went into a decline. In 2007 Harris Tweed Hebrides was formed and revived the mill at Shawbost. Tweed is facing a revival however this is still a struggling trade. Softer fabric more suited to modern clothing is being produced and Scots designer Deryck Winter used tweed extensively in his 2008/9 collections. Individual weavers continue to produce cloth also. This work highlights the movement of population and the reasons for that movement. Lewis is not a marginal community but it is an isolated one. Bad weather can stop the ferries running even today and cut the islanders off. Isolation means that communities develop in certain ways not mirrored in areas of higher density population. Restricted resources make for fragile economies and the images show how Lewis is attempting to revive traditional industry and welcoming new.
The Internet connection on the island is limited as is mains gas, which leaves most of the island using log burners to heat homes. People wanting to live in the peace and tranquility the island offers; immigrate to offset the migration to the mainland. The people photographed are a combination incomers and islanders, in the true sense many of the incomers soon adapt to the life on the island or leave in the first winter. Many of the older islanders have not left the island having lived and worked in the same village in which they where born.
