Whitney Smith (born February 26, 1940) is a professional vexillologist and scholar of flags. The term vexillology, which he originated in his 1958 article Flags of the Arab World, refers to the scholarly analysis of all aspects of flags. In 1961, Smith and colleague Gerhard Grahl cofounded The Flag Bulletin (ISSN 0015-3370), the world's first journal about flags. The following year, Smith established The Flag Research Center which was located in Winchester, Massachusetts for 45 years. Smith retired from publishing The Flag Bulletin in 2011. He transferred the Center's library and archives in 2013 to The Dolph Briscoe Center for American History at The University of Texas at Austin; The Flag Research Center was transferred to The Trust for Vexillology, a non-profit corporation that supports the Whitney Smith Flag Research Center at the Briscoe Center.

Early life and education

Smith was born in Arlington, Massachusetts on February 26, 1940. He received his A.B. from Harvard University and his M.A. and Ph.D. from Boston University. He was instructor and assistant professor of political science at Boston University from 1964 to 1970.

The Society for the Preservation of Wild Culture (SPWC) was a Toronto arts organization in existence from 1986 to 1991 that explored environmental and ecological issues from an artistic perspective in a "quirky and innovative" way. The SPWC was best known for three programs: a literary magazine, The Journal of Wild Culture; artist-guided walks, "landscape readings"; and a series of cabarets, The Café of Wild Culture.

The organization was a unique hybrid. The oxymoron "wild culture" tweaked the interest of contrasting types: artists, scientists and activists, and the efforts made by the organization to develop creative projects and discourse around the term were well received. It was concurrently accepted as an arts organization by artists and an environmental organization by environmentalists.

The organisation was resurrected in 2011 and is now producing an online magazine based in London and Toronto.

Art and ecology

The style of the organization was determined by how participating artists expressed themselves around the undefined idea of "wild culture" (also see "wildculture"). While calling for new articulations of wild culture through its projects, at its height the society filled the cultural vacuum in Toronto with an eclectic kind of "thinking man's" fun and provided a forum for experimentation amongst performance artists. The broader public was encouraged by the SPWC to engage with questions about nature and art, while frequently congregating in the outdoors. This audience was also attracted to the organization's ability to 'soft pedal doom and gloom while partying for the planet".