Royal Geographical Society

The Royal Geographical Society, formally the Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers) and usually shortened to RGS, is the learned society and professional body for geography in the United Kingdom. It was founded on 16 July 1830 as the Geographical Society of London, to promote the advancement of geographical science, and began as a dining club whose members held informal debates on current scientific questions. Over time it absorbed the older African Association, the Raleigh Club and the Palestine Association, and in 1995 it merged with the Institute of British Geographers, a body for academic geographers. It has about 16,000 members, reaches the public through publications, research groups and lectures, and as a chartered body keeps the Register of Chartered Geographers, from which its fellows may use the postnominal FRGS.