From From Email Patrick O'Sullivan

Today is a National Day of Mourning in the Republic of Ireland.

I am forwarding to the Irish-Diaspora list the Statement of the President of
the Republic, Mary McAleese.

The references to Ruth Clifford McCourt and her little girl Juliana are to
the first identified Irish victims of the tragedy - they died in one of the
hi-jacked planes.

P.O'S.



STATEMENT BY PRESIDENT MCALEESE TO MARK NATIONAL DAY OF MOURNING

On this National Day of Mourning we take time to reflect on the
horrendous events of the past few days in the United States.
These horrible scenes represent an attack on the very foundations
of our human dignity.

We are sad, shocked, sickened, grieving, disbelieving, outraged,
frightened all at once. We are only beginning to hear the human
stories, the unbearable reports of final phone calls of love, of
the heroism of so many, the loss of so many. These stories will
continue to unfold for many days and weeks to come, bringing with
them a growing realisation of the full extent of the pain and
sorrow that is the gruesome legacy of these awful acts of hatred.

The people of the United States hold a special place in the hearts
of all of us here in Ireland. The roots go down through the
centuries and are as strong today as they ever were. Our first
thoughts therefore are with the American people as they try to
cope with the magnitude of what has happened in their great
country. To the bereaved, the injured and to those awaiting news
of their loved ones, we send our prayers, our deepest sympathy and
our support.

And we in Ireland face our own share of this tragedy. We only have
to look at the photograph of the beautiful face of Ruth Clifford
McCourt and her gorgeous little girl Juliana to see with our own
eyes the loss which Ireland, too, has experienced. There are deep
worries about other loved ones missing, still unaccounted for, and
we pray for the Irish families who wait to hear some word and who
hope for any possible consolation.

We have watched in admiration as the rescue services work
ceaselessly to locate the victims of these attacks and sadly, we
now know that many of the emergency personnel have themselves
perished in the course of their duties. Their heroic, loving care
for the stranger stands in sharp contrast to the evil of those who
perpetrated these horrors.

Our Embassy and Consulates in the United States and Government
Departments at home are deeply involved in providing caring
assistance to our Irish family here and in the United States and
we thank them for the kindness and sensitivity with which they go
about this difficult work.

This National Day of Mourning is a very special opportunity for
all of us to show solidarity with our brothers and sisters in the
United States of America. It sends a message across the Atlantic
and indeed around the globe that Ireland too is broken-hearted and
grieving at the unconscionable waste of life we have witnessed
this week.

God bless those in the United States, those in Ireland and all
those men, women and little children throughout the world who have
been personally, profoundly affected by this tragedy. May God
guide us safely through these troubled days.

From Email Patrick O'Sullivan

OK, this thing is coming together...

Below is the reply I have received from Simon Chadwick, the Editor of
Clarsach...

It is clear, I think, that we are talking about a heraldic harp...

P.O'S.


- -----Original Message-----
From: simon[at]clarsach.net [mailto:simon[at]clarsach.net]
Sent: 14 September 2001 17:49
To: osullivan[at]irishdiaspora.net
Subject: Re:Carved Harps


Dear Patrick,

2 harps to my knowledge have human figures carved at the peak. The Cloyne
harp (1621), http://www.clarsach.net/cloyne.htm , a large probably chromatic
Gaelic harp elaborately carved, has a male figure with crown and sceptre
carved on the underside of the neck in front of the pillar. (R. Rensch,
1969, The Harp, plate (?)29 b and c; also Early Music May 1987 p. 175). The
Bunworth Harp (1734) is an amateur effort, crudely decorated with lavish
carving including a standing figure who, when the harp is in the playing
position, rises vertically from the peak (far, pillar, end of the neck). (J.
Rimmer, 1969, The Irish Harp, p. 60).

However neither of these figures is actually formed into the forepillar as
you suggest.

The clearest parallel I have seen is a heraldic type of harp which has the
pillar formed by the body of a woman, her backwards-streched wings forming
the neck. This is/was I think often used as the symbol of Ireland in British
crests. As I have very little knowledge of or interest in heraldry I cannot
offer any more information though.

I suspect that the harp you're looking at is most likely to be related to
this heraldic harp, and not to any real instrument at all.

Hope this helps,

Simon Chadwick
editor, http://www.clarsach.net
tel +44 (0)1865 722126
email simon[at]clarsach.net

- --
Patrick O'Sullivan
Head of the Irish Diaspora Research Unit

Email Patrick O'Sullivan
Email Patrick O'Sullivan

Irish-Diaspora list
Irish Diaspora Studies http://www.brad.ac.uk/acad/diaspora/
Irish Diaspora Net Archive http://www.irishdiaspora.net

Personal Fax National 0709 236 9050
Fax International +44 709 236 9050

Irish Diaspora Research Unit
Department of Interdisciplinary Human Studies
University of Bradford
Bradford BD7 1DP
Yorkshire
England

From: Jim Doan
Subject: Re: Ir-D Irish Harps 4

Mary Helen Thuente gave a plenary address on the topic of 19th cent.
representations of Ireland as a woman, specifically focussing on the harp
imagery, at the IASIL meeting in Limerick about three years ago. Someone
may
know if that paper has already been published, or will appear in the
Conference
Proceedings being edited by Patricia Lynch of UL.

Jim Doan

irish-diaspora[at]Bradford.ac.uk wrote:

> >From Email Patrick O'Sullivan
>
> I am going to have to correct Patrick Maume...
>
> (A rare treat...)
>
> As I recall the 'Brian Boru' harp is NOT carved in the manner Dympna
> describes...
>
> See...
> http://www.haverford.edu/engl/faculty/sherman/Irish/harp.htm
>
> http://www.konzak.com/harps/brianb.html
>
> Oddly enough I had been chasing up this image myself. Dympna's query
> connects with my own work on John Denvir, the Liverpool and London Irish
> writer and publisher of the C19th.
>
> We often find in Irish - and 'Irish' - publications of that period a
> picture, a woodcut or some other kind of print, of a harp, a specific type
> of harp, where the curved upright of the harp is carved in the shape of a
> woman, clothed or unclothed. Like, as Dympna says, the figurehead of a
> sailing ship.
>
> I have searched but I cannot find... I have not been able to find a
picture
> of a real harp carved in this fashion. I would like to know if there is
any
> special technical term for such a harp - so that I can use the right word
to
> talk about it.
>
> I suspect we may be simply seeing an image repeated and copied by
printers -
> what we would nowadays call 'clip art'. Maybe something for the art
> historians rather than the harp historians?
>
> P.O'S.
>

From: Kerby Miller
Subject: Re: Ir-D President Fox of Mexico


This information may not pertain to Mexico's president, but, in the
course of doing research on the Lalor (or Lawlor) family of
then-Queen's Co., I learned that both in Queen's Co. and in America
(Wisconsin) they intermarried with a Fox family. If I remember the
story correctly (sorry, but I don't have time at the moment to dig
out my old notes), the Foxes were a Gaelic Irish family who had
changed their surname in the 16th or 17th century when at least some
branches turned Protestant. Nevertheless, they were still
intermarrying with Catholic Lalors in the mid-19th century, although
the religious affiliations of the latter may be murky, as Young
Irelander James Fintan Lalor, the youngest son of the family I
research in America, is sometimes described as Protestant, although
the father (a leader of the anti-tithe crusade in the 1830s) and at
least most of the other sons (incl. the Wisconsin and Australian
immigrants) were Catholic.
Kerby Miller.



>From: oliver[at]doyle-marshall.demon.co.uk
>Subject: President Fox of Mexico
>
>I've just been reading J¸rgen Buchenau's article 'Small numbers, great
>impact: Mexico and its immigrants, 1821-1973' in the _Journal of American
>Ethnic History_, vol. 20, no. 3, 2001, pp. 23-49.
>
>The article begins:
>
>"On 2 July 2000, the son of Irish and Spanish immigrants stunned the world
>by winning election to the presidency of Mexico."
>
>Can someone please provide some information on Presidente Vicente Fox's
>Irish background? In reality, I wonder how real is Fox's "Irish"
>antecedence? Or is it basically a matter that it is more politically
>acceptable to refer to supposed Irish (rather than British or US) origins
>is you're making a run for a Latin American presidency with a thoroughly
>"gringo" surname?
>
>Thanks,
>
>Oliver Marshall
>
>Centre for Brazilian Studies
>University of Oxford

From: =?iso-8859-1?q?Dymphna=20Lonergan?=
Subject: Re: Ir-D Irish Harps 8

Thank you everyone. I now have a word 'forepiller' and
the possibility that this is a piece of 19th century
printer's clip art. As it graced the banner of the
very political 'The Irish Exile and Freedom's
Advocate' in Tasmania in 1850, it would make sense
that it is the heraldic harp that represented
pre-Union times.

Dymphna Lonergan

From Email Patrick O'Sullivan


This is embarassing...

I should have known...

I knew this really...

Take down any standard work on heraldry...

Not necessarily Irish heraldry...

But here I have Micheal O Comain, The Poolbeg Book of Irish Heraldry, 1991.
And there on page 109 is a shield, with a picture of harp on it, the harp
with a carved lady on the fore-pillar.

And on page 108 the reminder that the coat of arms of Ireland is Azure, a
harp or, stringed argent. (In heraldry you give the background colour, the
'field', first. Azure = blue.)

What has confused us, maybe, is that in the C19th texts I have seen the harp
never seems to be placed within the shape of a shield.

But what we are seeing is simply the arms of Ireland - first recorded about
1275, O Comain says.

The decision whether or not to give the harp a carved lady on the
fore-pillar seems primarily a matter of aesthetics. Or maybe it is a matter
of what image came to hand. The harp is not so prescribed in the heraldic
description. And in current Irish government practice. Perhaps the
heraldry folk can tell us more.

P.O'S.

- --
Patrick O'Sullivan
Head of the Irish Diaspora Research Unit

Email Patrick O'Sullivan
Email Patrick O'Sullivan

Irish-Diaspora list
Irish Diaspora Studies http://www.brad.ac.uk/acad/diaspora/
Irish Diaspora Net Archive http://www.irishdiaspora.net

Personal Fax National 0709 236 9050
Fax International +44 709 236 9050

Irish Diaspora Research Unit
Department of Interdisciplinary Human Studies
University of Bradford
Bradford BD7 1DP
Yorkshire
England

From: "Brian McGinn"
Subject: Re: Ir-D President Fox of Mexico

Fox is a legitimate Irish surname. As is Rabbitt(e), an anglicization of the
Irish names Cunneen, Conheeny, etc., all deriving from the Irish word for
rabbit, coinín.

In case of Fox, the Irish antecedents may be less obvious. I quote from the
genealogical bible, Edward MacLysaght's Surnames of Ireland (Irish Academic
Press, 1991):

"Though some English Foxes settled in Co. Limerick," (quite unintentional
pun there, I'm sure) "Fox in Ireland is mainly a synonym of Kearney,
MacAshinah (sic), Shanahy or Shinnock."

Examples, again from MacLysaght:

(O) Kearney: An anglicized form of the Irish surname Ó Catharnaigh (warlike)
of Kilcoursey, Co. Meath, now often Fox, the head of the family being known
as 'The Fox'.

Mac Ashinagh: Mac an tSionnaigh (sionnach, fox).

So, son of the fox.

But it remains to be proven that Vicente Fox is the son, or grandson, of an
Irish immigrant. Press accounts in the U.S. regularly employ 'Irish' as a
synonym for 'Irish American' or meaning 'of Irish descent'.

According to Michael McCaughan, writing in the Irish Times, July 4, 2000,
Fox's family first set foot on Mexican soil in 1913, when his grandfather,
"of Irish descent", bought a ranch from a Spanish landowner.

His grandfather's name is not mentioned. One account describes him as an
Irish immigrant, another mentions that he grew up in Ohio. If any serious
genealogical work has been done, I haven't seen it.

An experienced family historian at the New England Biographical and
Genealogical Society once told me that really solid work on the family trees
of U.S. presidents generally emerges only a decade after they leave office.
As Oliver Doyle suggests, public figures are not above exploiting vague
ethnic links for political advantage. But, as Ireland also reminds us, the
'Roots' business is also entrepreneurially driven.

Brian McGinn
Alexandria, Virginia

From: Elizabeth Malcolm
Subject: Re: Ir-D President Fox of Mexico 2

Like Kerby Miller, I'm not sure how relevant the following
information is as regards the genealogy of the current Mexican
president, but Kerby is certainly right that there was a Fox family
in Ireland in the early 17th century. The references I have are not
to Queen's County though, but to Limerick. A John Fox, a member of a
prominent local family, was mayor of Kilmallock and took the Irish
side during the 1641 rebellion.

I thought he might be from an English family who came over as part of
the Munster Plantation in the 1580s - some English catholics joined
the plantation in hopes they would fare better in Ireland. But, on
looking at a map of the plantation, it seems that, while it covered
large parts of Limerick, that small south-east corner of the county
around and beyond Kilmallock, which includes the Galty Mountains, was
not part of the plantation.

So, perhaps as Kerby speculates, they were an Irish family who
anglicised their name sometime in the late 16th/early 17th centuries
- - although, if so, some of them were still very catholic and
anti-English in the 1640s.

Anyone know what the word 'fox' is in Irish? But does the name really
refer to the animal? On reflection, it seems to me that even in
English there aren't many surnames derived from animals - in fact,
off the top of my head the only other one I can think of is Lamb.
Well, foxes and lambs, cunning and innocence - very biblical. Did the
Irish use names referring to animals?

Elizabeth Malcolm
Melbourne

PS. Totally irrelevant I'm sure, but the Quakers were established by
a man called Fox who spent time in Ireland in the 1660s.


>From: Kerby Miller
>Subject: Re: Ir-D President Fox of Mexico
>
>
>This information may not pertain to Mexico's president, but, in the
>course of doing research on the Lalor (or Lawlor) family of
>then-Queen's Co., I learned that both in Queen's Co. and in America
>(Wisconsin) they intermarried with a Fox family. If I remember the
>story correctly (sorry, but I don't have time at the moment to dig
>out my old notes), the Foxes were a Gaelic Irish family who had
>changed their surname in the 16th or 17th century when at least some
>branches turned Protestant. Nevertheless, they were still
>intermarrying with Catholic Lalors in the mid-19th century, although
>the religious affiliations of the latter may be murky, as Young
>Irelander James Fintan Lalor, the youngest son of the family I
>research in America, is sometimes described as Protestant, although
>the father (a leader of the anti-tithe crusade in the 1830s) and at
>least most of the other sons (incl. the Wisconsin and Australian
>immigrants) were Catholic.
>Kerby Miller.
>
>
>
> >From: oliver[at]doyle-marshall.demon.co.uk
> >Subject: President Fox of Mexico
> >
> >I've just been reading J¸rgen Buchenau's article 'Small numbers, great
> >impact: Mexico and its immigrants, 1821-1973' in the _Journal of American
> >Ethnic History_, vol. 20, no. 3, 2001, pp. 23-49.
> >
> >The article begins:
> >
> >"On 2 July 2000, the son of Irish and Spanish immigrants stunned the
world
> >by winning election to the presidency of Mexico."
> >
> >Can someone please provide some information on Presidente Vicente Fox's
> >Irish background? In reality, I wonder how real is Fox's "Irish"
> >antecedence? Or is it basically a matter that it is more politically
> >acceptable to refer to supposed Irish (rather than British or US) origins
> >is you're making a run for a Latin American presidency with a thoroughly
> >"gringo" surname?
> >
> >Thanks,
> >
> >Oliver Marshall
> >
> >Centre for Brazilian Studies
> >University of Oxford

Professor Elizabeth Malcolm Tel: +61-3-8344 3924
Chair of Irish Studies FAX: +61-3-8344 7894
Department of History Email: e.malcolm[at]unimelb.edu.au
University of Melbourne
Parkville, Victoria, 3010
AUSTRALIA

From: harrisrd
Subject: RE: Fox Family in America

I may be able to help anyone who is seriously interested in searching for
the
Fox name in America. In the confusion of the past week I'm not certain
whether it was a serious enquiry or not. But if so, I searched my "Missing
Friends" Boston Pilot newspaper database [31,000+ records] and find 57
records
where the persons seeking or the person sought was named Fox. None had a
Queens Co. connection; Meath, Tipperary and Leitrim dominated. Ohio appeared
as a location for seekers, contact persons or where the sought was known to
have been, but did not dominate; as usual, locations were all over the
place.
In one case the seeker was a Fox seeking someone who had stolen $50. from
him.
I would be happy to supply anyone with an index to the advertisements.
Ruth-Ann Harris

From Email Patrick O'Sullivan

The Conference...

University of Salford

European Studies Research Institute

CONSTRUCTIONS OF IRISHNESS: THE IRISH IN IRELAND, BRITAIN AND BEYOND

now has a web site...

www.esri.salford.ac.uk/irishness

Welcome to the conference website.

Call for papers
Programme -- not yet available
Registration form -- not yet available

The web site will be updated from time to time...

P.O'S.


- --
Patrick O'Sullivan
Head of the Irish Diaspora Research Unit

Email Patrick O'Sullivan
Email Patrick O'Sullivan

Irish-Diaspora list
Irish Diaspora Studies http://www.brad.ac.uk/acad/diaspora/
Irish Diaspora Net Archive http://www.irishdiaspora.net

Personal Fax National 0709 236 9050
Fax International +44 709 236 9050

Irish Diaspora Research Unit
Department of Interdisciplinary Human Studies
University of Bradford
Bradford BD7 1DP
Yorkshire
England

From Email Patrick O'Sullivan

There have been some funerals, following the terrible events in New York,
and in Washington and that field near Pittsburgh, last Tuesday, September 11

We have all cried.

I guess some of this has 'Irish Diaspora' 'relevance...' The eye catches
the 'Erin Go Bragh' flag at the funeral of Fire Service Chaplain, Michael
Judge, whose family came from Leitrim. Or notes the death of veteran Irish
American firefighter William Feehan. We are now getting lists of the Irish
dead and missing...

But I am not sure how 'relevant' this really is, since so many countries
lost citizens and, as one commentator put it, the roll call of the dead and
missing reads like the ledgers of Ellis Island.

As far as the Irish-Diaspora list is concerned, I am not at all sure how to
handle this.

I do not want to stand in the way of discussion. But almost any comment is
upsetting. Even a reminder that 'the ethos of the list is scholarly...'

Can I just remind people that the convention is that email messages sent to
Irish-Diaspora list
are meant for distribution via the Irish-Diaspora list, and go out to all
Ir-D members.

Would people who have already sent in messages confirm that they still do
want them distributed via the Irish-Diaspora list.

Messages sent to me personally at
Patrick O'Sullivan
I will deal with when I can.

Patrick O'Sullivan


- --
Patrick O'Sullivan
Head of the Irish Diaspora Research Unit

Email Patrick O'Sullivan
Email Patrick O'Sullivan

Irish-Diaspora list
Irish Diaspora Studies http://www.brad.ac.uk/acad/diaspora/
Irish Diaspora Net Archive http://www.irishdiaspora.net

Personal Fax National 0709 236 9050
Fax International +44 709 236 9050

Irish Diaspora Research Unit
Department of Interdisciplinary Human Studies
University of Bradford
Bradford BD7 1DP
Yorkshire
England

From: "William H. Mulligan, Jr"
Subject: Re: Ir-D Issues in the study of the Irish Diaspora & Autumn School

It would be very nice if those of us unable to attend could get copies of
papers, etc. presented at both of these events. This looks like a very fine
conference and one I would like to attend if at all possible, but see no way
to do so -- especially with the uncertainties we face her now about air
travel.

Bill Mulligan.

From: "joan hugman"
Subject: Re: Ir-D Irish Harps 7

Dear Paddy
This is very helpful. The masthead of Charles Diamond's Irish
Tribune newspaper (1884-1897) has a harp with a winged woman
and I have been wondering about its provenance.
Joan

Subject: Ir-D
Irish Harps 7 Date: Fri 14 Sep 2001 18:30:00 +0000 From:
irish-diaspora[at]Bradford.ac.uk Reply-to:
irish-diaspora[at]Bradford.ac.uk To:
irish-diaspora[at]Bradford.ac.uk


>From Email Patrick O'Sullivan

OK, this thing is coming together...

Below is the reply I have received from Simon Chadwick, the Editor of
Clarsach...

It is clear, I think, that we are talking about a heraldic harp...

P.O'S.


- -----Original Message-----
From: simon[at]clarsach.net [mailto:simon[at]clarsach.net]
Sent: 14 September 2001 17:49
To: osullivan[at]irishdiaspora.net
Subject: Re:Carved Harps


Dear Patrick,

2 harps to my knowledge have human figures carved at the peak. The Cloyne
harp (1621), http://www.clarsach.net/cloyne.htm , a large probably chromatic
Gaelic harp elaborately carved, has a male figure with crown and sceptre
carved on the underside of the neck in front of the pillar. (R. Rensch,
1969, The Harp, plate (?)29 b and c; also Early Music May 1987 p. 175). The
Bunworth Harp (1734) is an amateur effort, crudely decorated with lavish
carving including a standing figure who, when the harp is in the playing
position, rises vertically from the peak (far, pillar, end of the neck). (J.
Rimmer, 1969, The Irish Harp, p. 60).

However neither of these figures is actually formed into the forepillar as
you suggest.

The clearest parallel I have seen is a heraldic type of harp which has the
pillar formed by the body of a woman, her backwards-streched wings forming
the neck. This is/was I think often used as the symbol of Ireland in British
crests. As I have very little knowledge of or interest in heraldry I cannot
offer any more information though.

I suspect that the harp you're looking at is most likely to be related to
this heraldic harp, and not to any real instrument at all.

Hope this helps,

Simon Chadwick
editor, http://www.clarsach.net
tel +44 (0)1865 722126
email simon[at]clarsach.net

Joan Hugman
Department of History, Armstrong Building,
University of Newcastle NE1 7RU Tel 0191 222 6701

From: "noel gilzean"
Subject: Re: Ir-D September 11


Noel Gilzean
rosslare51[at]hotmail.com
n.a.gilzean[at]hud.ac.uk
University of Huddersfield UK
http://www.hud.ac.uk/hip

Hi
I agree with Paddy that the time to discuss these issues is not yet upon us.
Most of the issues he raised in his previous e-mail "The Latest Atrocity"
have been discussed elsewhere. I can't see that there is anything to be
gained by discussing these issues at this time on this mailing list.
Noel

From: McCaffrey
Subject: Re: Ir-D September 11th 2

Noel,
Might I add to your message and say that I totally agree with you and with
Paddy. He has shown very good judgment as a moderator.
I have not been afraid to read the posting here for the past
week. Thanks Paddy!
Carmel

irish-diaspora[at]Bradford.ac.uk wrote:

> From: "noel gilzean"
> Subject: Re: Ir-D September 11
>
> Noel Gilzean
> rosslare51[at]hotmail.com
> n.a.gilzean[at]hud.ac.uk
> University of Huddersfield UK
> http://www.hud.ac.uk/hip
>
> Hi
> I agree with Paddy that the time to discuss these issues is not yet upon
us.
> Most of the issues he raised in his previous e-mail "The Latest Atrocity"
> have been discussed elsewhere. I can't see that there is anything to be
> gained by discussing these issues at this time on this mailing list.
> Noel

From Email Patrick O'Sullivan

DIRDA - the Database of the Ir-D Archive...

Irish-Diaspora list members will wish to be aware of this new resource...

Go to
Irish Diaspora Net Archive http://www.irishdiaspora.net

Click on Special Access, at the top of the screen.

Username irdmember
Password zorro

That gets you into our RESTRICTED area.

Click on RESTRICTED, and you have access to EFORUM: DIRDA.

Click on that and you are in the first page of the database/archive.

You will see that we have nearly 3 full years of Ir-D messages, November
1998 onwards, in a searchable database. Most recent first.

Log out by clicking on irishdiaspora.net at the top of the screen.

Our plan is that the database should be restricted to Irish-Diaspora list
members, and maybe the occasional bona fide scholar or researcher. We will
change the access password often, and thus restrict use of the database.
The change of password will be announced here via the Ir-D list.

Our reasons for keeping accessing to DIRDA restricted in this way are:
we do sometimes discuss sensitive issues;
we were never given, and do not have, permission from everyone to broadcast
or publish everything, and cannot assume retrospective permission;
the existence of this useful research resource depends on the goodwill,
scholarly generosity and co-operation of Irish-Diaspora list members. And
if members feel that their goodwill is being abused then the whole thing
shrivels...

There are still a few untidynesses to sort out. Ir-D members may
occasionally find that the DIRDA database is offline and not available, as
the software is re-designed and fine-tuned.

But I thought it best to let people know about the facility now.

The Irish-Diaspora list got underway in November 1997, on 'Majordomo', the
list software 'supported' by the Computer Centre University of Bradford,
working from my old 486 computers.

(If people would like some understanding of the vicissitudes of working with
'Majordomo', see my 'Bad-Tempered Guide to Majordomo', now displayed on
http://www.irishdiaspora.net in the Irish-Diaspora list folder.)

Hard disk failure then lost us the whole of the first year's messages. We
now have cause to hope that we may now have found ways of rescuing most of
the first year of the Irish-Diaspora list's messages, from November 1997
onwards.

In November 1998 we persuaded the Computer Centre at the U of Bradford to
switch on 'Majordomo' archiving system - but that did not solve the problem
of access. The solution to the problem was always obvious - out-think
'Majordomo' and create a database with its own email address.

But it was only this year that Dr. Stephen Sobol, of SobolStones,
http://www.sobolstones.com
thought through the problem and designed the software.

We are very grateful to Stephen Sobol.

Patrick O'Sullivan

- --
Patrick O'Sullivan
Head of the Irish Diaspora Research Unit

Email Patrick O'Sullivan
Email Patrick O'Sullivan

Irish-Diaspora list
Irish Diaspora Studies http://www.brad.ac.uk/acad/diaspora/
Irish Diaspora Net Archive http://www.irishdiaspora.net

Personal Fax National 0709 236 9050
Fax International +44 709 236 9050

Irish Diaspora Research Unit
Department of Interdisciplinary Human Studies
University of Bradford
Bradford BD7 1DP
Yorkshire
England

The following item appeared on the H-Albion list...

Forwarded for information...

P.O'S.

Date: Mon, 17 Sep 2001 11:32:18 +0100
From: "Deirdre Mcmahon"

The Parliamentary Debates of the Irish Dail and Senate between 1919 and 1997
are now on the web at www.oireachtas-debates.gov.ie
These include the minutes of the revolutionary Dail 1919-1921 and the
debates on the 1921 Anglo-Irish Treaty, private and public sessions,
1921-1922.

Deirdre McMahon
History Department
Mary Immaculate College
University of Limerick

Our Irish Harps queries have been wandering about...

The following message appeared on the SSNCI list...

Also, I have been trying to check another line of thought, sparked by some
of the older images, where the harp lady is frankly ugly. Is this one of
those heraldic visual puns, where the harp is also a harpy?

P.O'S.



Re query regarding Irish harps:
My colleague at NUI Maynooth, Dr Barra Boydell (Music Dept) has
published extensively on the history of Irish harps. Below are details
as to some of his publications.

Best wishes,
Margaret Kelleher


BARRA BOYDELL:

'The Irish Harp on Glass'. Irish Arts Review 12 (Dublin 1995),
110-114.

'The Female Harp: The Irish Harp in 18th- and early-19th-century
Romantic Nationalism'. RIdIM/RCMI Newsletter XX/1 (New York 1995),
10-17.

'The Iconography of the Irish Harp as a National Symbol', Irish
Musical Studies , v: The Maynooth International Musicological Conference
1995. Selected Proceedings Part Two (ed. Devine & White, Four Courts
Press, Blackrock, 1996), 131-145.

'The United Irishmen, music, harps and national identity',
Eighteenth-Century Ireland, 13 (1998), 44-51.

[The following message was received from Padraic Finn on Saturday September
15...]


From: "Padraic"
Subject: Re: Ir-D The Latest Atrocity
Date: Sat, 15 Sep 2001 09:52:57 +0100

Patrick,

While everyone would agree that the grieving relatives of the victims of the
attack in New York and Washington should have whatever support we can give
and be allowed to "collect and bury their dead" you put it, we must be wary
of the "politics of the latest atrocity" not just preventing discussion (and
this is a debateable point anyway: why else do these attacks happen?) but
being consciously used to whip up support for "counter-terrorist" measures
which just perpetuate the whole vicious spiral.

Listening to the church bells pealing out over London yesterday, I felt like
we were being prepared for latter-day Crusade. Already Moslems, indeed
anyone "foreign" i.e. not white, are being targeted for abuse and attack,
ratcheting up the scapegoating of asylum seekers, feeding off the press and
the discourse of "evil", used in particular by the US government and
preparing for the attack which it has been threatening and which will, as in
the past, simply create more orphans and more martyrs.

What can the Irish diaspora do? Surely, by definition, we should understand
how it feels to be an outsider, to be denounced as dirty, as evil,
superstitious, irrational, prone to violence, cowardly, stupid, incapable of
governing ourselves; needing strong lessons in order to curb our weak and
ungovernable natures. Does this caricature stand comparison with the view of
Muslims or Arabs pouring out as justification for the righteous vengeance
which a just and terrible God will soon wreak on these "fanatics"? If our
experience of being flung to the four corners of the earth doesn't give us
some insight into these tangled questions, what is the point of the
"Irish-diaspora" as a reference point at all?

We all have relatives in the US and family who travel there regularly. We
can identify with the numbing horror of what happened and we grieve
especially with those who wait for the bodies of their relatives and friends
to be taken from the ruins I thought the President's statement dreadful,
not because it didn't express, on our behalf these feelings, but because of
what it did not say. There was no acknowledgement that, in an ever more
interdependent world, and however hard it might be, we needed to think about
the issue of how we could live together in a way which would not allow one
set of human beings to inflict the damage they did on another group of
humans. Just the folksy identification with "God" and America. If this is
the best that the leader of the new, confident, cosmopolitan,
"post-nationalist" Ireland can offer, then we have forgotten everything and
learned nothing, and "Irish" means an ephemera of American TV kitsch and
wholesome tales of people making good in a "new" world. Closer to home, it
doesn't bode well for "post-nationalist" Ireland's understanding of its own
past and present (but still mainly Christian) fundamentalists and how we
might live together.

In this spirit, the site should be opened now to anyone who wants to
contribute to a discussion about what it means to be Irish, with the
emphasis on what our disparate experiences might contribute to saving
humanity from all our certainties.

Padraic Finn


- ----- Original Message -----
From:
To:
Sent: Friday, September 14, 2001 7:00 AM
Subject: Ir-D The Latest Atrocity


>
>
> From Email Patrick O'Sullivan
>
> One of the weird, and horrible, things about living in the late twentieth
> century was that we all had to learn how to think like terrorists. We had
> to try to understand the meaning of acts against which our own simple
> humanity rebelled - what was the message, what was the rationale, what was
> the logic?
>
> So, into the twenty-first century...
>
> Members of the Irish-Diaspora list are entitled to know that I have put on
> hold - and I have sought advice about - a number of messages to Ir-D that
> concern the attacks on New York and Washington.
>
> Some of these messages are simple expressions of grief, sympathy and
> concern.
>
> Others raise more complex issues. I do wonder if an Irish Diaspora
Studies
> email discussion group is the right place to explore these more complex
> issues.
>
> It might help - it would certainly help me - if we could identify what
might
> be the Irish Diaspora Studies elements to these discussions...
>
> Ownership of the word 'terrorism'. Yes, oppressive regimes like nothing
> better than an all encompassing definition of 'terrorism', and, yes, the
USA
> seems bent on a series of alliances with oppressive anti-democratic
regimes
> in its attack on terrorism and its defence of democracy... Yes, one
> person's terrorist is another person's founding father...
>
> Yes, in the current crisis, already the Prevention of Terrorism Act is
being
> used here in Britain. And it would seem that the Muslims of America are
now
> going to find themselves in a position similar to that held by the Irish
in
> Britain (or Irish Catholics in Britain), for some centuries, in different
> crises. They are going to be, in Paddy Hillyard's phrase, 'a suspect
> community'. And Paddy Hillyard's book - changing what needs to be
changed -
> is a good outline of what they can expect.
>
> Yes, here in the British Isles we are used to - but not inured to - 'the
> politics of the latest atrocity', whereby the terrorists' own actions
> prevent discussion of grievances. This may be part of the logic, of
> course - the violence is intended to provoke more violence. I do not
speak
> of 'the last atrocity' - but 'the latest atrocity...'
>
> Yes, the logic which led to the attacks on the New York financial district
> is most probably the same logic that led to the IRA attacks on the City of
> London.
>
> Yes, elements of 'Irish-America' have long displayed - yes,
self-indulgent -
> support for acts of political violence. I should say, maybe, elements of
> the Irish Diaspora. But, yes, see above, 'one person's terrorist...'
>
> The attack on New York will, it seems, in some ways be an Irish-American
> tragedy - as the names of the dead firefighters and police officers are
made
> known. Already it is clear that more British people died in this attack
> than in any previous terrorist event. The first known Irish victims were
in
> the hi-jacked planes, but there were certainly more in the destroyed
> buildings. New York is, of course, a city of the Irish Diaspora.
>
> Have I left anything out?
>
> I think it would be odd if we, on the Irish-Diaspora list, did not discuss
> at least some of these issues. But I think we should first let America,
and
> all the people and countries who lost loved ones, collect and bury the
dead.
>
> Patrick O'Sullivan
>
>

From: "NK Killeen"

I understand Patrick?s desire for restraint. Discussing the
implications of this event, at this moment, seems a bit like
questioning the virtues of the dead whilst attending the funeral. But
I believe Padraic Finn is right. Between us, we of the Irish diaspora
have knowledge and experience of the misery and futility of bigotry,
oppression, violence and wilful ignorance. We should speak up
and remind the world that fighting fire with fire just makes a bigger
fire. As we in Ireland have found out, cycles of violence and
injustice will only be broken through dialogue with others, an
acknowledgement of our part in creating such situations and an
acceptance that we do not have a monopoly on ?truth? or
?goodness?. We can wait until all the American dead have been
buried, but by then we may have a lot more bodies to consider,
both in Afghanistan and in our own countries where attacks on
Muslims ( and those mistaken for Muslims) have already begun.
Nuala Killeen