From: "Padraic Finn"
To:
Subject: Re: Ir-D Ethnicity and Race/Identity

Dear Grainne,

A good place to start, if you haven't already done so, would be a trawl
of Race & Class and in particular its special edition, "The Three Faces
of British Racism" 43/2 Oct-Dec 2001.

Ronit Lentin and Robbie McVeigh's Racism and Anti Racism in Ireland,
(Beyond The Pale, 2002) is a collection of articles looking at racism
and identity but mostly in the South of Ireland. Good Luck,

Padraic Finn



- ----- Original Message -----
From:
To:
Sent: Thursday, May 22, 2003 5:59 AM
Subject: Ir-D Ethnicity and Race/Identity


>
> From:
> To:
> Subject: Ethnicity and Race/identity
>
> Dear Members,
>
> I've been lurking on the list for quite a while and now
> I need your help.
>
> Could anybody recommend some good articles which discuss the concepts
> of 'ethnicity' and 'race' and perhaps 'identity'? (and these related
> to British society)
>
> Thanking you all in advance,
>
> Grainne O'Keeffe
> phd student
> University of Le Havre
> France

From:
To:
Subject: Ethnicity and Race/identity

Dear Members,

I've been lurking on the list for quite a while and now
I need your help.

Could anybody recommend some good articles which discuss the concepts of
'ethnicity' and 'race' and perhaps 'identity'? (and these related to
British society)

Thanking you all in advance,

Grainne O'Keeffe
phd student
University of Le Havre
France

From Email Patrick O'Sullivan

The latest issue of History Ireland is now being distributed, and the
web site has been updated...

This is the first issue under the new publisher, Wordwell - see earlier
Ir-D discussion - and edited by Tommy Graham alone.

I have pasted in, below, the list of Contents. It is a good issue,
which makes good use of HI's ability to use illustrations.

Interestingly, 2 of the articles - and perhaps 3 - engage in a sort of
debate with movie versions of history. Two articles even use stills
from movies. New evidence on Sunday 21 November 1920 is the release of
the records of the British army enquiries held, in camera, in December
that year. Carey and de Burca discuss the version of the Croke Park
massacre given in Neil Jordan's film, Michael Collins - with the British
armoured car charging on to the pitch (a version of events which has
mis-led at least one British historian). Apparently there were armoured
cars involved, and the car in St. James' Avenue fired at least 50
rounds. The Toby Joyce article uses stills from Scorsese's Gangs of New
York.

The possible third is Michael Smith's article on Tom Crean. There are 2
movies around, the one starring Kenneth Branagh, directed by Charles
Sturridge - with one of the McGann brothers as Tom Crean - and the IMAX
Shackleton's Antartic Adventure.

P.O'S.

http://www.historyireland.com/

History Ireland
Volume 11 No. 2 Summer 2003

CONTENTS:

? News & Shorts
Historians campaign to save 1916
Rebel HQ
The Donegal corridor and the
Battle of the Atlantic
Robert Lynd: essayist and Irishman

? Sources: 'Bloody Sunday 1920: new evidence
Tim Carey and Marcus de Búrca

? Longford musketeers: the Farrells of Annaly and the sieges of St
Ghislain and Tangier
Stephen Collins

? The New York draft riots of 1863: an Irish civil war?
Toby Joyce

? Yeats, Henry and the western idyll
Marie Bourke

? Tom Crean (1877?1938)?an Irish hero
Michael Smith

? Fifty years of Busáras
Paul Clerkin

? Interview: Mentioning the War: the Bureau of Military History

? Reviews
The Stuart kingdoms in the seventeenth century: awkward neighbours
The IRA 1926?1936 George Russell (Æ) and the new Ireland, 1905?30
Female activists: Irish women and change 1900?1960

From: "Sarah Morgan"
Subject: Re: Ir-D Ethnicity and Race/Identity 3

Grainne,

You could also try the following:

The Future of Multi-Ethnic Britain, report of the Commission on
Multi-Ethnic Britain (also known as the Parek report)

Alibhai-Brown, Y. 2000 Who Do We Think We Are: imagining the new
Britain, Penguin

Brah, A., Hickman, M.J. and Mac an Ghaill, M. (eds) 1999 Thinking
Identities: ethnicity, racism and culture, Macmillan.

'Classic' authors to look out for on this issue might include Stuart
Hall, Tariq Modood, Avtar Brah, Robin Cohen, Floya Anthias, Nira
Yuval-Davis, Phil Cohen. If you're particularly interested in the Irish
in Britain, look out for Mary Hickman and Bronwen Walter, including:

Hickman, M.J. 1995 Religion, Class, Identity, Avebury

Walter, B. 2001 Outsiders Inside, Routledge

Sarah Morgan.

> ----- Original Message -----
> From:
> To:
> Sent: Thursday, May 22, 2003 5:59 AM
> Subject: Ir-D Ethnicity and Race/Identity
>
>
> >
> > From:
> > To:
> > Subject: Ethnicity and Race/identity
> >
> > Dear Members,
> >
> > I've been lurking on the list for quite a while and now
> > I need your help.
> >
> > Could anybody recommend some good articles which discuss the
> > concepts of 'ethnicity' and 'race' and perhaps 'identity'? (and
> > these related to British society)
> >
> > Thanking you all in advance,
> >
> > Grainne O'Keeffe
> > phd student
> > University of Le Havre
> > France
>

From: patrick maume
Sender: P.Maume[at]Queens-Belfast.AC.UK
To: irish-diaspora[at]Bradford.ac.uk
Subject: Re: Ir-D Michael Corr van der Maeren

From: Patrick Maume
I work for the DICTIONARY OF IRISH BIOGRAPHY, and we are
currently debating whether to include the
nineteeenth-century Belgian free trade campaigner Michael Corr
van der Maeren, known as "the Cobden of Belgium", who began
liofe as Michael Corr of Co. Meath. He gets a couple of
mentions in Anthony Howe FREE TRADE AND LIBERAL ENGLAND
1846-1946 (Oxford, 1997). Does anyone in the list have any
information on him, in particular relating to his activities in
Belgium and subsequent historical reputation?
Best wishes,
Patrick

----------------------
patrick maume

From: cmcc[at]qis.net
To: irish-diaspora[at]Bradford.ac.uk
Subject: Re: Ir-D History Ireland, 11, 2, Summer 2003

Paddy,
Thanks so much for this information on History Ireland - as you know I
am a big supporter of this magazine and have long admired the work they
do to make scholarly history accessible to a wider audience. I look
forward to getting my copy.

Carmel

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

>From Email Patrick O'Sullivan
>
>The latest issue of History Ireland is now being distributed, and the
>web site has been updated...
>
>This is the first issue under the new publisher, Wordwell - see earlier

>Ir-D discussion - and edited by Tommy Graham alone.
>
>I have pasted in, below, the list of Contents. It is a good issue,
>which makes good use of HI's ability to use illustrations.
>
>Interestingly, 2 of the articles - and perhaps 3 - engage in a sort of
>debate with movie versions of history. Two articles even use stills
>from movies. New evidence on Sunday 21 November 1920 is the release of

>the records of the British army enquiries held, in camera, in December
>that year. Carey and de Burca discuss the version of the Croke Park
>massacre given in Neil Jordan's film, Michael Collins - with the
>British armoured car charging on to the pitch (a version of events
>which has mis-led at least one British historian). Apparently there
>were armoured cars involved, and the car in St. James' Avenue fired at
>least 50 rounds. The Toby Joyce article uses stills from Scorsese's
>Gangs of New York.
>
>The possible third is Michael Smith's article on Tom Crean. There are
>2 movies around, the one starring Kenneth Branagh, directed by Charles
>Sturridge - with one of the McGann brothers as Tom Crean - and the IMAX

>Shackleton's Antartic Adventure.
>
>P.O'S.
>
>http://www.historyireland.com/
>
>History Ireland
>Volume 11 No. 2 Summer 2003
>

From: ppo[at]aber.ac.uk
Subject: Ethnicity and Race Identity

From: Paul O'Leary


Grainne,

If you are interested in race and identity in different parts of
Britain, you might look at:

Charlotte Williams, Neil Evans and Paul O'Leary (eds), A Tolerant
Nation? Exploring Ethnic Diversity in Wales, University of Wales Press,
2003.

One of the editors, Charlotte Williams, has just won a literary prize at
the Hay festival for her personal memoir of her mixed heritage
upbringing.
See:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/em/fr/-/1/hi/wales/mid/2940110.stm

From: "M. A. Ruff"
To:
Subject: RE: Ir-D Ethnicity and Race/Identity

I am very grateful to everyone who has provided Grainne with a book list
which is also very valuable for my own project - many thanks. My own
starting point in understanding the concepts and use of the terms
ethnicity, race and identity was to look through the Oxford Reader
"Ethnicity" (OUP). Haven't the publication details here, but can
provide them.

Cheers
Moira

- -----Original Message-----

From:
To:
Subject: Ethnicity and Race/identity

Dear Members,

I've been lurking on the list for quite a while and now
I need your help.

Could anybody recommend some good articles which discuss the concepts of
'ethnicity' and 'race' and perhaps 'identity'? (and these related to
British society)

Thanking you all in advance,

Grainne O'Keeffe
phd student
University of Le Havre
France

From Email Patrick O'Sullivan

Forwarded on behalf of Dr John Kirk...

P.O'S.

- -----Original Message-----
Subject: Fourth Language and Politics Symposium-ANNOUNCEMENT

Fourth Language and Politics Symposium:
The Media, the Performing Arts, and the Economy
Queen?s University Belfast, 17-20 September 2003

MAIN THEMES
· Irish, Scottish Gaelic, Scots/Ulster-Scots/Hiberno-English, Sign
and broadcasting, the press, the performing arts, and the economy
· What does bi-/multi-lingualism mean in terms of Northern
Ireland, the Republic of Ireland, and Scotland? Is this the goal of
language policy? How will it be achieved?
· Lessons from comparisons with Basque and Walloon

ACCEPTED INTERNATIONAL SPEAKERS
· Professor Jean-Luc Fauconnier, Ministère de la Communaut
Wallonie-Bruxelles
· Professor François Grin, Université de Genève
· Professor Eduardo J. Ruiz Vieytez, University of Deusto, Bilbao

PARTICIPANTS
Academics, statutory officials, professionals, broadcasters,
journalists, scriptwriters, producers, directors, economists,
consultants, politicians, activists, linguists, dialectologists,
educationalists, and many others ? from whom offers of contributions
(max. 15 minutes!) to panels specifically on those topics are invited by
15 June 2003. Acceptances will be issued by 25 June 2003. A volume of
edited proceedings will be published in December 2003.

OUTLINE PROGRAMME (please note new dates!)
Wednesday 17 September: Arrivals
Thursday 18 September: Panels and Papers & book launch buffet reception
Friday 19 September: Panels and Papers & symposium dinner
Saturday 20 September: Departures

Participation by advance registration

CONTACT
Dr John Kirk, School of English, Queen?s University Belfast
Te. (+44) (0)28 9027 3815, Fax (+44) (0)28 9031 4615
Email j.m.kirk[at]qub.ac.uk

Prof. Dónall Ó Baoill, Irish and Celtic Studies, Queen?s University
Belfast
Te. (+44) (0)28 9027 3390, Fax (+44) (0)28 9032 4549
Email d.obaoill[at]qub.ac.uk

Supported by the AHRB Research Centre for Irish and Scottish Studies,
with additional funding under active consideration ? approaches and
collaboration welcome.
Organised on behalf of the Forum for Research on the Languages of
Scotland and Ulster.

From: Peter Hart
Subject: Re: query re. Meagher

I have a query from a Latin Americanist friend that I hope someone can
help me with.

He wants to get Thomas Francis Meagher's account of his 1859-60 travels
in Costa Rica republished (sounds like a good idea) and was wondering
therefore about recent biographical work.

Does anyone know of any such - or even about the book in question?

Also, a related question: has anything been published on Stonyhurst
(Jesuit) College in Lancashire in the 19th Century? It certainly has an
impressive website...

Thanks very much,

Peter Hart

From: TGLynch[at]aol.com
Subject: Re: Ir-D Queries, Meagher, Stonyhurst
To: irish-diaspora[at]Bradford.ac.uk

Meagher's account "Holidays in Costa Rica" were serialized in
Harpers
New Monthly Magazine, December 1859- February 1860. (Volumes XX_-XI)
See
also Meagher's "The New Route through Chiriqui" in the January 1861
(Volume XXII)
issue.

There is a need for a new, scholalrly treatment of Meagher. The
best,
though seriously dated, treatment remains Robert G. Atherarn's Thomas
Francis
Meagher: An Irish Revolutionary in America. A shorter piece, written by

myself, can be found in Working Papers in Irish Studies, Vol. 00, no.
4.
Kinnealy's The Great Shame also contains some good biographical
information. Hope
this helps.

Best regards, Tim Lynch

Lecturer in History and Social Sciences
California Maritime Academy, CSU

From: "Bryan P. McGovern"
Organization: University of Missouri
Subject: Re: Ir-D Queries, Meagher, Stonyhurst

Also, note that the Meagher Harper's New Monthly Magazine articles are
freely available at this Cornell web site:

http://cdl.library.cornell.edu/moa/browse.author/m.92.html

From: Kerby Miller
Subject: Re: Ir-D Queries, Meagher, Stonyhurst

Decades ago, I read the weekly installments of his Costa Rican
travels in Meagher's newspaper, the New York IRISH NEWS, late 1850s.

Patrick Maume would know better than I, but the only biographical
works I know offhand are Michael Cavanagh's old (1892) but still
useful book and the shorter, more recent (1949), and scathing study
by Robert G. Athearn. I also find a book I didn't know: Capt. W. F.
Lyons, Brigadier-General Thomas Francis Meagher: his political and
military career; with selections from his speeches and writings (New
York, D. & J. Sadlier & co. [c1886]).

On Stonyhurst, I'd ask David N. Doyle at UCD and
.

Good luck,

Kerby Miller.





>From: Peter Hart
>Subject: Re: query re. Meagher
>
>I have a query from a Latin Americanist friend that I hope someone can
>help me with.
>
>He wants to get Thomas Francis Meagher's account of his 1859-60 travels

>in Costa Rica republished (sounds like a good idea) and was wondering
>therefore about recent biographical work.
>
>Does anyone know of any such - or even about the book in question?
>
>Also, a related question: has anything been published on Stonyhurst
>(Jesuit) College in Lancashire in the 19th Century? It certainly has
>an impressive website...
>
>Thanks very much,
>
>Peter Hart

From: "Bryan P. McGovern"
Organization: University of Missouri
Subject: Re: Ir-D Queries, Meagher, Stonyhurst

He is probably referring to Meagher's "Holidays in Costa Rica" which
were published in Harper's New Monthly Magazine in Dec. 1859, Jan' 60,
and Feb. '60.

Bryan McGovern
University of Missouri

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

> From: Peter Hart
> Subject: Re: query re. Meagher
>
> I have a query from a Latin Americanist friend that I hope someone can

> help me with.
>
> He wants to get Thomas Francis Meagher's account of his 1859-60
> travels in Costa Rica republished (sounds like a good idea) and was
> wondering therefore about recent biographical work.
>
> Does anyone know of any such - or even about the book in question?
>
> Also, a related question: has anything been published on Stonyhurst
> (Jesuit) College in Lancashire in the 19th Century? It certainly has
> an impressive website...
>
> Thanks very much,
>
> Peter Hart

From Email Patrick O'Sullivan

A recent issue of RECUSANT HISTORY 26 (2002) had an article...
WHITEHEAD M, 'In the Sincerest Intentions of Studying: The Educational
Legacy of Thomas Weld 1750-1810 Founder of Stonyhurst College', - which
might have some leads.

Recusant History is published by the Catholic Record Society.
http://www.catholic-history.org.uk/crs/index.htm

A search of the British Library catalogue with the word Stonyhurst as
Subject turns up quite a few items...
http://blpc.bl.uk/

P.O'S.

From: "John McGurk"
To:
Subject: Re: Ir-D Queries, Meagher, Stonyhurst

Dear Peter, Old but useful on Stonyhurst two works by John Gerard S.J.
"Memorials of Stonyhurst College, 1881 and the same author, 'Stonyhurst
College' 1894 and there is also Hubert Chadwick 'St Omers to Stonyhurst'
( 1962). Sorry I do not appear to be able 'to do' italics for book
titles- the above are books not articles. Kind regards
John McGurk: ,jjnmcg[at]eircom.net

- ----- Original Message -----
>
> From: Peter Hart
>
> has anything been published on Stonyhurst
> (Jesuit) College in Lancashire in the 19th Century? It certainly has
> an impressive website...
>
> Thanks very much,
>
> Peter Hart
>
>

From Email Patrick O'Sullivan

Further to my earlier message about the special issue, 'Irish Studies
Today', of the International Journal of English Studies... Message,
including the Contents, pasted in below...

Keith Gregor, the Editor of the special issue, has now sent us 2 spare
copies. If any Irish Studies specialist would like to receive one of
these copies do contact me directly, and I will happily forward...

First come, first served...

Paddy

- -----Original Message-----

From Email Patrick O'Sullivan


The International Journal of English Studies is based at the University
of Murcia, Spain. Basic information at...

http://www.um.es/engphil/nueva/id22.htm

The recently published IJES, Volume 2, Number 2, 2002 was a special
issue on 'Irish Studies Today', edited by Keith Gregor of the University
of Murcia. I have pasted in, below, the Table of Contents.

I am not able to analyse this collection in great detail. But Keith
Gregor is to be congratulated on a nice piece of work - very much within
mainland Europe's 'philologia' tradition, a reasonable number of
well-known names, plus some very able scholars whose names are new to
me. The specialists - on for example The Bell, Friel, Lavin - will find
items that spark interest. Some of the titles do hide their themes from
the casual observer - Aida Diaz Bild is, of course, writing about
Seamus Deane, Reading in the Dark (and how very quickly this text has
become much analysed....). Moynagh Sullivan writes about Eavan Boland.
And Rosa Gonzalez Casademont's article is a very confident study of the
place of Ford's The Quiet Man in world understanding of 'the Irish'.

This may be an over-reading of Keith Gregor's collection, but... It
sems to me that the collectiuon can cumulatively be read as revealing
mainland Europe's vision of 'Irish Studies Today'. On that note I do
have to draw attention to the point made in the Editor's Preface - how
very much that vision is shaped by the decades of conflict in Northern
Ireland.

P.O'S.

IJES, Volume 2, Number 2, 2002
Irish Studies Today
Issue Editor: Keith Gregor

Table of Contents


PREFACE
KEITH GREGOR


ARTICLES:

DAVID PIERCE
«Cultural Nationalism and the Irish Literary Revival

MALCOLM BALLIN
«Transitions in Irish Miscellanies between 1923 and 1940:
The Irish Statesman and The Bell

TAMARA BENITO DE LA IGLESIA
«Born into the Troubles: Deirdre Madden?s Hidden Symptoms

AÍDA DÍAZ BILD
«Reading in the Dark: the Transcendence of Political Reality through
Art

ROSA GONZÁLEZ CASADEMONT
«Ireland on Screen. A View from Spain

MIREIA ARAGAY
«Ireland, Nostalgia and Globalisation: Brian Friel?s Dancing at Lughnasa

on Stage and Screen

SPURGEON THOMPSON
«Returning the Gaze: Culture and the Politics of Surveillance in
Ireland

MARIE ARNDT
«Narratives of Internal Exile in Mary Lavin?s Short Stories

MOYNAGH SULLIVAN
«I am, therefore I?m not (Woman)


BOOK REVIEWS

Elizabeth Butler Cullingford (2001). Ireland?s Others: Gender and
Ethnicity in Irish
Literature and Popular Culture. Cork: Cork University Press in
association with Field Day.
Reviewed by SPURGEON THOMPSON.

Inés Praga Terente (Ed.)(2002). Irlanda ante un nuevo milenio. Burgos:
Asociación Española de Estudios Irlandeses. Reviewed by KEITH GREGOR


ABOUT THE AUTHORS

From: Noel Gilzean
To: irish-diaspora

Noel Gilzean
University of Huddersfield
n.a.gilzean[at]hud.ac.uk

Hi following on from the recent discussion on race and ethnicity this
conference may be of interest to post-graduate student members.

Noel


From the website "Questions to be addressed at the conference include:

How has Britishness been imagined in literature, popular culture and
within the media?

What are the implications of changes to notions of national identity for
the construction of Britain as a multi-cultural society?
How has Britishness been represented through material culture?
How has devolution affected political structures and national
identities?
Proposals are invited on these topics or on work that interprets the
conference theme more broadly. Proposals are invited for papers of 15-20
minutes and should include an abstract."

-----Original Message-----

CONFERENCE TITLE: UNDERSTANDING BRITAIN

CONFERENCE VENUE: UNIVERSITY OF SALFORD, MANCHESTER, UK

CONFERENCE DATE: 4TH AND 5TH SEPTEMBER 2003

This is the second postgraduate conference to be held at the University
of Salford. The conference is inter-disciplinary, aimed primarily at
students of arts, humanities and the social sciences. The conference
aims to explore historical and contemporary configurations of Britain,
and researchers are invited to intepret the themes in a broad context.

THE DEADLINE FOR PROPOSALS IS 20TH JUNE 2003

For more information please consult the conference website:

http://www.esri.salford.ac.uk/understandingbritain

or e-mail the conference organiser, Catherine McGlynn at

understandingbritain[at]hotmail.com

From: "Richard Jensen"
Subject: Fw: ANB - Bio of the Day

American National Biography Online

Shields, Thomas Edward (9 May 1862-5 Feb. 1921), Catholic priest and
educator, was born in Mendota, Minnesota, the son of John Shields, an
immigrant Irish farmer, and Bridget Burke. The year that Thomas was
born, a Minnesota Sioux uprising forced the Shields to take refuge at
Fort Snelling. In his early youth, Thomas was known as an "omadhaun," a
Gaelic term for fool or simpleton, because he was thought to be
uneducable. Through the efforts of a parish priest, however, he learned
to love reading and study.

In 1882 Shields's parents sent him to three years of higher education
at the College of St. Francis in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. In 1885 he
attended the Seminary of St. Thomas Aquinas in St. Paul, Minnesota,
where he studied for the priesthood. He was ordained in 1891, and after
a year as a curate at Archbishop John Ireland's (1838-1918) cathedral,
he was sent to St. Mary's Seminary in Baltimore, where in 1892 he
obtained a master's degree in theology, and to Johns Hopkins University,
where he studied biology and experimental psychology, obtaining a
doctorate in 1895.

From 1895 to 1902, Shields taught psychology and biology at the
Seminary of St. Paul, where Archbishop Ireland intended for him to
introduce clerical students to a competent dialogue between theology and
the modern sciences. Because of his reputation for scholarship, in 1902
he was hired by the Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C.,
as an instructor in psychology. Shortly after joining that faculty,
however, Shields focused his interest on the application of biology and
psychology to the field of education. In 1905 he established a
correspondence course, supplemented by diocesan summer institutes, for
the numerous teaching sisters in the rapidly expanding Catholic school
system across the nation. He also founded the university's Department of
Education in 1909. To provide further for the professionalization of
Catholic teachers, he conducted the first summer institute for teaching
sisters and built the Sisters College at the university in 1911.

Shields was a strong advocate of higher education for women and women
religious, believing that the teaching sisters in particular needed
professional training and graduate degrees to meet the demands of state
certification and the rising standards of education within the nation.
His support for higher education for women was considered innovative in
the early twentieth century when many at the Catholic University of
America, as elsewhere in Catholic higher education, resisted the trend.

Shields was a Catholic representative of the Progressive Era in
American education. Along with John A. Ryan in social thought, Edward
Pace in philosophy, and William Kerby in sociology, he was one of the
progressive faculty members at the Catholic University who sought to
develop creatively a rapproachment between Catholic theology and modern
science and philosophy. Shields became a national Catholic leader in
developing a Christian view of education. He was clearly influenced by
his own education in biology and experimental psychology and by the
child-centered approaches to education of the Progressive Era. In 1907
and 1908, Shields entered into a major national debate with Father Peter
Christopher Yorke at the Catholic Education Association's national
meetings on religious education. Yorke emphasized content, and Shields
argued that more emphasis ought to be placed upon the method of teaching
and the teacher's awareness of the student's learning readiness and
psychological capacity. Shields opposed the method of memorization that
was common in the catechisms. He wanted to correlate the content with
the psychological growth of the student. In 1908, such an approach was
considered revolutionary.

Shields's primary study, The Philosophy of Education (1917),
incorporated the thought of many of the educational reformers of his
day. Shields wanted educators to supplant the passivity of the old
educational system with activities within the normal experiences of
childhood. Like John Dewey and other innovators, Shields believed that
children learned best by doing, by becoming active in the pursuit of
knowledge, not only through books and teaching lessons but also through
music, signs, symbols, and liturgical activity. Education should
correspond to the actual stage of the child's psychological development.
Shields also believed, like Dewey, that students needed some means of
linking together the various subjects presented to them. Unlike Dewey,
however, he believed that religion could provide that integrating and
directive link. Shields believed in developing the child according to
the laws of his or her own nature, but he asserted that nature itself
needed the guidance of revelation and religion to direct the child's
total development.

To propagate his revolutionary new methods of teaching, Shields edited
with Pace six elementary textbooks and readers in the Catholic Education
Series (1908-1915), set up his own Catholic Education Press, founded the
Catholic Educational Review (1911), conducted lectures at convents and
diocesan educational conventions across the country, and wrote numerous
articles and books on education.

Shields was an American-Irish activist whose Progressive Era energy and
optimism made him attractive to the students who attended his classes at
the university. His innovations in teaching methods and his attempts to
chart new directions in the teaching of religion, however, also produced
enemies and critics within American Catholicism. Although the old
methods of education prevailed throughout the first half of the
twentieth century, Shields's new methods gradually helped to transform
the education of women religious who attended summer schools and the
Sisters College at the Catholic University of America, and through those
women religious the new methods were put into practice in the American
Catholic school system.

After 1916 Shields suffered with valvular heart trouble; he died in his
Washington, D.C., home.


Bibliography

Shields's letters and unpublished papers are located primarily in the
Archives of the Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C. Among
his more important published works are Twenty-Five Lessons in the
Psychology of Education (1905-1907), The Education of Our Girls (1907),
The Teaching of Religion (1907), The Making and the Unmaking of a
Dullard (1909), and Teachers Manual of Primary Methods (1912). The only
biography is Thomas Edward Shields, biologist, psychologist, educator
(1947) by Justine Bayard Cutting Ward, one of his students and admirers.

Patrick W. Carey



Back to the top

Citation:
Patrick W. Carey. "Shields, Thomas Edward";
http://www.anb.org/articles/08/08-01382.html;
American National Biography Online June 2003

Copyright Notice
Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of the
American National Biography of the Day provided that the following
statement is preserved on all copies:

From American National Biography, published by Oxford University
Press, Inc., copyright 2000 American Council of Learned Societies.
Further information is available at http://www.anb.org.

From: "GRAINNE & FRED"
To:
Subject: Ethnicity/race + identity

I would just like to thank all the members who took
the time to answer my query, it was very much appreciated.

Best Wishes,

Grainne