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5101  
3 September 2004 08:44  
  
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 08:44:54 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
Conference, Sunderland, The Word, The Icon and The Ritual
  
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From: Alison Younger
alison_younger[at]yahoo.co.uk

Dear Patrick,
We have almost finished the programme for the conference we are hosting at
the University of Sunderland, but would still be interested in proposals
from those wishing to speak on issues relating to the diaspora. We are also
keen to invite anyone along to participate even if they don't wish to give a
paper...
Programme below...
Slainte mor
Alison


Irish Studies Conference

The Word, The Icon and The Ritual

12th to 14th November, 2004

University of Sunderland's Sir Tom Cowie Campus at Saint Peter's

Keynote speakers include:
Professor Stephen Regan (University of Durham)
Professor Willy Maley (University of Glasgow)

This event, which combines an academic conference with a celebration of
Irish culture will include a performance of English Heart: Irish Soul by a
professional company on the evening of Friday 12th November, followed by
exhibition dancing and a ceilidh with refreshments in the National Glass
Centre, on Saturday 13th and a poetry reading on Sunday 14th by Eilis Ni
Dhuibhne followed by an optional guided tour of the National Glass Centre.

With thanks to the Irish Embassy, London for their support.

Cead Mile Failte.
 TOP
5102  
3 September 2004 18:22  
  
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 18:22:22 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
BOOK REVIEW, JOHN McDONAGH, Brendan Kennelly: A Host of Ghosts
  
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Email Patrick O'Sullivan

The following book review has kindly been made available to us by IR-D
member Alison O'Malley-Younger.

Our thanks to Alison.

Paddy

________________________________

BOOK REVIEW BY
Alison O'Malley-Younger
University of Sunderland
alison_younger[at]yahoo.co.uk

JOHN McDONAGH,
Brendan Kennelly: A Host of Ghosts
2004
Dublin, Liffey Press
ISBN 1-904148-44-1


Let me preface this review with a quotation from Joseph Heller's Catch-22:
"He knew everything about literature except how to enjoy it". This is
clearly NOT an accusation that could be levelled at John McDonagh in his
book, Brendan Kennelly: A Host of Ghosts, a study which is clear,
accessible, thought provoking and intellectually stimulating, a lively
combination of common-sense witticism and critical reflection on a poet who
the author defines as "one of Ireland's most important poets" who has
languished somewhat in the critical wilderness.

The virtue of reading this comprehensive critical introduction to
Kennelly's corpus, is that it sets the poet's work in a
biographical-developmental frame in the astute and informed introduction,
capturing the complexity of Kennelly as a poet and a man while offering a
stylistic and thematic introduction to the poet's prolific output. It then
proceeds, chapter-by-chapter to combine various theoretical paradigms with
close readings in what amounts to an eloquent synthesis of theoretical
stringency, potent irony, wit and verve written by an author who has an
enviable familiarity with the works of Kennelly .

From the outset McDonagh sets out his theoretical and thematic
stall, establishing Kennelly's key themes as the loss of language; the
harsher realities of rural and urban life; 'betrayal, violence and
passionate love' asserting throughout the interdependence of the poet's life
and artistic achievement while foregrounding the 'crucial cultural
significance' of Kennelly's 'dangerous, challenging and tautly constructed
body of work'. The resulting text is verbally acute and jargon-free, a
critically coherent and, on occasion playful critique of Kennelly the
'self-professed cute hoor' from Kerry.

McDonagh has assembled the book in five chapters entitled: Getting
up Early, Old Loyalties: The Boats Are Home, Spilling Selves: Cromwell, The
Chaos of Mind: Medea and Following the Judasvoice with a culminating
conclusion: Blitzophrenia: Brendan Kennelly's Postcolonial Vision,
Blitzophrenia being, according to the author, the 'defining characteristic
of [Kennelly's] long and varied career. The book contains important new
insights and informed and detailed analyses beginning in Chapter one wherein
the author examines recurring poetic motifs and images introduced in the
earlier poems and developed in the later, 'epic' collections. Placing
Kennelly in the company of other 'emerging and established poetic voices,
including Seamus Heaney, John Montague, Thomas Kinsella and Richard Murphy,
McDonagh hails the early poetry (including the heavily anthologised 'My Dark
Fathers' and 'The Pig Killer') as 'the emergence of a major new poetic
voice' that examines the icons and chimeras surrounding identity both
personal and collective, individual and national. This approach is developed
in chapter two wherein the author examines seminal and formative moments in
the life of the poet, aligning these to the 'reevaluation and
reappropriation' of memories in Kenelly's corpus of works. Highlighting the
roles of storytelling and singing in the 'formation of cultural identity'
McDonagh examines their importance to both the form and content of
Kennelly's poetry while tracking the de-mythologising imperative in the
same. This chapter addresses the manner in which Kennelly's poetry is a
deeply nuanced conduit for voices from the lyrical in 'The Singing Girl is
Easy in Her Song' to the menacing in 'The Stick'. Covering the themes of
education and childhood this chapter elucidates the manner in which Kennelly
is a poet of extremes: at once the ludic jester of 'Poetry My Arse' and the
attentive observer of violence in poems such as 'Beatings'.

One of the highlights of this book for me is the chapter on
Cromwell wherein McDonagh examines themes such as nation and imagination in
the conceptual frameworks of reappropriation and desacralisation. In the
Introduction to Cromwell Kennelly suggests that: 'Because of history, an
Irish poet, to realise himself, must turn the full attention of his
imagination to the English tradition. An English poet committed to the same
task need hardly give the smallest thought to things Irish', hence the
inclusion of Edmund Spenser in both the poem and its analysis. Discussing
the epic scope and genre of the collection McDonagh points to the manner in
which Kennelly reconfigures the English sonnet, allowing his poetic persona
Buffun to wield it in his search for self-identity and identifying the self.
This chapter included theoretical paradigms from the Freudian to the
Bhabhalian: the Psychoanalytic to the Postcolonial, it offers edifying
Orientalist readings utilising the theories of Said to define Kennelly's
'destabilising hermeneutical poetics' in a register that is academic,
insightful, engaged, engaging and extremely readable.

McDonagh's chapter on Kennelly's version of Medea re-emphasises
the theme of betrayal and the device of storytelling prevalent in Kennelly's
works. Contextualising the play in women's stories overheard by Kennelly in
a Dublin hospital in 1986 McDonagh foregrounds the universality of the sense
of female victimisation that is at the heart of the play along with
Kennelly's authorial connection with Jason. This chapter's foci are the
importance of 'versions', the vicarious 'voicing' of women, de-mythologising
and violence. It is a critique of the misogyny of male authority which takes
the conceptual fabric of Euripides' original and makes it into something new
that speaks to Kennelly's own culture.

In the Introduction to the Book of Judas Kennelly explains that in
Cromwell 'I tried to open my mind, heart and imagination to the full,
fascinating complexity of a man I was from childhood taught, quite simply,
to hate. A learned hate is hard to unlearn.' The Book of Judas, the subject
of chapter five develops this notion, highlighting the obvious (and for
Kennelly, recurring) theme of betrayal in the central figure of Judas
Iscariot. Comparing Kennelly to Heaney, McDonagh enters into a fascinating
analysis of Kennelly's view of the role of the poet, poetic authenticity and
'the untrustworthiness of words, memories and ideas'. Identity, its
instability and formation is foregrounded in the potent image of Christ and
Judas in a Lacanian dyad, fundamentally interdependent and necessarily
linked. McDonagh deftly and skilfully brings to the fore the way in which
Kennelly turns the notion of betrayal on its head by depicting Judas as a
scapegoat in the design of Christ's martyrdom. It is the ultimate act of
desacralisation and, some would say blasphemy but it highlights one of
Kennelly's greatest strengths, the ability to locate his work in the middle
of the interpretative battlefield between the authentic and the inauthentic,
'the fake and the real thing'.

What is Blitzophrenia? A postcolonial, polyvocal poetics that
exists to challenge cultural monoliths and icons and indices of Irishness, a
cultural correlative and poetic corrective to historical and stereotypical
binarisms, a multiplicity of voices that coalesce in a 'selfswamp'. This is
what I understand from McDonagh's final theoretical chapter, which is
refreshing in its accessibility, its brevity, its tightness and its clarity.
This chapter concludes a book that says exactly what it will do on the
sleeve, that is to 'provide a comprehensive critical introduction to the
broad corpus of his [Kennelly's] work'. It is a stimulating and valuable
contribution to the field of Irish Studies and Kennelly scholarship that
provides thought-provoking reading, concise critical evaluation, exacting
scholarly research and valuable bibliographic information. This book should
be welcomed and will almost certainly be cited in subsequent studies of
Kennelly. If it is not, it should be as it retrieves from the critical
wilderness a poet who is described by Geert Lernout as "All things to all
men, and a proper Irishman too". "the robust, ever-smiling Kerryman with a
touch of genius" - Brendan Kennelly.


Alison O'Malley-Younger [Dr]
Department of English
University of Sunderland
Priestman Building
Green Terrace
Sunderland
Tyne and Wear
UK
 TOP
5103  
3 September 2004 18:33  
  
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 18:33:20 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
Book Review, Edmundo Murray, Devenir Irlandes
  
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From: Patrick O'Sullivan
Subject: Book Review, Edmundo Murray, Devenir Irlandes
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Email Patrick O'Sullivan

The following book review by Sergio Kiernan appeared in The Buenos Aires
Herald, 30 July 2004.

I am grateful to Sergio Kiernan, and to The Buenos Aires Herald, for =
kindly
making the review available to the Irish Diaspora list.

Our thanks...

P.O'S.


BOOK REVIEW=20
By Sergio Kiernan
Published by The Buenos Aires Herald, 30 July 2004

In search of the real Irish

Review of
Devenir Irland=E9s, by Edmundo Murray
Eudeba, May 2004

Edmundo Murray's book on the Irish in Argentina gleefully explodes old
myths. This scholarly work analyzes in detail four original sources, two
collections of letters and two brief autobiographies, written by Irish
settlers in the 19th century and by their Argentine-born children. The
picture that emerges is surprising: when we listen to them, the Irish =
and
Irish-Argentines of the period sound Victorian and British. There is no
nationalism, no folklore, no leprechauns, not even a little Parnellism =
in
their writings. Our ancestors were no-nonsense immigrants working hard =
to
get ahead, and tended to see themselves as Britons abroad. The only
references to the situation in Ireland are a passing one to "unjust =
laws"
and the constant urging of relatives and friends to emigrate to =
Argentina,
where things were much better. Exactly what you find in contemporary =
memoirs
by English settlers such as Richard Seymour, who published =93A Settler =
in the
Pampas=94 as an adventure yarn and an economics pamphlet for emigration.

Argentine-born Edmundo Murray is a scholar, writer and historian. He =
lives
and teaches in Geneva, where he also edits a website on Irish Migration
Studies in South America and was a founding member of the Irish =
Argentine
Historical Society. "Devenir Irland=E9s", published by the University of
Buenos Aires' Eudeba, is the result of a long and detailed work of
collecting letters sent by Irish emigrants to Argentina to friends and
relatives in Ireland and Australia.

The first document in the book is a short memoir by Edward Robbins, a =
native
of Co Offaly that arrived in Argentina at 47, a widower with seven =
children
married to a Mullingar widow with four children. In Robbins' telling,
getting to Argentina in 1849 implied sailing in coffin ships: the family
arrives in Buenos Aires so sick that they have to spend weeks =
quarantined.
Edward's wife dies and soon after one of his children and one of her
daughters die as well. After paying the doctors and burying his family,
Robbins has spent his capital, a hefty eighty pounds, and starts looking =
for
a job. Things do improve, but the 1852 fall of Rosas and the ensuing =
civil
war leave him seriously in debt again. Robbins' story as an immigrant is =
not
a success one.

He is the exception. The following section of the books collates the =
letters
of the Haysland, Co Wexford, Murphys, a large family that loved =
Argentina
--"The best country under the sun"-- and spent years bringing neighbors,
relations and relatives here. "The longer people stay in Ireland, the =
worse
for them" writes John James Murphy in June 1865. "The situation there =
gets
worse by the day. I am convinced that there will be no changes in the =
law
that will benefit the farmers who lease their land and there will always =
be
an open rift between landlords and farmers, with the latter kneeling =
down."

In contrast, Argentina is a land of opportunity. "What surprises the
just-arrived the most is to find this country so different from what =
they
imagined it like. Most people there think that we live in a =
half-civilized
half-wild place; a sort of natural desert out of a Synbad tale. (...) =
Dear
friends, believe me when I tell you that a man can be happier and more
independent here than the largest farmer in Ireland, with a third of his
flock." Later the same year, John James writes a long letter to his =
brother
Martin trying to convince him to up and come: "Those who stay in Ireland =
are
completely blind to their future; they should hurry while they have the
means to come and while Argentina is in a position to admit them".

Since his sources are private correspondence and family papers, Murray's
book provides a window into daily life in Argentina in the second half =
of
the nineteenth century. The letters contain complains about the cold in =
the
Pampas, tales of Indian raids, and orders for socks, trousers and =
worsted
woolens, "unavailable here". Murphy actively smuggles in farm implements =
and
machinery, asking his family to send them as baggage under the name of =
the
Irish he hires.
=20
The third section is dominated by this fascinating domesticity. The
collection of letters sent to John James Pettit by his many Argentine
cousins is a trove of daily-life details and a very early testimony of
Irish-Argentine life. Pettit was born in Argentina of Irish parents who =
took
him to Australia when he was a toddler but who never lost touch with his
family here, relatives he never met in person. Sally Moore is the most
prolific writer in this section, which collects letters from the
mid-eighteen sixties, during the war with Paraguay.

From Buenos Aires Sally writes about marriages, deaths, births and =
accidents
in a rather large family already stretching from Santa Fe to the Indian
border west of the city. She tells John James that they don't "get along =
too
well with the locals, but we prefer them to the English, perhaps because
they are Catholic". Another writing cousin, Fanny, disagrees: "The =
people in
our country are mostly very ugly, dark and with black hair and eyes. =
They
are like savages. As of education, only a few can read and write and =
those
who can are regarded with respect by the lower orders. Their most common
weapon is the knife. They carry a very long one on their backs and they =
pull
them out on any pretext. They are very good to foreigners, and very =
poor.
Their women sew for a living. The upper classes live in towns. Very few =
of
the English live in towns."

As the years pass, cousins die "because his blood is weak" or go crazy =
but
recover. Brothers and cousins try to avoid going to the war by lying =
about
their place of birth or securing British consular protection. The Moores =
and
Pettit trade newspapers and constantly complain about copies getting =
lost or
stolen in the mail (some things never change...) and comment on =
disasters
such as a locust invasion, several dry spells, dust storms and constant
bouts of cholera. Sarmiento's election is well received ("He has been to =
the
United States and speaks English"), and Sally muses on why so many Irish
take to the drink as soon as they disembark (she is specially concerned
about the ridicule before "the natives, who never drink").

Pettit's cousins are more complex figures than the immigrants in the =
first
two chapters. They were born here and never set foot in Ireland, but
considered themselves British, if not English. They write not as =
"natives"
but as old Argentine hands, long-serving expats commenting on a country =
they
know well but remains foreign to them.

The last chapter of Devenir Irland=E9s is another short memory, that of =
Tom
Garrahan, an Argentine-born farmer and a self confessed "seco" with a
remarkable memory for figures. Life for Garrahan is a never-ending =
buying
and selling of sheep and cattle, a succession of leases and deals he =
writes
down for his children never missing a profit margin or a net price. Life =
is
lightened by the odd dance --"I don't drink and I don't smoke, and I
couldn't afford to dress up for the dances"-- and by meeting famous
customers such as Hip=F3lito Irigoyen, who buys some cows from him. =
There is
Sixto, the peon who speaks English with a brogue, and Sunday games with =
the
Lobos Hibernian Club, of which Garrahan is predictably treasurer. And =
there
is a hint to that mystery that so interested Borges, the intermarriage =
of
the Irish and the Basque: they shared leases and regarded each other as
colleagues of a sort.

Murray edited and translated the letters and memoirs --he is preparing =
an
English-language edition-- and provided hundreds of footnotes that can =
be
read sequentially or as separate chapters. He assumes his own voice only =
in
brief introductions to every collection and in a short, sharp final =
chapter
on the mysteries of nationality. There he explains his idea of how the
Irish, in order to become Argentines, had to lose their fear of things
Argentine and start seeing England as an enemy of the old country.
=20
I wish he had said more about that, but they say that it is better to =
leave
the table hungry. And anybody who reads this book will be hungry for =
more.

BOOK REVIEW=20
By Sergio Kiernan
Published by The Buenos Aires Herald, 30 July 2004
 TOP
5104  
3 September 2004 21:11  
  
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 21:11:17 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
Article, Reflections on a White Man's Journey
  
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P.O's.


Reflections on a White Man's Journey

The Diversity Factor 1 April 2004, vol. 12, no. 2, pp. 17-22(6)

John Farragher

Abstract:
As a young, white, Irish Catholic man growing up in the Boston area, John
Farragher never had to think about his race or ethnicity. He never had to
make decisions about the acceptability of his physical appearance or be
concerned about his physical safety. In this article, John candidly shares
insights and experiences of his journey as a white man learning about his
own privilege and power. His final thoughts offer a roadmap for other white
men who are ready to learn.

Document Type: Research article ISSN: 1545-2808

SICI (online): 1545-2808(20040401)12:2L.17;1-

Publisher: Elsie Y. Cross Associates, Inc.
 TOP
5105  
3 September 2004 21:13  
  
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 21:13:57 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
The Past is Another Planet
  
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From: Patrick O'Sullivan
Subject: The Past is Another Planet
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For information...

Tidying up some items left over from before the holidays...

The Past is Another Planet: The Absence of Funding for Global Historical
Research
Patrick Manning
Northeastern University

is a little essay in the online journal, World History Connected... The
essay was written to mark the CLOSURE of Patrick Manning's World History
Center.

He makes points we have made on Ir-D before - and which I touch on in my
article for New Hibernia Review last year... His last paragraphs include
this section...

'The center's closure, for lack of local or national funding, is a clear
reflection of the low priority of global historical studies. Part of the
problem lies with the historical profession. Historians think of history as
local studies, and think of world history as an accumulation of local
studies. When they define a job a "world history" they mean a job to teach
freshman surveys, and they want a faculty member who knows about a couple
world regions (outside the U.S. and Europe). This rarely has to do with
research...'

Full text at
http://worldhistoryconnected.press.uiuc.edu/1.2/manning.html

P.O'S.
 TOP
5106  
3 September 2004 22:36  
  
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 22:36:13 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
Francis Davis, "The Belfastman"
  
Sender: The Irish Diaspora Studies List
From: Patrick O'Sullivan
Subject: Francis Davis, "The Belfastman"
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From: Kerby Miller
MillerK[at]missouri.edu
Subject: Re: Francis Davis ["The Belfastman"]

W. P. Ryan's old THE IRISH LABOUR MOVEMENT (ca 1920) refers on p. 130 to the
19th-century writings of "the muslin weaver, Francis Davis, 'The
Belfastman,' a Munsterman who went to Belfast. . . . Very earnest, much
against part spirit and sectarianism, he wrote a great deal [poetry,
apparently, but perhaps also essays] in the fluent, rhetorical Young Ireland
style...."

Can anyone provide any information about Davis and his published works?
Apparently, he wrote for the post-famine NATION in Dublin, but were his
essays, etc., ever published in book form?

Many thanks,

Kerby
 TOP
5107  
3 September 2004 22:49  
  
Date: Fri, 3 Sep 2004 22:49:36 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
Book Review, Lenihan,
  
Sender: The Irish Diaspora Studies List
From: Patrick O'Sullivan
Subject: Book Review, Lenihan,
Conquest and Resistance: War in Seventeenth-Century Ireland
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For information...

P.O'S.
=20

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

Subject: REV: Trim on Lenihan, _Conquest and Resistance: War in
Seventeenth-Century Ireland_

H-NET BOOK REVIEW
Published by H-Albion[at]h-net.msu.edu (August 2004)

P=E1draig Lenihan, ed. _Conquest and Resistance: War in =
Seventeenth-Century
Ireland_. History of Warfare Series. Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2001. =
viii
+ 382 pp. Figures, maps, notes, bibliographies, index. $112.00 (cloth),
ISBN 90-04-11743-1.

Reviewed for H-Albion by D. J. B. Trim , Early
Modern Research Centre, University of Reading

Military Mismatch: The English and Scottish Conquest of =
Seventeenth-Century
Ireland

This handsome looking volume, a contribution to Brill's excellent =
History of
Warfare series, comprises ten thematic essays which explore the
seventeenth-century Irish experience of war, from political and social
contexts, military finance and logistics, and strategic geography, to =
the
actual conduct of a range of different types of military operations. =
They
are topped and tailed by editorial pieces, which try to pull the various
threads together and advance arguments for the volume as a whole; but =
while
the editor deserves praise for providing a conclusion as well as an
introduction, the conclusion is essentially a contribution to =
early-modern
military history's most significant debate--over whether there was a
"military revolution" in the period--and relates military developments =
in
seventeenth-century Ireland to the military revolution theory.

Ten thematic essays fall into two halves. Five assess strategic
considerations in various local and international contexts. Tadhg =D3
hAnnrach=E1in surveys the role of European powers in Irish military =
affairs
from 1596 to 1691 (the effective terminal date of the seventeenth =
century in
this volume); John Young considers Hiberno-Scottish relations, =
especially
the passage of military forces between the Hebrides and Ulster from 1641 =
to
1691; John McGurk focuses on how topography influenced the conduct of =
the
final English campaigns against Tyrone, in 1600-03; the editor develops =
the
theme of geographical influences on strategy and operations in an essay =
on
the period 1641-91; and Paul M. Kerrigan considers English, Irish rebel, =
and
French naval strategy in the same half century. The remaining five =
essays
are more diverse in subject matter.
James Scott Wheeler boils down his work from two substantial books in a
study of logistics and military finance over the period 1598-1692.
Weapons and tactical systems between 1594 and 1691, and siege warfare
between 1648 and 1691, are considered by Donal O'Carroll and James Burke
respectively. Two "war and society" studies round out the volume: =
Raymond
Gillespie surveys the effects of war on Irish towns and cities from the
1570s to 1691, and Bernadette Whelan examines women and warfare between
1641 and 1691.

Overall, the volume follows Lenihan's argument in his introduction that =
the
military potential of England and, later, Great Britain, was =
immeasurably
greater than that of Irish Catholics. McGurk, Wheeler, and Kerrigan
evaluate the logistical and naval strategies that exploited this =
advantage.
The disparity between Ireland and the English-cum-British kingdom was =
such
that an effective Irish military response to conquest and colonization =
was
only feasible in the favorable archipelagic and continental European
circumstances explored by Young and =D3 hAnnrach=E1in.
Defeat or victory ultimately depended on relative military performance =
in
maneuver, battle, and siege--operations evaluated by Lenihan, O'Carroll, =
and
Burke. Whelan's study of the role of women as victim, survivor and
(occasionally) combatant, and Gillespie's insightful analysis of Irish =
towns
bring out well the impact of the unequal struggle on Irish society.
The conclusion pulls a number of strands together in arguing that a =
military
revolution can be witnessed in seventeenth-century Ireland and that the
application of the military revolution was an important factor in the
conquest of Ireland.

The volume's main weakness is that most of it is actually on the period
1641-91. One can have no argument with the terminal date: "the Irish
century of warfare has a definite conclusion" (p. 21). But given the =
title,
and the fact that Tyrone's rebellion (the so-called "Nine Years'
War") was only defeated in 1603, it would be reasonable to find a
seventeenth century that runs from 1594 to 1691. Possibly the Nine =
Years'
War--which dwarfs all subsequent military events in Ireland until the =
great
rebellion of 1641--would have been better left to a volume on
sixteenth-century Ireland, yet, given this volume's title, one =
reasonably
expects more on the first four decades of the seventeenth century. Five =
of
the ten main essays deal only with events in the 1640s and after (and =
one,
that by Burke, commences with Cromwell). Of the remaining five, only =
one
chapter, McGurk's, is focused only on events before 1641. And among all =
the
broad thematic surveys, McGurk's intensive case study of 1600-03 seems =
oddly
out of place. Thus, only four essays actually cover the whole of the
seventeenth century, even though Lenihan begins his introduction by
stressing the value of a comparative approach that ranges across the
seventeenth century.

It is not clear why some essays deal only with post-1641 events. Was
Ireland not important in English/British (and Spanish!) naval strategy
before 1641? There was certainly just as much to-ing and fro-ing of =
troops,
ranging from small groups of volunteers, to large-scale forces, between
Scotland and Ireland in the half century which preceded 1641 as that
following it. Siege warfare probably was more common from the 1640s, =
but
Kinsale, in 1603, doomed Tyrone's rebellion to defeat and was thus one =
of
the most significant military events--much less sieges--in
seventeenth-century Ireland. That a chapter called "Siege Warfare in
Seventeenth-Century Ireland" does not even mention it, and also =
overlooks
the important sieges in the early days of the great rebellions, is =
absurd
and a reproach to the editor.

Burke's chapter is, in fact, basically a narrative of important sieges
between 1648 and 1691, but other contributors stick well to the task of
producing analytical essays; these are often conceived in broad terms, =
and
this makes for stimulating chapters. Thus, Kerrigan relates naval =
strategy
to Mahan, one of the most influential writers on maritime strategy, =
while
Whelan's study is theoretically informed and conceptualizes its subject
broadly, delivering a rounded picture of women's relationship with war. =
The
inclusion of an essay on the difficult (and therefore often overlooked)
areas of logistics and finance is to the editor's credit. It is a pity =
that
Wheeler does not place events in Ireland and the British Isles in a =
wider
context of the supply of war in this period, but he brings out well how
English/British superiority left the Irish gravely disadvantaged. The
Catholic challenge in 1689-90 was only as effective as it was because =
France
deployed "large amounts of logistical and naval support to offset =
superior
English resources" (p.
207). O'Carroll very effectively puts tactical and technological =
systems in
a European context, capably summarizing developments over the century
1594-1691 as a whole (though he is too pessimistic about cavalry before
1640, having misconstrued developments in the Netherlands), as a prelude =
to
a narrative of particular campaigns that brings out "the fundamental
weakness of the Irish infantry, lack of firepower" (p. 252). Lenihan's =
own
thematic essay, on strategic geography, at times fails to distinguish
appropriately between strategy and tactics, but his conclusion that =
"ethnics
geography patterned Irish warfare at least as much as physical =
geography",
so that "geographical determinism is inappropriate" is an important
contribution to early-modern Irish history and to military studies more
generally. Gillespie similarly has produced a study that is of =
relevance to
the growing literature on early-modern urban life as well as to Irish =
social
history.

Overall, the thematic focus of essays is a definite virtue, allowing
continuity and change to emerge. Arguably it might be helpful if =
Lenihan's
conclusion were less narrowly focused, but it makes a telling =
contribution
to the military revolution debate and there is certainly ample scope for
readers to draw comparative insights for themselves.

The volume is not as well produced as it should be. Most of the =
problems
are slight, but taken as a whole they detract from the book's quality, =
if
only by distracting one from the text. Lenihan's introduction uses
parenthetical references; but =D3 hAnnrach=E1in and Young then use =
footnotes,
before McGurk cites sources using both systems. The next five chapters, =
and
the final two, all use parenthetical referencing, but in between =
Gillespie
cites with footnotes again. This is off-putting (and hints at some
slackness of the editorial reins) but, more fundamentally, parenthetical
referencing is better suited to the social or political sciences, where
authors are generally summarizing a body of secondary literature, than =
to
historical scholarship, which tends to draw on a more complex (and =
therefore
not easily cited) range of sources. In those chapters that are heavily
archivally-based, such as Wheeler's, parenthetical references become
particularly cumbersome, and distract from the text. At least all =
chapters,
regardless of citation method, are consistent in providing =
bibliographies.
There is no list of contributors.
Many of them are well-known names, but not all, and it would be helpful =
to
know more about them. There is also no list of figures, maps, or
illustrations; the table of contents lists a list of illustrations, but =
it
is not to be found inside! This is especially annoying since the volume
does contain illustrations and maps. On the plus side, the index is
comprehensive.

The thematic and generally broad nature of the essays and the provision =
of
bibliographies make the volume an excellent resource for students, at
undergraduate as well as postgraduate level. One hopes that the =
publisher
puts this into paperback, because it would make a valuable addition to =
the
libraries of any institution that has classes on seventeenth-century =
Irish
history, or on general military history--but Brill's absurd hardback =
prices
will no doubt put many librarians off this collection, rendering it
accessible only to scholars able to consult it at major research =
libraries.
This would be a pity, for despite the problems highlighted in this =
review,
_Conquest and Resistance_ will stimulate early-modernists, military
historians, and historians of Ireland and British-Irish relations, to =
all of
whom it is recommended.


Copyright (c) 2004 by H-Net, all rights reserved. H-Net permits
the redistribution and reprinting of this work for nonprofit,
educational purposes, with full and accurate attribution to the
author, web location, date of publication, originating list, =
and
H-Net: Humanities & Social Sciences Online. For other uses
contact the Reviews editorial staff: hbooks[at]mail.h-net.msu.edu.
 TOP
5108  
4 September 2004 08:36  
  
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 08:36:42 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
Francis Davis 2
  
Sender: The Irish Diaspora Studies List
From: Patrick O'Sullivan
Subject: Francis Davis 2
MIME-Version: 1.0
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From: Sean Mc Cartan
smccartan[at]utvinternet.com
Subject: Francis Davis


From Queens University Library Belfast:

Earlier and later leaves : or An autumn gathering / by Francis Davis ; with

Davis, Francis, 1810-1885
1878
* 3 copies -

Earlier and later leaves: or, An autumn gathering / By Francis Davis, "The
B

Davis, Francis, 1810-1885
1878
* 1 copy -

Lispings of the lagan / By Francis Davis, (The Belfast man.)

Davis, Francis, 1810-1885
1849
* 1 copy -

Miscellaneous poems and songs / By Francis Davis, (The "Belfast man.")

Davis, Francis, 1810-1885
1847
* 1 copy -


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


> From: Kerby Miller
> MillerK[at]missouri.edu
> Subject: Re: Francis Davis ["The Belfastman"]
>
> W. P. Ryan's old THE IRISH LABOUR MOVEMENT (ca 1920) refers on p. 130 to
the
> 19th-century writings of "the muslin weaver, Francis Davis, 'The
> Belfastman,' a Munsterman who went to Belfast. . . . Very earnest, much
> against part spirit and sectarianism, he wrote a great deal [poetry,
> apparently, but perhaps also essays] in the fluent, rhetorical Young
Ireland
> style...."
>
> Can anyone provide any information about Davis and his published works?
> Apparently, he wrote for the post-famine NATION in Dublin, but were his
> essays, etc., ever published in book form?
>
> Many thanks,
>
> Kerby
 TOP
5109  
4 September 2004 08:52  
  
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 08:52:12 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
John P. Duggan,
  
Sender: The Irish Diaspora Studies List
From: Patrick O'Sullivan
Subject: John P. Duggan,
Herr Hempel at the German Legation in Dublin: 1937-1945
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Email Patrick O'Sullivan

For information...

Herr Hempel at the German Legation in Dublin: 1937-1945. John P. Duggan
Reviewed by Robert S. Redmond
in Contemporary Review, March, 2004.

Full review freely available at
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m2242/is_1658_284/ai_114594460

P.O'S.


Hitler's man in Dublin - Herr Hempel at the German Legation in Dublin:
1937-1945 - Book Review
Contemporary Review, March, 2004 by Robert S. Redmond

Herr Hempel at the German Legation in Dublin: 1937-1945. John P. Duggan.
Irish Academic Press. [pounds sterling]35.00. 352 pages. ISBN 0-7165-2764-4.

'The letter of credence dated 22 June 1937 from Hitler to King George VI,
tells us something of the odd position of the Irish Free State at the time.
It recommends Eduard Hempel as Envoy Extraordinary and Minister
Plenipotentiary of the German Government. It hoped Hempel would 'earn the
goodwill of His Majesty and deepen the bonds between the British and German
people'. Hempel was a career diplomat who put protocol above all else.
During his time in Dublin, he had to deal with different pressures...'
 TOP
5110  
4 September 2004 08:58  
  
Date: Sat, 4 Sep 2004 08:58:48 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
Review of The Encyclopaedia of Ireland
  
Sender: The Irish Diaspora Studies List
From: Patrick O'Sullivan
Subject: Review of The Encyclopaedia of Ireland
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Email Patrick O'Sullivan

For information...

The Encyclopaedia of Ireland - Reviewed in New Statesman, Jan 5, 2004 by
Maurice Walsh

Full review freely available at

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0FQP/is_4669_132/ai_112448322

P.O'S.


An immodest proposal - The Encyclopaedia of Ireland - Book Review
New Statesman, Jan 5, 2004 by Maurice Walsh

'In Peace in Ireland, his recent book on the Northern Irish Troubles,
Richard Bourke tells a revealing story about Richard Crossman, secretary of
state for social services during Harold Wilson's government of 1966-70.
Referring to riots that had occurred at the Orange parades of 12 July 1969,
Crossman wrote in his diary: "There had been commotions on St Patrick's Day,
it may have been."

Although Northern Ireland no longer poses quite such a challenge, today's
ministers would do well to have a firmer grasp of the local parade calender
than Crossman. Keeping The Encyclopaedia of Ireland to hand might help...'
 TOP
5111  
6 September 2004 20:21  
  
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 20:21:11 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
Ir-D Web Review, Bannerji et al, Of Property and Propriety
  
Sender: The Irish Diaspora Studies List
From: Patrick O'Sullivan
Subject: Ir-D Web Review, Bannerji et al, Of Property and Propriety
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Email Patrick O'Sullivan

For information...

http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.cgi?path=200671069094538

Himani Bannerji, Shahrzad Mojab, and Judy Whitehead, eds. Of Property and
Propriety: The Role of Gender and Class in Imperialism and Nationalism.
Anthropological Horizons Series. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2001.
xii + 244 pp. Bibliography. $60.00 (cloth), ISBN 08-0204380-1; $24.95
(paper), ISBN 08-0208192-4.

Reviewed by Lisa Pollard, Department of History, The University of North
Carolina, Wilmington.
Published by H-Gender-MidEast (September, 2003)

'This eclectic volume, edited by a sociologist, an anthropologist, and an
education faculty member, aims to add "legs" to the study of colonialism and
post-colonialism. The chapters in Of Property and Propriety historicize the
struggle between feminism, "the woman question," imperialism, and
nationalism in a number of contexts, uncovering and highlighting the
multitude of voices through which struggles against patriarchal states--both
colonial and indigenous--have been articulated. The book thus gives
alternatives to a tendency in colonial and post-colonial studies to view
male and female nationalists' response to colonial discourse about women and
the nation as monolithic, and as arising simply in reaction to colonial
rule...'

This book includes a chapter by Dana Hearne "Contesting Positions in
Nationalist Ideologies in pre-Independence Ireland", of which reviewer
Pollard says...

'Hearne's chapter provides an excellent overview of modern Irish history,
its feminist and workers' movements, and concludes that a multiplicity of
nationalisms were sidelined and silenced by the triumph of conservative,
Catholic, patriarchal state nationalism there after World War I. Hearne also
illustrates the legacy of activism, stating that while feminist and workers'
challenges to the nationalism of the church, the South, and the clan were
not successful, they did provide a "potentially transformative" vision of
national liberation...'

P.O'S.
 TOP
5112  
6 September 2004 20:31  
  
Date: Mon, 6 Sep 2004 20:31:14 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
TOC Journal of Social Issues, September 2004, Volume 60, Issue 3
  
Sender: The Irish Diaspora Studies List
From: Patrick O'Sullivan
Subject: TOC Journal of Social Issues, September 2004, Volume 60, Issue 3
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Email Patrick O'Sullivan

The latest issue of the Journal of Social Issues is a Northern Ireland
special...

The Cost of Conflict: Children and the Northern Irish Troubles, edited by
Orla T. Muldoon.

http://www.spssi.org/jsi_issueinfo.html

http://www.ingenta.com/journals/browse/bpl/josi

Orla is to be congratulated on a very thoughtful piece of work.

I have pasted in, below, the full TOC - some familiar names...

As I absorb all this I might post to IR-D the abstracts of articles of
special interest. Or someone else might comment...

On a train of thought... An earler issue of the journal this year marked...

The 50th Anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education: Interethnic Contact and
Change in Education in the 21st Century
Journal of Social Issues
Volume 60, Issue 1 - 2004
edited by Sabrina Zirkel
San Francisco, CA 94133-4640

P.O'S.

Journal of Social Issues

September 2004, Volume 60, Issue 3
Publisher: Blackwell Publishing on behalf of the Society for the
Psychological Study of Social Issues

1. Children of the Troubles: The Impact of Political Violence in
Northern Ireland
Orla T. Muldoon
Journal of Social Issues, September 2004, vol. 60, iss. 3, pp. 453-468(16)
Blackwell Publishing

2. Young Men as Victims and Perpetrators of Violence in Northern
Ireland: A Qualitative Analysis
Jacqueline Reilly; Orla T. Muldoon; Clare Byrne
Journal of Social Issues, September 2004, vol. 60, iss. 3, pp. 469-484(16)
Blackwell Publishing

3. Secular Trends in Substance Use: The Conflict and Young People in
Northern Ireland
Kathryn Higgins; Andrew Percy; Patrick Mc Crystal
Journal of Social Issues, September 2004, vol. 60, iss. 3, pp. 485-506(22)
Blackwell Publishing

4. Children and Socio-Cultural Divisions in Northern Ireland
Karen Trew
Journal of Social Issues, September 2004, vol. 60, iss. 3, pp. 507-522(16)
Blackwell Publishing

5. Identity Change in Northern Ireland: A Longitudinal Study of
Students' Transition to University
Clare Cassidy; Karen Trew
Journal of Social Issues, September 2004, vol. 60, iss. 3, pp. 523-540(18)
Blackwell Publishing

6. Peace and Progress? Political and Social Change Among Young
Loyalists in Northern Ireland
James W. McAuley
Journal of Social Issues, September 2004, vol. 60, iss. 3, pp. 541-562(22)
Blackwell Publishing

7. Teachers' and Ppils' Educational Experiences and School-Based
Responses to the Conflict in Northern Ireland
Rosemary Kilpatrick; Ruth Leitch
Journal of Social Issues, September 2004, vol. 60, iss. 3, pp. 563-586(24)
Blackwell Publishing

8. The Development of Intergroup Forgiveness in Northern Ireland
Frances McLernon; Ed Cairns; Miles Hewstone; Ron Smith
Journal of Social Issues, September 2004, vol. 60, iss. 3, pp. 587-601(15)
Blackwell Publishing

9. Young People and Political Involvement in Northern Ireland
Jean Whyte; Ian Schermbrucker
Journal of Social Issues, September 2004, vol. 60, iss. 3, pp. 603-627(25)
Blackwell Publishing

10. After the War Comes Peace? An Examination of the Impact of the
Northern Ireland Conflict on Young People
Tony Gallagher
Journal of Social Issues, September 2004, vol. 60, iss. 3, pp. 629-642(14)
Blackwell Publishing

11. Introduction for Louis A. Penner's SPSSI Presidential Address
Geoffrey Maruyama
Journal of Social Issues, September 2004, vol. 60, iss. 3, pp. 643-644(2)
Blackwell Publishing

12. Volunteerism and Social Problems: Making Things Better or Worse?
Louis A. Penner
Journal of Social Issues, September 2004, vol. 60, iss. 3, pp. 645-666(22)
Blackwell Publishing

Publisher: Blackwell Publishing on behalf of the Society for
the Psychological Study of Social Issues
 TOP
5113  
7 September 2004 11:32  
  
Date: Tue, 7 Sep 2004 11:32:58 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
CFP ACIS University of Notre Dame April 13-17, 2005
  
Sender: The Irish Diaspora Studies List
From: Patrick O'Sullivan
Subject: CFP ACIS University of Notre Dame April 13-17, 2005
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Email Patrick O'Sullivan

For information...

P.O'S.

http://www.nd.edu/~irishstu/conferences.html

http://www.acisweb.com/data/cfp.php

CALL FOR PAPERS

Ireland Beyond Borders

American Conference for Irish Studies Annual General Meeting
April 13-17, 2005

University of Notre Dame
South Bend, Indiana

"Ireland Beyond Borders" hopes to explore new conceptions of Ireland,
Irishness, and Irish Studies that challenge the boundaries that =
politics,
the academy, and culture have set for them. The theme is intentionally
open-ended. Topics might include, for example, globalization, partition, =
the
Internet age, gender and sexuality, critical race theory, popular =
culture,
music, dance, the visual arts, contemporary literature, the Irish =
language,
or Irish studies as an academic discipline; however, that list is not
intended to be prescriptive or exclusive. We encourage submissions that
reach across traditional disciplinary boundaries, and submissions on =
topics
outside the areas of history and literary criticism. The deadline for
submitting proposals is October 15, 2004. Participants must be members =
of
the American Conference for Irish Studies. Visit www.acisweb.com to =
become a
member.

We will mark the 25th anniversary of the Field Day Theater Company with
appearances by founding members Seamus Deane and Stephen Rea. Other =
featured
speakers include Nuala O'Faolain, Angela Bourke, Tom Kilroy, Joep =
Leerssen,
Cathal =D3 Searcaigh, David Roediger and James R. Barrett, and Katie
Trumpener. There will also be performances by Irish dancer Jean Butler =
and
musical group Alt=E1n. Margaret Corcoran's show An Enquiry will be on =
display
in the Snite Museum of Art and the Special Collections department of the
Hesburgh Library will mount an exhibit highlighting the =
recently-acquired
Loeber Collection of Irish Fiction. An Irish film series will run at the
Performing Arts Center throughout the conference.

We encourage participants to submit panel proposals. We will give equal
consideration to individual proposals. However, we have found that =
panels
organized by the participants are often more coherent and generate =
better
discussions than those put together by the conference organizers. We
recommend three participants per panel. We will be happy to accept =
proposals
written in Irish.

Panel Proposals: Submit one 250-word abstract from each participant =
along
with a cover letter giving the title and a brief description of the =
panel.

Individual Proposals: Submit one 250-word abstract, including a title, =
your
contact information, and a brief description of the paper.

Electronic Submission: Email proposals to acis2005[at]nd.edu.

Surface Mail: Send proposals to:
ACIS 2005
Keough Institute for Irish Studies
422 Flanner Hall
Notre Dame, IN 46556

For more information, visit the Keough Institute website or contact =
Susan
Harris at sharris2[at]nd.edu or Sarah McKibben at smckibbe[at]nd.edu.
 TOP
5114  
9 September 2004 09:49  
  
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 09:49:57 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
Germans envy Ireland
  
Sender: The Irish Diaspora Studies List
From: Patrick O'Sullivan
Subject: Germans envy Ireland
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Email Patrick O'Sullivan

I have remarked before on the strange and special place Ireland has =
within
certain present day western European discourses - see, for example, my =
notes
on 'An Irishman at the Basque World Congress' on irishdiaspora.net...

A further, interesting, example, from Hugo Hamilton, in The Guardian =
this
week...

P.O'S.


The loneliness of being German

'In striving to exorcise their past Germans have surrendered their =
ability
to love themselves and their country. Perhaps this is why they envy =
Ireland
- a country they see as having all the emotions they have lost. =
German-Irish
novelist Hugo Hamilton on a people still in denial...'

Tuesday September 7, 2004
The Guardian

'In 1957, Heinrich B=F6ll published his famous travel book Irisches =
Tagebuch,
which was later translated as Irish Journal. The Irish hated it and the
Germans loved it. For the Irish it had too many donkeys and stone walls, =
too
much dreaming and backward innocence. For the Germans, however, it was
precisely these simple things that became so attractive. They carried =
the
book with them in their rucksacks, searching for a kind of emotional
connection to the people and the landscape. It gave them a sense of
innocence and belonging, an inner life of feelings that was denied to =
them
in their own country...'

Full story at...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1298617,00.html
 TOP
5115  
9 September 2004 09:54  
  
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 09:54:31 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
Roddy Doyle interview
  
Sender: The Irish Diaspora Studies List
From: Patrick O'Sullivan
Subject: Roddy Doyle interview
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Email Patrick O'Sullivan

...A wide-ranging interview with Roddy Doyle, in The Guardian, earlier this
week...

Some paragraphs pasted in below...

P.O'S.


'Sexy Dublin? It's a con'

'He's just written a third book for infants but Roddy Doyle is better known
for the novels and films that depict a violent, impoverished Ireland. So
what does he really think about his homeland?'

Emma Brockes
Monday September 6, 2004
The Guardian

Roddy Doyle: 'We've done an incredibly good job of selling ourselves as the
land of the writing, singing, little people.' Photo: Eamonn McCabe

'...The Ireland of those books - violent, impoverished, flattened by the
church - is not supposed to exist any more. With a fervour the English are
spared, all Irish writers are required to define what it means to be Irish,
partly as a result of their own self-mythologising, partly through the
tenacity of the stereotypes applied to them. In any case, says Doyle, being
Irish has changed "about 17 times" in the last hundred years. He finds the
image put out by the tourist board of Ireland these days hilarious in its
cheek, particularly since all around the world people have swallowed it.
"It's a big con job," he says. "We have sold the myth of Dublin as a sexy
place incredibly well; because it's a dreary little dump most of the time.
Try getting a pint at one in the morning and you'll find just how raving it
actually is."...

Earlier this year, Doyle got into trouble for suggesting, off the cuff, that
James Joyce "needed a good editor". He had practically to go into hiding;
everyone from the New York Times to Icelandic radio was after him. But it
still amuses him to kick against the po-faced orthodoxies of literary
Ireland. "You know," he says, "Shaw left when he was 16 and Oscar Wilde was
Irish, but you could just as accurately say he was British; the Isle of Man
was probably their natural home, somewhere half way. And yet we've done an
incredibly good job of selling ourselves as the land of the writing,
singing, little people. I've been asked why does Ireland produce so many
great musicians, and the answer is it doesn't. When you count the great
musicians Ireland has given the world in the last 20 years, you can do it on
one hand."...'

Full story at
http://www.guardian.co.uk/g2/story/0,,1297900,00.html
 TOP
5116  
9 September 2004 11:59  
  
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 11:59:43 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
Article, Potato Paradoxes
  
Sender: The Irish Diaspora Studies List
From: Patrick O'Sullivan
Subject: Article, Potato Paradoxes
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Email Patrick O'Sullivan

This article by Sherwin Rosen has turned up in our nets - as the databases
move backwards...

I have not been able to get hold of an Abstract.

But the article seemed worth bringing to the attention of the IR-D list -
since we are here in another of those extensive footnotes that you have to
write in Irish history, famine history and in Irish Diaspora Studies.

There is much discussion in the economic literature of possible 'Giffen
goods' - 'goods' in the sense of 'products' or stuff - or the 'Giffen
paradox', where the demand for a certain foodstuff might actually rise as
the price rose. Named after evidence that someone, possibly Robert Giffen,
gave to the British parliament. A web search will turn up much
discussion... For example...

http://william-king.www.drexel.edu/top/prin/txt/MUch/prefap2.html

Sherwin Rosen makes a point that I have not seen made before - that potatoes
are capital goods as well as being consumption goods. A sizeable fraction
of the potato crop is needed for seed potatoes, and this can produce unusual
market dynamics.

Rosen concludes...
'Since the Giffen paradox is not useful for understanding the Irish
experience, is it asking too much of future writers of elementary texts to
find another example?'

I have pasted in the Rosen reference, below, plus a reference to McDonough &
Eisenhauer - an article which covers similar ground but is not listed by
Rosen.

P.O'S.


1.
Potato Paradoxes

Sherwin Rosen

The Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 107, No. 6, Part 2: Symposium on the
Economic Analysis of Social Behavior in Honor of Gary S. Becker. (Dec.,
1999), pp. S294-S313.



2.
Journal of Economic Issues / September 01, 1995 / Sir Robert Giffen and the
great potato famine: a discussion of the role of a legend in neoclassical
economics.

Sir Robert Giffen and the great potato famine: a discussion of the role of a
legend in neoclassical economics.

McDonough, Terrence
Eisenhauer, Joseph

Journal of Economic Issues

September 01, 1995

giffen legend, potatoes, demand curve, giffen, robert giffen, giffen
paradox, irish potato, price, neoclassical paradigm, giffen phenomena,
marshall, potato famine, story, samuelson, positively sloped

It is widely believed that British economist Sir Robert Giffen
observed Irish peasants consuming increasing quantities of potatoes as
potato prices rose during the mid-nineteenth century famine. The
conventional explanation for this purported behavior assumes that
potatoes were strongly inferior goods and constituted a large portion of
the typical Irish consumer's budget; consequently, the demand curve
for them was upward-sloping. The historical evidence, however, appears
to contradict this view. Indeed, the very nature of a famine implies
that this behavior could not have been characteristic of the populace as
a whole. There is no way to buy more potatoes when there are fewer
potatoes. Thus, the Giffen legend concerning the great potato famine...
 TOP
5117  
9 September 2004 14:46  
  
Date: Thu, 9 Sep 2004 14:46:54 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
Article, Potato Paradoxes 2
  
Sender: The Irish Diaspora Studies List
From: Patrick O'Sullivan
Subject: Article, Potato Paradoxes 2
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From: Thomas J. Archdeacon
tjarchde[at]wisc.edu
Subject: RE: [IR-D] Article, Potato Paradoxes

Abstract of Rosen

Abstract
Price and quantity data prove that Irish potatoes in the 1840s were not
Giffen goods. Intertemporal trade-offs required by the fact that a sizable
fraction of the potato crop is needed for seed crops can produce unusual
market dynamics. The Irish experience is well described by a normal demand
model in which a permanent decline in the productivity of seed potatoes was
at first mistaken as a transitory crop failure. These mistakes provoked
"oversaving" of seed crop in a population in dire circumstances. With the
benefit of hindsight, consumption of seed crop capital was warranted.
Erroneous expectations of potato productivity by growers delayed necessary
agricultural adjustments and contributed to the catastrophe later on.



-----Original Message-----
Email Patrick O'Sullivan

This article by Sherwin Rosen has turned up in our nets - as the databases
move backwards...

I have not been able to get hold of an Abstract.

But the article seemed worth bringing to the attention of the IR-D list -
since we are here in another of those extensive footnotes that you have to
write in Irish history, famine history and in Irish Diaspora Studies.

Potato Paradoxes

Sherwin Rosen

The Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 107, No. 6, Part 2: Symposium on the
Economic Analysis of Social Behavior in Honor of Gary S. Becker. (Dec.,
1999), pp. S294-S313.
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5118  
10 September 2004 13:44  
  
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 13:44:10 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
Article, Parliamentary Democracy in Ireland
  
Sender: The Irish Diaspora Studies List
From: Patrick O'Sullivan
Subject: Article, Parliamentary Democracy in Ireland
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Email Patrick O'Sullivan

The July 04 issue of the journal, Parliamentary Affairs, is a special issue
on
PARLIAMENTARY DEMOCRACY TODAY:
with an Introduction by Malcolm Shaw

There follow articles on Parliamentary Democracy in France, Italy, the
Netherlands, Scandinavia, Ireland, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the
United Kingdom...
ending with a further Overview by Malcolm Shaw

I have pasted in below the Abstract of
Neil Collins, Parliamentary Democracy in Ireland

Parliamentary Affairs is an OUP journal
http://pa.oupjournals.org/
which over the years has covered some Irish issues, mostly to do with events
in Northern Ireland.

You can sign up and see a free sample issue - but it's not an especially
interesting issue.

P.O'S.



ISSN
0031-2290 electronic: 1460-2482

publisher
Oxford University Press

year - volume - issue - page
2004 - 57 - 3 - 601


article

Parliamentary Democracy in Ireland

Collins, Neil

abstract

Among the currently significant themes in Irish parliamentary democracy are
corporatism, clientelism, corruption and centralisation. Ireland has
corporatist institutional arrangements of the type found in several small
European countries. They provide consensus and stable policies but challenge
the vitality of parliament. Similarly, clientelism is examined in the light
of its potential to undermine the role of the legislative function in a
political system that promotes high levels of constituency service. The
article also addresses the problem of political corruption from the
perspective of its impact on the political system and the balance between
parliamentary and judicial means of dealing with it. Finally, the recent
plan to decentralise the civil service is discussed.
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5119  
10 September 2004 16:46  
  
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 16:46:36 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
Tony Hendra, Father Joe
  
Sender: The Irish Diaspora Studies List
From: Patrick O'Sullivan
Subject: Tony Hendra, Father Joe
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From: Linda Dowling Almeida
lindaalmeida[at]hotmail.com
Subject: Father Joe

I'm not sure if this has been discussed already, but I have just started
reading Tony Hendra's memoir called Father Joe. The first fifty pages is a
quite frank account of anti-Catholic, anti-Irish attitudes in England in the
mid-1950s. I don't know how it continues, but Hendra's account is an
interesting perspective given some of the discussion we have had about Irish
navvies in the post-war period. Anybody read Father Joe? Any comments?

Linda Dowling Almeida
New York University

See
http://www.tonyhendra.com/
http://www.randomhouse.com/catalog/display.pperl?1400061849
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5120  
10 September 2004 18:17  
  
Date: Fri, 10 Sep 2004 18:17:57 +0100 Reply-To: Patrick O'Sullivan [IR-DLOG0409.txt]
  
Shalom Ireland, RTE, Sunday, September 12
  
Sender: The Irish Diaspora Studies List
From: Patrick O'Sullivan
Subject: Shalom Ireland, RTE, Sunday, September 12
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From: Michael_Kenneally=20
kenneal[at]alcor.concordia.ca
Subject: Shalom Ireland

Dear Paddy,

IR-D members may be interested in this notice I received from Valerie =
Lapin
Ganley, the director of this film.

Best wishes,

Michael Kenneally


From
Valerie Lapin Ganley

I am pleased to announce that RT=C9 will help bring in the New Year with =
the
Irish premiere of Shalom Ireland, a one-hour documentary about =
Ireland=B9s
remarkable, yet little known Jewish community. The special pre-Rosh
Hashanah broadcast of Shalom Ireland will be Sunday, September 12 at =
8:00pm
on RT=C9, Network 2.
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