Very interesting...

Forwarded, because interesting...

P.O'S.

------- Forwarded message follows -------
From: Darren Walhof

Call for proposals:

______________________________________
After secularism/religion
Interpretation, history, and politics
______________________________________

11-14 May 1999 at the University of Minnesota


Featured speakers include

Gauri Viswanathan
Columbia University
Author of _Outside the Fold: Conversion, Modernity and Belief_ (1998)

Enrique Dussel
Universidad Autonoma Metropolitana, Iztapalapa
Author of _The Invention of the Americas : Eclipse of 'the Other' and the
Myth of Modernity_ (1995)

For a full version, go to the conference web page:



This cross-disciplinary conference will critically explore the genealogies
and futures of secularism and its estranged kin, religion. We want to
problematize the history by which religion and secularism are presented as
polar oppositions, both to complicate our understanding of the past and to
think in new ways about politics and the practices of faith. Our current
inability to think past inherited dichotomies is a product of the history
that made religion into a state of mind, a private mark of affection
opposed to the public rationality of secularism. By engaging with the
assumptions about progress, pragmatism, and rationality that underpin the
geneaology of secularism, this conference will, we hope, generate new
languages of interpretation that reveal both the partialities of secularism
and the worldliness of religious belief. In so doing, the conference may
open up new questions about the discursive construction of religious
fundamentalisms as necessary others to secular states; about the creative
and critical politics imagined and embodied within religious movements;
about the limits and possibilities of secular states; about conversion and
new politics of identity; and about theology after religion.

We want to structure our questions around three related problematics. Our
first series of questions is about historiography, for it is competing
visions of history's future that underwrite secular projects and inspire
religious hopes. A second series of questions concerns the genealogy,
structure, and future of secular politics. We are particularly interested
in how secularism plays out, and breaks down, in specific historical and
contemporary situations. A third series of questions has to do with the
futures of Christianity, Islam and other religions after "religion." Here,
we want to engage with the interpretive paradigms and forms of knowledge
that emerge from the practices of particular communities of faith.

We invite proposals from any discipline, drawing from any regional
literature, that take up aspects of the religion/secularism problematic.
Please submit a one-page abstract no later than December 15, 1999, to

Secularism conference committee
MacArthur Program
214 Social Sciences Building
University of Minnesota
Minneapolis, MN 55455

For further information or questions, contact . For a
fuller version of this position paper, please refer to




______________________________________
Darren Walhof
Dept. of Political Science
University of Minnesota

- --
Patrick O'Sullivan

From: ppo[at]aber.ac.uk (Paul O' Leary)
Subject: Re: Ir-D Irish in Nineteenth Century Britain


One unpublished study which makes extensive use of the cenuses for the late
nineteenth century is the thesis by Louise Miskell, 'Custom, Conflict and
Community: A Study of the Irish in South Wales and Cornwall, 1861-1891' PhD
University of Wales (Aberystwyth), 1996.

Paul O'Leary


>
>
>From: Enda Delaney
>
>Irish in Nineteenth Century Britain
>
>
>Dear Ir-D List Members,
>
>We have been fortunate enough to secure some funding here at
>Queen's for a project on the Irish in late nineteenth-century
>Britain. This will be a collaborative project with members of the
>Cambridge Group for the History of Population and Social
>Structure, who are currently examining Scottish-born persons in
>England in a similar time period. Our pilot project involves an
>examination of the 1881 census data for Lancashire (available
>from the History Data Archive at Essex) in order to compare the
>demographic and socio-economic profile of the Irish-born and
>Scottish-born in Liverpool in 1881. We would appreciate the help
>and advice of members of the Ir-D list in the following areas:
>
>(1) We are familiar with the earlier census work done on
>Liverpool (and Manchester), but is anyone aware of a previous or
>current study on the Irish in Liverpool at this time, based
>principally on an analysis of the census data?
>
>(2) We are primarily interested in patterns of marriage,
>fertility, the socio-economic profile and settlement patterns.
>Are there other aspects we should be thinking about? Of course,
>we are trying to ensure comparability in terms of the work done
>by colleages with the Cambridge Group.
>
>Any advice and suggestions gratefully received.
>
>Enda Delaney (e.delaney[at]qub.ac.uk)
>Liam Kennedy (l.kennedy[at]qub.ac.uk)
>
>School of Modern History
>The Queen's University of Belfast
>
>
>
>
Dr. Paul O'Leary
Adran Hanes a Hanes Cymru/Dept. of History and Welsh History
Prifysgol Cymru Aberystwyth/University of Wales Aberystwyth

From Patrick O'Sullivan




I have pasted in - below - the email from Enda Delaney about his and
Liam Kennedy's research on the Irish in Nineteenth Century Britain.

First of all, congratulations to Liam and to Enda on getting this
project up and running. It is particularly good to see being built in
the connections with Scottish research.

But, Enda, my difficulty with this sort of query is that I have to find
some way of finding out what you don't know. You say that you and Liam
are familiar with earlier work - and I know from your own work that you
are. It therefore becomes difficult for me, or anyone, to really
contribute. We might be reluctant to just list stuff you know already -
but, at the same time, many of the people on the Ir-D list might like to
see this stuff listed.

I don't know any simple way round this difficulty. Except maybe to ask
for more information - bring us up to date on your thinking and Liam's
thinking so far.

Is there some shortish document you could let us see?

Paddy O'Sullivan



From: Enda Delaney

Irish in Nineteenth Century Britain


Dear Ir-D List Members,

We have been fortunate enough to secure some funding here at
Queen's for a project on the Irish in late nineteenth-century
Britain. This will be a collaborative project with members of the
Cambridge Group for the History of Population and Social
Structure, who are currently examining Scottish-born persons in
England in a similar time period. Our pilot project involves an
examination of the 1881 census data for Lancashire (available
from the History Data Archive at Essex) in order to compare the
demographic and socio-economic profile of the Irish-born and
Scottish-born in Liverpool in 1881. We would appreciate the help
and advice of members of the Ir-D list in the following areas:

(1) We are familiar with the earlier census work done on
Liverpool (and Manchester), but is anyone aware of a previous or
current study on the Irish in Liverpool at this time, based
principally on an analysis of the census data?

(2) We are primarily interested in patterns of marriage,
fertility, the socio-economic profile and settlement patterns.
Are there other aspects we should be thinking about? Of course,
we are trying to ensure comparability in terms of the work done
by colleagues with the Cambridge Group.

Any advice and suggestions gratefully received.

Enda Delaney (e.delaney[at]qub.ac.uk)
Liam Kennedy (l.kennedy[at]qub.ac.uk)

School of Modern History
The Queen's University of Belfast
- --
Patrick O'Sullivan
Head of the Irish Diaspora Research Unit
Email Patrick O'Sullivan
Irish-Diaspora list
Irish Diaspora Studies http://www.brad.ac.uk/acad/diaspora/

Personal Fax National 0870 0521605
Fax International +44 870 0521605

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

From Patrick O'Sullivan

In his email about his research project Enda Delaney mentioned the
online resources at Essex.

Coincidentally, this update from Essex has percolated through.

And here it is, passed on for information...

P.O'S.



------- Forwarded message follows -------
Digitising History: A Guide to Creating Digital Resources from Historical
Documents

The History Data Service is pleased to announce that this guide to creating,
documenting and preserving digital is now available in print from Oxbow
Books (ISBN 1-900188-91-0). Please contact Oxbow Books, email:
oxbow[at]oxbowbooks.com, telephone: +44 (0) 1865 241249, fax: ++44 (0) 1865
794449 for details.

The web version of this guide, which was published in April, is still
available at http://hds.essex.ac.uk/g2gp/digitising_history/index.html

The guide is intended as a reference work for individuals and organisations
involved with, or planning, the computerisation of historical source
documents. It aims to recommend good practice and standards that are generic
and relevant to a range of data creation situations, from student projects
through to large-scale research projects. The guide focuses on the creation
of tabular data which can be used in databases, spreadsheets or statistics
packages, however, many of the guidelines are more widely applicable.

The guide includes a glossary and a bibliography of recommended reading, and
offers guidance about:

* Effectively designing and managing a data creation project.
* Transferring historical source documents into digital form and designing a
database.
* Choosing appropriate data formats and ensuring that a digital resource can
be preserved without significant information loss.
* Documenting a data creation project.

The guide has been commissioned by the History Data Service as part of the
Arts and Humanities Data Service publication series Guides to Good Practice
in the Creation and Use of Digital Resources. The series aims to provide
guidance about applying recognised good practice and standards to the
creation and use of digital resources in the arts and humanities.

Cressida Chappell, History Data Service, Data Archive, University of Essex,
Wivenhoe Park, Colchester, CO4 3SQ, Phone +44 (0)1206 873984, Fax +44
(0)1206 872003, email cress[at]essex.ac.uk, http://hds.essex.ac.uk/

From Patrick O'Sullivan

This is worth following, if only to give a flavour...

P.O'S.


------- Forwarded message follows -------
ANNOUNCEMENT -- GARY GERSTLE MODERATES A WEB FORUM ON TEACHING
IMMIGRATION AND ETHNICITY

Starting November 1, 1999, Gary Gerstle will moderate an open
discussion on teaching ethnicity and immigration on the HISTORY
MATTERS Web site (http://historymatters.gmu.edu). From the "Browse"
page select "Talking History" then select "Immigration and Ethnicity"
under Fall 1999 Forums.

Professor Gerstle will answer questions about teaching immigration
and ethnicity and lead a discussion on this topic among participants.
The discussion will focus particularly on how approaches to teaching
about immigration in the standard U.S. history survey course and
suggestions for resources or strategies.

H-Net subscribers can participate in the forum from the Web site or
via e-mail as part of a listserve. To subscribe to the listserve go
to the web site and select "Join or leave list."

HISTORY MATTERS: The U.S. Survey Course on the Web is a new site that
serves as a gateway to the Web for teachers of the U.S. History
Survey course. It provides high school and college teachers (and
their students) a starting point for exploring American history on
the Web, a large number of first-person historical documents for use
in the classroom, and a range of teaching resources (sample syllabi,
teaching assignments, and forums, for example). A project of the
American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning of the
City University of New York and the Center for History and New Media
at George Mason University. This forum is sponsored by the New York
Council for the Humanties. The HISTORY MATTERS Web site was created
with support from the W. K. Kellogg Foundation. The site is an
in-progress prototype that will grow as our resources permit.

Pennee Bender
Multi-Media Producer
212/966-4248 ext. 215
Fax -212/966-4589
American Social History Project/Center for Media and Learning
Graduate School and University Center
The City University of New York
99 Hudson Street
New York, NY 10013

- --
Patrick O'Sullivan
Head of the Irish Diaspora Research Unit
Email Patrick O'Sullivan
Irish-Diaspora list
Irish Diaspora Studies http://www.brad.ac.uk/acad/diaspora/

Personal Fax National 0870 0521605
Fax International +44 870 0521605

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

From Patrick O'Sullivan

This might be a way of continuing recent Ir-D list discussions...

As I recall, you access the H-Net book review logs at
http://www.h-net.msu.edu/reviews/

P.O'S.

------- Forwarded message follows -------
NOTE: H-STATE (Peter Dobkin Hall), H-URBAN (Clay McShane) and H-SCI-MED-TECH
(Harry M. Marks) have organized a review symposium of Daniel T. Rodgers'
_Atlantic Crossings_. Rodgers' book offers a substantial reinterpretation
of Euro-American social reform in the decades 1880-1940; it discusses topics
of interest to a great many kinds of historians, including urban history,
public health, labor and political history among others.

The symposium leads with a summary of the book by Harry M. Marks (The Johns
Hopkins University), to be followed by comments (in separate messages) from
Prof. Victoria de Grazia (Columbia University), David Hammack (Case Western
Reserve University), Seth Koven (Villanova University), Sonya Michel
(University of Illinois at Urbana-Champagne), and Pierre-Yves Saunier (CNRS,
Lyon). The author's own comments can be found linked to each individual
review.

Anyone who is interested in accessing the colloquium, in whole or in part,
can do so in the Book Review Logs under the headings of H-Sci-Med-Tech,
H-State, and H-Urban. All of the individual posts will be placed under each
list's header.

- --
Patrick O'Sullivan
Head of the Irish Diaspora Research Unit
Email Patrick O'Sullivan
Irish-Diaspora list
Irish Diaspora Studies http://www.brad.ac.uk/acad/diaspora/

Personal Fax National 0870 0521605
Fax International +44 870 0521605

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

From Patrick O'Sullivan

Forwarded for information...
Publisher's Blurb on Rodgers, Atlantic Crossings


ATLANTIC CROSSINGS
Social Politics in a Progressive Age
DANIEL T. RODGERS

Winner of the 1999 Ellis W. Hawley Prize of the Organization of American
Historians


Honorable Mention, Association of American Publishers 1998
Professional/Scholarly Publishing Annual Award in History

"The most belated of nations," Theodore Roosevelt called his country
during the workmen's compensation fight in 1907. Earlier reformers,
progressives of his day, and later New Dealers lamented the nation's
resistance to models abroad for correctives to the backwardness of
American social politics. Atlantic Crossings is the first major account
of the vibrant international network that they constructed--so often
obscured by notions of American exceptionalism--and of its profound
impact on the United States from the 1870s through 1945.

On a narrative canvas that sweeps across Europe and the United States,
Daniel Rodgers retells the story of the classic era of efforts to repair
the damages of unbridled capitalism. He reveals the forgotten
international roots of such innovations as city planning, rural
cooperatives, modernist architecture for public housing, and social
insurance, among other reforms. From small beginnings to reconstructions
of the new great cities and rural life, and to the wide-ranging
mechanics of social security for working people, Rodgers finds the
interconnections, adaptations, exchanges, and even rivalries in the
Atlantic region's social planning. He uncovers the immense diffusion of
talent, ideas, and action that were breathtaking in their range and
impact.

The scope of Atlantic Crossings is vast and peopled with the reformers,
university men and women, new experts, bureaucrats, politicians, and
gifted amateurs. This long durée of contemporary social policy
encompassed fierce debate, new conceptions of the role of the state, an
acceptance of the importance of expertise in making government policy,
and a recognition of a shared destiny in a newly created world.

Daniel T. Rodgers is Professor of History at Princeton University.

OTHER HARVARD BOOKS BY THIS AUTHOR:

Contested Truths: Keywords in American Politics Since Independence




- --
Patrick O'Sullivan
Head of the Irish Diaspora Research Unit
Email Patrick O'Sullivan
Irish-Diaspora list
Irish Diaspora Studies http://www.brad.ac.uk/acad/diaspora/

Personal Fax National 0870 0521605
Fax International +44 870 0521605

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

From: Enda Delaney

Subject: Re: Ir-D Irish in C19th Britain


Dear Paddy,

Yes I agree that these sort of general queries can cause
problems in terms of duplication of material. As you say, even
if references are mentioned which we may be familiar with,
others may not be aware of previously published work and might
therefore find such references useful. Our research assistant on
this project is currently compiling an extensive bibliography
which we will be happy to make available on the Irish Diaspora
Web Site at a later date.

From our point of view, we are especially interested in
work in progress for possible exchange of information and ideas.
In order to provide some indication of the type of project we
are thinking about, I'll post to the list a (short) summary of
our ideas to date.

Enda Delaney


On Mon, 8 Nov 1999 09:14:00 +0100 irish-diaspora[at]Bradford.ac.uk
wrote:

>
>
> From Patrick O'Sullivan
>
>
>
>
> I have pasted in - below - the email from Enda Delaney about his and
> Liam Kennedy's research on the Irish in Nineteenth Century Britain.
>
> First of all, congratulations to Liam and to Enda on getting this
> project up and running. It is particularly good to see being built in
> the connections with Scottish research.
>
> But, Enda, my difficulty with this sort of query is that I have to find
> some way of finding out what you don't know. You say that you and Liam
> are familiar with earlier work - and I know from your own work that you
> are. It therefore becomes difficult for me, or anyone, to really
> contribute. We might be reluctant to just list stuff you know already -
> but, at the same time, many of the people on the Ir-D list might like to
> see this stuff listed.
>
> I don't know any simple way round this difficulty. Except maybe to ask
> for more information - bring us up to date on your thinking and Liam's
> thinking so far.
>
> Is there some shortish document you could let us see?
>
> Paddy O'Sullivan
>

From: "Anthony McNicholas"

Subject: Faith and Fatherland


Dear Ir-D List,

I have a question about gender and identity- 'Faith and Fatherland' is the
current working title of my PhD on the Irish press in mid-Victorian England.
I took it from the motto of one of the papers under study, the Universal
News. Prior to this research, I had always assumed Ireland to be a
'motherland'. At the time, British newspapers sometimes referred to Ireland
as the 'sister isle,' and Ireland was usually portrayed as a female. Indeed,
the masthead of the Universal News was of a female figure seated on a throne
on the ocean, encircled by the words, 'Our Faith, Our Fatherland.' It
strikes me as curious that there should be this apparent discrepancy in
gender.

'Manliness' is a constant theme in the journalism of the time, and Alan
O'Day has noted in his introduction to Hugh Heinrick's survey of the Irish
in Britain in the 1870s how it was highly valued. Was this gendering of the
nation as male a reaction to the supposedly feminine characteristics of the
celtic races? Was Ireland always a fatherland, and as it has subsequently
ceased to be one, when was that? I seem to recall Michael Collins speaking
of a fatherland. Has anybody written anything on this?

Anthony McNicholas

From Patrick O'Sullivan

Three 'I have been reminded' items...

I have been reminded...

1.
Steve Fenton¹s 1996 piece has a very good discussion on the invisibility
of the Irish in official British statistics. The reference is...
Fenton, S. (1996) Counting ethnicity: social groups and official
categories, in Levitas, R. and Guy, W. (eds.) Interpreting Official
Statistics, London: Routledge. 143-165.

2.
Anyone studying the sources for the history of the Irish in Manchester
needs to know that the name, Reach - as in Angus Bethune Reach - is
Scottish. And that the name is pronounced REE-ACK. Or thereabouts.

There is a chapter on Manchester in Asa Briggs, _Victorian Cities_,
originally published 1963, Penguin 1968 - which remains a good
introduction to the discourse.

3.
Dorothy Thompson begins her essay, 'Seceding from the Seceders: The
Decline of the Jacobin Tradition in Ireland, 1790-1850', by contrasting
the views on 'race' of James Napper Tandy ('We are all of the same
family, black and white...') with those of John Mitchel. The essay can
be found in her collected essays, _Outsiders: Class, Gender and
Nation_, Verso, London & NY, 1993.

Also reprinted in that collection is her essay (originally 1982 -
mentioned in Don MacRaild's Study Guide'), 'Ireland and the Irish in
English Radicalism before 1850,' - in that essay Dorothy Thompson comes
very close to seeing the Irish as (to steal Patrick O'Farrell's phrase)
'the key dynamic factor...'

P.O'S.


- --
Patrick O'Sullivan
Head of the Irish Diaspora Research Unit
Email Patrick O'Sullivan
Irish-Diaspora list
Irish Diaspora Studies http://www.brad.ac.uk/acad/diaspora/

Personal Fax National 0870 0521605
Fax International +44 870 0521605

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

From: "Elizabeth Malcolm"

Subject: Faith and Fatherland.


Dear Paddy,

This reference may well be too far outside Anthony McNicholas' period to =
be of any interest. But in recent 16th-century Irish historiography =
there has been a debate regarding the concept of 'faith and fatherland'. =
I think it's best summarised in Hiram Morgan's article 'Faith and =
Fatherland in Sixteenth-Century Ireland' in 'History Ireland', Summer =
1995, pp 13-20.

Elizabeth Malcolm
Liverpool

From: "Bruce Stewart"

Subject: Faith and Fatherland [Anthony's message below]

May I put in a quickfire reaction here? One of the constant themes
of recent Irish-studies has been this topic of gendered nationality.
The Arnoldian characterisation of the Celtic mind as feminine is now
immensely familiar and the political inference that Ireland needed
the attentions of a 'masculine' British master is quite explicit in much
of contemporary political discourse. Likewise, by corollary, a
discourse of 'hysteria' is obviously related to this in a Freudian
analysis. Images and symbols of nationality play their part in all of
this also, and work by Mary Helen Thuente on the female figure of
Ireland on United Irishman harps is indicative of the way in which
this analysis can be developed - though often at the cost of radical
overstatement. If every female personification is linked to a gender
revolution we would soon be in trouble - those speaking languages
with a gender system especially so, though the rich area of play
involved in this for French poststructuralists is not always apparent
to English-translation readers. (We're so damn literal - that's part of
the problem.)

In the Irish context, I do believe there is some danger of
oversimplification or else of overgeneralisation from semiological
observations to grand theory in the current cultural environment. For
instance - and an instance often cited - Charlotte Brooke called
Ireland 'the sister isle' in her pref. to Reliques of Ancient Irish
Minstrelsy (1789), but meant that Ireland and Britain were sister
isles rather than that Ireland was the sister of a British brother. (I
was interested to see Michael Cronin refer to her honeymoon in a
recent context - the first I ever heard that she was married.)

Such gender designations are more arbitrary and variable than the
theoretical approach perhaps allows. Fatherland is not necessarily a
belligerent and motherland not necessarily and autocthonous
conception. Likewise, appeals to 'manhood' are as much part of the
rhetoric of a given period as expressions of a strong reversion to
gender models in given colonial or postcolonial circumstances.
When James Connolly berates Synge's early plays he urged
nationalists not to tolerate such 'unmanly' drama, he meant 'French'
and 'decadent', probably with more than a tinge of repulsion for the
Wildean instance.

I believe that Stephen Dedalus is called a 'manly little fellow' by the
Congowes rector in A Portrait of the Artist. While it might be fun to
built a theoretical distinction on these instances, and so flatter
ourselves that the project of gender equality is inscribed on Irish
history in some positive (or even negative) sense, I would be very
wary of supposing that this analysis has any genuinely explanatory
power in relation to contemporary usage. This is an implied criticism
of the snap-happy post-everything approach, and as such you may
dismiss it as old fogeyism, especially when I tell you that I recall a
day when 'manly' was still in common usage as a form of
commendation particularly for young boys performing derring-do on
the rugger field or owning up to naughtiness in a manly way (as it
was called). I was distinctly manly at the age of eight, I do assure
you, though rather less so at the age of twenty-eight.

Lest we berate the old fogeys too vigorously, it is curious to note the
frequency with which Irish time obituaries and occasional comments
on Irish studies lists advert to the idea that such and such a person
was or is 'a gentleman in the true sense of the word'. I don't think
that M. Lacan would be impressed by the 'true sense', or Marx either
- - yet it is very much a part of the petty-bourgeois mentality that lies
behind such forms of eulogy. It can be taken as meaning that
though he was not what the world calls (or used to call) a gentleman
when that epithet served to register the idea of real social
advantage, he possessed the essential virtues of humility and
kindness to which such people pretended and therefore held a
better right to that name than they themselves. In other words, the
wrong group is identified by the term. You see now why I call it petty-
bourgeois.

My own reaction to theses about the genderisation of nation and so
forth is less to probe whether this is well-founded in historical reality
than to ask, what the dickens is this critic up to? On the one hand, it
seems to suggest a thin appreciation of the actual fabric of historical
language and cultural, on the other an immoderate desire to see
social and linguistic contingencies reduced to some sort of political
rule in the realm of sociological theory. If Michael Collins spoke of
the fatherland, as he did, it should be remembered that a) Pro Patria
et Fide - commonly translated 'Faith and Fatherland' - was the motto
of the Irish Confederation of 1642 and perpetuated, rather oddly, in
the Latin banner of the Irish News in Belfast. He was therefore
participating in a much older rhetoric with counter-Reformation
origins in the religious wars of the seventeenth century. It cannot
therefore be suggested that his was a reaction to Matthew Arnold
who, for all his virtues, was not much read in nineteenth century
Ireland outside of liberal (i.e., Protestant) circles. I was interested to
see Irish Times journalism remarking on the 'liberal' agenda in RTE,
and adding that this vehemently intolerant form of revisionism -
slagging off the Archbish. of Dublion as a pederast and the like -
was quite distinct from the only truly liberal tradition in the country,
which subsisted within the walls of Trinity College.

This is something of a kite, but one worth flying. It seems to me that
the theoretisation of Irish studies runs the risk of being illiberal in
this core sense of overlooking the sheer provisionality of many
linguistic conventions and, indeed, political institutions. I am strongly
of the view that the government of N. Ireland, for instance, will and
ought to be a 'provisional government' in the sense that it is cobbled
together that the point where comprise and toleration make it
possible to institute a form of government to which no party has a
damning objection. My thinking on the theoretisation of irish studies
is somewhat parallel in that we have to accept the provisionality of
theory as a starting point in order to avoid the jarring revolutions
which are a hall mark of the way that theoretical sciences move
onwards from generation to generation. Cultural theory is petty-
bourgeois - it is based on a fundamentally insecure relation to
culture which represents itself as an epistemological sophistication
rather than a wise and flexible manner of inhabiting the intellectual
dwelling house of any period.

As often as people espouse theoretical models and substitute them
for substantive forms of knowledge and the sheer mapless ocean of
cultural experience, as often do they find themselves dumped out of
the intellectual process when their theoretical model has reached its
sell-by date. Empiricism and theory are not necessary companions.
Irish studies and ideology are not bound together. Compassion and
understanding, investigation and even accusation are not the
property of this or that intellectual grouping. It is necessary, in the
last analysis, to show a certain manly indifference to the exorbitant
claims of gender politics in order to understand just how
fundamental and pervasive the codes of gender have always been in
human society and all its products. And how we shape them and are
in turn shaped by them. End speil. Bruce.




>>>>>>

Dear Ir-D List,

I have a question about gender and identity- 'Faith and Fatherland' is the
current working title of my PhD on the Irish press in mid-Victorian England.
I took it from the motto of one of the papers under study, the Universal
News. Prior to this research, I had always assumed Ireland to be a
'motherland'. At the time, British newspapers sometimes referred to Ireland
as the 'sister isle,' and Ireland was usually portrayed as a female. Indeed,
the masthead of the Universal News was of a female figure seated on a throne
on the ocean, encircled by the words, 'Our Faith, Our Fatherland.' It
strikes me as curious that there should be this apparent discrepancy in
gender.

'Manliness' is a constant theme in the journalism of the time, and Alan
O'Day has noted in his introduction to Hugh Heinrick's survey of the Irish
in Britain in the 1870s how it was highly valued. Was this gendering of the
nation as male a reaction to the supposedly feminine characteristics of the
celtic races? Was Ireland always a fatherland, and as it has subsequently
ceased to be one, when was that? I seem to recall Michael Collins speaking
of a fatherland. Has anybody written anything on this?

Anthony McNicholas



bsg.stewart[at]ulst.ac.uk
Languages & Lit/English
University of Ulster
tel (44) 01265 32 4355
fax (44) 01265 32 4963

From: don.macraild[at]sunderland.ac.uk (MACRAILD Don)

Subject: RE: Ir-D Invisibility, Manchester, Mitchel


It's funny reading, this, Paddy, for I am reminded that both of the Mackay's
(Charles and Alexander, not related) and Reach (indeed, pronounced REE-ACK),
who worked with Mayhew on the big MC survey were Scots. And none of them
liked the Irish very much: though Reach's malice was the greater. Also,
Dorothy Thompson's essay you mention comes close to giving us a handle on
class and ethnicity -- the sort of handle for which Fielding strives in his
book on Manchester. The only problem, of course, is that most of Thompson's
Irish radical agitators offered themselves to their legal inquisitors as
'man of no religion', so, having lost their Catholicism, we are still left
with this nagging doubt that (religious) ethnicity and class may be mutually
exclusive.

Don MacRaild
----------
From: irish-diaspora
To: irish-diaspora
Subject: Ir-D Invisibility, Manchester, Mitchel
Date: 09 November 1999 12:29



From Patrick O'Sullivan

Three 'I have been reminded' items...

I have been reminded...

1.
Steve Fentons 1996 piece has a very good discussion on the invisibility
of the Irish in official British statistics. The reference is...
Fenton, S. (1996) Counting ethnicity: social groups and official
categories, in Levitas, R. and Guy, W. (eds.) Interpreting Official
Statistics, London: Routledge. 143-165.

2.
Anyone studying the sources for the history of the Irish in Manchester
needs to know that the name, Reach - as in Angus Bethune Reach - is
Scottish. And that the name is pronounced REE-ACK. Or thereabouts.

There is a chapter on Manchester in Asa Briggs, _Victorian Cities_,
originally published 1963, Penguin 1968 - which remains a good
introduction to the discourse.

3.
Dorothy Thompson begins her essay, 'Seceding from the Seceders: The
Decline of the Jacobin Tradition in Ireland, 1790-1850', by contrasting
the views on 'race' of James Napper Tandy ('We are all of the same
family, black and white...') with those of John Mitchel. The essay can
be found in her collected essays, _Outsiders: Class, Gender and
Nation_, Verso, London & NY, 1993.

Also reprinted in that collection is her essay (originally 1982 -
mentioned in Don MacRaild's Study Guide'), 'Ireland and the Irish in
English Radicalism before 1850,' - in that essay Dorothy Thompson comes
very close to seeing the Irish as (to steal Patrick O'Farrell's phrase)
'the key dynamic factor...'

P.O'S.

[Note: This message, like many Ir-D messages, is forwarded for
information only. The fact that we distribute the message does not mean
that we necessarily endorse or support this approach to the creation and
the financing of Web based archives. P.O'S.]



Forwarded on behalf of
Brigitte.Anton[at]btinternet.com

------- Forwarded message follows -------
The Linen Hall Library, Belfast, in conjunction with the Belfast
Telegraph, has published on the Internet an archive of contemporary
sources for the study of the United Irishmen, from their foundation in
1791 until the failure of Emmet's Rebellion in 1803.

This archive addresses the fundamental question of how Ireland was to be
governed within the context of the United Kingdom and of Europe. The
influences of the French Revolution on a nation state on the western
seaboard of Europe are explained in contemporary texts; and government
reaction to a revolutionary political philosophy and its military
ramifications are laid before the student/researcher as events unfolded.

The importance of this archive to the student of history and politics
cannot be overemphasised. I would ask you to visit the website yourself
(http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/linenhall); to contact the Linen Hall
Library (Brigitte.Anton[at]btinternet.com) with comment or query; and to
consider seriously subscribing to the site (£56 per annum).

From Patrick O'Sullivan



HISTORY IRELAND 7/3 (Autumn 1999): SCOTLAND AND IRELAND THROUGH
THE AGES

This special issue of History Ireland had its origins in the HI
Conference in Belfast 2 years ago, The North Channel: Ireland and
Scotland Interactive.

There is the usual problem of the History Ireland 'house style' - no
proper notes and references. But this is a very interesting, thought-
provoking issue.

Cormac Bourke, 'Northern flames: remembering Columba and Adomnan'
Covers much the same ground as Bourke, Studies in the Cult of St.
Columba, 1997. Says the Book of Kells the chief monument of the cross-
channel Columban church.

Sean Duffy, 'Medieval Scotland and Ireland: overcoming the amnesia'
Contrary to the usual Irish line, '...in Ireland there never emerged, at
any stage in the Middle Ages, a willingness to accept foreigners and to
offer them, as it were, membership of the Irish nation.' By contrast
foreigners who settled in Scotland could very quickly become Scots.

[This observation runs so counter to usual Irish pieties about Ireland
'absorbing' incomers that it can only be welcomed...]

Further reading suggested is Duffy's own article in T.M. Devine, ed.,
Celebrating Columba: Irish-Scottish connections, 597-1997 (1999) -
which I have not yet seen.

Kenneth Nicholls, 'Celtic contrasts: Ireland and Scotland'. Another
tightly argued piece - too packed to summarise briefly - using the
history of Scotland, and the history of Bretagne/Brittany, to highlight
patterns of ignorance within Irish historiography. EG 'the quite common
belief that the Highlands remained "largely Catholic' - true only if you
define 'the Highlands' as the Catholic part of the North of Scotland.

Jane Ohlmeyer, 'Driving a wedge within Gaeldom: Ireland and Scotland
in the 17th century'. 'The North Channel World' in the C17th.

Jim Smyth, 'A tale of two generals: Cumberland and Cornwallis'.
Comparing Scotland, 1746, with Ireland 1798.

Patrick Fitzgerlad, 'The Scotch-Irish and the 18th century Irish
diaspora'. This is a very important article - a critique of the whole
'Scotch-Irish' historiography, a reconsideration of C18th Irish patterns
of migration. And - though I trust Paddy Fitzgerald - I do want to see
the fully referenced, totally scholarly version of this piece.
Conclusion: '...the challenge of over-hauling the terminology of the
nineteenth century may, in the twenty-first, be realised.'

T.G. Fraser, 'The Scottish-Irish Orange connection' - adaptable
Orangeism in Scotland.

Reviews:
S.G. Ellis on B. Bradshaw and P. Roberts (eds), British consciousness
and identity: the making of Britain 1533-1707
O.P. Rafferty on J.D. Brewer and G.I. Higgins, Anti-Catholicism in
Northern Ireland 1600-1998
P. Maume on G. Moran (ed.), Radical Irish priests 1660-1970
M. Perceval-Maxwell on J. McCavitt, Sir Arthur Chichester, lord
deputy of Ireland 1605-1616
J.G.R. Cronin on N.G. Bowe and E. Cumming, The arts and crafts
movements in Dublin and Edinburgh 1885-1925

P.O'S.
- --
Patrick O'Sullivan
Head of the Irish Diaspora Research Unit
Email Patrick O'Sullivan
Irish-Diaspora list
Irish Diaspora Studies http://www.brad.ac.uk/acad/diaspora/

Personal Fax National 0870 0521605
Fax International +44 870 0521605

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

From: "Jill Blee"
Organization: University of Ballarat

Subject: Through Irish Eyes Conference, December 4 onwards

CONFERENCE UPDATE

Program Changes.

11.15am Saturday, December 4: Keynote Address will be
given by his Excellency the Irish Ambassador, Richard O'Brien

7.00pm Conference Dinner: Keynote Address will be given
by renowned writer and broadcaster Siobhan McHugh.


9.45am Sunday December 5, Forum: Eureka at the Movies.
The starting time for this session has been brought forward to
9.45am. It will take place in the St Alipius Church Hall so that those
wishing to go to Mass beforehand will be able to do so.

11.00am. Eureka Centre. Unveiling of the statue of the
Pikeman's Dog.

12noon Ballarat Fine Arts Gallery. Reading of the Oath of
Allegience.

12.30pm. Eureka Trust Lunch. The Lunch is organised by the
Eureka Trust who have advised us that the cost is now $40 instead of
the $30 advertised on the Registration Form. This is a very popular
Ballarat event, and bookings are likely to be heavy. The Australian
Studies Centre will make bookings for those people who have indicated
they wish to attend on the registration forms received by November
15.

Conference details and booking form can be found on the website
http://www.ballarat.edu.au/bssh/asc/throughi.htm

BIOGRAPHIES OF PRESENTERS

Could all participants in the conference who are presenting a
paper please provide the convenor with a biography of approximately
100 words as soon as possible and confirmation of the title of your
paper.


PROCEEDINGS

It is the intention of the Australian Studies Centre to publish a
proceedings of the Through Irish Eyes Conference. Could all presenters
abide by the following guidelines.

1. Suggested word limit of 2000 -3000 words

2. Footnotes, if used, should be numbered serially, and placed at the
end of the paper.

3. A paper copy, and also a copy on disk, to be provided to the
conference convenor on arrival at the conference. The disk copy
should be in an IBM format, in Microsoft Word or Wordperfect, or in
ASCII format, clearly labelled with the name of the file.

4. Any maps or illustrations intended for inclusion should be on
separate sheets of paper, with their location in the text marked by a
guideline, e.g., "Table 1 here". Photos should have details of
ownership and have permission to publish.

Copyright of papers is vested in the authors.


REMINDER

Registration forms are due in on Monday, November 15, 1999.

Jill Blee
Conference Convenor
School of Behavioural and Social Sciences and Humanities
University of Ballarat
PO Box 663
Ballarat 3353
Telephone: 0353 279710
Fax: 0353 279840

From: Sara Brady
Subject: Re: Ir-D Theatre of Diaspora


Sorry, Paddy, for not replying earlier to your email.

Thanks for the great references mentioned below.

Speaking of Irish Theatre, specifically in New York, did anyone get a
chance to see "Celtic Tiger Me Arse" by Macalla Theatre Company? I'm not
aware of any reviews, but I think it would be interesting to see how it
was received. I believe it was at the Irish Arts Center?


>
>>From Patrick O'Sullivan
>
>Thinking further about Sara Brady's interesting and brave project...
>
>(Sara and I have discussed this a little, already, off-list...)
>
>We have all been hauled out of the poacher pockets of Conn the
>Shaughraun. That is to say, Irish theatre is shaped by the interactions
>between the professional work of Dion Boucicault and the commercial
>needs of the Irish-American theatre managers. Attending a Boucicault
>play becomes, as I have said elsewhere, 'a sacramental celebration of
>Irishnesss...' This - lively - tradition becomes hidden by purely
>Ireland-based studies of the theatre and drama of Ireland.
>
>It strikes me, about the Irish end of Sara's project, that much of it
>could be done over the Internet and Web. It is possible to go through
>the theatre reviews of the Irish newspapers - not forgetting the Ferries
>of Galway, and their email Newsletter, The Irish Emigrant.
>
>And see which plays and which theatre companies have tackled the issue
>of emigration. Some may now be contactable through email. The best
>place to start searching might be Bruce Stewart's IASIL Web site...
>http://www.ulst.ac.uk/iasil/
>
>Worth looking at is the new ACIS Collection, which certainly gives a
>flavour of (a part of) the current Irish theatre scene - John P.
>Harrington & Elizabeth J. Mitchell, eds, Politics and Performance in
>Contemporary Northern Ireland, U Of Massachusetts Press/ACIS, Amherst,
>1999, ISBN 1 55849 196 1 or 197 x. I particularly like Helen Lojek's
>piece on the Charabanc Theatre Company.
>

Sara Brady
Managing Editor, TDR
Tisch School of the Arts
721 Broadway, 6th floor
New York, NY 10003-6807
212-998-1626 phone
212-998-1627 fax

Read TDR on the Web at:
http://mitpress.mit.edu/TDR

From: Patrick Maume
Subject: Re: Ir-D Faith and Fatherland 2

From: patrick Maume
D.P. Moran (of the LEADER) was very hostile to the image of Ireland
as feminine because he saw it as encouraging passivity and self-pity.
(Yeats' Celtic Twilight he saw as an attempt by a shrewd Prod with an
eye for the main chance to encourage the Irish - i.e. the Catholics -
to be dreamy and sentimental while "Pensioner Yeats" collared the
boodle - he portrays Yeats as not fully masculine. An interesting
comparison would be with the 1880s UNITED IRELAND cartoons of AJ
Balfour which insinuated that "Mr. Golfour" was a homosexual who
derived sadistic pleasure from evicting stalwart Irish peasant
families - incidentally their portrayal of Erin shows her as a very
stalwart lady indeed, occasionally administering a good thrashing to
the comparatively puny Balfour.)
Moran's manifesto THE PHILOSOPHY OF IRISH IRELAND (1905, originally
published in NEW IRELAND REVIEW 1899) and early issues of the LEADER
are full of calls for Ireland to be more "masculine" and less
"feminine". One 1904 issue carried a cartoon, by the stained-glass
artist Michael Healy, of the image which Moran wanted to replace
Kathleen ni Houlihan (whom he said should be permanently banished to
Hy-Brasil) - a muscular male nude, reminiscent of the neoclassical
sculpture of Herr Arno Breker and his Russina contemporaries, grappling
successfully with the serpent of Anglicisation. (The serpent is
carefully positioned to avoid bringing a blush to the cheek of any
young person.) Unfortunately I didn't devote much space to this
imagery of masculinity and femininity in my little book on D.P. Moran
(Dundalgan/Historical Association of Ireland 1995) - it's tough
covering 36 years in 21,000 words.
The obvious Unionist image of the "sister isles" is the famous
1860s Punch cartoon of a decidedly butch Britannia (with armour and
sword) shielding a weeping Erin from snarling ape-like Fenians.
Best wishes,
Patrick

On Tue, 9 Nov 1999 19:17:00 +0100 irish-diaspora[at]Bradford.ac.uk wrote:

> From:irish-diaspora[at]Bradford.ac.uk> Date: Tue, 9 Nov 1999 19:17:00
+0100
> Subject: Ir-D Faith and Fatherland 2
> To: irish-diaspora[at]Bradford.ac.uk
>
>
>
> From: "Bruce Stewart"
>
> Subject: Faith and Fatherland [Anthony's message below]
>
> May I put in a quickfire reaction here? One of the constant themes
> of recent Irish-studies has been this topic of gendered nationality.
> The Arnoldian characterisation of the Celtic mind as feminine is now
> immensely familiar and the political inference that Ireland needed
> the attentions of a 'masculine' British master is quite explicit in
> much of contemporary political discourse. Likewise, by corollary, a
> discourse of 'hysteria' is obviously related to this in a Freudian
> analysis..

From Patrick O'Sullivan

The Irish Empire television series - into which some of us have put some
input - begins its run on RTE, Irish television, tomorrow, Monday
November 15.

I will nip across to Dublin tomorrow, to share in the production team's
relief and joy - and to shake appropriate hands and say appropriate
things. I will be staying in Staunton's Hotel, 83 Stephen's Green - if
anyone wants to get in touch with me. But, since Dublin is simply a
very large village, I am sure we will all bump.

The series has already been shown in Australia, from whence I have
received a number of comments. To those who have asked me - no North
American showing is, at this time, definitely planned. The production
team do tell me that it is planned to sell video tapes of the series to
individuals. I will clarify the details when I am in Dublin. And I
will see if I can chase up some reviews and media comment.

I should be back here by Tuesday evening.

Paddy O'Sullivan

- --
Patrick O'Sullivan
Head of the Irish Diaspora Research Unit
Email Patrick O'Sullivan
Irish-Diaspora list
Irish Diaspora Studies http://www.brad.ac.uk/acad/diaspora/

Personal Fax National 0870 0521605
Fax International +44 870 0521605

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

From: "Jill Blee"
Organization: University of Ballarat
Subject: Through Irish Eyes

R E M I N D E R

Conference Booking forms are due now. Please return asap so we can
make you a name tag and pack up an information package for you. We
also need to tell the caters and the restaurants how many mouths we
need to feed.

Booking forms are available on our website at

http://www.ballarat.edu.au/bssh/asc/throughi.htm

If you have any difficulty downloading it please let me know,

Jill Blee
Conference Convenor
School of Behavioural and Social Sciences and Humanities
University of Ballarat
PO Box 663
Ballarat 3353
Telephone: 0353 279710
Fax: 0353 279840