Negotiations of Irish identity in the wake of terrorism: the case of the Irish in Birmingham 1973–74

This article explores the Irish migrant experience in Birmingham during and in the wake of terrorist campaigns carried out in Britain between 1969 and 1975 and attributed to the Irish Republican Army (IRA). Beginning with a discussion of the competencies with which Irishness was associated at the close of the 1960s in England, many of which were hinged on a notion of the Irish predisposition towards violence, the article continues on to take the political, cultural and religious “temperature” of the Irish community in Birmingham between 1969 and 1975, and follows on with a discussion of the specific strategies sought out by Irish immigrants to come to terms with the effect of events such as the “Birmingham Bombings” on their daily lives. Principle findings that emerge from the study indicate that IRA terrorism forced the Irish in Birmingham to engage with and adopt a number of distinct linguistic and cultural strategies in the post-1974 period, the cultivation of which indefinitely altered their relationship with Ireland as “home”, their visibility in the public British sphere and their associational patterns and practices within the migrant enclave.     

“Much the more political of the two”: Mabel FitzGerald and the Irish revolution

This article offers an assessment of the career and ideology of the Irish republican and Cumann na mBan activist Mabel FitzGerald, née McConnell (1884–1958). From a staunchly Unionist Belfast Presbyterian family, Mabel converted to republicanism while an undergraduate in the early 1900s. In 1911 she eloped with Desmond FitzGerald, a Catholic poet. The couple became prominent nationalist activists, and participated in the Easter Rising. In 1922 Desmond, now a minister in the provisional government, supported the Anglo-Irish Treaty. This caused a rift with Mabel, who remained a republican. Although she chose not to separate from her husband, she retained her republican sympathies; there is evidence that she continued to offer aid to the anti-Treaty side. After the Civil War, Mabel and Desmond were reconciled, and she strongly revised her political views, eventually coming to regret the Irish separatist project. Mabel FitzGerald’s career offers insight into the nature of radicalisation among Irish nationalist activists, as well as providing an example of the competing loyalties of family and politics that frequently informed and constrained the actions of nationalist activists.     

Exploring the post-release experience of former Irish Industrial School “inmates”

This article provides an insight into the life course of 25 men and women who were incarcerated in Industrial Schools in Ireland during the twentieth century. Twenty-five semi-structured, in-depth interviews were conducted with former Industrial School “inmates” and they covered questions about their life during and after their incarceration in order to understand the impact that the Industrial School had on their lives. The article describes the regimented, abusive and degrading regime they were forced to live in while incarcerated in the Industrial School followed by the difficulties they faced after their release. A theme that was significant throughout the interviews, was empowerment, and this article looks at how the 25 men and women interviewed empowered themselves in the outside world, while being faced with difficulties in learning how to survive in a world that was new to them, whilst facing marginalisation in Irish social life.     

The famished soul: resonance and relevance of the Irish famine to Irish men’s accounts of hunger following immigration to England during the 1950s and 1960s

This paper uses a hermeneutically informed analysis to reveal how Irish men’s accounts of acute hunger on arrival in England during the 1950s and 1960s resonate with archival oral accounts of the Great Hunger in Ireland during the 1840s. The paper makes the case for a new continuum of memory which foregrounds the corporeal and spiritual dimensions of acute food deprivation and its significance over space, place and time. I argue that a corporeal-spiritual medium of memory represents a two-sided reality, a pivotal yet nebulous point of contact which exemplifies our understanding of how discourses of hunger recounted over the course of a century help shape reconstructions of Irish sociocultural identity. The symbolic potency of hunger and particular foods to expose a distinct moral and social order during both time periods is examined. I also show how this more burnished and fluid medium of corporeal and spiritual memory highlights the importance of intracultural diglossia in respect of Irish sociocultural identity and with it, the interface between individual, collective and folk memory.     

Defenders of the state: the Irish Labour Party,coalitionism and revisionism, 1969–77

Irish Labour Party politics underwent a significant transformation during the period 1969–77. During these years, the party moved from a position of opposition to coalition and apparent support for socialist politics to involvement in a coalition government with Fine Gael and an abandonment of its previously stated goal, the thirty-two-county socialist republic. This paper locates the main factor behind this shift in Labour’s attachment to the institutions of the Republic of Ireland state. As that state was threatened by the crisis in Northern Ireland from 1969 onwards, so the Labour Party was compelled to shift ground politically and move towards agencies that could offer stability. This led to permanent shifts in Labour policy and strategy.     

Re/negotiating “suspicion”: exploring the construction of self in Irish migrants' memories of the 1996 Manchester bomb

On 15 June 1996 the Provisional IRA exploded a 3000 lb bomb in the city of Manchester, home to a large Irish community. This article uses oral history to explore the distinct ways in which two male Irish migrants, both of whom settled in the Manchester area during the post-war period, recall and negotiate their experiences of the bomb and its aftermath. Focusing on how memory production is shaped though interactions between different cultural forms and interior psychic processes, the article uses memories of the bomb to explore how the culture of suspicion generated around Irishness in Britain during “The Troubles” could be productive of distinct forms of Irish migrant subjectivity.     

Protecting the honour of the daughters of Eire: welfare policy for Irish female migrants to England, 1940–70

Across the middle decades of the twentieth century, approximately 500,000 people left Ireland for Britain. Around half were young, single females migrating alone. Drawing on archival material in Ireland and England, this paper analyses the ways in which Catholic and secular agencies became aware of female Irish migrants; and how they understood and responded to their needs. Catholic organisations focused on maintaining religious belief and practice as a means of avoiding social problems in migrants. Some female migrants, such as nurses, were considered exemplars of Catholic and Irish femininity. However, female sexuality was problematised when associated with single motherhood, prostitution and cohabitation. The Irish hierarchy expected to lead policy development for migrant welfare. The framing of female migrant social needs within a moral and religious discourse led to solutions prioritising moral welfare delivered by Catholic priests and volunteers. Both the Irish government and British institutions (state and voluntary) accepted the centrality of Catholicism to Irish identity and the right of the Catholic Church to lead welfare policy and provision for Irish female migrants. No alternative understanding of Irish women's needs within a secular framework emerged during this period. This meant that whilst the Irish hierarchy developed policy responses based on their assessment of need, other agencies, notably the British and Irish governments, did not consider any specific policy response for Irish women to be required.     

Creative planning in Ireland: the role of culture‐led development in Irish planning

This paper attempts to close specific gaps in our understanding of practice and policy concerning culture, planning and development in Ireland. This is a nation in which the development and planning impacts of cultural policy are of increasing importance, yet the state of knowledge of policy and infrastructure remains underdeveloped. The paper begins by charting the evolution of culture‐led development in Western Europe over the last few decades, highlighting the emergence of culture as a central element in both economic and social development strategies. The paper then focuses upon Ireland, reviewing the nation's rich cultural and especially musical heritage, and the direct economic impacts of this. Detailing the successful mobilization of this heritage in search of tourism, the recent incorporation of culture into strategic planning and development initiatives, and the links between culture and development in Dublin, Cork and Galway, the paper concludes that Ireland is in a strong position to avail itself of the positive social and economic impacts of planning for culture and creativity.