For Kneecap, Irish is a living language that is simply a part of their daily life. But it is also part and parcel of their politics, an embodied stance of resistance against British cultural and political hegemony. Continue reading
Tagged with Irish history …
Anois teacht an earraigh – Now with the coming of spring
Reflecting on a third life of St Brigid, Bethu Brigte, and asking if
women’s rights increased with the arrival of the Christian church. Continue reading
Meeting of the Waters: Echuca and beyond
Catherine is a direct descendant of Arthur Guinness who started the stout, (she and Wayne got special treatment at the brewery), and a grand-daughter of Harry Guinness who was a leader alongside Roger Casement and Edmund Morel in opposing Belgian slavery in the Congo. (In 2017 Catherine wrote a stunning book, Rubber Justice, about him.) Continue reading
Poetry in Irish and English: Gearóidin Nic Cárthaigh, Louis Mulcahy, Emily Cullen, Ben Keatinge
He will not study Famine roads on any map in school.
I discovered those myself much later, Trevelyan’s twisted
dictate, the futile labour of those arteries tapering
into the ether, Continue reading
Kicking up a Riot and Grabbing Headlines: Second-wave feminists in Ireland
An invigorating history and historiography of feminist activism in Ireland in second wave. Continue reading
A Novel for the Bloomsday Season
A rich plum pudding of a novel crammed with characters from the Joyce biographies and the novels, allusions and bits of text. Continue reading
Kerry Folklore: Na Cruacha Dubha agus Paróiste na Tuaithe: Seanchas agus Scéalaithe
Little of that inheritance was recorded in the new country, but books like this give a vivid impression of what came and what was lost. The Australian links in the material presented here are interesting. In one story a landlord declares that if any of his workers steal even a lamb they will be transported. Continue reading
Agallaimh le Scríbhneoirí na Gaeilge/Interviews with Irish Language Writers
I grew up in County Monaghan, in Ulster and I have been profoundly influenced also by Patrick Kavanagh and Seamus Heaney and the love of landscape and placename. Continue reading
Old Wisdoms, with an Irish cultural twist
The premise of Saskia Levy Rogers’ book is to provide a new look at old wisdoms, with an Irish cultural twist. Continue reading
Agallaimh le Scríbhneoirí na Gaeilge/Interviews with Irish Language Writers
Language has always been of interest to Colin Ryan as a way of shaping and expressing the world, and he began writing quite early. Continue reading
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