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    Canadian Association for Irish Studies: Halifax, May 2010

    Tuesday, January 12th, 2010

    Call for papers for the annual conference of the Canadian Association for Irish Studies to be held at Saint Mary’s University, Halifax, May 19-22, 2010.

    IRELAND AND ITS DISCONTENTS
    Success and Failure in Modern Ireland

    Canadian Association for Irish Studies/ l’Association canadienne d’études irlandaises Annual Conference, 2010
    Saint Mary’s University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
    19-22 May 2010

    “Anyone who is failing at one thing,” psychoanalyst Adam Phillips has  suggested, “is always succeeding at another.” We invite proposals for papers interrogating the relationship between success and failure in modern and contemporary Ireland, as reflected in its politics, its economic policies, its literature, and its popular culture. The Celtic Tiger is one obvious recent example of a ‘success’ narrative that was intimately linked to a series of failures on the part of Irish society to safeguard its more vulnerable communities. With the recent publication of the “Ryan Report,” to cite another example, it is clear that the success of the Catholic Church in exerting its power over Ireland’s educational and reformatory institutions came at the price of a failure to guarantee the safety and welfare of Ireland’s youth. By the same token, it might be argued that Fianna Fáil’s longtime political success depended on the failure to engage with the ‘National Question,’ i.e., Partition and Northern Ireland. Success and failure, as manifested in language revival policies, in gender-related issues, in the lives of prominent public figures, and the reality and perceptions of the Irish diaspora, including the Irish in Canada, are also topics worthy of consideration.

    We welcome papers that address other topics and proposals for special panels.

    Please send proposals including contact information (250 words) by
    e-mail to:
    Pádraig Ó Siadhail, D’Arcy McGee Chair of Irish Studies, Saint Mary’s University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, B3H 3C3
    (padraig.osiadhail@smu.ca) by 15 January 2010.

    American Conference for Irish Studies: Pennsylvania, May 2010

    Tuesday, January 12th, 2010

    2010 ACIS Conference

    Call for Papers
    Deadline: 24 November, 2009

    The 2010 national meeting of the American Conference for Irish Studies will
    be held on 5 – 8 May 2010 at the Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel in
    State College, PA.

    There will be an opening reception on Wednesday evening, May 5th, and
    concurrent panels will begin on Thursday morning, May 6th. The announced
    theme is intended to encourage a broad range of paper topics.

    Papers are welcome on any Irish Studies topic, including traditional
    concerns of the discipline and evolving areas of interest in the visual,
    literary, and interdisciplinary areas. We welcome proposals for individual
    papers, which, if accepted, will be placed within a relevant panel.

    Proposals for panels are especially welcome, and panels have been proposed
    on Reassessing Diasporic Studies within Irish Studies and Reassessing Irish
    Historiography. Additional papers are welcome on such topics as evolving
    literary and visual arts movements, the culture and literature of Northern
    Ireland, and other related topics!

    Plenary speakers confirmed to date are Dean John Harrington (Fordham
    University) and Dr. James Smith (Boston College). Moya Cannon will be
    reading from her poetry at a special session. U.S carriers offer frequent
    flights to State College, PA. Further details will be posted as they become
    available. A conference website is also under development.

    Due Date for Conference Paper Proposals: Tuesday, 24 November 2009. Please send your 250 word (or less) abstract to Dr. Tramble T. Turner at
    ttt3@psu.edu. If you have questions or would like additional information,
    please contact me at 215 868.5848 (mobile), 215 881.7532 (office), or via
    e-mail at ttt3@psu.edu. Dr. Tramble T. Turner Associate Professor of English
    Penn State Abington 1600 Woodland Rd. Abington, PA 19001

    ACIS website

    Irish Theatrical Diaspora: Manchester, April 2010

    Tuesday, January 12th, 2010

    The Irish Theatrical Diaspora Conference 2010

    Ireland’s Drama in British Cities,
    Manchester Metropolitan University, April 15-16, 2010.

    The 2010 Irish Theatrical Diaspora Conference will consider the history and context of performing Irish plays and characters on British stages, as well as the more general performance of Irish diasporic identity in an urban British context. Some of the areas that the conference will address are:

    • the role of festivals in performing Irish identity,
    • the role of British theatres in performing Irish plays,
    • the significance of geographical variations,
    • and the impact of globalisation on the position of Irish theatre in Britain

    Keynote speakers:

    • Mary Hickman, Professor of Irish Studies and Sociology, London Metropolitan University
    • Patrick Mason, Director, Adjunct Professor, University College Dublin, and Visiting Professor, Liverpool Hope University

    Confirmed speakers:

    • Claire Connolly
    • Mike Cronin
    • Karen Fricker
    • Nicholas Grene
    • Patrick Lonergan
    • Holly Maples
    • Victor Merriman
    • Aoife Monks
    • Jim Moran
    • Catherine Rees
    • Shaun Richards

    This conference will examine performances of Irish identity in the urban
    centres of Britain since the beginning of the 19th century. The idea of
    performance is intended to include events staged in the theatres and on the streets, for example parades, musical performances and political
    demonstrations.

    By discussing such performances and their reception by various audiences, speakers and delegates will examine the ways that ‘Irishness’ has changed in meaning and association in Britain, pressurised by contexts such as colonialism and nationalism, modernisation and economic change in Ireland, the Troubles and the Peace Process, and many others.

    In particular, the conference is concerned to examine the changing status of Irish, and Irish-descended, people in Britain.  Since 1995, the diaspora has arguably become more recognised in Ireland, after President Mary Robinson urged the Irish nation to the ‘moral act’ of remembering and commemorating their sacrifices.  In Britain, the Irish arguably became more visible after recognition of their ‘ethnic minority’ status in the 2001 UK census; and, more recently, interest in Britain’s oldest and largest ethnic minority has been renewed amidst a more general concern with immigration and the ways in which the case of the Irish in Britain might be seen to foreshadow and intersect with the experience of many other immigrant groups.

    Delegates will be able to reflect on questions including:

    • What different versions of Irishness have been suggested by theatrical and other performances in Britain, and how have these been received and understood by their audiences?
    • In what ways have Irish cultural festivals affected perceptions?
    • How have notions of second-generation Irishness changed?
    • What significance do performances of Irishness abroad have for the Irish nation ‘at home’?
    • Have visible assertions and performances of Irish identity impacted on ideas of Britishness?
    • How have the Irish enacted and interacted with ideas of nation and identity in a British context, and how has this been affected by changes in Ireland and key events in Irish-British relations?
    • To what extent are the Irish in Britain an ‘acceptable’ ethnic minority?
    • To what extent are the Irish in Britain ‘post-nationalist’ now?

    More information:

    Irish Theatrical Diaspora website

    Tweet archive: international diaspora roundup

    Monday, January 11th, 2010

    Here are a few Tweets I’ve posted in the last few weeks regarding diaspora happenings of other nations.

    First history of Irish in Vermont published

    Monday, January 11th, 2010

    The first-ever book on the history of the Irish in Vermont has been published, authored by historian Vincent E. Feeney. “Finnigans, Slaters and Stonepeggers: A History of the Irish in Vermont,” examines the Irish experience in the state from the 1760s through the twentieth century.

    Feeney says the Irish stayed in their ethnic ghetto for over a century, before the community assimilated in the later years of the twentieth century. The Times-Argus carries a review.

    (Images From the Past, 2009, 250 pages, $19.95 paperback)

    Related web pages:

    India to allow expat vote as Irish interest grows

    Friday, January 8th, 2010

    India is working to join the 115 countries around the world that allow their expats to vote.  Prime Minister Manmohan Singh yesterday told the 1,500 delegates attending the annual Pravasi Bharatiya Divas gathering of the Indian diaspora that he hopes that the government will be able to facilitate non-resident Indians (NRIs) voting in the next general election.

    “I recognise the legitimate desire of Indians living abroad to exercise their franchise and to have a say in who governs India,” he said.

    “We are working on this issue and I sincerely hope that they will get a chance to vote by the time of the next regular general elections. In fact, I would go a step further and ask why more overseas Indians should not return home to join politics and public life as they are increasingly doing in business and academia.”

    The Indian move is part of a growing international trend to allow expats a voice in their home political systems. India’s engagement with its diaspora has frequently been cited by Irish policy-makers as an example of good practice, so it will be interesting to see what impact the granting of voting rights to NRIs will have on the debate here.

    Although perhaps “debate” is too strong a word. As Mary Hickman stated at the recent Irish Diaspora Seminar hosted by UCD in London, the issue of emigrant voting rights is taboo in Ireland. As the Irish Post reports this week, however, it is attracting rising interest among emigrants. With the recent upsurge in emigration and increased public discourse on the issue of political reform, it seems likely that the issue of Irish emigrant voting rights will take on greater importance in the future.

    And although nearly every country in Europe and most in the developed world already allow emigrant voting rights, India’s leadership in the arena of diaspora engagement will make its granting of expat voting rights difficult to ignore.

    Related pages:

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