Irish history

What Peace in Northern Ireland Looks Like at 25

Both Brexit and the recent revelation that Catholics outnumber Protestants in Northern Ireland introduce new tensions into the peace agreements reached in 1998. 

Staging History to Make History: Theater and the Road to the Good Friday Agreement

by Marilynn Richtarik

Brian Friel's play "Making History" wasn't faithful to the facts of the life of Hugh O'Neill, a 16th century chieftain who had symbolized Irish resistance to colonization. But, as an influential artist, Friel purposefully substituted myths of cultural hybridity for myths of nationalism to make the negotiation of peace palatable to his friends in politics.

Irish Legend Should Inspire the Fight Against Famine Today

by William Lambers

The Irish show Riverdance has incorporated elements of legend derived from the Irish experience of famine, and raised funds to help victims of hunger around the world, an example to follow at St. Patrick's Day. 

How The Irish Saved Wellington at Waterloo

by Brendan Farrell

For centuries, the Irish provided manpower to the British military, never more notably than on June 18, 1815. 

Thomas Cahill, Popular and Scholarly Historian of Ireland, Dies at 82

Cahill's 1995 surprise bestseller emphasized the role of isolated Irish monks in preserving religious and literary scholarship after the fall of Rome. 

The Long Road to Redress in Ireland

by Mark Holan

James Smith, a scholar and advocate for the victims of Ireland's social service institutions including mother and child homes, reformatories, and the notorious Magdalen Laundries, warns that the government's attempts at compensation stifle openness and transparency. 

United Ireland "Closer Now than it's Ever Been"

Both demographic change in the North and shifts in United Kingdom politics have made Irish reunification a reasonable possibility to discuss. 

British and Irish Historians Discuss Oliver Cromwell

Patrick Geoghegan talks all things Cromwell with a panel of historians. 

"Phantom Catholic Threats" Haunt Ireland's National Maternity Hospital

by Máiréad Enright

Secular Irish health advocates fear that a partnership between the state and religious charities to operate the national maternity hospital will impose limits on care, including abortion access. Is this justified or a case of finding "nuns under the bed"? 

The Irish Lesson: Abortion Bans Won't Stop Abortion

by Fintan O'Toole

The recently overturned Irish constitutional ban on abortion and the recent attack by conservative Americans on abortion rights have a common intellectual champion in Notre Dame's Charles E. Rice. The Irish learned the hard way what followed. 

Ireland, We Hardly Knew Ye: Fintan O'Toole's Story of Modernization

by Jack Sheehan

Fintan O'Toole's acclaimed popular history of modern Ireland delivers a sharp indictment of child abuse by Catholic priests and the operators of reform schools and institutions, but substitutes national-level psychoanalysis for research in other areas, a historian argues.

Fintan O'Toole on Ireland's Great Gamble

O'Toole's "personal history" of Ireland shows that the Republic sought both modern prosperity and traditional values, but could secure only one. 

The Trappings of Catholic Tradition Around St. Patrick's Day are out of Step with Modern Ireland

by Donald Beaudette and Laura Weinstein

Americans claiming a connection to Irish heritage and tradition today should consider the Republic of Ireland's ongoing transition toward a more secular, liberal, and multicultural democracy.

The Trappings of Tradition Around Irish-American St. Patrick's Day are out of Step with Modern Ireland

by Donald Beaudette and Laura Weinstein

Americans claiming a connection to Irish heritage and tradition today should consider the Republic of Ireland's ongoing transition toward a more secular, liberal, and multicultural democracy.

Why Does St. Brigid Get So Much Less Attention than Patrick?

by Lisa Bitel

"This year on March 17, when you’re wearing the green and singing “Dirty Ol’ Town,” take a moment to whisper thanks to St. Brigid, the compassionate, sensible, native-born patron saint of Ireland, and ask if Ireland’s premier patron saint should be a woman."

Excavation at Mass Grave in County Galway Could Begin This Year

The remains of children buried in a mass unmarked grave in Tuam, County Galway, could be exhumed later this year under newly-published legislation.

At 50th Anniversary of "Bloody Sunday" Peace Feels Less Certain

by Mark Holan

A hometown headline 50 years ago introduced the author to the Troubles in Northern Ireland; at the anniversary of Derry's "Bloody Sunday" a hard-won peace feels precarious. 

Beware Prophecies of Civil War

by Fintan O'Toole

Northern Ireland's history shows how "premonitions of civil war served not as portents to be heeded, but as a warrant for carnage," as a seemingly inevitable mass conflict justifies and normalizes smaller-scale political violence as an everyday phenomenon.

Can an Official Government Account of Northern Ireland's Troubles be Credible?

"What is needed is not “official” history, but a decision to properly open sensitive archival material to facilitate the writing of evidence-based history. The political will to facilitate that is highly unlikely to materialise."

Memo From Irish History: Welcome to Your Future, American Women

by Laura Weinstein

After sustained public outcry, the Republic of Ireland looked to its history of horrific treatment and preventable death of girls and women under its draconian abortion laws and said "enough." Will this example change the course American states like Texas are poised to follow?