The Irish in their own Words: Personal and Collective Identities in Ireland

(3 Credit Hours) · Undergraduate

What does it mean to be "Irish"? How do the Irish define themselves in the modern era and why? How is "Irishness" developed in response to violent imposition, radical dislocation and societal rupture? Medieval Ireland boasted the oldest literary tradition in Europe outside the classical world of Greece and Rome and yet its inhabitants were described by Gerald of Wales, a writer of that time, as "a truly barbarous people ... a filthy people, wallowing in vice." It was the type of description that was to remain current in English accounts of Ireland for centuries; it was reinforced when Ireland, unlike England, remained largely Catholic during the Protestant Reformation and formed the basis for the anti-Irish sentiment that characterized much of the early immigrant experience in the United States and elsewhere. What provokes such a characterization and how do a people so affronted and degraded respond to such defamation? This course will examine the dynamic and contentious formation of individual and collective identities through literature, language and history in the period 1600-1900 in Ireland. This period sees the establishment and consolidation of English (or later British) rule over the country and is therefore a time of cumulative crisis for the Irish. We will read closely a rich, diverse selection of both prose and poetry representing various facets of this crisis and of Irish responses to them. The material provides dramatic contrasts and comparisons for those who have already studied some Anglo-Irish literature and it will also be of interest to students of Irish history and culture. The texts that we read will also be placed in their wider European and global contexts by considering work by scholars in disciplines as diverse as anthropology, history, psychology and sociology on various aspects of the formation of social, cultural and national consciousness. In particular, we will examine cutting edge work on the interface between language, anthropology and identity in order to deepen our understanding of the literature and its contexts. To that end, within the framework of those texts, we will study the development of a number of words relating to concepts such as heritage, nationhood, freedom and civility to establish the affiliations between these concepts and the often traumatic changes that beset the culture in which they played a defining role. We will use our examination of the Irish experience to think about the following more general questions. How are personal and collective, including national, identities formed? Do identities formed when people think they are under attack differ from other identities? Are all national identities formed in opposition? How can we gain perspective on deeply felt identities so as to make them an object of dispassionate analysis? All materials, many of which were originally written in Irish, will be read in English and no previous knowledge of Irish is required.