Department of
History Newsletter 2015-2016 Inside this Issue Welcome Message
Staff News
Research News
Upcoming Events
Past Events
Message from the Head of Department Welcome to the Department of History fourth annual alumni newsletter. As always, it has been a lively year in the department, with varied activities and events alongside the regular work of the department in teaching and research. To get a sense of how things are at the moment, why not take a look at our recently commissioned video, featuring students and staff, available to view at History website - www.tcd.ie/history - and on the Trinity YouTube channel - www.youtube.com/ watch?v=-ianomg4lgY Our alumni have been involved with many of the activities which have taken place over the past year, and on behalf of the department I would particularly like to thank those of our graduates who have acted as GradLink mentors, both in 2014-15 and during the current academic year. The contribution which the programme makes to students can be life-changing, and we greatly appreciate the time and interest which mentors are prepared to give for the benefit of our current undergraduates.
Trinity College Dublin in 1916
Very significant changes are taking place in the Department at the moment, with the arrival of a number of new staff and, sadly, the retirement of three long-serving members of the Department, all dedicated teachers and scholars: Professor David Fitzpatrick, Professor John Horne and Professor Ian Robinson. Our commitment to excellence in teaching remains a priority for us, though, and I’m delighted to report that two colleagues, Dr Daniel Geary and Dr Ciaran O’Neill were awarded Provost’s Teaching Awards for 2015, for outstanding contributions to teaching. The Newsletter highlights just some of the things that have been going on – or are coming up – in the months ahead. As you will see, with us now in the midst of the 2016 ‘Decade of Commemoration’ the Department is playing a very full role in the College’s commemorative activities and has a wide range of events planned. We’ve also included details of just some of the many projects, from books to conferences to online courses, with which the department is involved. I hope you will find the latest newsletter enjoyable and informative.
Robert Armstrong Head of Department of History
Department of History School of Histories and Humanities
Newsletter 2015 – 2016
Staff News 2015 saw the retirement of three colleagues, Professors David Fitzpatrick, John Horne and Ian Robinson. All three of them will be known to successive cohorts of students, in each case for their combination of internationally renowned scholarship, and committed and inspiring teaching. They have made signal contributions to the fields of medieval, modern European and modern Irish history, through their books and their even more extensive publication of articles, essays, collections and editions. Of course, for David, John and Ian the life of scholarship continues apace, and all have plans for forthcoming publications. To the Department it is a tremendous loss to no longer have them take part in the day-to-day life of the department, where each was such a presence. We are also losing a newer member of staff, Dr Susan Flavin, who has been with us for three years, and has already carved out an important place for herself in the study of early modern Ireland. We are, though, in a position to welcome new colleagues. We are delighted to have with us Dr Richard Mc Mahon, holder of an innovative joint post, which sees him teach partly in our department and partly in Carlow College. Richard is an expert on the histories of crime, law and violence, both in Ireland and internationally. He has published widely on the subject, including the book Homicide in pre-famine and famine Ireland (Liverpool University Press, 2013). With the new Michaelmas term we were joined by five additional staff, the largest number of new faces any of us can remember. An exciting departure for the department was signalled by the arrival of Dr Isabella Jackson as Assistant Professor in Chinese history, a new field of study and research for us. Isabella has previously taught at the Universities of Oxford and Aberdeen, and her first book will soon be published on the International Settlement in Shanghai from 1900 to 1943. In Modern Irish history, we are welcoming two new colleagues. Dr Carole Holohan brings valuable additional expertise in social history, with research interests in youth culture (again the subject of an upcoming book) and of poverty in modern Ireland. Her specialization in the decades since the 1950s will greatly enhance our teaching
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Professor David Fitzpatrick
Professor John Horne
and research. Dr Georgina Laragy is taking up another innovate post, a joint appointment between the department and the Glasnevin Trust. It is a post which will bring to the fore our commitment to public history, both in the sense of bringing history to the public, and reflecting on how society at large understands and
interprets our shared past. Two colleagues will be joining us for the year: Dr Thomas Smith to teach medieval history, and Dr Tara Windsor to teach twentieth-century European history. Hopefully many of you will encounter our new colleagues at some of the events coming up this year. It is an exciting time for the History Department!
Department of History School of Histories and Humanities
Research News New Book Daniel Geary: Beyond Civil Rights: The Moynihan Report and Its Legacy (University of Philadelphia Press, 2015) Professor Daniel Geary’s new book, just published, is the definitive history of a controversial 1965 U.S. government report on “the Negro family” and examines the cultural assumptions embedded in the report’s analysis and demonstrates its significance for liberals, conservatives, neoconservatives, civil rights leaders, Black Power activists, and feminists. Shortly after the 1964 Civil Rights Act, Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan authored a government report titled The Negro Family: A Case for National Action that captured the attention of President Lyndon Johnson. Responding to the demands of African American activists that the United States go beyond civil rights to secure economic justice, Moynihan thought his analysis of black families highlighted socioeconomic inequality. However, the report’s central argument that poor families headed by single mothers inhibited African American progress
touched off a heated controversy. The long-running dispute over Moynihan’s conclusions changed how Americans talk about race, the family, and poverty.
Letters and papers of Oliver Cromwell Oxford University Press has assembled a handful of leading scholars to produce a new five-volume edition of the letters and papers of Oliver Cromwell, one of the most controversial figures in Anglo-Irish history, with legacies on both sides of the Irish Sea that continue to be contested. There have been two major previous editions of his writings – one by Thomas Carlyle, published in 1845, and the other by W.C. Abbott published in the period 1937-47. Both have well known deficiencies. This new edition will confront a series of issues not tackled in the previous works and make use of new material not hitherto available. Professor John Morrill of the University of Cambridge is the series editor, while Dr Micheál Ó Siochrú of Trinity, author of God’s Executioner: Oliver Cromwell and the conquest of Ireland (London, 2009), is the only Irishbased academic involved in the project. He is co-editing volume two, which contains most of the Irish and Scottish material, including those letters relating to the notorious massacres at both Drogheda and Wexford in late 1649. The British Academy, the Arts Humanities Research Council and the Leverhulme Trust in the UK, as well as by the Irish Research Council provided funding. All the printed and manuscript material located in British, Irish, U.S. and European archives has now been digitised and transcribed, and Oxford University Press intends to produce this definitive edition online and in hard copy in 2016.
Oliver Cromwell, St Ives
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Newsletter 2015 – 2016
Trinity College and the Decade of Commemoration Trinity was at the centre of many of the stirring and decisive events that reshaped Ireland in the ‘long decade’ between 1912 and 1923, sometimes quite literally, given our city-centre location. The History Department has had a central role in College’s response to the question of commemorating that past one hundred years on, including of course the anniversary of the Easter Rising in 2016. Last year’s alumni newsletter highlighted the Curragh Mutiny conference of March 2014. Podcasts of the lectures and talks given at the event, some setting the background and others investigating the controversial sequence of events, are now available at www.tcd.ie/decade-commemoration/ events/archive/curragh-mutiny. A year on, and we held another successful one-day symposium entitled ‘The North Began? Ulster and the Irish Revolution, 1900-25’, co-hosted by the Centre for Contemporary Irish History, Trinity and the Department of History, St Patrick’s College, DCU. The symposium examined the paradox that many of those who revived Irish republican nationalism in the early 20th century were from Ulster, yet some were excluded from the 1916
pantheon. It also discussed northern nationalist activists who migrated south, exploring the formation of their nationalist identity, and the consequences of their migration for them, for the new Irish Free State, and for nationalist communities in the new Northern Ireland. A full audio podcast of the symposium will shortly be available on the Trinity Decade of Commemorations page www.tcd.ie/decade-commemoration.
Details of upcoming events organised by different Schools and Departments within College can be found in ‘Trinity and the Rising’ booklet, with contributions from Eunan O’Halpin an Ciaran Brady, are also available on the decades commemoration website. Among events to look out for are the Proclamation Day Symposium on 15 March 2016 and the conference ‘Gallant Allies and Saxon Foes – the Rising and the Great War’, organised by the Centre for Contemporary Irish History in April.
Online Courses Ireland in Rebellion, 1782-1916 A free fourteen-week online course called ‘Ireland in Rebellion, 1782-1916’ presented by Professor Patrick Geoghegan is now available to watch online - www.tcd.ie/digital/video. Leading up to the 100th anniversary of the 1916 Easter Rising, the series looks at the Republican tradition in Ireland back to the United Irishmen in the 1790s. Innovatively, it entwines the story of that tradition with that of constitutional nationalism, often its rival, and at the alternative pursuits of armed insurrection and parliamentary political action promoted across the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries in Ireland. The course covers such themes as the 1798 Rebellion; the Act of Union; Robert Emmet; O’Connell; Parnell; Unionism; 1916 itself, and questions of commemoration. Along with short lectures from Patrick, there will be interviews with several members of the Department as well as other experts.
Irish Lives in War and Revolution: Exploring Ireland’s History 1912-1923 In March 2016 Trinity and FutureLearn will re-open the immensely popular massive open online course (MOOC) ‘Irish Lives in War and Revolution 1912-1923’. Designed by members of the History Department, the course has already gained the participation of over 18,000 learners. It makes use of textual, visual and aural sources to allow a direct engagement with the lives of men, women and children in Ireland alive during the turbulent years from 1912, with the onset of the Home Rule crisis, through the Dublin Lockout, the Great War, the Easter Rising, the War of Independence, Partition, the establishment of the Free State and the Civil War. The course focuses in particular upon the everyday lived experience of Irish people and how such events impacted upon their lives. Register online at www.futurelearn.com/courses/irish-history
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Department of History School of Histories and Humanities
Upcoming Events Conflict, Migration and Identity in Modern Ireland: Global and transnational perspectives Carlow College, 13-15 April 2016
This interdisciplinary conference will be co-hosted by Trinity College Dublin, Carlow College and VISUAL Centre for Contemporary Art. As such it offers an exciting opportunity to encounter questions of the relationships between conflict, migration and identity in modern Irish history and culture not only through lectures and papers but also through a programme of visual arts exhibitions and music. Masterclasses on the histories, sociology and literatures of migration, conflict and identity will also be offered by leading scholars in their fields including Bridget Anderson (Oxford University), Joe Cleary (Maynooth University), Enda Delaney (University of Edinburgh) and Joe Lee (New York University). The conference
Alumni News: Class of 1970 Reunion
John and Yvonne Healy at the Class of 1970 Reunion
Yinka Shionibare, Cannonball Heaven, 2011. Image Courtesy Stephen Friedman Gallery
will be set within the context of VISUAL’s spring exhibition programme of Irish and international work which explores questions of contemporary cultural identities in response to the centenary of the 1916 Rising. The programme includes a major solo show by Yinka Shonibare MBE, Post Colony by Gareth Kennedy, new work
A couple of years ago a few of us from the History and Political Science Class of 1970 had the bright idea that it was time we had a get-together. After all it was over 40 years since we graduated and most of us had not met during that time. So the reunion of May 2015 was conceived. With much help from friends, contacts and especially the Alumni Office, we spent a year or so locating most of our class, and they were certainly scattered around the globe, and in many fields of endeavour. What we had in common was our graduation year of 1970 and the fact that most of us were retired. Or supposedly retired! We were delighted that over half of our year responded positively and turned up, several with spouses or partners, on 27 May, many having travelled long distances. Our first visit was an excellent tour of the Provost’s House, followed by a walking tour of the campus, followed by a reception and buffet meal in the
by Clodagh Emoe in collaboration with Spiresi, a humanitarian, intercultural, nongovernmental organisation that works with asylum seekers, refugees and migrants; The Great Wall by Tadhg O’Sullivan; and a new musical composition in response to the season’s themes, by musicians Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh and Iarla Ó Lionáird.
new common room with Professor Aidan Clarke as our guest of honour. On Thursday morning 28 May, the group re-assembled for a comprehensive overview by Prof David Ditchburn of the developments in the study of history over the past few years, and tours of the libraries and the Science Gallery, ending the day with our reunion dinner. It was remarkable how many of us remembered each other and even got on well after a gap of a few decades. We owe a great debt of gratitude to all those who helped us with our visits and events, and all have exchanged email addresses etc., so that further communication is guaranteed. History is obviously still in good fettle in Trinity and long may it remain so - we clearly did not wreck it after all! Robert Kirkpatrick
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Newsletter 2015 – 2016
Past Events Second Trinity Medieval Ireland Symposium: The Irish–Scottish World in the Middle Ages
The grave of Edward Bruce, ‘king of Ireland’, slain at the battle of Faughart in 1318 after three years of campaigning in Ireland.
The year 2015 marked the 700th anniversary of the Bruce Invasion of Ireland (1315–18), when Edward Bruce, brother of King Robert I of Scots, was crowned king of Ireland and began a three-year campaign against the Anglo-Norman lordship of Ireland. The Bruce Invasion was a turning point in the history of these islands. Its causes and consequences can only be understood in light of the closely interwoven histories of Ireland and Scotland in the Middle Ages, and the constant movement of peoples across the North Channel. To explore these connections, the Second Trinity Medieval Ireland Symposium explored the theme of The Irish–Scottish World in the Middle Ages. The Trinity Medieval Ireland Symposium (TMIS) was established in September 2013 by Peter Crooks and Seán Duffy to make cuttingedge historical scholarship accessible to all persons interested in researching, teaching
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or learning about the history of Ireland in the Middle Ages. The proceedings of the first symposium will be published in 2016 by Four Courts Press: The Geraldines and Medieval Ireland: The Making of a Myth, ed. Peter Crooks and Seán Duffy. Few peoples have as much in common as the Irish and the Scots. The very name ‘Scotland’ – from Scotia, the ‘land of the Scoti’ – is an ever-present reminder of that connection, because, in the Latin of the early Middle Ages, a Scotus was an Irishman, and the homeland of the Scoti was Ireland. That the name came to be applied to the northern part of Britain is testament to the strength of Irish influence there, which this year’s Symposium explored. The links were such that in King Robert’s famous letter to ‘his friends’, the Irish, he reminded them that they and the Scots ‘stem from one seed of birth’, and offered
a permanent alliance against the English, their would-be conquerors, ‘so that our nation’ – one nation, the Scots and Irish – ‘may recover her ancient freedom’. That alliance culminated in the inauguration of his brother Edward as high king of Ireland in the summer of 1315, which formed the cornerstone of this Symposium. The keynote address, on Friday 18 September, was delivered by the leading Scottish medieval historian of his generation, Professor Dauvit Broun of the University of Glasgow. He addressed the question: ‘Two countries, one people? Conceptualising the Irish dimension in Scottish history’. Professor Broun is author of The Irish Identity of the kingdom of the Scots (1999) and Scottish Independence and the Idea of Britain from the Picts to Alexander III (2007). He is also Principal Investigator for the People of Medieval Scotland project (www.poms.ac.uk).
Department of History School of Histories and Humanities
GradLink Mentoring Programme The History Department, alongside the other Departments of the School of Histories and Humanities, is pleased to take part in the highly successful GradLink Mentoring Programme. Coordinated by the Department, with the support of the Careers Advisory Service and Trinity Development & Alumni, the programme draws on the wealth of experience that our graduates can offer to undergraduates considering their career options and hoping to develop their skills and knowledge for life after College. The number of students taking part continues to grow each year, a telling sign of how the programme is received among our students and a testimony to the hard work of our alumni mentors. This year’s programme was launched in October 2015, after which students were assigned to mentors whom they will meet over the course of the academic year. For those of us in attendance at the launch event, it was remarkable and heartening to hear of the very diverse career paths our graduates have taken since graduation. The Department greatly appreciates the readiness of our alumni to make time amidst successful and busy lives to mentor students. A survey of mentors taking part in 2014-15 found that 100% of them would recommend the programme to a fellow graduate. We will be on the lookout for mentors again in the years ahead, so please feel encouraged to take up the challenge! Alumni & students at the History GradLink launch 2015
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Remember. The power of a legacy to Trinity There’s an old saying that the true meaning of life is to plant trees under whose shade one does not expect to sit. When you leave a legacy to Trinity however big or small, you’re planting a tree which will grow to provide shelter to many. You’re empowering ground-breaking research which will benefit people in Ireland and all over the world. You’re supporting students from all backgrounds to access a Trinity education. You’re helping preserve our unique campus and heritage for new generations.
When you remember Trinity in your will, you join a tradition of giving that stretches back over 400 years – and reaches far into the future. For more information about leaving a Legacy to Trinity, please contact Carmen Leon.
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Department of History School of Histories & Humanities Room 3118, Arts Building Trinity College Dublin 2 Phone 00353 1 896 1020 / 1791 Email histhum@tcd.ie