News

Friday the fourth of November was the interdisciplinary conference Before 1916: Robert Lynd and Visions of Ireland to Come at the NUI Galway campus. The Gender ARC of NUI Galway organised the conference together with the Moore Institute. Simultaneously with the conference was an exhibition of publications by Robert Lynd, Tom Kettle, Katherine Tynan, Stephen Gwynn and other contemporary writers on display in the foyer of the James Hardiman Library.

Writer and critic Robert Lynd selected in his book Ireland a nation (1919) “voices of the new Ireland” which were expressed by George Russel (AE), Alice Stopford Green, Patrick Pearse, Dora Sigerson and Tom Kettle. These alternative visions and voices of the new Ireland before the 1916 Rising were explored during the conference.

‌In the morning, Margaret O’Callaghan spoke profoundly about Alice Green, Roger Casement and the politics of Irish history before the Rising. After a short break, Bryan Fanning continued with sharing his insights on Patrick Pearce’s ghost frequencies. Subsequently followed the lunch and an entertaining music and performing programme. The final item of the conference was a roundtable. Five members of the Gender ARC individually discussed from an interdisciplinary and gender perspective one of the five “voices of new Ireland”.   ‌‌

This conference was part of the NUI Galway’s 1916 commemoration programme – A Nation Rising. If you are interested to stay informed about upcoming events or additional information, please visit http://www.nuigalway.ie/anationrising/. For more information about the Gender ARC or the Moore Institute you can visit their websites http://www.genderarc.org/ and https://www.nuigalway.ie/mooreinstitute/.