David Convery
I recently completed an Irish Research Council Postdoctoral Fellowship based at the Irish Centre for the Histories of Labour and Class, Moore Institute, National University of Ireland, Galway. My project was titled 'The British Working Class and Ireland, 1922-1945: Identity, Representation, and Postcolonialism'.
In 1921 Ireland became the first state to break from the British Empire in the twentieth century. Moreover, as Britain’s neighbour and an integral part of the United Kingdom, Ireland had occupied a central place within the Empire and the British imagination. This was therefore a crucial period in the relationships between the islands and peoples, their politics and sense of self. Britain was also home to a large population of immigrant Irish, their interactions with wider British society having a direct impact upon its shape and identity.
Accordingly, many of the features which would later characterise the research agenda of postcolonial studies were present in Britain at this time. However, although the relationship between the governments in Dublin, Belfast and London has received considerable attention, the effect of Irish independence on the majority of the population of Britain and on the Irish immigrant population has remained underexplored.
This project will analyse the attitude of the British working class, which formed the majority of British society at this time, to Ireland and the Irish in the period from Irish independence until the end of the Second World War and the landslide election of a Labour government. It will pay particular attention to British working-class social relations with and representation of the Irish population in Britain. Working-class discourse in relation to Ireland and the Irish will be analysed through an intersectional approach that considers issues of gender, ethnicity, religion and class. The project will be predominantly based upon a study of the labour movement, as the arena in which class identity was most articulate and the nexus in which the Irish and British working class could interact with, in theory, a common agenda. The integration of the Irish within the British labour movement will thus form an important case study.
I have recently edited a book called 'Locked Out: A Century of Irish Working-Class Life', published by Irish Academic Press in 2013. This book aims to commemorate the centennial of the 1913 Dublin lockout by offering fresh perspectives from a new generation of historians utilising an inter-disciplinary approach to explore everyday life, culture, gender and the creation of identity among the Irish working-class in the twentieth century.
I received my PhD in history from University College Cork in 2012 for a thesis entitled 'Brigadistas: The History and Memory of Irish Anti-Fascists in the Spanish Civil War'.
I have been the holder of a Government of Ireland scholarship from the Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences from 2009-2012.
Previous awards are:
UCC Dept of History, Michael Joseph McEnery Prize 2009
UCC College of Arts, Celtic Studies and Social Sciences PhD Scholarship 2008
UCC College Scholar 2004
I graduated with a BA in History and Archaeology from UCC in 2006 for which I received a first class honours.
Supervisors: Dr John Cunningham
In 1921 Ireland became the first state to break from the British Empire in the twentieth century. Moreover, as Britain’s neighbour and an integral part of the United Kingdom, Ireland had occupied a central place within the Empire and the British imagination. This was therefore a crucial period in the relationships between the islands and peoples, their politics and sense of self. Britain was also home to a large population of immigrant Irish, their interactions with wider British society having a direct impact upon its shape and identity.
Accordingly, many of the features which would later characterise the research agenda of postcolonial studies were present in Britain at this time. However, although the relationship between the governments in Dublin, Belfast and London has received considerable attention, the effect of Irish independence on the majority of the population of Britain and on the Irish immigrant population has remained underexplored.
This project will analyse the attitude of the British working class, which formed the majority of British society at this time, to Ireland and the Irish in the period from Irish independence until the end of the Second World War and the landslide election of a Labour government. It will pay particular attention to British working-class social relations with and representation of the Irish population in Britain. Working-class discourse in relation to Ireland and the Irish will be analysed through an intersectional approach that considers issues of gender, ethnicity, religion and class. The project will be predominantly based upon a study of the labour movement, as the arena in which class identity was most articulate and the nexus in which the Irish and British working class could interact with, in theory, a common agenda. The integration of the Irish within the British labour movement will thus form an important case study.
I have recently edited a book called 'Locked Out: A Century of Irish Working-Class Life', published by Irish Academic Press in 2013. This book aims to commemorate the centennial of the 1913 Dublin lockout by offering fresh perspectives from a new generation of historians utilising an inter-disciplinary approach to explore everyday life, culture, gender and the creation of identity among the Irish working-class in the twentieth century.
I received my PhD in history from University College Cork in 2012 for a thesis entitled 'Brigadistas: The History and Memory of Irish Anti-Fascists in the Spanish Civil War'.
I have been the holder of a Government of Ireland scholarship from the Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences from 2009-2012.
Previous awards are:
UCC Dept of History, Michael Joseph McEnery Prize 2009
UCC College of Arts, Celtic Studies and Social Sciences PhD Scholarship 2008
UCC College Scholar 2004
I graduated with a BA in History and Archaeology from UCC in 2006 for which I received a first class honours.
Supervisors: Dr John Cunningham
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Bob Doyle, Irish member of the International Brigades, was fond of ending his speeches with the words ‘la lucha continua’ – ‘the struggle continues’. In the past two decades, the memory of the Irish who fought for the Spanish Republic in the Spanish Civil War has been rediscovered and reinvented to reflect modern preoccupations, particularly in relation to the changing nature of political and social realities in Northern Ireland. The recovery of historical memory in Spain, occurring at the same time as the transition to peace in Northern Ireland, has created a new impetus for the creation of memorials to the Spanish Civil War. The Irish International Brigaders legacy of uniting Protestants and Catholics in common struggle offers a powerful glimpse of overcoming historic divides and has been called upon and contested by various groups in the shifting battleground to create new identities in an era of peace. Through the creation of memorials, traditions are cemented, territorial spaces defined and legitimacy conferred on present struggles through association with the infallible martyrs of the past. This paper will explore their contested legacy and their memorialisation both in Ireland and in Spain.