Marc Scully

International Women's Day
Our online oral history exhibition includes lots of fascinating clips of interviews with Irish women across generations who emigrated to Britain, or are second and third generation Irish here.

Take a look! https://bit.ly/HeritageExhibition

Two gin-scented tears trickled down the sides of his nose. But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved … the Scotland rugby team.

*Jangly Belle & Sebastian-esque soundtrack kicks in as we flash back to the Granary Theatre in the early 00s*

I know you're doing a bit, but this is now reminding me of a girl with a double-barrelled name who used to be in UCC Dramat back in the day who would have been precisely the type to borrow a copy of Salvador Dali's insane autobiography and never give it back.

Notions: the Lives of Irish Working-Class Academics, edited by Iona Burnell Reilly, Stephen Baker and yours truly, will be published in May: www.hive.co.uk/Product/Iona...

a man with a green bottle in front of his face and the words makeagif.com on the bottom Alt: Teresa Mannion imploring people not to make unnecessary journeys.

I did wonder, and had a brief internal debate as to whether I wanted to distract myself from an afternoon's work in order to argue the point.

That's a good analogy.

No problem!

When I'm teaching place identity, I use the concept of 'banal countyism' based on Billig's 'banal nationalism' - everyday reminders that, in Ireland, we live in counties, in a nation, in a world of nation-states. So, for instance, car license plates etc. Maybe similar applies in the US?

I wrote a thread about another subnational identity, that of the county, in England vs Ireland just this morning!

Does it help to think of the state as a nested identity? So whether there's an outgroup state or not, to have a 'home state' is an aspect of American identity?

bsky.app/profile/marc...

Know Your Sport made good sturdy umbrellas acceptable for a generation of men who could see the utility of staying dry in order to be able to make notes on their match programmes while attending hurling matches in the driving rain.

We must reintroduce it.

Sure. And as always, unsympathetic examples and extreme case formulations resound in such rhetorical arguments!

At the very least, citizens of a country that has sporadic waves of not-particularly-voluntary youth emigration every few decades might want to think a little about suggesting this is an area where the state can abdicate its responsibilities.

I regret to inform you that universalism means that you do wind up having to make the left-wing case for evacuating ungrateful tax exiles from war zones.

I get that ‘Dubai tax exiles/influencers’ are not the most sympathetic group but the broader principle of “the state’s responsibility towards you ends when you no longer contribute through taxation” that I see people asserting now is not a good one! You’d probably avoid it in other contexts!

One obvious difference is the GAA.

An interesting counterfactual here would be if the GAA, having organised locally on a parish level, decided that the next administrative level up should be dioceses, not counties. So last year’s All-Ireland might have been Cloyne vs Cashel, not Cork vs Tipp.

Whereas people who identify strongly as Cornish or Geordies often do so as a means of positioning themselves apart from Englishness. (A lot of Cornish people would argue that it isn't really a *county* identity at all.)

People's Republic of Cork memes aside, that's not really a thing in Ireland.

BIFFOs, jackeens and Dagenham Yanks: county identity, “authenticity” and the Irish diaspora Despite being an everyday point of reference in Irish discourse, the extent to which the county serves as a locus of identification has been oddly overlooked in the Irish studies literature. In pa...

So, for instance, as I've argued here, for people of Irish descent in the diaspora, claiming a specific county identity becomes a means of authenticating and proclaiming their Irishness, and distinguishing themselves from people of vaguer Irish heritage: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

An interesting difference between county identity in Ireland and England, is that in England county identity is arguably strongest where it acts a point of distinctiveness from a generic English identity.

Whereas in Ireland (and particularly in the diaspora), county identity *accentuates* Irishness

I realise the book chapter is behind a paywall, but I'm happy to share a copy with anyone who might want one.

#StPiransDay bump for this alongside a photo I took of the annual procession across the Perran Sands dunes in 2015.

A cartoon skunk holds up a bazooka style device and says “Well, don’t worry about that now, have a go on my newest invention, the WISH CANNON instead”.

Should we be worried that our 7-year-old strongly identifies with the evil genius character?

Probably, tbh.

Cheers!

The market (me) demands a ready to wear Skunky costume with Doomsday Device™️ accessories for next year!

A cartoon skunk and monkey. Skunky: Don’t blame me, I let monkey design this one. Monkey: I won a contest!

Just so @jamiesmart.bsky.social knows what he’s wrought, it’s 7.15am on #WorldBookDay and we are valiantly attempting to transform our 7 year old into Skunky from the Bunny vs Monkey books.

Yeah, I played Natasha Bedingfield to close out a lecture the other day (I had my reasons): while there wasn’t quite the rapturous reception there was for No Scrubs, there were appreciative murmurs.

May as well take advantage of this peculiarity in the musical taste of the youth while it’s there!

More intergenerational ‘No Scrubs’ interactions.

bsky.app/profile/figg...

Ah, excellent!

It strikes me that instead of a book launch, ye should hold a wake.

The Phoebe/Joey speaking French meme. Phoebe: We need... Joey: We need... Phoebe: To study... Joey: To study... Phoebe: Life as it is lived Joey: Life as it is lived Phoebe: We need to study life as it is lived. Joey: We need to design more stringent lab experiments!

There's a discussion on my TL about whether you'd expect studies from the 90s to replicate in the 20s given that the situational context has changed, and it feels like everyone involved is *so* close to getting it but the hegemony of experimental methods in US social psych is proving a mental block.

I think @sophcocooper.bsky.social & @fearfuljoycuit.bsky.social have something in the pipeline on this: www.iasil.org/2024/10/cfp-...

Irish end-of-life care: new report published Sing our own Song: End-of-Life Care and the Irish Community in Britain, findings from a national consultation.

Out now!
We're delighted to announce the publication of our report, with Innisfree Housing Association, 'Sing our own Song: End-of-Life Care & the Irish Community in Britain, findings from a national consultation'
Thank you to everyone who contributed💚
https://ow.ly/K8H150YkY3g

“And you cud fry an egg, if you had an egg!!! ☀️ 😎 🍳 #lol #jk No, but seriously, yolks aside 😉, we are sooo grateful to the UAE government for the regular supply of eggs! #thankful 🙏🏻 🤩 🇦🇪 💚 “

Greg Davies: cooked the salmon, didn't taste it once, easy! Burned your thumb but powered through. Well played!

Fionn Mac Cumhaill: go raibh maith agat

Alex Horne: actually we did spot *something*