The Irish Seminar 2011

Here is the press release for the Irish Seminar 2011, which will be held this summer at UCD:

'The IRISH SEMINAR 2011: Irish Modernisms

20 June – 8 July 2011

THEME

Modernism, marked by a strong self-conscious rupture with tradition and a formal and conceptual inventiveness, is often understood as a vigorous reaction against established religious, social and political views. Informed on one hand by the horrors of the Great War (1914-18) and governed on the other by a belief that our world is created in the very act of perceiving it, no absolute truth existed to provide guidance or solace. Dominated by a relativistic aesthetic, Modernists turned inward to examine the sub-conscious, advocating individuality and celebrating interiority. The crisis of representation, the rise of the cosmopolitan, cultural dislocation, the vexed issues of the subconscious, memory, sexuality, and gender all found expression in European modernism in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Modernism exerted, and still exerts, a profound pressure on contemporary culture, literature, cinema, art and scholarship.

The Irish Seminar 2011 convenes a stellar cast of international scholars to examine Irish Modernism in its varied manifestations, as well as their interrelationships with Western and global Modernism. The contribution of Ireland’s English-language authors to Modernism is unparalleled: Yeats, Joyce, Beckett, Bowen, and O’Brien. Recent criticism has engaged with issues of national, regional and local origin to construct a ‘Modernism of the Margins’. A three-week series of presentations, lectures and workshops probes the paradoxical and opposed trends of revolution and reaction (1916, War of Independence, Civil War), the struggles of nascent political parties in their clashes with established forces and older vested interests, the attrition of traditional elites and the emergence of new states north and south.

Yet Modernism, no less than Ireland itself, cannot be reduced to a caricature or stereotype. A key concern of the Irish Seminar 2011 is the interrogation of the standard account. In addition to exploring Modernism of the margins, the Seminar examines minority languages, vernacular culture, the local and the national, and gendered identities in the Irish Modernist experience.

As well as concentrating on historical and theoretical issues, the Seminar will focus on modernism as a mode of creativity that emphasizes disruption and fracture, questioning expressiveness, originality, tradition, revolution, gender, sexuality, language and identity. Exploring the constant tension between nihilism and enthusiasm, energy and ennui that emerged in Ireland between 1880 and 1940, and which sparked this efflorescence of modernist works, the Irish Seminar 2011 will provide challenging perspectives on Irish modernism in its multi-faceted dimensions.

Full Information available at http://www.irishseminar.nd.edu/.

2011 FACULTY

The 2011 IRISH SEMINAR faculty includes the following speakers: Joe Cleary (Yale), Seamus Deane (Notre Dame), Wes Hamrick (Notre Dame), John Kelly (Oxford), Declan Kiberd (Notre Dame), José Lanters (Uni. of Wisconsin-Milwaukee), Joseph Lennon (Villanova), David Lloyd (Uni. of Southern California), Barry McCrea (Yale), Bríona Nic Dhiarmada (Notre Dame), Emer Nolan (NUI Maynooth), Brian Ó Conchubhair (Notre Dame), Gearóid Ó Tuathaigh (NUI Galway), Kevin Whelan (Notre Dame).

FURTHER INFORMATION
E-mail: eclowry@nd.edu'

UPDATE:

'Tuition for the IRISH SEMINAR, which includes housing for the three weeks in Dublin, is €2,250. Participants will be responsible for their own food, airfare, and other travel expenses. Some open fellowships will be available, covering tuition, travel, and accommodation, but applicants are urged to seek financial assistance from their home institutions. For more information please contact Eimear Clowry ­ eclowry@nd.edu.'

MA Program in Manx Studies

The University of Liverpool has announced that it will offer a one-year MA in Manx Studies, starting in October of 2011.  Here is the press release:

'MA in Manx Studies

University of Liverpool, Centre for Manx Studies, Douglas, Isle of Man
Commencing October 2011

The MA in Manx Studies offers students the chance to study for a postgraduate qualification while spending a year on the beautiful Isle of Man, with its rich Celtic and Viking heritage. Although one of the British Isles, the Island is not part of the UK and has its own parliament, Tynwald.

The MA allows students to pursue a wide variety of subjects, which are taught with a combination of general study skills training, disciplinary background and Manx case studies. Students will learn about Manx history, archaeology, and culture, and will have the opportunity to learn Manx Gaelic and participate in Manx cultural events.

Please visit the Centre for Manx Studies website for more details: www.liv.ac.uk/manxstudies/'

Eigse 37 (2010)

The latest issue of Éigse (vol. 37, 2010) has just been mailed to subscribers.  In addition to the usual book reviews, the volume contains nine articles in Irish and English:

• 'On the Ó Cléirigh Recension of Leabhar Gabhála' by Pádraig A. Breatnach,
• 'Approbationes' by P.A.B.,
• 'The Áiliu Poems in Bretha Nemed Dédenach' by Johan Corthals,
• 'A Poem on the Mutilation of Brian Óg Ó Néill (d. 1449)' by Gordon Ó Riain,
• 'Scríobhaí "Leabhar Mhuintir Laidhe" agus "Rosa Anglica"' by Tomás Ó Con Cheanainn,
• 'Sloinne agus Áitainm i gConamara' by Tomás Ó Con Cheanainn,
• 'Cloich, Cruaich and Similar Forms in the Munster Dialect' by Diarmuid Ó Sé,
• 'Further to the Drink of Death' by Sharon Arbuthnot,
• 'Caoineadh Shéamais Óig Mhic Coitir (1720)' by Pádraig A. Breatnach.

Scholarship for Students Studying Scottish Gaelic

An Comunn Gàidhealach, Ameireaganach is accepting applications for its $2000 (USD) University Scholarship.  The scholarship is open to full-time American or Canadian university students who are studying Scottish Gaelic, although preference will be given to those enrolled in a Gaelic-medium program.  Details on the application process, which must be completed by 1 March 2011, are available on An Comunn Gàidhealach, Ameireaganach website.

Celts in the Americas Conference 2011

A preliminary schedule and list of abstracts for the Celts in the Americas Conference, which will be held 29 June - 2 July 2011 at Saint Francis Xavier University, has just been posted on the conference website.  Registration information will be posted in March.

Call for Papers -- California Celtic Conference 2011

The call for papers has just gone out for the 33rd Annual University of California Celtic Conference, which will be held 1-2 April 2011 on the Berkeley campus.  Papers on any aspect of Celtic Studies are welcome.  Abstracts of no more than 250 words are due to conference organizers by no later than 20 January 2011.

The New CSANA Website

The recently revamped CSANA website, which launched just before the holidays, has a new address at http://irishlanguage.nd.edu/programs/csana/homepage.htm.  Comments and questions about the new site should be addressed to Mattieu Boyd, the website coordinator.