Irish Identity in a Transnational Context

Abstract

THE CONCEPT OF IRISH IDENTITY FORMATION AMONG specific émigré Irish communities in Canada and the USA is a complex topic that continues to generate scholarly analysis among historians and others. This is particularly true in terms of the hypothesis that Irish identity in North America represents an interplay of migration patterns, enduring cultural connections with Ireland, and New World settlement geography. A dynamic transnational geography mediated news and views emanating from the Irish homeland, creating a hybrid cultural identity that, paying homage to an Irish past, was intrinsically shaped nonetheless by the geopolitical and social realities of the New World. Three recent monographs examine different aspects of this hypothesis: Matthew Barlow’s Griffintown: Identity and Memory in an Irish Diaspora Neighbourhood, Patrick Mannion’s A Land of Dreams: Ethnicity, Nationalism, and the Irish in Newfoundland, Nova Scotia, and Maine, 1880-1923, and Mark G. McGowan’s The Imperial Irish: Canada’s Irish Catholics Fight the Great War, 1914-1918.1 The temporal reach employed by the authors is primarily the period 1880-1920, although Barlow extends his analysis to include 21stcentury community development. In focus and periodicity they may be seen as useful adjuncts to the 2011 work of Simon Jolivet on the Irish in Quebec and William Jenkins’s 2013 study of Buffalo and Toronto.2 Common to all three studies are community responses to events that originated well beyond the North American experience. Europe’s descent into the First World War, Ireland’s prolonged engagement with Home Rule, an Irish rebellion, a War of Independence, an Anglo-Irish Treaty, and the partitioning of Ireland characterize this era of unprecedented turmoil. Decisions and outcomes determined within this period resonated throughout contemporary émigré