Women’s Agency, Catholic Morality, and the Irish State

The text reviews four new books in Irish women’s history and the history of sexuality: Mary McAuliffe’s biography of the revolutionary Margaret Skinnider; Jennifer Redmond’s Moving Histories, exploring the discourses about Irish women migrants to Great Britain in the first few decades of the Irish state, and their everyday lives in Britain; Lindsey Earner-Byrne and Diane Urquhart’s The Irish Abortion Journey, which documents the repressive discourses and policies surrounding abortion in twentieth-century Ireland and relates stories of traveling to Great Britain to obtain it; and finally, Sonja Tiernan’s book examining the ultimately successful political and legal campaign for marriage equality in Ireland. These highly readable, well-researched books place gender and sexuality at the center of Irish history; provide insight into the contradictory political, religious, and medical discourses about Irish women, gays, and lesbians; and document the lives of women both in and out of Ireland.