When women are erased from history, what are we left with?

Between 1912 and 1922, Ireland experienced sweeping social and political change, including the Easter Rising, World War I, the Irish Civil War, the fight for Irish women's suffrage, the founding of the Abbey Theatre, and the passage of the Home Rule Bill. In preparation for the centennial of this epic decade, the Irish government formed a group of experts to oversee the ways in which the country would remember this monumental time. Unfortunately, the group was formed with no attempt at gender balance. Women and the Decade of Commemorations, edited by Oona Frawley, highlights not only the responsibilities of Irish women, past and present, but it also privileges women's scholarship in an attempt to redress what has been a long-standing imbalance. For example, contributors note the role of the Waking the Feminists movement, which was ignited when, in 2016, the Abbey Theater released its male-dominated centenary program. They also discuss the importance of addressing missing history and curating memory to correct the historical record when it comes to remembering revolution.

Together, the essays in Women and the Decade of Commemorations consider the impact of women's unseen, unsung work, which has been critically important in shaping Ireland, a country that continues to struggle with honoring the full role of women today.

About the Author

Oona Frawley is Associate Professor of English at Maynooth University. She is author of Flight and of Irish Pastoral: Nature and Nostalgia in 20th Century Irish Literature. She is also series editor (with Guy Beiner and Ray Cashman) of Irish Culture, Memory, and Place for Indiana University Press.

Reviews

"What an impressive collection of scholarly insights and reflections on the many overlooked but hugely influential roles played by Irish women in those convulsive times through the Great War, the Rising, the War of Independence and the Civil War. The eyes cast over the history of those times have often been blinkered. Facts, truths, perspectives and analyses which could have offered more complete account did not always make it through the embedded filters which both subtly and unsubtly skewed the narratives away from what the stories of women could add and infill. This collection of very fine essays helps redress the imbalance. It offers us important pieces of the jigsaw puzzle of our history that we did not know we had lost but that we have been lost without."-Mary McAleese, Former President of Ireland

"Crucially, 'to commemorate' is 'to call to remembrance' and this volume of essays is a clarion call: making newly visible Irish women's historical agency and international impact, and countering a century of oblivion and neglect."-Margaret Kelleher, Chair of Anglo-Irish Literature and Drama, University College Dublin

Book Information
ISBN 9780253053725
Author Oona Frawley
Format Paperback
Page Count 374
Imprint Indiana University Press
Publisher Indiana University Press