Workshop: ‘Beyond the Island: Transnational approaches to research in the humanities’

April 20th and 21st 2012

Description of Workshop

This interdisciplinary conference brings together scholars of History, Political Science, Law and English to discuss the merits and limitations of transnational and global studies. In recent years, scholars have increasingly recognized the limitations of the nation-state as a framework of analyses and as a result transnational and global approaches have moved to the top of research agendas across many countries. At the same time, explorations in this area have been largely overlooked in Irish universities. This conference will debate the merits of transnational vistas for understanding the important themes of diaspora, nationalism, political violence, and human rights in the Irish past and present, and will compare how transnational approaches move beyond or differ from established fields such as the Atlantic world, imperial studies, world history, comparative studies, and so on. The conference papers cover a broad geographical scope and stretch across a long chronology, from late-medieval to contemporary history. Guest speakers will include, among others, Kevin Kenny (Boston College), Kiran Patel (Maastricht), Timothy Meagher (CUA, Washington), Carl Levy (Goldsmiths, London) and Irene Bueno (Leiden).

Beyond the Island: Transnational Approaches to History

An int e r d i s c i p l ina r y c on f e r en c e 20- 2 1 Ap r i l 2 0 1 2

C o n t a c t : n i a l l . w h e l e h a n @ n u i g alwa y . i e

DAY ONE FRIDAY 20 APRIL

9.30 Welcome

9.45-10.00 Opening Remarks

10.00-11.00 ‰Û÷Diaspora: An Introduction‰۪ Kevin Kenny (History, Boston College)

11.00-11.30 COFFEE

11.30-13.00 Panel 1 Challenging transnational chronologies

‰Û÷Shaping ideas about the Eastern lands: the Avignon Papacy in transnational perspective‰۪

Irene Bueno (History, Leiden University)

‰Û÷Massacres and Moderation in the Atlantic World‰۪

Eamon Darcy (History, Trinity College Dublin)

‰Û÷State Power and the Inculcation of Religious change: the cases of Stuart Ireland and Habsburg Hungary considered‰۪

Tadhg O hAnnrachain (History, University College Dublin)

13.00-14.00 LUNCH

14.00-16.15 Panel 2 Transnational communities: diasporas from above and below

‰Û÷Irish America without Ireland? Irish Americans and Ireland in the Twentieth Century‰۪

Timothy Meagher (History, Catholic University of America, Washington)

‰Û÷Irish Convicts in Van Diemen’s Land‰۪

Hamish Maxwell-Stewart (History, University of Tasmania)

‰Û÷Irish merchants and ‰ÛÏthe cloak of neutrality‰۝ – trans-imperial commercial exchange at St. Croix, Danish West Indies during the Seven Years‰۪ War (1756-63)‰۪

Orla Power (History, National University of Ireland, Galway)

‰Û÷Between Poland and Ireland: Exploring the integration of Polish migrants in Dublin and their ties to the origin country‰۪

Antje Roeder (Sociology, Trinity College Dublin)

16.15‰ÛÒ16.30 COFFEE

16.30-18.00 Panel 3 Transnational lives and political activism

‰Û÷The Transnational Turn in the Study of Anarchism (1860s to 1940s)‰۪

Carl Levy (Politics, Goldsmiths, University of London)

‰Û÷Thomas IsmaÌÀl Urbain: cr̩ole, ‰ÛÏhomme de couleur‰۝ and a key figure behind Emperor Napol̩on III‰۪s Algerian Arab Kingdom‰۪

Sheila Walsh (French, National University of Ireland, Galway)

‰Û÷Conflict and collecting: Ulster, Ceylon and the imperial career of Sir James Emerson Tennent‰۪

Jonathan Wright (History, Trinity College Dublin)

* * *

DAY TWO SATURDAY 21 APRIL

9.30-11.30 Panel 4 Europe and Ireland

‰Û÷Irish ̩migr̩s in France and their influence in Ireland during the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries‰۪

Marian Lyons (History, National University of Ireland, Maynooth)

‰Û÷Count Cavour‰۪s 1844 Essay on Ireland: Agrarian Reform and Liberal Politics through Anglo-Italian Eyes‰۪

Enrico Dal Lago (History, National University of Ireland, Galway)

‰Û÷A Call to Action in Ireland? The January Uprising of 1863 in Congress Poland‰۪

RÌ_isÌ_n Healy (History, National University of Ireland, Galway)

‰Û÷Fionnuala in France: the transnational education of Irish girls in the nineteenth century‰۪

Ciaran O‰۪Neill (History, Trinity College Dublin)

11.30-12.00 COFFEE

12.00-13.30 Panel 6 Transnational advocacy: solidarities in the wider world

Of rice and men: Writing the history of non-governmental aid in the post-war era‰۪

Kevin O‰۪Sullivan (History, University College Dublin/University of Birmingham)

‰Û÷Irish diplomacy and the development of international human rights law: the politics and principles of advocating against torture‰۪

Michelle Farrell (Law, National University of Ireland, Galway)

‰Û÷Assessing the influence of NGOs on asylum policies in Europe‰۪

Irial Glynn (History, University College Dublin)

13.30-14.30 LUNCH

14.30-16.00 Panel 7 Transnational frameworks for national matters

‰Û÷How America discovered Sweden: New Deal History in a Global Perspective‰۪

Kiran Patel (History, Maastricht University)

‰Û÷The Mirage of Global Civility: Nationalism and Violence in Late Modernity‰۪

SiniÁa MaleÁeviÌãåà (Sociology, University College Dublin)

Concluding Remarks

Timothy Meagher