Outside the Glow
Protestants and Irishness in Independent Ireland

Author Biography

Heather K. Crawford returned to third-level education in the 1990s at University of the West of England at Bristol after a wide-ranging working life in Ireland, the UK and Spain. She completed her PhD thesis, 'Protestants and Irishness in independent Ireland: an exploration', at the National University of Ireland Maynooth in 2008.

Description

Does it still matter which foot you dig with in today's Republic of Ireland? "Outside the Glow" examines the relationship between Protestants and Catholics and the notion that southern Protestants are somehow not really Irish. From extensive interviews with representatives of both confessions, Heather K. Crawford demonstrates that there are still underlying tensions between the confessions based on 'memories' of events long buried in the past. By looking at various aspects of everyday life in today's Republic - education, marriage, segregation, Irish language, social life - she shows how these residues of religious, ethnic and cultural tension suggest that to be truly Irish is to be Catholic, and that consequently Protestants - and other minorities - cannot have an authentic Irish identity.