Thursday, May 22, 2008
Entwined Lives
BBC NI’s Hearts and Minds was packed with good and interesting discussion tonight. Here’s one of the examples. Starting from the Lives Entwined essays the subsequent studio discussion between three contributors to that project, Olivia O’Leary, Susan McKay and Richard English, referred, directly or indirectly, to the need to change our understanding of Britishness and Irishness, the Republic of Ireland’s view of the “mad old uncle” in the [Northern] attic, the effect of amending DeValera’s constitution, and, among other things, the need for a process of civilisation.
Pete Baker @ 10:08 PM
Cheers Pete. Interesting discussion alright.
Posted by on May 22, 2008 @ 11:23 PMI thought Eamoon Pheonix sounded rather remote in relation to the history of The Troubles. How can history be evaluated by future historians, maybe thirty or forty years from now, if those that were involved in that history, don’t bequeath their accounts for posterity, while they’re alive? One thing’s for certain; they sure can’t leave them when they’re dead.
Posted by on May 22, 2008 @ 11:35 PMmanus
Perhaps you should wait until that particular discussion is up for debate.
We already have a discussion on the floor.
Posted by on May 22, 2008 @ 11:41 PMSomething they didn’t consider at all is the huge increase in foreign travel, courtesy of Ryanair and charters. I would imagine that that alone must have exposed more Irish to English etc and vice versa on both islands and venues abroad. In my experience, it’s awfully hard to hate/dislike people once you have met them and got to know them a little.
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 12:01 AMCan I point you all to Michael Longley’s contribution to a Heritage Lottery Fund conference last year - Digging Deeper: Sharing our Past Sharing our Future.
Here Michael, in a thought piece on his own sense of Britishness and Irishness, talks about the “wonderful cat’s cradle of cultures that intertwine and pull against each other ... a whirlpool that causes violence sometimes, but it can also generate energy and creative commotion. We’re gradually harnessing for good the power of the whirlpool’.
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 08:46 AMApologies here is the link:
http://www.heritageandidentity.co.uk/ni/media.aspPosted by on May 23, 2008 @ 08:47 AM... the “wonderful cat’s cradle of cultures that intertwine and pull against each other ... a whirlpool that causes violence sometimes, but it can also generate energy and creative commotion. We’re gradually harnessing for good the power of the whirlpool’.
On a very simplistic level it does seem that living in close proximity to more than one culture can have an effect on creativity. In the context of Ireland, some of the most well-known (I won’t say ‘best’) artists, writers and thinkers have tended to come from the Protestant minority in the south, who have always been confronted with a culture that differed in many ways from their own. In a similar way, Catholic writers, both north and south, have always had to contend with the dominance of anglo-centric culture, while still being imbued with a culture that is subtly different.
The point I am slowly coming to (deliberately slowly, because it is often a sore point for some unionists, and Newton Emerson has even sneered at people who point it out), is that northern Protestant culture is conspicuous by its absence from the wider stage. Apart from Longley himself (who acknowledges his own sense of Britishness and Irishness), there are very few northern Protestant writers or artists of note. Could it be that northern Protestant culture identifies too completely with the dominant British culture, to the extent of entirely ignoring the Irish culture that is so near to them, and this to their own creative detriment?
To partially refute my own hypothesis, many mono-cultural groups manage to produce amazing works of art, music and literature. Britain itself produced many treasures long before it became ‘multi-cultural’, so clearly Longley’s ‘cats-cradle’ is not a pre-requisite. France, Germany, Italy, Russia .... the list of similar cases is long.
Groups similar to the northern Protestants have, in comparable circumstances, produced creative genius - Coetzee in modern South Africa comes to mind; there must be Israelis too but I can’t think of any names. Why the conspicuous absence of the northern Protestant tribe?
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 09:17 AMUnusually I managed to sit through last nights’ H & M without wanting to defenestrate the television. O’Leary was excellent and the quality gap between her contributions and those of McKay was stark.
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 10:01 AMPJM
Thanks for that. I may put it above the fold in a post of its own.
Horseman
“Why the conspicuous absence of the northern Protestant tribe?”
I think you’re looking in the wrong places, for the wrong things.
BonarLaw
More of a difference in emphasis than quality, I’d suggest. But it was certainly one of the better H&M;.
I may also have more clips to post from it.
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 10:17 AMPete Baker,
“Why the conspicuous absence of the northern Protestant tribe?”
I think you’re looking in the wrong places, for the wrong things.
What do you mean?
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 10:19 AMIs there really any need for this insistent ‘racist’ pigeon-holing of artists, authers, poets et al? Does it reflect an underlying inferiority complex?
The Ulster-Scots brigade is the latest manifestation in the culture wars marching to history’s tune.
If you can’t ‘eat a flag’ should you give yourself indigestion with a Paulin poem? Mind where you put your foot :)
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 10:56 AMNevin,
Is there really any need for this insistent ‘racist’ pigeon-holing of artists, authers, poets et al? Does it reflect an underlying inferiority complex?
As I said above, this is a subject that tends to upset some unionists.
Neither unionism nor Protestantism is a ‘race’, so I don’t think my comments are racist. I posed the question simply because, out of all of the various sub-categories of Irishness, one is conspicuously absent. And not because it is bringing its cultural gems to a different stage - it is just plain absent.
As for an ‘underlying inferiority complex’, I wonder who you might be referring to. My own sub-category is well represented in almost all fields (sport is conspicuous by its paucity, though). I suspect the unionist over-reaction to the very posing of the question exposes a nerve, so perhaps it is within unionism that you need to search for the answers.
Pete Baaker,
Any hints as to what you were talking about in your 11:17 AM post?
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 11:49 AMMissed Hearts & Minds last night cos I was out getting p*ssed but on a related point I cannot believe that David Adams, in his essay, dares to suggest that ireland owes Britain some sort of apology.I normally think he writes good, sensible stuff but he is talking completely out of his arse on this one.
Why the hell would Ireland owe Britain an apology? What annoys me most about a lot of Unionists is that they often seem to tar ALL Irish people with the same brush and just assume that everybody in the South is Anti-British. There is no way that is even arguable, and it is outrageously offensive to suggest that any atrocities committed by armed republicans during the troubles were somehow carried out in the name of Irish people or the Irish government. That is where Unionism so often gets it wrong and undermines its own position.
The unpalatable truth is that what happened in the North had nothing to do with us, so please do not try to drag us into this by way of laying blame at our doorstep. Of course there were sympathisers in the south, and plenty of people who willingly got involved in the situation but that is not the fault of ‘Ireland’, its government or people. NI became the mess it became because of the way it was governed and that is quite simply Britain’s own fault. They could have handled things differently if they’d wished, but they made an absolute horse’s arse of it, and now he wants ireland to issue some apology and accept part of the blame?
And as for his speculation that if Ireland were in England’s position it would have behaved in the exact same way as regards colonialism and Imperialism… What kind of bullshit logic is that? Where’s the evidence for such a suggestion? What a lazy, dismissive, convenient, airbrushed view of history. Total, utter and complete nonsense I’m afraid.
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 11:53 AMHave to say I disagree with Bonar Law. O’Leary had a viewpoint that operated only at the top sections of society, but the troubles were always waged by those at the bottom. And the reality is that in terms of housing, socialising etc we are just as divided as ever, if not more so. McKay’s point about the situation on the ground was well-taken, reminding us of both the sectarian and economic realities in too many areas. On the civil servants point, there were links going back well into the Stormont period, so I think that was overplayed, but relevant. Not so sure about the EEC thing. Again, pre-existing links between civil servants on both islands on economic issues.
But the big thing I think was missed was the extent to which culture, especially popular culture, is being homogenised across the globe in an Anglo-American framework. In many senses Britishness and Irishness have always shared many of the same fundamentals (along with aspects of our European heritage), and this has been increased recently, but I don’t think been fundamentally altered by increased contact. Rather, O’Leary is right to say that economics have changed the southern state’s perception of itself.
I thought English’s contributions were poisoned by psychobabble, just like his last book.
And Juan Kerr, if you want to see how Irish people might have behaved as the representatives of an imperial power, simply look at the way they behaved for the British Empire - no matter what their religious or political background at home, they were overwhelmingly happy imperialists.
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 12:11 PMHorseman, unionism doesn’t have a distinct culture beyond the dubious sense of fashion that matches a black bowler hat to an orange sash - certainly not one that merits its own State.
The principle behind the creation of a State, the first article of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, is that it is a sovereign territorial entity for a Nation (a peoples and their culture); and, ergo, it is a nation state by default and by design.
The nation state creates an environment in which the Nation protects and promotes its culture. Without that State, those Nations and their cultures struggle to survive, and never flourish.
The notion of the State sans the nation is meaningless, lacking legitimacy under Article 1, and can promote only a hollow ‘multiculturalism’ as validation. However, those cultures are the products of nation states; and without the nation state, those cultures cannot be produced or sustained. Chinatown in London or New York is meaningless without China.
So these proposed ‘shared spaces’ that are to operate as States and have only imported cultures are really just parasitic entities. Like all parasites, they are destructive to the host. Those who advocate the State sans a nation are unwittingly advocating the destruction of the source of cultures that they wish to share.
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 12:18 PMDave
what a charmingly fascist post.
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 12:33 PMwhat a charmingly fascist post.
At least you understood it ...
:-[
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 12:39 PMIt is nice to see the essence of nationalism described so transparently though.
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 12:40 PMDave,
To stick to the bit I did understand (i.e. the first half-sentence) - I am not talking about a ‘unionist’ culture, or even a ‘Protestant’ culture. I’m trying (vainly, I suspect) to understand why the members of those two groups in the north appear to have contributed very little of noticeable worth to the common cultural wealth of the English-speaking world.
Why did Yeats come from the south and not the north? Why did Patrick Kavanagh come from Monaghan and not Armagh? How come U2 are from Dublin and not Belfast? How many times have southerners (P and C) won the Booker Prize, while northern Protestants never have even been short-listed? Where is the northern Protestant contribution to our cultural wealth?
I’m not trying to get at members of that group (some of my best friends, etc, etc ....), but just trying to understand where its creativity actually goes.
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 12:47 PM“Missed Hearts & Minds last night cos I was out getting p*ssed but on a related point I cannot believe that David Adams, in his essay, dares to suggest that ireland owes Britain some sort of apology.”
I think you might find if you read the FULL Irish Times piece that he was being rather tongue in cheek, merely pointing up how ridiculous the prevailing notion within Ireland is of always having been the innocent victim. As example, he mentions the southern political offences legislation that cost so many lives during the Troubles as having been conveniently forgotten about.
Having just read the Lives Entwined thing, he doesn’t say anything about apologies in his essay - which is rather good by the way - so must have been making general comment.
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 01:04 PMHorseman
Are Van Morrison, James Galway, CS Lewis, James Nesbitt, Stephen Rea, to name but a few, not artists from the Protestant and/or unionist tradition?
Do we need to go into the sporting field as well?Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 01:09 PMIt is always wrong without exception to make sweeping generalizations.
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 01:19 PMLittle Eva,
Yeah, those five probably count for something - I thought of CS Lewis just after I posted. I don’t really consider actors as ‘creators’ of cultural wealth, more interpreters.
There are others, of course: the late Derek Bell (of The Chieftains), Charlie Lawson (of Coronation Street), Snow Patrol (part of), etc. But you’d have to admit that it is slim pickings. If you have more names, especially writers (my own interest), please let me know.
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 01:26 PMMichael Longley, Glenn Patterson.
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 01:33 PMJohn Hewitt of course.
Posted by on May 23, 2008 @ 01:35 PM
