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REVISED 3/20/07, 11:30 AM EDT
'Making the Irish American' a |
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Says Peter Quinn, in the final chapter of "Making the Irish American
"Whatever the future may hold, wherever it may take us, we can bring along only what we possess, and if we don't possess our past, if instead of a true history and a significant literature, we bring along only trivia, empty myths and a handful of stories, or worst of all the latest intellectually fashionable versions of ourselves, we will offer those to come after nothing of lasting consequence."
We need more books on Irish-American history to help avoid that emptiness. "Making the Irish American: History and Heritage of the Irish in the United States
The book's first entry is by Lee, the director of New York University's Glucksman Ireland House, an interpretation of the genesis of Irish-American studies. The genre began with Jewish scholars at Harvard University, citing Oscar Handlin's dissertation, published in 1941 as "Boston's Immigrants 1790-1865
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| From Ireland's Story; A Short History of Ireland |
Lee sees women as essential to the transmission of values in the family, and therefore crucial to the formation of Irish-America. Women, he contends, are ignored by most historians: as workers in the home, as wives lending moral support to husbands, as mothers influencing children's career choices, as grandmothers, and as managers of family finances, purchasing and investing. This is a simple yet pertinent point, one which is missing from most historiographies. Its inclusion here is most welcome.
Next, Dr. Eileen Reilly, Lee's assistant director, provides The Irish Background, grounding us in modern Irish history, beginning with Ireland's conquest in Henry II's name in the 12th century, and ending with the approval of the Good Friday Agreement in May 1998. The massive scope of this chapter deals with more than mere dates but goes into extensive historical context. We were particularly gratified to see The Great Hunger discussed in some depth, with attention given to the attempts at famine relief in both the United States and Ireland. After Lee's introduction and Reilly's backgrounder, the volume is split into sections: Foundations, Conflicts of Identity, Popular Expressions of Identity, and Reflections.
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| Illustrated London News, 1847 Searching the blighted ground in the hope of finding anything edible during "Black '47," the worst year of The Great Hunger. |
In the section Conflicts of Identity, Kerby Miller
Irene Whelan details the history of Irish Catholicism in America, including Catholic-Protestant dissension transplanted from Ireland to America. She associates the evangelical Protestant notion of citizen as free from slavery, and contrasts the opposing perceptions of Protestants and Catholics ("disloyal, slovenly, untrustworthy, sexually licentious, ignorant, ultimately slaves to Rome, and unworthy of participation in the public sphere").
Kevin Kenny's American-Irish Nationalism covers history from 1798 to 1998. He describes constitutional nationalism versus physical force nationalism, applying the former terms to Charles Stewart Parnell and the Land League and the latter to John Devoy and the Clan na Gael. Kenny records the Easter Rebellion and the early years of Irish self-government, but does not stop there; he writes about the activism of the late 1960s, identifying the major actors in the struggle. Kenny cuts through the alphabet soup of Irish politics and tells the tale of the IRA ceasefire in 1994, which led to the Good Friday Agreement, reached with the assistance of the American government. In a second essay on labor and labor organizations, Kenny discusses labor through the 19th century; a third essay examines the racialization of the Irish in the 19th century with the attendant social and political violence, from Manhattan's Five Points to eastern Pennsylvania's Mollie Maguires
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| LIbrary of Congress |
Margaret Lynch-Brennan in her essay suggests that the Irish Bridget, or domestic servant, provided a distinct service to the middle-class American family. Domestics furnished leisure time so the mother of the family could read, write letters, pay social calls, work in benevolent organizations, and generally develop the home as a moral center. For the American mother and the Irish Bridget, it was a win-win, symbiotic arrangement; the American families reaped the benefits of leisure, while the Irish domestics, although stereotyped in literature and cartoons, sent money home to Ireland for chain migration and became the acceptable face of the Irish in America.
In Popular Expressions of Identity, Mick Moloney discusses Irish-American popular music, from minstrelsy to variety theatre, to Harrigan and Hart, to Tin Pan Alley. The Irish tenor, which "became the ultimate positive representation of 'Irishness,'" helps explain the popularity of Bing Crosby. The McNulty Family and the Clancy Brothers
Robert Snyder discusses the Irish and vaudeville, dating the genre to the late 19th and early 20th centuries; by 1930, he states, vaudeville was dead. Irish-American artists such as George M. Cohan, Jimmy Cagney, Fred Allen, Jackie Gleason and Ed Sullivan, and movie executives like Joseph P. Kennedy ensured that the Irish stamp continued in the performing arts.
Ralph Wilcox contributes Irish Americans in Sports: The Nineteenth Century, and Larry McCarthy covers The Twentieth Century; boxing, baseball and football predominate, but there is mention of track and field, and the Gaelic Athletic Association.
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| Players from a turn of the century Irish-American baseball team. |
("Once We Were Kings" about the death of John F. Kennedy), Calvin Trillin ("Democracy in Action," about Judge James J. Comerford), Linda Dowling Almeida ("Irish America, 1940-2000"), Thomas J. Shelley ("Twentieth Century American Catholicism and Irish Americans" on the predominance of the Irish among the Church hierarchy), Timothy J. Meagher ("The Fireman on the Stairs: Communal Loyalties in the Making of Irish America," updated to include the tragedy of Sept. 11), and Daniel Casey and Robert Rhodes ("The Tradition of Irish-American Writers: The Twentieth Century"). The book closes with two elegant essays by Peter Quinn ("Looking for Jimmy" and "The Future of Irish America"), in which he expresses his amazement at not how the Irish became white, but how they stayed Irish.
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Making the Irish American: History and Heritage of the Irish in the United States By J. J. Lee (Editor), Marion Casey (Editor) Paperback: 736 pages Publisher: New York University Press; March 1, 2007 ISBN-10: 0814752187 |
Pulitzer Prize for "Beyond the Horizon
" was not mentioned; there was nothing written about his 150-year series of plays on Irish-America (a cycle from which only "A Touch of the Poet" remains). We would also have enjoyed more on awards won, on plays being made into movies, and on contemporary writers.
Lee writes in his introduction:
"One purpose of this volume will be achieved if it reminds us of the richness of tone and variety of range of that voice, however gruff at times, in the belief that it has something worth saying not only to Irish America but to America itself, to Ireland and perhaps even, for those with eyes to see, to the wider world."
Indeed, this rich volume splendidly lives up to Lee's hope. This book is rich, indeed; it complements a course in Irish studies because it is written by many of the experts in the field, and it touches on virtually every aspect of life in Irish-America. This will be a valued reference book for many years to come. WGT
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This feature was produced by Joe Gannon and edited by Gerry Regan.
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