Mn na h ireann – new history roadshow for 2018!

This year, 2018, is the centenary of Irish women winning the right to vote.

In commemoration, RTE History Show presenter Myles Dungan, and a team of Ireland’s most sought-after women historians is to tour libraries, county councils, country houses, history groups and festivals with a unique package of lectures on the changing lives and roles of Mn na h ireann a century ago.

Senator Marie Louise O’Donnell; Catriona Crowe, former Head of Special Projects at the National Archives of Ireland; Dr. Kate O’Malley, of the Royal Irish Academy; and author Liz Gillis will be among the key contributors.

Leitrim, Cavan, Louth and Killarney are among the counties the roadshow will visit in 2017/18.

The tour’s first call came on Saturday, December 2 at Leitrim Library, Manorhamilton, when an interested audience heard lectures including…

Author Liz Gillis: Guardians of the Revolution: Cumann na mBan 1917-1918
Dr. Kate O Malley, Royal Irish Academy: Women of the Irish Revolution – A Wider World

A further lecture will be held in Ballinamore Library on December 7, when Myles Dungan will be the guest speaker.

Mn na h ireann – Lectures & Lecturers

The general election of December 1918 saw women here voting for the first time – though they still had to be over 30 years of age and landowners.

2018 is also the 100th anniversary of the election of Ireland’s first female member of parliament – Countess Markiewicz.

Dr. MYLES DUNGAN

The Alpha Male In Irish History

There may be many answers to the question why were there not far more women in positions of influence in Ireland in the immediate pre and post independence period But Myles Dungan thinks there is a very simple answer MEN.

Myles Dungan, PhD, is one of Ireland s best-known and most respected broadcasters. A frontline RTE presenter, he has been hosting current affairs, arts and sports programmes on both radio and television for more than two decades. A Fulbright scholar, educated at UCD and the University of California, Berkeley, he is the author of a multiple books, including Irish Voices From The Great War (1995) and Mr. Parnell s Rottweiler: Censorship & the United Ireland Newspaper (2014), plus works on the Irish in America, the Great War, the Irish Crown jewels and golf. He is the presenter of The History Show on RTE Radio 1.

LIZ GILLIS

Guardians of the Revolution: Cumann na mBan 1917-1918

Guardians of the Revolution: Cumann na mBan 1917-1918 outlines the vital role that women played in the Easter Rising and beyond. Although often overlooked and seen as being mere supporters of the Rising and the revolutionary movement that followed, this talk aims to show that these women were educationalists, socialists, community workers, radicals, feminists and realists – all with a desire for one thing in common; Independence for Ireland. Through their participation they proved their worth and showed that they were indeed the invisible army of the Revolutionary movement and without their dedication and resolve, the events of Easter week could have faded into memory. Highlighting many of the lesser known women, the talk will show that the women were vital revolutionaries who gave their all in the hope of a better future for their country.

Historian Liz Gillis is the author of numerous books on Ireland s early 20th century revolutionary period. Her latest work, The Burning of the Custom House (2017), tells the story of the IRA s 1921 attack on Dublin s Custom House, then the heart of the British administration in Ireland. Liz, a central figure in the new Pegasus history roadshow, Mn na h ireann, has a Degree in Irish History and worked as a guide in Kilmainham Gaol, developing a revolutionary walking tour of Dublin’s Liberties. She now works as a researcher on The History Show, on RT Radio 1.

Dr. KATE O MALLEY

Women of the Irish Revolution – A Wider World

In the aftermath of the Easter Rising and the Irish Revolution, the Irish struggle for independence was watched with interest by nationalists in other parts of the British Empire, most notably India. Indian nationalists such as Gandhi, Nehru and Bose took an interest in Ireland, and nationalists in Ireland took an interest in India. This lecture will look at three revolutionary women, all friends, all veterans of the post-1916 independence struggle: Maud Gonne MacBride, Charlotte Despard and Mollie Woods. These women encouraged Indo-Irish collaboration in the hope that each side could learn from their respective experiences. They were agitators who attempted to add an aspect of global finesse to local nationalist politics and successfully established their own tailor-made organisation in the shape of the Indian Irish Independence League (IIIL). This lecture will shed light on some lesser known aspects of Irish and Indian history between the World Wars, and on the significance of the Irish revolution within the wider history of the British Empire.

Dr. Kate O’Malley is a historian with the Royal Irish Academy, and an Editor of the Documents on Irish Foreign Policy (DIFP) series, an RIA project in collaboration with the Department of Foreign Affairs and the National Archives of Ireland. She is a graduate of Trinity College, Dublin (BA, PhD), and has taught at TCD, UCD and Queen s University, Belfast. She has written extensively on Indo-Irish relations, authoring the book Ireland, India and Empire (2008).

This 2018 roadshow builds on Dr. Dungan’s hugely successful history roadshows The Fighting Irish (2010+), The Great War Roadshow (2014/15) and Paths To Freedom (2016/17).

We hope this new project will interest you. To discuss further, with no commitment, please contact… info@pegasusconsulting.ie