The Representation of Dublin in Story and Song

Dublin is a complex, multi-faceted city-region which has in turn generated a complex, multi-faceted culture traversing a wide array of genres and narratives. Literary Dublin is widely known and celebrated; but the popular arts – cinema and music, for example – are likewise implicated in the imaginative representation of the city. Of these, the latter possesses an especially rich genealogy: a reservoir of images and associations accumulated over an extended period of time, itself based on an older ballad tradition in which the city functioned as an imaginative spatial resource for a diverse array of discourses (class, gender, nation, community, profession, etc.). Given the city’s continuing centrality to the economic, cultural and political organisation of Ireland as a whole, it is likely that Dublin’s significance will only grow as the country endeavours to come to terms with the extinction of the Celtic Tiger

The Irish Rover: Phil Lynott and the Search for Identity

Phil Lynott, the lead singer of the rock band Thin Lizzy, was a complex character. An illegitimate black child who grew up in a working-class, Catholic district of Dublin, Ireland in the 1950s, Lynott spent his life searching for a sense of belonging, something which he explored through rock and roll. This study uses Lynott’s song lyrics to investigate his quest for identity. In particular, it identifies the many recurring themes and archetypes in his music that offered multifaceted self-portraits of his internal conflict between being black, Irish, illegitimate, a rockstar, a Lothario, a son, a father, and a husband, all at the same time

Helping Bilingual Pupils to Access the Curriculum

This work offers practical guidance for teachers working with bilingual pupils in mainstream primary and secondary education and aims to help teachers make the curriculum as accessible as possible to these children. It provides examples of the good practice that has evolved around teaching bilingual children in the classroom. The book includes: advice on how to tackle subject areas; guidance on planning lessons; photocopiable proformas for use in planning; case studies; suggested approaches for dealing with common difficulties in texts; and advice on working with bilingual parents. Teachers, student teachers, teaching assistants, English as a second language (ESL) and English as an additional language (EAL) co-ordinators should find this book helps them work effectively with bilingual children in mainstream settings

Place, Noise, Nation : Towards a Spatial Analysis of Irish Popular Music

This essay introduces some of the themes and methodologies which might characterise a spatial analysis of modern Irish popular music by considering a range of issues which emerge in relation to one genre (punk rock) and one band (The Saw Doctors). The principal intention of this brief account is to highlight some of the ways in which such an analysis might proceed ; a secondary motivation is to test some of the standard assumptions of Irish Studies against material traditionally seen as less tractable, and thereby perhaps to mitigate the disciplinary hegemony which has traditionally ordered the study of Irish cultural history. The author engages with theoretical developments in a variety of disciplines, including Geography, Irish Studies and Popular Music Studies.Cet article présente quelques-uns des thèmes et des méthodologies propres à caractériser une analyse spatiale de la musique populaire irlandaise, en examinant une série de questions relatives à un genre (rock punk) et un groupe (The Saw Doctors). Le but principal de cette brève étude est de mettre en lumière certains procédés d'analyse ; il s'agit aussi de mettre les hypothèses admises dans les études irlandaises à l'épreuve d'un matériau traditionnellement perçu comme moins docile, et par conséquent de réduire l'hégémonie qui a traditionnellement ordonné l'étude de l'histoire culturelle irlandaise. L'auteur aborde des développements théoriques dans plusieurs disciplines, comme la géographie, les études irlandaises et la musique populaire irlandaise.Smyth Gerry. Place, Noise, Nation : Towards a Spatial Analysis of Irish Popular Music. In: Études irlandaises, n°29 n°2, 2004. Espaces irlandais : zones et marges, sous la direction de Sylvie Mikowski et Claude Fierobe. pp. 75-89