How the Irish became “Gauchos Ingleses”: Diasporic Models in Irish-Argentine Literature

Declan Kiberd argues that “postcolonial writing does not begin only when the occupier withdraws: rather it is initiated at that very moment when a native writer formulates a text committed to cultural resistance.” Paradoxically, the Irish who emigrated to Argentina, a former Spanish colony, may be regarded (as they may have regarded themselves) as colonised in the country they left, and as colonisers of their new home. Their case is one of the better counterexamples to the typical pattern of identities in most of the English-speaking destinations of the Irish Diaspora. Using William Bulfin’s Tales of the Pampas as primary document, in this article I search the identities represented in his characters. In Tales of the Pampas, Bulfin amalgamates the ambiguous acculturation of the Irish settlers with that of the “gaucho” (those cowboys of the South American pampas who almost literally lived in the saddle), as well as with the symbols of Gauchesca narrative. Evolving from colonised to colonisers during their initial settlement, the Irish in Argentina swiftly became ingleses. In the following decades, in order to join the local bourgeoisie they were required to be gauchos, and to show signs of their effective integration to the native culture, as seen by the Argentine elites. This explains why most of the successful Irish settlers gradually separated from the Anglo-Argentine mainstream culture and shaped their own community. A negotiation of identities among Irishness, Britishness, and Argentineness was always in place. I argue that these identities are not only unmoored in the emigrants’ minds but also manoeuvred by community leaders, politicians and priests. After reviewing the major milestones of the nineteenth-century Irish emigration to Argentina, the article analyses selected passages from the text, offers a version of how the settlers became Irish-Argentines, and elucidates some of the processes which created the new Irish-Argentine hybrid.Declan Kiberd argues that “postcolonial writing does not begin only when the occupier withdraws: rather it is initiated at that very moment when a native writer formulates a text committed to cultural resistance.” Paradoxically, the Irish who emigrated to Argentina, a former Spanish colony, may be regarded (as they may have regarded themselves) as colonised in the country they left, and as colonisers of their new home. Their case is one of the better counterexamples to the typical pattern of identities in most of the English-speaking destinations of the Irish Diaspora. Using William Bulfin’s Tales of the Pampas as primary document, in this article I search the identities represented in his characters. In Tales of the Pampas, Bulfin amalgamates the ambiguous acculturation of the Irish settlers with that of the “gaucho” (those cowboys of the South American pampas who almost literally lived in the saddle), as well as with the symbols of Gauchesca narrative. Evolving from colonised to colonisers during their initial settlement, the Irish in Argentina swiftly became ingleses. In the following decades, in order to join the local bourgeoisie they were required to be gauchos, and to show signs of their effective integration to the native culture, as seen by the Argentine elites. This explains why most of the successful Irish settlers gradually separated from the Anglo-Argentine mainstream culture and shaped their own community. A negotiation of identities among Irishness, Britishness, and Argentineness was always in place. I argue that these identities are not only unmoored in the emigrants’ minds but also manoeuvred by community leaders, politicians and priests. After reviewing the major milestones of the nineteenth-century Irish emigration to Argentina, the article analyses selected passages from the text, offers a version of how the settlers became Irish-Argentines, and elucidates some of the processes which created the new Irish-Argentine hybrid

The Correspondence of Fr Matthew Gaughren OMI (1888-1890)

Em meados de 1888, o padre Matthew Gaughren (1843-1914) foi enviado à Argentina por seu superior, o O.M.I. provincial da Grã-Bretanha, a uma “expedição de mendicância”, que visava arrecadar dinheiro entre os colonos irlandeses para diminuir a dívida da igreja de Nossa Senhora da Graça em Tower Hill. No entanto, Gaughren mudou as prioridades de sua missão na América do Sul e apelou à comunidade de língua inglesa para apoiar os imigrantes irlandeses vindos de Cork, em fevereiro de 1889, no navio a vapor Dresden, e enviados a uma malfadada colônia irlandesa em Napostá, próxima ao porto de Bahía Blanca. Seu pensamento e sua luta são revelados nas cartas a seguir, coletadas de diversos arquivos, que agora estão sendo publicadas, a maioria delas pela primeira vez, em sua forma completa.In mid-1888, Fr Matthew Gaughren (1843-1914) was sent to Argentina by his superior, the O.M.I. provincial in Great Britain, on a “begging expedition”, which aimed at collecting money among the Irish settlers to lessen the debt upon the church of Our Lady of Grace at Tower Hill. However, Gaughren changed the priorities of his mission in South America and appealed to the English-speaking community to support the Irish immigrants who arrived in Buenos Aires in February 1889 on the Dresden steamer ship from Cork and were sent to an ill-fated Irish Colony in Napostá, near the port of Bahía Blanca. His thinking and his struggle are revealed in the following letters, collected from various archival sources, which are now being published, most of them for the first time, in their complete form

The Irish Road to South America: Nineteenth-Century Travel Patterns from Ireland to the Río de la Plata region

Nineteenth-century Irish emigration to Argentina has been studied from different perspectives. There is a growing number of historical, demographic and cultural studies focusing on diverse aspects of this migration, which together with Quebec and Mexican Texas, produced the only Irish settlements in non English-speaking territories. However, with a few exceptions, most of these studies concentrate on the settlement and the life of the emigrants from the time they arrived to their destination, thus neglecting the preparations for their journey and the material details of the voyage. While this essay deals primarily with the Río de la Plata region, including the pampas of Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay, many of its conclusions may be projected to other parts of the continent. How did the Irish emigrants travel from their townlands and rural villages to the most important ports in Ireland and England, and from there to South American ports? What means of transport did they use on land and sea, and how had those vehicles changed with the technical advances of the century? How expensive were the fares and how comfortable was the accommodation? Which were the most common emigrant ships to South America and what were their usual travel patterns

"Sighted the coast of Brazil the 28 th": John Murphy's journey to South America in 1863

John Murphy (1822-1909) was born in Haysland, Kilrane parish of County Wexford, the eldest son of the farmer Nicholas Murphy and his wife, Katherine, née Sinnott. It was a typical Catholic middle-class family of Wexford farmers. In 1844, as a member of an emigrant group organized by Kilrane merchant James Pettit, John Murphy went to Liverpool, sailed to the Río de la Plata region and settled in Buenos Aires. He first worked digging ditches in the district of Chascomús, and then as a shepherd in Chacabuco. In 1854 Murphy purchased land in Salto and established the successful sheep-farm "La Flor del Uncalito", in which many other Irish immigrants (including his brothers William and Patrick) would work as shepherds and ranch hands. When his mother died in 1861, John Murphy went to Ireland to visit the family and returned to Argentina in 1863

Explosive Journey: Perceptions of Latin America in the FARC-IRA Affair (2001-2005)

The IRA's alleged connections with FARC, which surfaced in 2001 and continue to appear in the Irish and Colombian media, are an ideal opportunity to analyse perceptions of Latin America in Ireland. Newspaper articles, personal interviews, and the judgement of the Appeals Court in Bogotá have been used to study different attitudes in this puzzling affair, which can be viewed as one of the lowest points in Irish relations with Colombia - and perhaps with Latin America as a whole

The Irish in Latin America and Iberia: An Annotated Bibliography

This bibliography includes books, book chapters, articles, documentaries and websites grouped in geographic areas: Latin America (general); Central America; the Caribbean; Argentina; Chile, Bolivia, Ecuador and Peru; Brazil; Colombia and Venezuela; Mexico; Paraguay and Uruguay; Portugal and Spain. Thematic lists include: San Patricio Battalion of Mexico; Eliza Lynch (1835-1886); William Brown (1777-1857). Some entries repeat in more than one category. This bibliography was first published in "Irish Migration Studies in Latin America" (www.irlandeses.org) in April 2003 and updated through October 2007. Some later published book-length studies have been added in 2019

Art Discovery and Censorship in the Centre William Rappard of Geneva - Building the Future

This is a history of the Centre William Rappard, the first building designed to house an international organization in Geneva, and its art treasures. For nearly a century, these works of art and decorations offered by governments and institutions encouraged smooth diplomacy and fluent international negotiations in the fields of labour, trade and human rights. On occasions hidden, removed and forgotten, and then recovered and restored, the history of the artworks in the Centre William Rappard represents the confrontation between art as diplomatic device and aesthetic experience, between representation and represented, between censorship and free expression. Even before its opening in 1926, the building started receiving works from the International Labour Organization member governments. Some pieces, such as the "Geneva Window" by Harry Clarke, never arrived in Geneva since it was censored by the Irish government. The Spanish "Pygmalion" by Eduardo Chicharro y Agüera was latter covered for its female nudity and remained hidden during decades. Later in the 1970s the secretariat of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade occupied the building and requested the removal of other major works. This was reversed in the 2010s by its successor the World Trade Organization, when many artworks were rediscovered, restored and placed in their original locations. However, new values in the world scene contributed to further changes in the building art, including the removal of Claude Namy’s caricature "In GATT We Trust" from public view in 2019. Art in the Centre William Rappard continues to speak to the viewer after waves of the positive reception, censorship and recovery

The Diplomacy of Art: Irish, Spanish and Latin American Artwork in a Historic Building of Geneva

This article focuses on the works of art offered by Irish, Spanish, Brazilian and other governments and institutions to embellish the Centre William Rappard since 1926 to date. The Centre William Rappard is the first building in Geneva designed to house an international organization. It was built for the International Labour Office, and later occupied by the United Nations High Commissioner for the Refugees, the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade secretariat, and currently the World Trade Organization. The article studies the messages sent by powerful players of international relations who donate, receive, restore and sometimes suppress works of art to support their political aims

Centre William Rappard: Home of the World Trade Organization, Geneva

The first building in Geneva designed to house an international organization, the Centre William Rappard has played host to the International Labour Office since it first opened its doors in 1926, and later to the General Agreement of Tariffs and Trade secretariat and to the World Trade Organization. "Centre William Rappard: Home of the World Trade Organization, Geneva" looks into the history of the building, its unique works of art and some of the colourful characters from its early years

Measurement of Mutual Coulomb Dissociation in sNN=130\sqrt{s_{NN}}=130 GeV Au+Au collisions at RHIC

We report on the first measurement of Mutual Coulomb Dissociation in heavy ion collisions. We employ forward calorimeters to measure neutron multiplicity at beam rapidity in peripheral collisions. The cross-section for simultaneous electromagnetic breakup of Au nuclei at $\sqrt{s_{NN}}=130$ GeV is $\sigma_{MCD}=3.67\pm 0.25$ barns in good agreement with calculations.Comment: This paper has been submitted for publication in Phys. Rev. Let