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Full-Text Articles in Arts and Humanities
Ann Flood, Mairéad Farrell, And The Representation Of Armed Femininity In Irish Republican Ballads, Seán Ó Cadhla
Ann Flood, Mairéad Farrell, And The Representation Of Armed Femininity In Irish Republican Ballads, Seán Ó Cadhla
Articles
This article critically considers the representation of armed femininity within the attendant song tradition of Irish physical-force Republicanism, with specific focus on the personal and cultural consequences for two prominent female Republican activists, both of whom successfully traverse the gender demarcation lines of war. While noting the didactic, often misogynistic, trajectory of works narrating ‘transgressive’ females within the broader ballad tradition, this article seeks to determine whether or not the interwoven essentialist tropes of death, martyrdom and resurrection — all deeply-embedded ideological constructs within the framework of Irish Republicanism — successfully supersede calcified patriarchal mores and in so doing, facilitate …
“Young Men Of Erin, Our Dead Are Calling”: Death, Immortality And The Otherworld In Modern Irish Republican Ballads, Seán Ó Cadhla
“Young Men Of Erin, Our Dead Are Calling”: Death, Immortality And The Otherworld In Modern Irish Republican Ballads, Seán Ó Cadhla
Articles
Irish physical-force Republicanism has long been noted for its tendency to promote the tropes of martyrdom and immortality as core tenets of its ideological belief system. This essay sets out to examine the genre of Republican death ballads so as to identify how such essentialist concepts are represented and promoted within the attendant song tradition. Particular attention will be paid to works that deploy overtly supernatural tropes in order to articulate the key Republican concept of heroic immortality. The present research will demonstrate the consistency with which such narrative devices have been retained within the Republican song tradition into the …
In Search Of The Original "Skewball", Seán Ó Cadhla
In Search Of The Original "Skewball", Seán Ó Cadhla
Articles
The well-known horseracing ballad ‘Skewball’ has been widely documented in oral tradition on both sides of the Atlantic, as well as on numerous English broadside printings. It recounts the tale of a mid-eighteenth-century horserace held at The Curragh of Kildare, in which a heavily-backed mare is comprehensively beaten by a relatively unknown skewbald gelding leaving the mare’s owner — along with much of the assembled onlookers — significantly out of pocket. The ballad became widely popularised in North America where it was first published in a song book in 1826 (Benton 1826:3-4). It was later subsumed into African-American song tradition, …
Horses For Discourses?: The Transition From Oral To Broadside Narrative In “Skewball”, Seán Ó Cadhla
Horses For Discourses?: The Transition From Oral To Broadside Narrative In “Skewball”, Seán Ó Cadhla
Articles
The well-known horse-racing ballad ‘Skewball’ (hereafter, SB) has a well-established oral tradition in Ireland, with versions documented throughout the eighteenth-,nineteenth- and twentieth-centuries. The latest is a 1979 field-recording of Derry folksinger and storyteller, Eddie Butcher (Shields 2011:58-9). The ballad was also assimilated into African-American oral tradition, in which it was reconstructed and renamed ‘Stewball’ (Scarborough 1925:61-4; Lomax 1994:68-71), and was still being documented in American folk tradition as late as the 1930s (Flanders 1939:172-4). In common with countless other folk songs, SB was appropriated by broadside printers and subsequently enjoyed widespread public appeal throughout England in the early- to …