Irish Seminar 2011

I attended the 'Irish Seminar' in 2011. The 'Irish Seminar' is a three week long Summer school in Irish Studies run in Dublin, Ireland every year. It is presented by the Keough Naughton Notre Dame Centre. About 40 graduate students from the USA and Europe particpated in the seminar. It was a very informative, if not busy three weeks and I really enjoyed the mix of academic and social aspects to the Seminar. It was interesting to hear about the different approaches to PhD education in Europe and the US. For example, I wasn't aware that in the States it could take several years longer to complete your PhD, due to the fact that students normally have a year or two of coursework even before they start their PhD. The Seminar normally takes place in O'Connell House on Merrion Square, which was the Dublin home of Daniel O'Connell (the man known as 'The Liberator', because of his fight for Catholic Emancipation in Ireland in the first half of the 19th century).

The theme of the 2011 seminar was 'Irish Modernisms'. The Seminar consisted of
(i) lectures by academics involved in Irish Studies from universities in Ireland and the US and
(ii) cultural activities, including plays, book and poetry readings and field trips to sites of interest in Ireland.

We visited places associated with Irish writers and playwrights, such as Thoor Ballylee associated with WB Yeats, Hook Head lighthouse and Lady Gregory's home Coole Park - some photos attached.
This is Thoor Ballylee in Gort, County Galway, Ireland. WB Yeats lived here with his family for a time in the 1920s and it was the inspiration for several of his poems.

This is all that remains of Coole House today. Yeats' friend Lady Augusta Gregory lived here.

Hook Head Lighthouse is situated on the Hook Head peninsula in County Wexford, Ireland.

ADEFFI 2012 Postgraduate Study Day - 3 March 2012

The ADEFFI (Association des études françaises et francophones d’Irlande) 2012 Postgraduate Study Day was held in the University of Sheffield on Saturday, 3 March 2012. This year ADEFFI joined forces with two other organisations ASMCF (Association for the Study of Modern and Contemporary France) and SSFH (Society for the Study of French History) to present a programme of events for posgraduate students in the area of French and Francophone studies studying in the UK and Ireland.

'Futures' was the theme of the day and 43 people attended. We heard from established academics about their experiences and up and coming reserachers about their research. Well done to all who helped organise the day and those who took part. The 2013 study day will be held in Dublin, more information to follow soon.

The Boolean Journal article

I wrote an article explaining my research for the University College Cork (UCC) post graduate journal, known as The Boolean. This second volume of the journal was launched in October 2011 and is named after George Boole - the first Professor of Mathematics in UCC and the inventor of Boolean logic. As that venerable source of information, Wikipedia states: "Boolean logic is the basis of modern digital computer logic. Boole is regarded in hindsight as a founder of the field of computer science".

This is a link to the article -

http://publish.ucc.ie/boolean/2011/00/OHanlon/37/en

Please have a look and tell me what you think.

Newspaper & Periodical History Forum of Ireland 2011

I have just returned from the fourth annual conference of the Newspaper & Periodical History Forum of Ireland, which took place on 18 & 19 November 2011 in the National Library of Ireland in Dublin.

The conference title was 'Writing the Press into History' and speakers from Europe and North America presented papers on their own areas of research. Attendees included press historians, working journalists and editors as well as academics and researchers from many different disciplines. I really enjoyed the conference and benefited enormously from it by hearing of what others are doing in the world of newspapers and by discussing my own research with them.

Well done to the organisers for creating such a unique and successful conference. This is a link to the forum:

http://www.newspapersperiodicals.org/index.html

UCC Doctoral Showcase 2011

The UCC Doctoral Showcase took place on 21 June 2011. The showcase is a relatively new concept whereby PhD students explain their research to a public, non-specialist audience. I applied to take part in it and was chosen to go through to the final on 21 June 2011.

There were three categories in the showcase:

- the poster competition, where students presented their research on a poster.

- the three minute thesis, where students presented their research in a three minute presentation, using whatever props they thought was necessary and only one powerpoint slide.

- the ten minute thesis, where students presented their research in a ten minute presentation, using props and as many powerpoint slides as they wanted.

As a first year PhD student I could apply for the poster competition or the three minute thesis. I decided to apply for the three minute thesis. Three judges evaluated the entrants and they awarded a first and second prize in each category. I was not successful on this occasion, but will keep practicing my presentation skills. I think it's a valuable skill to be able to describe your research (or anything for that matter) in a succinct and clear manner.

The Showcase brochure.

Twitter

This is a worlde of my blog as it stands at the minute. Yes you read that right. I only heard about Wordle for the first time today and think it is a very effective tool to give you a snapshot of the frequency of words appearing in any given space. I just pasted the URL of this blog into the create box on the Wordle site and it gave me a picture of the most commonly used words in my blog.

The word Twitter seems to be the most prominent word there at the minute - I suppose I have written a good deal about the uses of Twitter in my research. I will be writing a small bit more over the next while. So keep checking the blog for updates.

AFIS annual conference - Lille May 2011

I have just returned from the annual conference for the Association for Franco-Irish Studies (AFIS). It was held in Université de Charles de Gaule- Lille 3, or just Lille 3 for short.

The theme of the conference was 'Les irlandais en France et les français en irlande' or 'The Irish in France and the French in Ireland'. There were three keynote speeches, one by the French journalist, Sorj Chalandon, who reported from Northern Ireland for the French newspaper Libération during the the late 1970s until the 2000s. Professor Marianne Elliott, Director of the Institute of Irish Studies at the University of Liverpool, delivered a keynote speech on the experience of Wolfe Tone trying to enlist help in France for an Irish rebellion. Professor Jane Conroy from NUIG also delivered a keynote speech on a French visitor to Ireland in the late 18th century.

There was a very wide range of topics covered by the participants who presented 20 minute papers. I presented a paper on Simone Téry - a French journalist who was reporting from Ireland in the 1920s for the French press.

So much preparation must have gone into the organisation of the conference. Well done to AFIS and Lille 3 for organising such a great conference. This is a link to the conference on the Lille 3 homepage:

http://evenements.univ-lille3.fr/colloque-irlandais-francais/en/