Sport, Culture, and Nation Among the Hibernians of Philadelphia

Abstract

The Irish Americans of Philadelphia, prompted by an awakening of cultural nationalism across the Atlantic in native Ireland, constructed their own community of Irish culture, nationalism and ethnic pride in the waning years of the nineteenth century and early decades of the twentieth. The expressions of this Gaelic public awakening were seen in literature, language, theatre, and in sport; the adoption of Gaelic games became a particular poignant emblem of late-century Irish resurgence, the gallant Irish hurler a symbol of Irish masculinity. The return to Gaelic culture in a hard, industrial city coincided with the public posturing of a Celtic paramilitarism in the form of Hibernian rifle regiments, overnight encampments, and other displays of the revived and armed Celt of Irish Philadelphia.