Urban Ireland Research Articles

The provision of working- and lower-middle-class housing in late nineteenth-century urban Ireland

The provision of working- and lower-middle-class housing in late nineteenth-century urban Ireland

The provision of working-and lower-middle-class housing in late nineteenth-century urban Ireland

The provision of working-and lower-middle-class housing in late nineteenth-century urban Ireland

Just this Once: urban Ireland in film

By focusing on the city of Dublin as both setting and character, Once, written and directed by Dublin native John Carney, portrays urban Ireland in the global context. Using a series of replacements – replacing population loss with in-migration, and replacing parochial ideals with multicultural ones – the film re-places Dublin, both representing the city it has become and providing space for continuing growth and change. For Dublin, as elsewhere, change enters as global flows of information and people become part of the city. Rather than conforming to the traditional global power of American culture, Bord Scannán na hÉireann (Irish Film Board) is striking its own global poses, producing and distributing films that construct an urban Irishness for international audiences. In my article, I examine how this award-winning Irish film constructs Irish urban identity in the face of globalism's cultural flattening.

After the Race: Accelerator and the Cinematic Imagination of Urban Ireland

After the Race:Accelerator and the Cinematic Imagination of Urban Ireland Nicholas Miller (bio) Slouching toward Innisfree The one hundredth anniversary of the opening of Dublin's early movie theater, the Cinematograph Volta, founded by James Joyce in 1909, seems an appropriate occasion on which to consider, or reconsider, the relationship between urban Ireland and the history of Irish cinema. The idea for the Volta was put into Joyce's head by his sister, Eva, who thought it strange that Trieste, where Joyce and Nora Barnacle were living at the time, should have several movie theaters while Dublin, a larger city, had none. Joyce loved the movies, but it was his pressing need for cash rather than any devotion to cinematic art that prompted his return to Dublin, where, with four Triestine businessmen as his partners, he opened the Volta on 20 December 1909. From Joyce's standpoint the project was a failure. Having presided over the cinema's opening, he returned to Trieste, leaving the project under the management of his partner, Francesco Novak. Despite positive early notices in the Dublin press, the Volta soon began to lose money and Novak sold it within the year. From the perspective of Irish film history, however, Joyce's abortive venture into the cinema business was a signal moment, insofar as it marks a point at or near the beginning of cinema culture in Ireland.1 [End Page 12] While Irish cinema has had something of an embattled history over the past one hundred years, the cinema's role as part of the social and economic fabric of Irish cities has grown steadily and significantly in that time. The original Volta, which, in spite of being sold several times, remained in operation into the late 1940s, stood at the beginning of an exponential expansion of movie houses in Irish cities. Kevin Rockett reports that by 1916 there were some 149 theaters showing films in Ireland, a number that had grown to 265 by the end of the silent era in 1930.2 Today Ireland has one of the highest rates of cinema admissions in Europe, and film culture is thriving. Major film festivals are an annual occurrence in Galway, Cork, Dublin, and Belfast, and the opening of the Irish Film Centre (now Irish Film Institute) in Dublin in 1992 has created a major center for film research, education, preservation, and exhibition.3 What is striking is that although film has been and continues to be an important cultural presence in Irish cities, the image of urban space has itself played a decidedly minor role in Irish cinema over the last century. From the beginning, the most prominent films in Irish cinema history tended to emphasize the country's rural identity as primary. From The Lad from Old Ireland (Sidney Olcott, 1910) to Knocknagow (James Sullivan, 1918), Man of Aran (Robert Flaherty, 1934), The Dawn (Tom Cooper, 1936), The Quiet Man (John Ford, 1952), Ryan's Daughter (David Lean, 1970), The Field (Jim Sheridan, 1990), and The Secret of Roan Inish (John Sayles, 1994), the image of rural Ireland has persisted as cinema's chief means of contextualizing Irish stories and representing Irish experience in general.4 [End Page 13] Exceptions to this rule of course exist, although in works like The Commitments (Alan Parker, 1991), Michael Collins (Neil Jordan, 1996), and The General (John Boorman, 1998), for example, urban space figures prominently as a narrative setting without, however, ever becoming the primary focus of the narrative itself. The fact remains that after a century of cinema it is difficult to name a single Irish film that takes the urban as its central object of attention, that treats the city as a primary locus of Ireland's political, social, cultural, and economic self-definition, or that uses film language in new ways to explore and reveal the forms and images of urban Ireland. Furthermore, in view of the fact that Joyce played such a prominent role in introducing urban Ireland to the movies, it seems somewhat ironic that the cinema should not have proved a more influential tool for the development of the country's urban imagination. After all, it was Joyce who...

Nonadherence to Medication Four Years After a First Episode of Psychosis and Associated Risk Factors

This study examined concurrent associations and predictors at first indication of nonadherence to antipsychotic medication four years after a first episode of psychosis. A prospective cohort of 171 patients in urban Ireland with a first episode of psychosis was followed up four years after inception (follow-up primary analysis, N=84; secondary analysis, N=104). At the four-year follow-up 76% were adherent and 24% were not. Nonadherence was concurrently associated with substance misuse (p<.01), increased symptomatology (p<.01), less insight (p=.01), lower global functioning (p<.01), and negative attitudes toward medication (p<.01). Compared with other patients, those who were nonadherent had more readmissions (p=.01). Predictors of future nonadherence were substance misuse (p=.02) and duration of untreated psychosis (p=.04). This prospective investigation confirms previous cross-sectional studies. The association between longer duration of untreated psychosis and nonadherence warrants further research because it could be interpreted as further evidence of the importance of early intervention.

Green Consumption

In recent times, much has been written about consumers' co-responsibility for addressing environmental problems, with consumers expected to steer or regulate their consumption in an instrumental way. By drawing on data from in-depth interviews with green consumers in urban Ireland, this article examines how green consumers engage with environmental issues at an everyday level. The article considers green consumption through the theoretical lens of reflexive modernization, particularly its relevance to self-identity. We argue that although green consumption is important to the maintenance and constitution of a green subjectivity, it must be understood within the context of a process of increasing individualization, where individuals feel both responsible and empowered in dealing with environmental risks to both the wider global planet and themselves. However, such feelings are accompanied by doubts and insecurities about the choices to be made, creating a rather dichotomous situation. This challenges the idea that green consumption as some form of politics of choice can unambiguously form part of a strategy for environmental reform as it does not adequately address the fundamental dilemmas that people face.

Phrenology in Nineteenth-Century Ireland

Phrenology in Nineteenth-Century Ireland Enda Leaney National University of Ireland, Galway As the discipline of the history of science in Ireland has evolved, scholars have become increasingly concerned with the role science played in civic society. One consequence of this new concern has been an historiographical movement away from histories of elite scientific institutions and the biographies of eminent Irish men and women of science, and toward more thematic discussions of how the Irish public engaged with science on an educational, cultural, and recreational level. 1 The nineteenth century has proven to be an especially attractive ground for such investigations. It was an era when a public culture of science was created in many European countries, as scientists demanded a greater role in educational, economic, and social issues. 2 Ireland was no different; by the mid-nineteenth century, science was fully integrated into the cultural life of Irish polite society. 3 Recently, there has been a greater appreciation of the polymathic tenor of culture in Victorian Ireland, which has recognized the importance [End Page 24] of scientific knowledge—or at least, an affectation toward it—as a cultural signifier of sophistication and modernity. 4 The cult of science was fetishized by such extravagant public celebrations of science as the British Association for the Advancement of Science's (BAAS) visits to Cork, Dublin, and Belfast and the Dublin International Exhibition of 1853. 5 The creation of a public culture of science was predicated on a number of conditions. Two of the most important were the creation of venues for scientific audiences, and the simultaneous creation of a corps of scientific lecturers and demonstrators to entertain them. The rapid expansion of literary and scientific societies throughout rural and urban Ireland in the early decades of the century, which in turn attracted itinerant lecturers from the elite metropolitan scientific societies of Britain and Ireland, helped to fulfil these conditions. 6 Periodicals dedicated to the diffusion of useful knowledge included the Dublin Penny Journal, the Belfast Monthly Magazine, the Dublin Literary Journal and Select Family Advertiser, and the Kilrush Magazine and Monthly Journal of Literature and Useful Information, and expanded the audience for science beyond the restricted constituencies of the specialist societies. 7 By the mid-nineteenth century, scientific lectures, exhibitions, and conversaziones were commonplace throughout rural Ireland. 8 However, most scholarly examinations of the social and cultural role of science in Irish civic society has been restricted to the orthodox sciences. Irish scholars have neglected such marginal sciences as phrenology and mesmerism. Though such pursuits would necessarily be omitted from normative or celebratory [End Page 25] accounts of the history of science or medicine, it remains a fact—well noted by British historians of science—that phrenology was much more than a nineteenth-century parlor entertainment practiced by charlatans and embraced by dilettantes. Phrenology was undoubtedly the most popular science in nineteenth-century Britain. As such, it was a significant medium for popularizing naturalistic accounts of both nature and society. Phrenology had widespread appeal across a road spectrum of British society, from gutter-press radicals to the "chattering classes" of St. John's Wood. 9 As the organization of science in nineteenth-century Ireland largely mirrored British trends, it is unsurprising that phrenology would find advocates in Ireland. Examining the role of phrenology in Irish society is therefore especially useful in helping us delineate the creation of a public culture of science in Irish civic society—for the crucial reason that phrenology was deemed an unorthodox pursuit. The arbiters of scientific orthodoxy in Ireland, such as Trinity College Dublin, the Royal Dublin Society, and, after 1853, the department of science and art, dismissed the legitimacy of phrenology and thereby ensured that it remained a marginal pursuit. Denied a forum in the most powerful and respectable arenas for the public dissemination of scientific culture in Ireland, phrenology was taken up by a private, scientific subculture. Without the patronage of the scientific establishment, phrenology relied upon the public energies of private citizens to expand...

General practice in Ireland: are we equipped to manage mental health?

General practice plays a key role in the detection, assessment and treatment of mental health problems in Ireland. A recent report indicated that 25% of patients attending their general practitioner (GP) had a mental health problem and over 95% of these problems were dealt with in primary care.1 Additionally, urban Ireland has been found to have the highest prevalence of depressive disorder in Europe.2 The World Health Organisation is predicting that by 2020 depression will constitute the second most burdensome health problem after coronary heart disease.3 However, there has been insufficient research in Ireland to look at how primary care is coping with this growing problem. Research in other countries has consistently shown that general practice is not adequately equipped to deal with the burden of mental health problems. In particular, it is estimated that half of the patients presenting with depressive symptoms are missed on their first consultation.4;5 Of those, some will spontaneously improve and others will be detected later, but even at three-year follow up 18% remained undetected.6 Even in those detected, management in general practice may be inadequate with subsequent poor outcomes.7 GPs have, in the past, been shown to prescribe inadequate doses of antidepressants and, more recently, been advised to prescribe fewer antidepressants in mild depression.8 It is not surprising that GPs may be feeling bruised over criticism of their management of mental health problems. The question then arises as to how this situation can be improved. The research evidence is not encouraging. The routine administration and feedback of simple questionnaires measuring depression or quality of life has no impact on the recognition, management, or outcome of depression in nonspecialist settings. Detection rates of depression can be increased when a practice nurse or administrative assistant deliver and score a questionnaire and feed back positive results. However, there is no evidence that this actually influences clinical practice or clinical outcome.9 Simple educational strategies to improve the recognition and management of depression by general practitioners, when given alone, have minimal impact on clinical practice and the outcome of depression.9 Psychiatric placements for GP trainees may also fail to meet the needs of GPs.10 The lengthy psychiatric interviews used in hospitals do not translate easily into ten-minute GP appointments. In addition and probably most importantly, the types of mental health problems seen in hospital psychiatry are largely different from those seen in the community. Ireland has particular issues that contribute towards the deficiencies in the management of mental health problems in general practice. There is a clear lack of mental health capacity in the community. Many GPs do not have the knowledge or skills to deal with the common primary care mental health problems. In combination with the lack of a ‘primary care team’ with easy access to primary care based counseling, psychology, social work, psychotherapy and cognitive behavioural therapy, this has contributed towards a medicalisation of mental health problems. There is also inequitable access to counseling and psychological therapies, with GMS patients needing referral to psychiatry for these services. The subsequent stigmatization of patients with a mental health problem in being referred to psychiatry discourages further referrals. The discrepancies between hospital-based psychiatry and general practice mental health problems have led to attitudinal problems in the way GPs and psychiatrists view each other and consequently hindered shared learning and working practices. Poor communication about patients between psychiatric services and general practice and the difficulty experienced by GPs in referring patients due to sectorisation of psychiatric services have further contributed to a service that does not provide optimal care for the patient. There is further evidence that simple information is not readily accessible to GPs concerning mental health services such as voluntary agencies and self help groups. In spite of all this, primary care is ideally situated for the prevention, detection and management of the majority of mental health problems. It is clear that the improvement of the management of mental health problems in general practice is similar to other chronic disease management and is complex. Provision of education and guidelines for GPs is necessary, but not enough. Practices must adopt active management strategies that continue contact with patients by monitoring treatment and patient status. Thus, responding promptly to patient concerns and need for treatment modification. There is a variety of strategies, ranging from quality improvement and case management to collaborative care and other complex models that improve patient outcomes. Integrated quality improvement programmes involving combinations of clinician and patient education, nurse case management, enhanced support from specialist psychiatric services, and monitoring of drug concordance have been shown to be clinically and cost effective in the shorter term, but this effect disappears in longer term follow-up. Simple telephone support, counseling, and medication monitoring

Questions on urban living

Concepts of space and urban theory are considered in the context of the dramatic growth in urban Ireland over the past fifteen years with a focus on the interrelated ideas of space, time and place. These are developed and explored in an interdisciplinary way with the view to illuminating the empirical research that follows. It is argued that the articulation of these concepts have very practical impacts on the lives of those living in towns and cities. This leads to a consideration of a case study of recent developments in Tower, a settlement approximately 8km from Cork. A detailed study of the perceptions and attitudes of the residents provides insights into the process of urbanisation and its impact on urban communities.

British Parliamentary Papers as a Window on Pre-Famine Urban Ireland, with Particular Reference to Drogheda

British Parliamentary Papers as a Window on Pre-Famine Urban Ireland, with Particular Reference to Drogheda

Historical geographies of a colonised world: The renegotiation of New English colonialism in early modern urban Ireland,c. 1600–10

Abstract Following the defeat of the Irish at the Battle of Kinsale (1601), the English Crown's authority prevailed over most of Ireland and the loyalty of colonial outposts such as Cork no longer needed to be buttressed significantly. This paper examines the geopolitical environment of early seventeenth‐century Ireland, by providing a case study of the renegotiation and strengthening of English colonial power from c. 1600–10 in an Irish urban space, namely the city of Cork. In examining the role of New English colonialism in forging the character of the early modem city of Cork from c. 1600–10, the wider military considerations related to New English imperial expansion at the time will be considered. A synthesis will also be provided of the resistance of the Cork citizens to the colonial strategies of the English Crown and Government in the early 1600s, as exemplified by the outbreak (and subsequent repression) of the ‘Recusant Revolt’ in 1603, when the citizens of the city refused to proclaim James I as...

Exclusionary protests in urban Ireland

This article examines those collective protests in urban Ireland that aim at excluding some categories of people from the local area. Travellers, drug-users, asylum-seekers, undesirable services such as rehabilitation clinics or community for mentally ill patients represent the main targets of actions by local residents. The distinctive feature of exclusionary protests are analysed in terms of the issues raised, the targets of the action, the participants and the resources which protestors can mobilize. It is argued that this kind of collective activity is not adequately understood in terms of a culturalist reading of the city. Exclusionary protests emerge only in the context of the social relations which structure city life.

“God Save Ireland”: Manchester-Martyr Demonstrations in Dublin, 1867–1916

On 23 November 1867 three Irishmen--William Philip Allen, Michael Larkin, and Michael O'Brien--were executed in Manchester, England. They had been found guilty of murdering a policeman during a successful attempt to rescue two Fenian prisoners from a police van in Manchester. Although the policeman had been killed with just one shot, allegedly by accident, five men were sentenced to death for the killing. Shortly afterward, one of them, Thomas Maguire, was pardoned, and another, Edward O'Meagher Condon, an Irish-American, was reprieved owing to insufficient evidence. As all five men had been tried together on the one indictment and convicted on the same verdict, many observers expected that the case against the other three men would also be dropped. When they were executed, many Irish nationalists believed that the government had refused to exercise mercy not because the men were unquestionably guilty, but in order to satisfy English public opinion, which expected that somebody would be punished for the crime. Much sympathy was also aroused among the Catholic community in Ireland because the three men, who were believed to be devout Catholics, did not receive a proper Christian burial, their bodies having been covered with quicklime in Salford jail. (1) The executions had an immediate impact on public opinion in Ireland. The Irish nationalist press expressed feelings of outrage. Many mock funeral processions were held across Ireland within days of the executions to commemorate the three men. (2) These men became popularly known as the martyrs. For over fifty years demonstrations were held to mark the anniversary of their execution. Thus far, however, little attention has been paid by historians to the Manchester-martyr commemorative demonstrations that were held after 1867. (3) These demonstrations were popular not only in Ireland but also throughout the Irish community in Britain and the US and could vary greatly in size and character, depending on the locality in which they took place. For example, in Britain the usual practice was simply to offer a mass for the souls of the martyrs on their anniversary. In the US commemorative concerts and lectures were often held to mark their anniversary. These events were most popular in those cities that had a large Irish population, such as New York and Chicago. In Irish country towns people often gathered by torchlight in a town square to hear a commemorative speech by a local politician. During the 1870s the Irish Republican Brotherhood (I.R.B.) usually organized the demonstrations in both rural and urban Ireland. After the formation of the Land League, however, many of the demonstrations in rural Ireland were organized by supporters of the constitutional nationalist movement. By contrast, the demonstrations in Dublin were remarkable for the extent to which control of the demonstrations lay more firmly in republican hands. For this reason they were of continued interest to the Dublin Metropolitan Police, which suspected that their success or failure was a rough guideline to the degree of influence that the I.R.B. exercised in the city. On 11 September 1867, six months after the abortive Fenian Rising in Ireland, the police in Manchester apprehended the acting Fenian leader Colonel Thomas J. Kelly and his associate Captain Timothy Deasy. Exactly one week later, as Kelly and Deasy were being transported in a prison van from court back to jail, they were rescued by a body of armed Fenians. During the rescue, depicted in this sketch, an English police sergeant named Charles Brett was killed when one of the rescuers fired a shot through the ventilator of the locked back door of the van. The shot fatally wounded Brett, though the intention was probably not to kill him but to frighten him into opening the door or to break open the lock. A woman prisoner inside the van then took the keys from the dying Brett and passed them out to the rescuers through the ventilator. …

The pattern of support networks among the community dwelling elderly in urban Ireland: variations with mental disorder

The pattern of support networks among the community dwelling elderly in urban Ireland: variations with mental disorder

The pattern of support networks among the community dwelling elderly in urban Ireland: variations with mental disorder

AbstractObjectives: The changing family and social patterns in modern society are likely to influence the availability of informal support for older people. The aims of this study were to determine the support network distribution of a community dwelling elderly population in Dublin, and of those with mental disorders (dementia, depression and anxiety).Methods: Interviews with 1,001 community dwelling older people using GMS-AGECAT. In addition, a support network assessment instrument was administered, which identifies five different support network types. The local integrated and wider community focused networks are characterised by extensive community involvement, family dependent networks by close family support, and the local self contained and private restricted networks by low levels of family and community involvement.Results: Of the elderly population, 83% had support networks characterised by close community and/or family involvement. Subjects with cognitive impairment had lower levels of informal support from the community, as indicated by a lower proportion of local integrated (44% v 63%) and a higher proportion of private restricted (6% v 12%) networks. Late life depression was also associated with decreased levels of community integration.Conclusions: The elderly in Dublin appear to have high levels of informal support. The extensive support may be a factor in the lower rates of depression found in Dublin than in London and New York. While the overall level of informal support available to older people with mental disorders in the community remains high, a proportion have low levels of family and community involvement and consequently their mental health problems may go unrecognised.

"You Have a Basket for the Bread, Just Put the Bloody Chicken in It"

"You Have a Basket for the Bread, Just Put the Bloody Chicken in It"

Hepatitis A in urban Ireland.

To determine the prevalence of immunity to hepatitis A virus (HAV) infection in urban Ireland and to categorize the region into low, intermediate or high HAV endemicity, and to analyse the significance of certain commonly associated risk factors. Two hundred and thirty three volunteers were recruited from 6 general practices in Dublin, Ireland. There were 44 volunteers in the 10 to 19 yr age group, 40 in the 20 to 29, 42 in the 30 to 39, 43 in the 40 to 49 and 64 in the over 50 age groups. Each participant completed a detailed questionnaire and was tested for anti-HAV total antibody (primarily IgG) using a competitive ELISA assay. Urban Ireland was classified into the appropriate area of HAV endemicity according to the prevalence of immunity by age group. Risk factor differences were analysed for significance using the chi square test and Fisher's exact test. One hundred and fifty seven (67 per cent) volunteers were immune, of whom 20 (45 per cent) were in the 10 to 19 yr age group, 17 (43 per cent) in the 20 to 29, 30 (71 per cent) in the 30 to 39, 34 (79 per cent) in the 40 to 49 and 59 (92 per cent) in the over 50 age groups. Fifty-five per cent of the individuals studied below the age of 20 yr were non-immune. The immune rates over the age of 30 were significantly greater (p < 0.01) than those in the 10 to 29 age groups. Socioeconomic pattern in the total and 10 to 19 yr age group was a significant (p < 0.0002, p < 0.004 respectively) risk factor for infection. This study concludes that urban Ireland is an area of low HAV endemicity with age and socioeconomic status as the significant influences on seropositivity. This survey provides an insight into the changing epidemiology of HAV infection in Ireland and serves as a guide for immunisation of at risk population groups.

Fertility control early in marriage in Ireland a century ago

Data were extracted from the 1911 Irish manuscript census to study the regional variation in the extent and character of family limitation strategies in Ireland a century ago. Regression analysis of the data shows evidence of ‘spacing’ in both urban and rural Ireland. Further analysis of the so-called child ‘replacement’ problem also produces results consistent with ‘spacing’.

Community factors influencing psychiatric hospital utilization in rural and urban Ireland.

The role of community factors in psychiatric hospital utilization in rural and urban Ireland was evaluated using Hollingshead & Redlich's conceptual model. Rural and urban differences in identification of psychiatric disorders, attitude to psychiatric facilities and social isolation were assessed using a community survey (N = 200). No difference was found in the recognition of schizophrenic behavior. Rural residents tended to normalize neurotic behavior and significantly fewer recognized it as deviant. The two communities did not differ in the identification of alcoholism or neuroses as mental illness. Rural individuals had a more negative attitude to psychiatric facilities, and sought help more frequently from relatives who were less accessible than their urban counterparts.

Primary-Group Differentiation in Urban Ireland

This research attempts to replicate and extend the work of Litwak and Szelyeni on primary group structures in Hungary and the United States. Their findings indicated that proximity of kin and occupation affected primary-group relationships. Employing data drawn from interviews with 686 Irish women, we generally confirmed their findings; however, by means of a step-wise regression procedure we were able to show that occupational prestige was negatively correlated with kin usage in our three time-demand situations because of its association with low fertility in respondent's families of orientation and higher rates of geographic mobility.