Ireland, Masculinity and Popular Culture 1990-2010

Huston School of Film and Digital Media
NUI Galway, September 23-25th 2011

Keynote Speaker: Prof Diane Negra (UCD)

1990 was a watershed year in contemporary Irish history for several reasons, but perhaps the most resonant was the election of Mary Robinson, feminist, activist and lawyer, to the position of Irish President, a position previously reserved as a retiring ground for elderly male politicians A new and exciting phase of Irish history was suddenly in the offing and Robinson’s inclusive vision of Ireland looked beyond earlier understandings of the state to give a central importance to the women of Ireland and those forgotten by generations of emigration; the Irish Diaspora. Slowly but incrementally over the following two decades the patriarchal authority of Irish political and religious structures collapsed. During this period Irish popular culture generated a variety of masculinities across genres and forms. In fiction and theatre - the stage and screen plays of Conor McPherson, Martin McDonagh and Mark O’Rowe; the soft masculinity of Louise Walsh’s boybands – Boyzone, Westlife, Jedward; the cinema of the Celtic Tiger; Irish TV drama - Bachelor’s Walk, Pure Mule, Love/Hate; national sporting moments circulating around male sports stars and teams. As traditional roles models and models of male authority gradually eroded and Ireland became a more multicultural environment, popular culture assumed an ever-increasing centrality in exploring tensions in Irish manhood.

We invite papers and panels exploring manhood in Irish popular culture – sport, film and television, theatre and fiction, music and media - for a conference to take place at NUI Galway September 23-25th 2011. Proposals of 300-500 words should be sent to tony.tracy@nuigalway.ie

Date for submission is June 6th 2011.