Current News
The online primary and secondary source database is now active. IUSS researchers have completed an updated and revised database of primary source material relevant to the study of Ulster Scots History, Literature, Migration and identity. Our intention was that this database along with the updated secondary bibliography which will provide an extensive catalogue of source material for researchers and scholars of Ulster and Scottish history as well as for the study of Ulster Scots migration and diaspora. The material, which has been re-categorised has been uploaded and can be viewed by clicking bibliography on the left hand-side menu. To complete a key word search in each section press ctrl and f - from there enter a keyword search. The research team will continue to update the database will further material. Word files will be added to each section allowing users to download material in a printer-friendly format.
View the online bibliography: http://www.arts.ulster.ac.uk/ulsterscots/research/biblio.html
Flight of the Earls
The Flight of the Earls is a bi-lingual collection of essays produced as a result of the international conference held by the Institute of Ulster Scots Studies and Donegal County Council in the Letterkenny Institute of Technology, Donegal, during August 2007 and is due for publication this spring.
This English/Irish volume edited by Dr Dr Éamonn Ó Ciarda (University of Ulster), Dr David Finnegan (Goldsmith’s, London) and Ms Marie-Claire Harrigan (University of Ulster) has thirty-two contributors, a ‘who’s who’ of early modern Irish history and literature (including scholars from the Univ. of Connecticut, CUNY, Discovery Programme, Edinburgh, Howard Community College, King's College, London, LCCC, Liverpool Hope, Notre Dame, NUI, Galway, NUI, Maynooth, St. Columb’s, St Patrick’s Drumcondra, Strathclyde, Trinity College Dublin, Thornhill, University College Dublin and Ulster). This will be a signature bilingual publication on a watershed event in Irish History and a major teaching and research tool.
The book will be available for purchase here: http://www.ghpress.com/
Recent Events
Atlantic Gateway
The tenth book in the IUSS Ulster and Scotland series, Atlantic Gateway, was officially launched on 26th November at the Magee Campus, University of Ulster. The book by Professor Robert Gavin, Professor Dolores O'Reilly and adjunct IUSS staff member Dr William Kelly examines the significant role played by the port and city of Londonderry since 1700. Dr Kelly noted at the launch, 'As Simon Schama remarked in his History of Britain, "history should never be confused with nostalgia, it is written not to revere the dead but to instruct the living". In a very profoud sense therefore, history is as much, if not more about the future than it is about the past.' The book was published by Four Courts Press with financial assistance from the Londonderry Port and Harbour Commissioners, The Honourable The Irish Society, Derry City Council, The University of Ulster and the Institute of Ulster Scots Studies.
It is available for purchase along with other IUSS sponsored texts from Four Courts Press:
www.fourcourtspress.ie/subcategory.php?intSubCategoryID=34
“From Ulster to New Zealand - and back”
Associate member of the IUSS Professor Brad Patterson from Victoria University of Wellington visited the Magee Campus on 9th & 10th November as a guest of the IUSS. During his visit Professor Patterson presented a paper entitled “From Ulster to New Zealand - and back”. Professor Patterson's research interests are the Irish and Scottish Diasporas. Recent publications include an edited volume Sport, Society and Culture in New Zealand (1999) and The Irish in New Zealand: Historical Contexts and Perspectives (2002) and most recently edited, Ulster-New Zealand Migration and Cultural transfers (2006).
The Ulster-Scots Diaspora writing in America Conference, University of Ulster, Magee
23-24th October, 2009
The Institute of Ulster Scot Studies recently hosted a conference entitled ‘The Ulster-Scots Diaspora writing in America’. The event was held over two days with the second day being held in the newly-opened Ulster-Scots heritage centre in Monreagh, County Donegal. Speakers included Richard MacMaster, Carol Baraniuk, Brian Lambkin, Andrew Holmes, Johanne Trew, William Roulston, Eull Dunlop, Alister McReynolds, Frank Carey and Frank Ferguson.
Event organiser Frank Ferguson said: “Ulster Scots emigrants and their descendants have created an exceptional archive of texts that tell many stories about Ulster and America. This conference brought these various narratives to light and demonstrated how interwoven Ulster Scots culture has become with mainstream American literature and history.
"From Professor’s Tobin’s keynote paper, which began the conference, to the launch of Professor Richard MacMaster’s new book Scotch-Irish Merchants in Colonial America, that concluded it, the proceedings demonstrated the new and exciting scholarship that the Institute of Ulster Scots Studies is propagating at Magee.”
Commemorating the Plantation
Plantation and Reaction: The 1641 Rebellion Trinity College, Dublin, 23-25th October, 2009
The third and final conference in a series of planned events commemorating the 400th anniversary of the Plantation of Ulster took place on 23-25th October in Dublin. The conference began with a keynote address by Professor Aidan Clarke on the 1641 Depositions project currently ongoing in Trinity College Dublin. More than 300 people attended the address given at Dublin Castle where the event was officially launched by Councillor Dermot Lacey, Deputy Mayor of Dublin, Professor John Hegarty, Provost of Trinity College and Professor John Morrill, University of Cambridge. In his address, Professor Clarke noted that the ‘selective use of history’ had skewed understanding of the causes and consequences of the rebellion but that contemporary use of source material like the depositions have and will continue to enlighten and determine how the alleged massacres are perceived and understood. Speakers at the conference included Professor William Smyth (UCC), Dr David Edwards (UCC), Professor Nicholas Canny (NUI Galway), Dr Phil Withington (Cambridge), Professor Ronald Asch (University of Freburg), Professor Peter Wilson (Hull), Dr Igor Perez Tostado, Professor Karen Kupperman (NY), Professor Judith Pollman (University of Leiden) and Professor Andy Wood (University of East Anglia). The conference, which was in association with the IUSS marked the end to the series of three events over this year including two earlier conferences on the Plantation in Goldsmiths College, London and University of Ulster, Magee. Projects within the IUSS continue to examine and analyse the use of the depositions from linguistic, historical and political dimensions.
The other conferences in the The Plantation of Ulster 1609-2009: A laboratory for Empire series included:
The Plantation of Ulster: Politics, Economics and Cultural Contexts, London, 25-26 June, 2009 (in association with Goldsmith’s University)
The Plantation of Ulster: The Politics, socio-economic and cultural impact, UU Magee, Derry/Londonderry, 3-5 July, 2009
Ulster American Heritage Symposium, 26th June 2008 Centre for Migration Studies, Ulster American Folk Park, Omagh, Co. Tyrone.
The Institute of Ulster Scots Studies (IUSS) at the University of Ulster is a key player in the Atlantic Arc Network, a new research partnership to facilitate research co-operation and the use of archives among institutes in Canada, USA and Europe. A special conference was held on 25th-28th June 2008 for the Atlantic Arc Network as part of the Ulster American Heritage Symposium. The event was hosted by the IUSS and Four Courts Press and took place at the conference panel and a plenary session by the New Brunswick partners from the Provincial Archives and the University of St. Thomas. This was followed by a reception and book launch of David A. Wilson's The Orange Order in Canada (Four Courts, 2007) hosted by the IUSS and Four Courts Press.
The Institute of Ulster Scots Studies and Guelph University Canada are co-hosted a conference 'Tourism and Cultural Exchange in Ulster and Scotland: Historical Perspectives' on the 28th June 2008 at the Tower Museum Londonderry. The conference looked at the long established historic links between the two countries in terms of tourism and cultural exchanges. There were 14 guest speakers from Canada and Scotland, as well as a local audience including Provost Pro-Vice Chancellor, Professor James Allen, council members and local universities and colleges.
Ulster Scots Writing: An Anthology edited by Frank Ferguson (Four Courts Press, 2008)
This groundbreaking anthology is the first major collection to chart the impact of Scottish influences upon Ulster writing. The proximity of the province of Ulster to Scotland has resulted in lively confluence of people, ideas and cultures for many centuries. This has been recorded in an abundance of texts that express Ulster's complex and dynamic relationship with Scotland.
Ulster-Scots Literature, An Anthology charts the breadth and diversity of Scottish influences upon Ulster writing from the seventeenth century to the present day. For the first time, this is explored through literary prose, poetry and drama and a number of other important genres: philosophy, political and polemical texts, sermons, historiography, autobiographies and folk writings. The collection records how familiar and less well-known Ulster writers negotiate Scottish inheritances in their work. As well as introducing readers to significant works, the anthology will offer fully annotated texts with biographical notices of each author. The book is aimed at all those interested in the cultural, linguistic and literary history of Ulster. It is an invaluable resource for students and researchers as well as the casual reader who wishes to learn more about Ulster's Scottish dimension. It provides a timely contribution to debates on Ulster-Scots language, identity and heritage and celebrates a significant literary tradition.