Showing posts with label Ireland. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Ireland. Show all posts
Sunday, July 31, 2011
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
I don't *heart* St Patrick's day
I loathe the green beer binge drinking version of St Patrick's day that afflicts us ever year. My father's family is of Irish descent and their story is fairly typical: part of the wave of immigrants in the mid to late 19th century (when about a third of immigrants to the U.S. were from Ireland), settled in New York and eventually ended up as police and firefighters, except for my grandfather, who became a dentist. He and his wife had social pretentions that some would label "lace curtain" Irish.
Both of my parents fled their East Coast ethnic enclaves when they left New York and moved to San Francisco. As a result, I didn't grow up in contact with any relatives or a community--we moved often. But certain Irish and Italian gestures, ways of thinking and acting, were handed on as an invisible legacy. One element that was most openly Irish was the music. Songs that told stories fascinated me, as did Tommy Makem's thrilling vibrato.
The Irish republican songs (no, not like U.S. Republican, more like Up the IRA="freedom fighters" throw-out-the-British) influenced my later studies of colonialism as the case of AngloNorman/English/British colonization of Ireland (800 years) and the "troubles" in Northern Ireland stood out as a particularly painful and intractable situation.
Irish independence is still new. The oral history of Robert Emmet's 1803 speech from the dock is still a living memory. In this press conference on the Ken Loach film The Wind That Shakes The Barley the actors tell how they grew up with the echoes and the presence of the struggle for independence earlier in the century; the Black and Tans burned Cork City in December 1920. This conflict continues to be played out in our days in the six counties in the North that are still part of the U.K. Since the 1997 Good Friday agreements, a difficult but growing consensus for peaceful negotiations and co-government has emerged. The most recent act of violence has been roundly condemned by Gerry Adams and Sinn Fein, both in Northern Ireland and in the U.S. havens formerly nostalgic for a romantic nationalism (such as Boston), maintaining the policy of renouncing violence as a means to political ends. The 1997 film The Boxer by Jim Sheridan shows how hard it is for and embattled people to give up the myths and structures that have enabled their very survival and resistance and yet how necessary it is that they do so. Part of me hates to see this complex and compelling history reduced to an excuse to get as drunk as possible. But I also want to steer clear of what the Irish call being a "Plastic Paddy" so if we must celebrate inebriation, here are some great Irish drinking songs! My very favorite is Johnny McEldoo because it is also about food.
Tommy Makem and the Clancy Brothers "Whiskey You're the Devil"
The Pogues, "Streams of Whiskey"
"
Ronnie Drew of The Dubliners talks with the Clancy Brothers and
singing one of those grimly funny songs that fascinated me when I was a kid.
Both of my parents fled their East Coast ethnic enclaves when they left New York and moved to San Francisco. As a result, I didn't grow up in contact with any relatives or a community--we moved often. But certain Irish and Italian gestures, ways of thinking and acting, were handed on as an invisible legacy. One element that was most openly Irish was the music. Songs that told stories fascinated me, as did Tommy Makem's thrilling vibrato.
The Irish republican songs (no, not like U.S. Republican, more like Up the IRA="freedom fighters" throw-out-the-British) influenced my later studies of colonialism as the case of AngloNorman/English/British colonization of Ireland (800 years) and the "troubles" in Northern Ireland stood out as a particularly painful and intractable situation.
Irish independence is still new. The oral history of Robert Emmet's 1803 speech from the dock is still a living memory. In this press conference on the Ken Loach film The Wind That Shakes The Barley the actors tell how they grew up with the echoes and the presence of the struggle for independence earlier in the century; the Black and Tans burned Cork City in December 1920. This conflict continues to be played out in our days in the six counties in the North that are still part of the U.K. Since the 1997 Good Friday agreements, a difficult but growing consensus for peaceful negotiations and co-government has emerged. The most recent act of violence has been roundly condemned by Gerry Adams and Sinn Fein, both in Northern Ireland and in the U.S. havens formerly nostalgic for a romantic nationalism (such as Boston), maintaining the policy of renouncing violence as a means to political ends. The 1997 film The Boxer by Jim Sheridan shows how hard it is for and embattled people to give up the myths and structures that have enabled their very survival and resistance and yet how necessary it is that they do so. Part of me hates to see this complex and compelling history reduced to an excuse to get as drunk as possible. But I also want to steer clear of what the Irish call being a "Plastic Paddy" so if we must celebrate inebriation, here are some great Irish drinking songs! My very favorite is Johnny McEldoo because it is also about food.
Tommy Makem and the Clancy Brothers "Whiskey You're the Devil"
The Pogues, "Streams of Whiskey"
"
Ronnie Drew of The Dubliners talks with the Clancy Brothers and
singing one of those grimly funny songs that fascinated me when I was a kid.
Thursday, March 13, 2008
Bound for California!
When I was a kid, I'd listen to my parents' records of the Clancy Brother and Tommy Makem, over and over. One of my favorites was The Rising of the Moon. YouTube is amazing: here is some film footage and stills the 1916 Easter Rising in Dublin Rising ,although the ballad itself is about an earlier rebellion, in 1798. But as well as their republican songs, I loved their sea shanties and songs about sailing: emigration, whaling, "bound for California"!
I clearly remember the chorus of one song as "Heave away, haul away, we're bound for California." But when I went to look for it, I find that it's really "bound for South Australia!" Huh? a good example of a Mondegreen.
Maybe there's another version floating around there with California in it, but here it is: I'm bound for California for the next little while.
I clearly remember the chorus of one song as "Heave away, haul away, we're bound for California." But when I went to look for it, I find that it's really "bound for South Australia!" Huh? a good example of a Mondegreen.
Maybe there's another version floating around there with California in it, but here it is: I'm bound for California for the next little while.
Thursday, February 28, 2008
Sunday, January 20, 2008
Leaving Cork
I return to Minneapolis today, accompanied by my new friend Mr. Belly. Four weeks of holiday feasting will do that to you. I enjoyed every minute of it. It's about 4:45 Am and I'm about to wait for a shuttle to the airport. Then it's Cork city-Amsterday, wait wait wait wait, then Amsterdam Minneapolis. Somewhere in the air I will live those seven hours difference in time zone, so even though I return ths evening, I'm rather sure my eyes will be spinning in my head. I must ransom my car from airport parking (a story, that one) and return to salute my furry friend, whose fur will have been deposited in a fine layer over every surface in my house.
Tomorrow is teaching day, so vaccuuming will probably have to wait. The conference was a total blast. I had such a good time, and feel refreshed and inspired.At the last minute I was able to join some folks on a little excursion to Blarney Castle, set in lovely grounds, and semi-ruined. yes, I kissed the Blarney Stone, not that I needed to, but hey. It was surprisingly scary! But I also saw snowdrops, daffodils, and azaleas, along with a huge Cedar tree. I cannot wait to return to Ireland. Our hosts Nuala and Jane were fantastic. I have eaten enough scones to last a lifetime.
Tomorrow is teaching day, so vaccuuming will probably have to wait. The conference was a total blast. I had such a good time, and feel refreshed and inspired.At the last minute I was able to join some folks on a little excursion to Blarney Castle, set in lovely grounds, and semi-ruined. yes, I kissed the Blarney Stone, not that I needed to, but hey. It was surprisingly scary! But I also saw snowdrops, daffodils, and azaleas, along with a huge Cedar tree. I cannot wait to return to Ireland. Our hosts Nuala and Jane were fantastic. I have eaten enough scones to last a lifetime.
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