the house of the irish
October 5, 2009 § Leave a comment
i submitted a book proposal to mcgill-queens university press the other week. i mailed it out monday, i got an email response on thursday. i was astounded canada post could get something somewhere that fast, even if the proposal travelled no more than 3.5km from pointe-saint-charles to mcgill. anyway, mqup liked what they read. they are interested in publishing the book, once it becomes a book.
so now, i am beginning to ponder how to turn “the house of the irish”, the dissertation, into the house of the irish, the book. i am cutting out the first substantive chapter, on the shamrock lacrosse club. that will become an article or two. and i am extending a chapter on nations and nationalism in griffintown, c. 1900-17 to at least 1922, with the establishment of the irish free state. part of my argument is that once ireland gained something approximating independence, even if the north was left out (or, more properly stated, opted out), the irish of the diaspora more or less lost interest in ireland, at least that was, i think, the situation in montréal. ireland was already an imagined nation by the early 20th century on account of there being hardly any irish-born irish in montréal by this time, immigration having dried up shortly after the famine. but after the free state was established, the irish here turned even more inwards. so that’s the first major revision or expansion.
the other is to correct the methodological issues in the last two chapters of the dissertation, which is too much reliance on the same set of sources. to correct this, i am going to engage in some oral history. but i am back to the same problem i had with the dissertation in a sense here. i am not interested in talking to the professional griffintowners, the don pidgeons and denis delaneys of the world. their thoughts and opinions on the griff are very well known, they are part of the commemorative process amongst the griffintown diaspora. i want to talk to people who didn’t necessarily think that they grew up in shangri-la. the ones who have an alternative view of the griff, or at least a more critical one. one former griffintowner in burman’s film said something like it was a shame to see the griff go, as they had it all. oh really? despite the poverty, unemployment, insecurity of tenure, etc.? of course, this is partly nostalgia, partly a child’s view of life in the 1940s. but i want to talk to people who have a more critical memory.
and that’s the hard part. where do i find these people? they’re not the ones at all the various griff gatherings. i have a few ideas, one of which is to make use of the parish of saint-gabriel, the historically irish church in the pointe (in fact, almost next door to us here). i recognise old griffintowners standing outside of saint-gabriel’s every sunday morning, so i’m hoping i can start there, talk to a few of them, get references to their friends, and so on.
either way, i am excited about this, i’m excited to turn this story of griffintown into a book. i think this is a story that has wider implications, not just for montréal, but for the irish diaspora, and even as an example of the acculturation of an ethnic group in a major metropolitan centre in north america.
as my favourite soccer blogger used to say at the end of each post: onwards!
The Melting Pot of Diasporas
March 26, 2009 § 2 Comments
So, with PhD in hand, I have begun to think about new research projects. One in particular that I am interested in is the plight of diasporas in large, multi-ethnic urban centres in North America. This one came to me in the Mile End of Montréal, today the home of hipsters, artists, and musicians. Indeed, damn near every Montréal band of recent vintage hails from the Mile End: The Arcade Fire, Stars, Patrick Watson, and so on and so forth. Anyway, we were in St. Viateur Bagels, buying bagels, then we planned to head over to Open Da’ Night, the legendary local Italian café, for the best caffé latté in North America. As we made our way along the street, we passed a Greek restaurant, whilst all around the hipsters and pretentiarati, Hasidic Jews made their way to and from synagogue and business. Me, I’m an Irish-Canadian. And, yeah, so, big deal. That’s urban life. But it’s more than that, it’s urban space, it’s identity, and it’s place. How do diasporas mix in the city in North America? How do Hasidic Jews in Montréal maintain their distinct, separate identity in the midst of this urban chaos? What has become of the old Portuguese, Greek, and Italian immigrants of the Mile End? What does it mean to speak the English language in Montréal? Charles Boberg, a linguist at McGill, has postulated that we speak a distinct idiom of English here, influenced as it is by the obvious source: French, but also by words and diction from the diasporic peoples of the city, especially Greeks and Italians. Me, I think about accents in the city, about the different French accents (they vary according to class, location in the city, location in Québec), how the Irish of Verdun speak so differently from the Anglos of Westmount, and the variations of Italian-, Greek-, Portuguese- Montrealers. And what about the cultures? Montréal is famous for, amongst other things, smoked meat, bagels, and poutine. The first two are Jewish delicacies, the last, québécois.
What about music? First there’s the case of the legendary québécois chanteuse, La Bolduc. La Bolduc was born Mary Travers in the Gaspésie in 1894, the daughter of an Irishman and québécois mother. Her music was largely comprised of traditional Irish jigs and reels, over which she sang in québécois French. Today, one of the most popular québécois bands is Les Cowboys Fringants, who play an acoustic, traditional-based rock, and by traditional, I mean québécois. And yet, many of the jigs and reels of the Fringnants’ music are Irish-based.
Indeed, so Irish are Les Cowboys that every time I listen to them, I sometimes forget that they’re québécois, they sound like an acoustic version of the Irish-American “punk” band, Flogging Molly. “Punk” is in quotations because Flogging Molly are more Irish than punk, their punk energy comes from the fast-paced nature of their Irish ditties. Indeed, they’re not unlike Les Cowboys in that sense. At any rate, Flogging Molly originated in Los Angeles, a city not particularly well-known for its Irish diaspora, but very well known for its punk rock.
All of this is still in its infancy, but it is something that I think about as I make my way to and from work, as I interact with my students, and listen to the conversations of the city. As I develop these ideas, watch this space, and the Complex Terrain Laboratory.
Matthew Barlow 