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NEWS REVIEW 2000

IRISH CENTRE FOR MIGRATION STUDIES/IONAD NA hIMIRCE

VOLUME 1, NUMBER 1

CONTENTS

OBITUARY: OUR FOUNDING PATRON, JIM DEVERE

A message from our Chairperson
A Millennium of Migration
Why have an Irish Centre for Migration Studies?
Breaking the Silence - an on-line oral archive
The North-South Dimension
Teaching Activities and other Current Research Priorities and Projects
On-line Developments
International Contacts
The Resource Centre
Governing Board
Our core staff
Visiting Students
Holly Boyington, George Mitchell Visiting Fellow
Ariane Liazos, Fulbright Visiting Fellow
Ciaran Dooly: the Centre's Web Guru
What's in store for 2000
Can you help us?
Contact us

A MESSAGE FROM OUR CHAIRPERSON

Professor W.J. Smyth
Chairperson
ICMS

It gives me great pleasure to welcome readers to the ICMS News Review. Through it, we hope to keep you informed of the work of the Centre.

Since our first major event, the very successful Scattering conference in 1997, the Centre has developed projects and activities in several fields. Overall, as set out below (see Why have an Irish Centre for Migration Studies) we aim to strike a balance between the exploration of Ireland's powerful historical experience of migration and the rapidly changing contemporary scene, using a variety of academic and aesthetic perspectives and employing the lastest technologies to communicate our message.

On the historical front, we recognise that the history of the Irish Diaspora has not always paid sufficient attention to its geography. In other words, the global nature and sheer geographical breadth of Irish migration has not been fully appreciated, probably because of an understandable emphasis on the specificity of local studies of migration and because of the dominance of (very fine) US scholarship in this field. We aim to develop a comparative perspective on the global Irish experience of migration, comparing and contrasting the relative success of the Irish and their descendants in different places, at different periods and in different social contexts. The first major publication to emerge from the work of the Centre The Irish Diaspora: A Global Perspective is informed by this approach.

We have been fortunate enough to receive three-year funding for an internet-based oral archive, which we see as a first step in the construction of a collaborative database of the Irish in Ireland and world-wide. We have a particular interest in the 1950s, a neglected decade.

In the contemporary area, a rapidly changing Ireland is now experiencing substantial immigration – something which was scarcely imaginable a generation ago. We are running a number of projects in this area, including a survey of foreign immigrants working in Ireland, a school information pack on immigration and racism (funded by the Ireland Fund) and a policy paper (jointly with the Social Science Research Centre, University College Dublin) on regional arrangements for asylum seekers.

Behind the scenes, on-line projects are a core element of our work. The website now hosts substantial internet resources on Irish migration issues, with a particular emphasis on immigration and asylum issues, teaching resources, document databases and a regularly-updated press digest. Other activities include publications, seminars and conferences, while we are also focusing on networking with partner institutions within Ireland and abroad. The Centre's resource room is now in operation and we are gradually adding a wide range of  primary and secondary documentation.

Migration issues are very much in the news at present here in Ireland. The Centre has an active role in media presentations and policy debates; an example is the recently completed major television documentary on the Irish world-wide past and present, The Irish Empire, for which the Centre's Director, Piaras Mac Éinrí, was a consultant.

We welcome opportunities to build new links, especially with universities, research centres and community-based institutes in any country which has received or sent migrants to or from Ireland or where there is an interest in international comparative migration studies.

We have been fortunate to welcome a number of visiting students, including Fulbright scholar Ms Ariane Liazos from Swarthmore last year and one of the first holders of the George Mitchell Peace Scholarship, Ms Holly Boyington of the University of Maine, this year.

In recent weeks we suffered the loss of the death of our Founding Patron, Jim Devere, who is profiled elsewhere in this newsletter. His generosity and foresight made possible the launching of the Centre in the first place. Although he had reached a ripe age, no-one who met Jim and had the good  fortune to experience his feisty character, lively, enquiring mind and extraordinary generosity of spirit could regard his passing as other than untimely. We extend our condolences to all who were close to him.

I would like to take this opportunity to wish all readers the compliments of the season. We would like to hear from you, wherever you live.

A MILLENNIUM OF MIGRATION

Piaras Mac Éinrí
Director

One thousand years ago, the Irish were on the high seas, travelling as far as Britain, continental Europe, Iceland and possibly even America. The tradition established then has continued in various forms and has been influenced by many events ever since. Thus, for instance, the eighteenth-century Irish were found in other parts of Europe, the Americas and world-wide, serving in other people's armies or trading across the ports of Atlantic Europe.

It was the aftermath of the Great Famine that set the final seal on the image of an emigrant people, driven away from their homeland by poverty, despair, oppression and lack of opportunity. For nearly 150 years after the Famine, the stream of outward migration continued, with new peaks as recently as the 1950s and the 1980s.

Against this background, and the deeply rooted attitudes which have grown out of such a long experience of migration and exile, it is difficult to grasp the magnitude of the change which has come over contemporary Ireland. The country now has the fastest-growing economy in the industrialised world. Unemployment has plummeted. Official projections actually indicate a severe shortage in the labour economy.

As recently as 1988/89, one of the bleakest years this century, 70,600 persons left Ireland. In 1998/99, a decade later, about 29,000 left, but 47,500 came here, the highest figure on record. 55% of these immigrants were returning Irish migrants but, increasingly, Ireland is experiencing significant in-migration by people with no Irish background. Further large-scale immigration - up to 200,000 will be needed in the next decade - is inevitable.

Apart from those foreign immigrants who are coming to live and work here and the many Irish emigrants who are returning home, Ireland's positive image in the developing world as well as its booming economy are also attracting asylum seekers fleeing their own homelands in other parts of Europe, Africa and further afield. In part this latter phenomenon reflects our new-found wealth but in part (contrary to those who claim that the country is now a 'soft touch' for 'illegal' immigrants - inflammatory and frequently ill-informed language has become the norm) it is because Ireland has received for almost the first time a very small number of the increasing flow of refugees and asylum seekers escaping from misery, war and famine, often brought about in the first place through the actions and policies of rich countries pursuing their own agendas. Irish people, more than most, should appreciate the piquancy of this situation: it is only ten years since our own Government lobbied the US administration to regularise the status of tens of thousands of Irish ‘illegal immigrants’ in the USA.

These changes pose challenges for a society which has traditionally seen itself as relatively homogenous. While relatively little overt racism has been expressed so far, there is not much recent experience in Ireland of dealing with difference and thus far we are not making a very good job of it. A dangerous vacuum in policy, attitudes and infrastructure has developed.

How can we address this challenge?

We can call upon a number of valuable resources.

In the first place, most other countries have long experience of the issues; we can learn from their successes and mistakes. We need a model of multiculturalism (or more correctly interculturalism) which respects difference, unlike the French, but which does not ghettoize the different, as has sometimes happened in the UK and the USA. We should study the classic examples such as Britain, France and the USA, but also some of those more innovative and experimental models, especially in countries that have not themselves been colonising empires. Canada and Australia come to mind, but we can learn from a range of European and African examples.

Secondly, the Irish themselves are a scattered world community. Wherever they have gone, they have been the 'other', although this has not always prevented them from oppressing those who were more 'other' than themselves. Even if some Irish sought to survive by 'becoming white', there has always been a powerful alternative current. This includes the Irish who have been involved in civil rights agitation in the USA, those who inter-married with people from other ethnic communities and those who, for religious and/or humanitarian reasons, have committed themselves personally and directly to working in majority world countries. Ireland now needs to listen to the voices and experiences of such people. This listening process should include approaches as diverse as those employed by the Irish Immigrant Center in Boston, which works in close collaboration with other migrant groups in the city, or Comhlámh in Ireland, which mobilises returned development workers with previous direct experience of cross-cultural contexts.

Finally, it is, of course, not true to say that Ireland has not received immigrants over the centuries. The seventeenth century, for instance, saw an inflow of immigrants - planters of English and Scottish stock - which was unparalleled elsewhere in Europe. The context may well have been one of oppression, political exclusion and enforced settlement. Moreover, the legacy of this unwished-for co-habitation led directly to the present-day troubles in Ireland. Yet, if the current peace process in Ireland is about anything, it is about living with difference. Indeed, developments as we go to press suggest that an historic shift in relations within Ireland may be in prospect, with a power-sharing arrangement between old foes and a new relationship between all communities on the island.

If we can deal with internal interculturalism, the external kind might not be such a major hurdle.

WHY HAVE AN IRISH CENTRE FOR MIGRATION STUDIES?

Emigration from Ireland has been high since the eighteenth century until recent times, with extremely heavy outward migration after the Great Famine in the eighteen forties and further waves this century, especially during the nineteen fifties and the nineteen eighties. This recurrent pattern has been accompanied by significant changes in the profile of those who migrate, their destinations and their experiences once there. At the same time, within the very recent past, a new phenomenon is to be seen, with the emergence of a stronger economy in Ireland and the arrival, for the first time in modern history, of significant numbers of return Irish migrants and first-time immigrants, including asylum seekers and refugees.

At the official level, emigration has traditionally been treated almost as a taboo subject within Ireland. The newly independent state did not seem to be able to solve it any more than the country's former British rulers could in their day. As an isolated society, cut off from modern twentieth century Europe in significant respects, the country proved unable or unwilling to address the issues caused by its biggest export: the young people of Ireland, most especially the disadvantaged young.

The study of the impact of migration on the sending society, and on migrants themselves, is not easily undertaken. The bulk of scholarly work has tended to be carried out in the receiving societies, since that is where the migrants are. Moreover, migration studies is in itself an ill-defined field, making it difficult to achieve a coherent academic focus.

The Irish Centre for Migration Studies (ICMS) is an inter-disciplinary research centre, working with relevant National University of Ireland, Cork academic departments and centres (Adult Education, Applied Psychology, Applied Social Studies, Economics, English, Geography, History, International Famine Centre, Law, Music, Sociology) as well as its national and international partners. It is committed to the provision of teaching, research, publications and on-line resources in Irish and comparative international migration studies, past and present.

The Centre is the only one of its kind in the State. It aims to address a substantial lacuna in the history of the Irish world-wide, while becoming a flagship project for the National University of Ireland, Cork. Its mission may be summarised as follows:

• The detailed historical reconstruction of the diversity of Irish emigration experiences

• The exploration of the meaning of the Irish emigrant experience both in the past and at present, using poetry, music, drama, dance and other art forms

• The development of databases in all aspects of Irish migration and the use of the latest technologies to provide access to such databases to a world-wide community

• The investigation of Irish emigration experiences and conditions in the late twentieth century in Europe, America and other parts of the world; the parallel investigation of the implications of the growing rate of immigration into Ireland for Irish identity, culture and society; the consideration of the policy implications of these various developments

• The Centre seeks to meet the needs of the Irish emigrant community worldwide by enabling Irish people in Ireland and in other countries to inform themselves about all aspects of the Irish emigrant experience.

BREAKING THE SILENCE - AN ON-LINE ORAL ARCHIVE

Dr Breda Gray
Irish Centre for Migration Studies

The aim of this project is to investigate the impact of emigration in the 1940’s and 1950’s on 'those who stayed at home'. Images of nineteenth century emigration dominate our symbolic and mythical landscape and distort our perceptions of twentieth century emigration. Emigration is primarily accounted for and understood through the stories and accounts of emigrants. This project aims to provide new perspectives to our understanding of Irish emigration in the twentieth century by recording the memories and accounts of Irish women and men who never left Ireland, but who experienced the emigration of friends and family. Their decision to stay, in the context of large numbers leaving, will offer insights into the structure and culture of a society marked by emigration.

We will talk to 200 people in Ireland, north and south, who remember the experience of staying in Ireland while many of their contemporaries were leaving. The idea is to capture the living memories of this generation while they are still available to us.

The 1940s are remembered more for the war (or 'the Emergency', as it was called in neutral Ireland) than for the many emigrants leaving Ireland during that decade. Yet, between 1940 and 1951, nearly 363,000 received new travel permits, identity cards and passports to go to employment outside of Ireland. During the war, men outnumbered women emigrants, but after the war, the number of women emigrating was higher than men. Often, very young women left to become domestic servants, nurses or factory workers in Britain.

Irish emigration reached its highpoint in the 1950s, when well over 400,000 Irish people emigrated, most of them to Britain. The 1950s emigrants have been described as the 'Vanishing Irish' who 'disappeared in silence'. But it is also possible to say that many of those who stayed in this decade did so in silence as they watched family members and friends leave. Much research has been done on the circumstances that provoked so many Irish to emigrate and the successes, disappointments, bewilderment and discrimination many experienced on arrival in Britain, America, Australia and elsewhere. But what effect did the large numbers emigrating have on those who stayed in Ireland, and on wider Irish society in the 1940’s and 1950’s? The Irish Centre for Migration Studies research project sets out to answer these questions.

Although emigration as a social issue was sometimes seen as bad for Irish society, many emigrants saw it as an opportunity and gain. But how did their friends and family members who remained see it? Did they also think about going? What influenced their decisions to stay? The Commission on Emigration and Other Population Problems, which reported in the mid-1950’s, suggested that emigration had become part of the established custom of the people in certain areas - 'a generally accepted pattern of life'. Yet, there is no doubt that, even if an accepted way of life, emigration disrupted family and national life at the time. This research project is interested in hearing how women and men who stayed experienced the emigration of friends and family, the rituals of departure, their own staying behind, the return visits 'home', or in some cases not seeing relatives or friends again. Did the fact that most emigration in these decades was to Britain mean that family ties were less broken than in the past?

Some suggest that emigration enabled those who stayed in Ireland to maintain a reasonable standard of living, but many individuals who stayed might not have perceived their situation in this light. It has also been argued that emigration weakened national pride and confidence which, in turn, prevented development and progress in Ireland. This project is interested in the views of those who remained on such issues. Also, the idea that emigration deprived the country of its 'best people' is often put forward. What are the implications of such a view for those who stayed? If, as the Commission on Emigration suggested, social amenities were an important factor in high levels of emigration from rural areas, then were these factors not also significant for those who stayed? Did the publicity given to the successes of emigrants cause dissatisfaction with conditions at home as some have suggested? Or, was it more the case, as some argue, that emigrants were looked down on with emigration being seen as their own fault?

This project will record the stories of those who stayed and then make them available on a world-wide web site in the form of an on-line audio archive. This means that the stories will be available in audio form all around the world to those who access this dedicated web site. This database will form a framework for the ongoing development and expansion of the audio archive from decade to decade. Ultimately, this will constitute an audio resource for the study of Irish life in the twentieth century as it relates to the important phenomenon of emigration.

The research is funded by the Higher Education Authority and has been set up in consultation and association with similar projects based at Glucksman Ireland House, New York University and the Centre for Irish Studies, University of North London.

THE NORTH-SOUTH DIMENSION

North-South co-operation has been a key element of our work since the beginning.

The Centre for Migration Studies (CMS) at the Ulster-American Folk Park at Omagh, Co. Tyrone, Northern Ireland, has a very similar mission to that of the ICMS. The Folk Park commemorates those who left the northern part of the island, in particular, from the eighteenth century onwards. However, while recognising the specific nature of the ‘Scotch-Irish’ heritage, sometimes neglected by other historians of Irish migration, the Centre has increasingly broadened its focus. Both the CMS and the ICMS have recognised the natural complementarity of their work since contacts were first established.

Today, co-operation between the CMS and the ICMS is close and ongoing. It takes a number of forms:

The CMS, in conjunction with Queen’s University Belfast, currently teaches the only postgraduate programme in migration studies, the M.S.Sc. in Migration Studies in Ireland. ICMS cooperates on an annual basis through a special intensive seminar in Cork, combined with visits by CMS students to the Cobh Heritage Centre, which commemorates more than an century of Irish emigration to the USA in the very location from which the emigrants left.

On-line services

The CMS has already developed, over a period of many years, the Irish Emigration Database, containing more than 26,000 records concerned with emigration from the northern part of Ireland, from Sligo to Belfast. These records include a wide range of material, from emigrant letters to estate papers. At present they are available at the CMS in Omagh and throughout the Northern Ireland library system, but consideration is being given to internet availability. In Cork ICMS plans to add its own contribution to the database through the provision of Cork- and Munster-based resources eventually building to a national emigration database.

An Internet-based database using GIS (Geographical Information Systems) technology, which would link migration information with digitised maps, enabling queries to be answered and maps to be generated "on the fly" represents a very exciting opportunity for innovation in this area, using a leading-edge technology which has not yet been applied to any significant extent in the field of migration. ICMS and CES-UAFP/QUB will collaborate in developing a model suitable for Irish conditions.

CMS Director Dr. Brian Lambkin and ICMS Director Piaras Mac Éinrí recently presented a joint paper to a conference on Irish and Polish migration in Bochum Germany, entitled: An atlas of the Irish diaspora.

TEACHING ACTIVITIES AND OTHER CURRENT RESEARCH PRIORITIES AND PROJECTS

Undergraduate programmes

Migration studies is by definition global in scale and eminently suitable for distance learning. ICMS is involved in distance education through a Socrates European module and is developing proposals for distance-learning access to its undergraduate and postgraduate programmes. The Centre has already acquired the necessary hardware and software for this purpose. Moreover the provision of on-line resources for migration studies already constitutes a key element in the Centre’s programme.

The Director of the ICMS, Piaras Mac Éinrí is leader of a SOCRATES joint European module in comparative contemporary migration studies, co-taught with Pisa, Lille 1, Harnosand (Mid-Sweden) and Bonn. In the National University of Ireland, Cork the course is offered in the form of a Second Year European Studies/Geography elective course. A substantial website has been developed, enabling primary and secondary resources to be accessed on-line.

Survey of immigrant workers in the Irish economy. The Centre (Tanya Ward and Piaras Mac Éinrí) is currently carrying out the first major survey of foreign workers in the Irish economy. The response to the postal survey (on a sector-by-sector, company-by-company basis) has been excellent. Results will be tabulated and analysed within the coming months. The survey is being funded through the Socrates programme of the European Union.

ON-LINE DEVELOPMENTS

The Internet may not be changing the world, but it is changing the way in which information can be made available on a world-wide level. The importance and relevance of this change for those in the Diaspora and those interested in it needs little emphasis. If the Irish are scattered world-wide, the Internet can be used as the means to connect them. Moreover the Internet has no centre and no periphery: everyone can be connected to everyone else. For these reasons a major part of the work of the Centre will focus on the Internet and on Internet-based projects.

Although it cannot be described as research in the strict sense, the design, development and deployment of on-line databases, accessible over the Internet, is a key mission of the Centre, committed as it is to providing primary resources to a world-wide community. National University of Ireland, Cork has already a strong track record in this field. In a universe where data is increasingly being made available in electronic form, or not at all, the provision of such resources is the best, indeed the only, guarantee that original primary research will continue to be carried out into the Irish Diaspora in the future.

The Centre aims to provide significant on-line resources to anyone, inside and outside Ireland, with an interest in migration out of and into the country. This role encompasses the study of emigration in the traditional sense but also the very topical fields of immigration, return migration and internal migration. In the field of contemporary immigration issues, the Centre has been working to strengthen its resources. We are also working actively to develop collaborative projects in this field.

Documents of ireland. The oral migration archive referred to above is a sub-set of the Documents of Ireland project, for which funding has been received from the Higher Education Authority, the official funding agency for third-level education in Ireland. Piaras MacÉinrí, ICMS Director, was joint research group leader (with Professor Donnchadh Ó Corráin). Documents of Ireland is a major project which aims to provide internet-based access to substantial databases of resources relevant to Irish studies in a variety of fields. It is the only such project currently under way in Ireland.

ERIN (emigration resources information network). ERIN is a "gateway" web-based resource, which will ultimately host a wide range of information resources for Irish migration studies. This joint project (with CMS Omagh) is in development

INTERNATIONAL CONTACTS

ICMS has established a range of international contacts, including the National Sound Archive, British Library, Department of Sociology, University of Lancaster, Migration Centre, Sussex University, Centre for Irish Studies, University of North London, Glucksman Ireland House, New York University, and the Centre d’Études Irlandaises, Université de Paris III (Sorbonne Nouvelle), France. Contacts with other specialist centres in international migration studies are ongoing.

THE RESOURCE CENTRE AT NO. 6, BLOOMFIELD TERRACE

The ICMS has developed a resource room with up-to-date materials on migration (forced and voluntary); the Irish around the world; immigration; return migration and asylum seekers and refugees. The resource room also houses a networked computer and video equipment as well as a range of videos, journals and magazines on migration, refugees, ethnicity and identity. We have a particular interest in contemporary literature produced by small voluntary organisations, community groups and other bodies; this literature is in general difficult to find in conventional archives and libaries.

While our aim is to develop a key regional resource we also recognise that we can carry out no more than a portion of this task: cooperation and collaboration with other regional, national and international centres are essential.

GOVERNING BOARD

A Board oversees the activities of the Centre, which in turn reports to the President of National University of Ireland, Cork, Professor Gerry Wrixon. The Members of the Board are:

• Professor Willie Smyth, Department of Geography (Chair)

• Professor Joe Lee, Department of History

• (Professor Dermot Keogh, Department of History - alternate for Professor Lee)

• Professor Walter Lorenz, Department of Social Studies

• Alph O’ Brien, Department of History

• JJ Kett, Director General of Cork University Foundation

• Piaras Mac Éinrí, Director Centre (Secretary)

STAFFING STRUCTURES

Most of the programmes of the Centre are implemented through co-operative agreements with individual staff members and departments within National University of Ireland, Cork on a project-by-project basis.  The core structure of the Centre is supported by the following individuals:

Piaras MacÉinrí, Director

Piaras Mac Éinrí is Director of the Centre. A career in the Irish Diplomatic Service (with postings in Brussels, Beirut and Paris) gave him his first introduction to migration, multiculturalism and uprootedness, especially in Lebanon. After leaving the diplomatic service in the late 1980s he carried out the first survey of the 'new Irish' in Paris, as part of a postgraduate thesis at the Sorbonne, and taught for two years at the University of Orléans. Subsequently he moved to Cork, becoming head of the university's international office for five years before returning to teaching and research in the Department of Geography, subsequently being offered the post of Director of the ICMS. He has published and broadcast on contemporary Irish migration issues, including the introduction to the forthcoming The Irish Diaspora: A Global Perspective (edited by Andy Bielenberg) to be published by Pearsons in Spring 2000. He has just co-authored (with Dr. Bryan Fanning of University College Dublin) Regional Reception of Asylum Seekers: a Strategic Approach, a policy document on asylum reception in Ireland. He was joint academic advisor (with Dr Paddy Fitzgerald, Ulster American Folk Park, and Dr. Patrick O’Sullivan, University of Bradford) to the recently-completed The Irish Empire (commissioned jointly by RTÉ/BBC/SBS Australia), a major five-part series on the world-wide Irish Diaspora, and is external advisor to the Shoot the Scattering project in Co. Clare, a photographic project designed to capture the migrant experiences of Clare people around the world.

Mac Éinrí's main current interests are the changing nature of Irish diasporic identities and the emerging debate about hybridity and multiculturalism in Ireland in the light of recent immigration.

Dr. Breda Gray, Sociologist

Dr. Breda Gray is research project leader for the ‘Breaking the Silence’ oral archive. Her interest in migration arises from her own emigration to Canada and later Britain and her return migration to Ireland in the late 1990’s. Her PhD thesis, Locations of Irishness. Irish Women’s Accounts of National Identity (Department of Sociology, University of Lancaster, England), investigated gendered constructions of identity amongst emigrant and non-emigrant Irish women. It investigated the significance of emigrant/non-emigrant relations to the reproduction of Irishness in a context of 1980’s women’s emigration to London (the destination for nearly 70% of emigrants in that decade). Themes of national identity and belonging emerging from the empirical research were discussed in relation to 1990’s discourses of Irishness as a diasporic identity. Breda has published in a range of journals including Irish Studies Review, NWSA Journal, Youth and Policy, and Women’s Studies International Forum and in edited collections including Bielenberg (ed.). The Irish Diaspora. A Global Perspective, Mac Laughlin (ed) Location and Dislocation in Contemporary Irish Society, Pierson and Chaudhuri (eds.) Nation, Empire, Colony, Maynard and Purvis (eds.) New Frontiers in Women’s Studies. Knowledge, Identity and Nationalism and Byrne and Leonard (eds.) Women and Irish Society. A Sociological Reader. She is currently writing a book entitled Longings and Belongings. Gendering the Irish Diaspora. She is a member of the Dion Committee (the title is the Irish word for shelter) which meets at the Irish Embassy in London and is a member of the Advisory Committee to the Irish Government on emigrant welfare service in Britain. This committee makes recommendations on Irish government funding to support voluntary agencies in Britain and related academic research.

Siobhán Finn, Marketing Executive

Siobhán Finn has been associated with the Irish Centre for Migration Studies since 1997. In March of that year, Siobhán joined Cork University Foundation, the fund-raising arm of the University, with responsibility for securing funding and sponsorship for the Scattering Conference hosted later that same year. Since then, Siobhán have worked closely with the Director of the Centre in planning its’ strategic direction and in developing structures under which the Centre operates on a daily basis. Over the past two years, she has successfully developed a significant network of contacts at international, national and regional level, as well as building successful working relationships with various departments within the University.

Siobhán has extensive marketing experience, gained through working with non-profit organisations and institutions in both Brussels and Dublin before returning to Cork over two years ago. She is a graduate of the Marketing Institute of Ireland (MII) and is an active member of the MII Council for the South Region.

VISITING STUDENTS

The Centre operates an internship programme for visiting students. In 1998/1999 it received two undergraduate students, Ms Ann-Marie Healey and Ms  Anne Duncan, and one postgraduate Fulbright research scholar, Ms Ariane Liazos (Swarthmore, now at Harvard), all of whom made a substantial contribution to the work of the Centre.

Other postgraduate students, with an active interest in migration studies, work on an occasional basis at the Centre, carrying out additional research and web-site development. The Centre currently hosts a number of visiting scholars including:

• Holly Boyington, University of Maine and George Mitchell Visiting Peace Scholar; working on a school information pack on immigration, ethnicity and racism (funded by the Ireland Funds)

• Tanya Ward, Department of Geography, National University of Ireland, Cork; who has just recently completed an MPhil comparing Irish and Norwegian asylum policy and who is involved with work on asylum and related issues. Tanya is now working with the Irish Refugee Council and the Irish Council for Civil Liberties.

• Ciaran Dooley, Department of Geography, National University of Ireland, Cork, is the Centre's Web Guru

• Julian Eckl, University of Munich, is carrying out work on contemporary Irish attitudes towards immigrants.

As funding opportunities develop the Centre will offer bursaries and fellowships to visiting students and scholars. The first such scheme will begin in 1999/2000 with the start of a three-year oral archive programme (referred to above); one-two researchers will be required each year.

FINANCIAL SUPPORT FOR THE CENTRE

To date the Centre has been funded by a variety of sources. In 1997 a substantial private donation was received from Mr. Jim Devere (profiled elsewhere) a US-based donor who has been a strong support of the University in recent years. This donation was earmarked specifically for the Scattering Conference (held in September of that year) and was supplemented by monies from the European Commission, the Irish Government and a number of other public and corporate sources.

In 1998, this support was followed by a gift from the American Ireland Fund, presented, on the occasion of the New York Ireland Funds Dinner, by the Guest of Honour on the Night, Mr. Michael Foley, CEO of Heineken USA. The high profile created by this event for the Centre has since led to gifts being made by a number of other donors, specifically on the US side by Mr. David Ryan, Managing Director of The Ryan Partnership, based in Westport Connecticut. All funding coming from the US side has been facilitated by the fund-raising arm of the University, Cork University Foundation.

It is expected that financing of the Centre will be continue to be met through a combination of research grants, Foundation donations and University support for core costs.

HOLLY BOYINGTON, UNIVERSITY OF MAINE AND GEORGE MITCHELL VISITING PEACE  SCHOLAR

Thanks to the George Mitchell Peace Scholarship I have been able to study at UCC for my last term before graduating. This link, between the University of Maine and UCC, was set up in honour of George Mitchell's dedication and work for the Good Friday Agreement. This first year of student exchange will pave the way for future generations while bringing new ideas and greater hope for the future through understanding, education and cultural exchange. Over the last few months, I have become involved with the ICMS and have now come to a better understanding of not only Ireland’s past and present but also my own. My own cultural identity is a broad mix; from Native American and English to Czech. What once was an American ideology of the melting pot is now a shared world-view for hope. How we move towards this new world is now under influence from such factors as George Mitchell's role in the peace process to our own daily interaction with multiculturalism. We have one community, our "global community" to nurture.

Thanks to a recent generous grant from the American Ireland Fund, the ICMS is involved in the development of a teaching pack for schools that will stress the different contributions by people of different ethnic backgrounds to society. The pack will also address issues of racism, prejudice and discrimination and point to the positive experiences of Irish migrants to other countries. Through the use of teaching aids such as posters, workbooks and manuals this pack will be available to the second level educational community.

I would hope that my involvement with this project will help to bridge the past and future, of not only Ireland, but of all our futures. With this pack our children will be at an advantage of seeing not with their eyes but with their hearts and mind. We are all products of our environments. Let us make that the best possible environment that we can. Through the help of leaders such as George Mitchell, our educators and organisations like the Ireland Funds we will achieve our goal of peace toleration and celebration.

ARIANE LIAZOS, FULBRIGHT VISITING SCHOLAR, 1998/99

It was a real pleasure to welcome Ariane to the Centre during our first year of active operation. A graduate (majoring in History and Politics) of Swarthmore, Ariane came to Cork for a year before taking up an offer of a PhD place in Harvard. Her work in the Centre was invaluable, especially because of her previous archival experience. During her time at the Centre, Ariane was involved in the development of a number of new projects, notably the exploration of digitisation of primary archival resources. Some of this work was later in incorporated in the Documents of Ireland project, which will in time become a flagship project for the University, encompassing but going well beyond migration studies to embrace Irish studies in the broadest sense. Ariane also worked on a number of other projects, notably research into famous Irish people world-wide, as part of a 'migrants of the millennium' project - watch our website for more details in the coming months.  We are very grateful to her for her contribution to the work of the Centre and wish her the very best in her future academic career.

CIARAN DOOLY, THE CENTRE'S WEB GURU

Ciaran Dooly is currently finishing his masters in geography in the GIS field, and has been with the centre for over a year. He has been responsible for much of the web development work, doing everything from scanning documents to maintenaing the Centre's web server. He says:

Please visit us at http://migration.ucc.ie

OBITUARY: OUR FOUNDING PATRON, MR. JAMES P. DEVERE

Jim Devere, entrepreneur, successful businessman and philanthropist was born the son of Irish immigrants in Yonkers, New York in 1914. His father, Leo. B. Dever was born in Dublin in 1886 and emigrated to the US in 1910. His mother Elizabeth McCarthy was the youngest of 12 children and the only one of them not born in Ireland. Elizabeth died in 1917 in an influenza epidemic when Jim was only three years of age and because his father travelled extensively for work, the Sisters of Mercy in Los Angeles were responsible for raising Jim through childhood. Jim graduated from Loyola High School in the 1930’s and won an appointment to West Point Preparatory School. His love of sport and particularly baseball led to a Baseball Scholarship from UCLA. During this period Jim was extremely active in sports and student politics. Following graduation with a Major in History, he entered military service in World War II and received an honourable discharge at the end of the war.

Jim began his career as a sales person in the car industry and went on to form his own company in 1948, representing sporting goods and hardware companies as a manufacturers agent. The business prospered and under his direction became a large corporation that was one of the most successful of its kind in the US by the time Jim retired in 1985.

Having served on many of his university’s committees for over 50 years, Jim remained faithful to and supportive of the institutions and the people that subsequently enabled him to lead a fruitful and rewarding career. With his Irish nature at his core, Jim adopted the strong American values of "giving something back" and "if it is worth doing, do it now". And so, it was after he retired in 1985 that Jim began his philanthropic career in earnest. Following his first visit to Cobh in 1993, he became actively involved in the Cobh Heritage Trust. During this period he sought out public buildings which would carry his and his father’s name in perpetuity. These he found here in the National University of Ireland, Cork and then donated over $3 million dollars to the University. With his approval, a percentage of this large donation was used to fund the establishment of the Irish Centre for Migration Studies (and its sister centre – the International Famine Centre). Jim acted as the major international supporter of the Scattering Conference that was hosted between National University of Ireland, Cork and Cobh in September 1997. Jim attended this conference and throughout the three days was constantly motivating and energising the people he met. He believed that the development of this international centre provided an important educational and research resource, not just to Cork City but to the global Irish community.

Jim Devere died last month. Ar Dheis Dé go raibh a Anam.

His death marked the end of a life of achievement and caring. However, his memory lives on. We are proud that the Irish Centre for Migration Studies will forever be associated with him.

WHAT'S IN STORE FOR  2000

It is likely that the New Year will see momentous developments, with increasing numbers of arrivals and new Government initiatives. ICMS will continue to be involved in conducting reviews and developing proposals in this developing area in Ireland’s international and regional policy. As part of this work the Centre is developing contacts with NGOs and official bodies in the field of immigration (Irish Refugee Council, Irish Refugee Agency, Comhlámh, the Southern Health Board). It is also developing contacts with local and regional community-based organisations with an interest in Irish emigration.

Anyone who visits Ireland these days cannot but notice the rise in non-Irish workers in the service, financial and IT sectors, yet little research has been carried out. The first major postal survey of this topic has just been completed by the Centre, examining the presence of foreign workers in the Irish economy on a sectoral basis. Results and analysis will be published in the new year.

The ICMS is planning to run a series of seminars at the National University of Ireland, Cork during the Spring Term 2000 which will address the contemporary issues of migration, identity and belonging. At a time when there is much talk of a ‘new’ and ‘multi-ethnic’ Ireland arising from debates about immigration; asylum seekers and refugees; return migration; the implementation of the Belfast Agreement and establishment of Human Rights Commissions north and south of the border; it is important to air a range of debates, theories and approaches to issues of forced and voluntary migration, forms of membership and belonging. The seminar series will facilitate a broad-based discussion that will challenge the boundaries of our preconceived categories and frames of reference. The interdisciplinary focus of the seminars will be on cultural constructs of ‘nation’, national community/identity, political, cultural and social membership, ‘race’ and ‘ethnicity’. Speakers will include Jayne Ifekwunigwe from the New Ethnicities Research Centre, University of East London and Paul Cullen, Irish Times.

We propose to post these seminars to the Net using RealAudio technology, enabling anyone to listen to the debates in their own time. A discussion forum will also enable issues to be discussed and debated as the themes unfold. In this way we plan to provide a world-wide forum for discussion of critical issues of migration, identity and belonging in a global context.

Teaching

Again, we look forward to another joint seminar with the Omagh MSSc group in Spring 2000. Meantime, the Socrates 'Euromodule' course continues.

Publications

Longman/Pearson will publish The Irish Diaspora: a Global Perspective (edited by Dr Andy Bielenberg, introduction by Piaras Mac Éinrí, ICMS Director; the book also contains an article by Dr. Breda Gray of the ICMS), based in large part on papers presented at The Scattering, in Spring 2000.

ICMS will also launch a series of occasional papers on aspects on Irish migration. The first of these will be available in Spring 2000: if you would like to nominate your own or someone else’s work, please get in touch.

Outreach

Discussions are ongoing with Cork Corporation, Cork Civic Trust and community development groups from Oileán Cléire and Sherkin Island, with a view to developing joint projects focusing on regional and local aspects of Irish migration history and addressing heritage and tourism issues.

Other projects at the planning stage

GIS project I – famine and forced migration. In co-operation with the International Famine Centre and with an outside sponsor, it is proposed to develop an interactive web-based GIS database portraying famine and forced migration. The data will be capable of remote interrogation and analysis for clients in NGOs, government and official agencies, as well academic institutions.

GIS project II – mapping the diaspora. Plans are in development for an project entitled Mapping the Diaspora, using GIS technologies to map Irish migration and related phenomena by integrating cartographic and demographic data with placename, family name and other primary data, within a database capable of handling client-side queries and analysis and of generating maps "on the fly" for delivery to client-side browsers.

CAN YOU HELP US WITH OUR WORK?

The Centre is still very new and its agenda is far-reaching. Much of the story of Irish migration has yet to be written, while the momentous changes taking place within Ireland itself in the present period will also need to be documented and analysed. Our website (http://migation.ucc.ie) is probably the best way of keeping up to date with developments.

We are particularly interested in hearing from anyone who would like to work with us on our projects. Such cooperation could extend from formal joint research, teaching, publication or on-line projects, to individuals who may have valuable information about their own family roots. ,We are interested in any materials (emigrants' letters, photographs, estate papers, other material arelating to migration in the past or present) for the purpose of scanning and storage of such materials in electronic format. We guarantee that all original materials will be restored to the owners in the condition in which we receive them. We are aware that many individuals and families in Ireland and elsewhere may have much material which they do not consider to be of great value but which may be of great interest from a migration viewpoint - please feel free to contact us.

It is time to tell all the stories. In the context of the Breaking the Silence archive, we are especially interested in material relating to the 1940s and 1950s, still a somewhat under-researched period. We would also like to hear from others whose stories have not been fully told or who are relatively under-represented in the accounts which have been written. These include:

• descendants of the large and neglected community of Irish who left in the days of British rule to work in various parts of the British Empire.

• descendants of people who took the anti-Treaty side in the Civil War and left Ireland subsequently

• women migrants in all periods

• descendants or members of the southern Protestant diaspora which left post-independence Ireland

• those who left Ireland in more recent times for  non-economic reasons, such as sexual  orientiation

• members of the Irish religious diaspora, whose story has only been told in part

• members of other Irish minority communities e.g. the Jewish community, who subsequently left.

• the Irish who took the 'road less travelled' and made unusual choices - governesses in pre-Revolution St.Petersburg, foreign legionnaires, children of mixed ethnic backgrounds who left a 'white' Ireland.

We shall be happy to receive information and suggestions about these and other groups.

CONTACT US AT

The Irish Centre for Migration Studies
National University of Ireland, Cork
6 Bloomfield Terrace
Western Road
Cork
Ireland
Tel: 353 21 902889
Fax: 353 21 903326
Email: migration@ucc.ie
Web: http://migration.ucc.ie