Shattering Silence

Rating:
Summary: Very interesting
Review: As a strong reader with a great interest in the "Troubles", I've read many books, by T. P. Coogan, P. Taylor, M. Dillon and others. I found most of them very interesting, but I was amazed by the overwhelming "shattering silence" about women. For instance, in 519 pages of Coogan's "The Troubles", one of the most important IRA women, Mairead Farrell, well known far beyond the Irish borders, gets only 11 lines.

While I was reading these books I wondered why the writers seemed so little interested in highlighting the actual women's role in the "war". In their researches women are seen and interviewed (when they are interviewed)just as mothers, wives, sisters, never as women with their own life, stories, experiences, dreams, their own struggle or political involvement.

Begona Aretxaga gives us a convincing answer about the roots and the meaning of this silence. She fills the gap between the Myth of Mother Ireland and the real life of the real women in the North, and, in so doing, she offers an excellent contribution in women studies in Ireland, beyond the stereotypes that sometimes affect mainstreaming feminism. But she also offers a helpful key to understand the "Truobles" as a whole. Her arguing about "the parallel between the struggle of republican women for recognition and voice within the republican movement, and the struggle of republican movement for recognition and voice within the arena of Northern Ireland politics", as well as about the issue of decommissioning, helped me in understanding the full, underlying meaning of what was going on along the difficoult months following the Good Friday Agreement.

In Aretxaga's words, "this book is an ethnography of unrecognised and misrecognized nationalist working-class women" as political subjects, and it's very useful to people who wish to know more about gender and violence in Northern Ireland thruogh the last 30 years. But because of its analysis of the interlocking systems of inequality of colonialism, class and gender, I recommend it to everyone interested in getting a better comprehension of the complexities of the Troubles and of the ongoing, difficoult, sometimes disheartening, peace process.

Rating:
Summary: Very interesting
Review: As a strong reader with a great interest in the "Troubles", I've read many books, by T. P. Coogan, P. Taylor, M. Dillon and others. I found most of them very interesting, but I was amazed by the overwhelming "shattering silence" about women. For instance, in 519 pages of Coogan's "The Troubles", one of the most important IRA women, Mairead Farrell, well known far beyond the Irish borders, gets only 11 lines.

While I was reading these books I wondered why the writers seemed so little interested in highlighting the actual women's role in the "war". In their researches women are seen and interviewed (when they are interviewed)just as mothers, wives, sisters, never as women with their own life, stories, experiences, dreams, their own struggle or political involvement.

Begona Aretxaga gives us a convincing answer about the roots and the meaning of this silence. She fills the gap between the Myth of Mother Ireland and the real life of the real women in the North, and, in so doing, she offers an excellent contribution in women studies in Ireland, beyond the stereotypes that sometimes affect mainstreaming feminism. But she also offers a helpful key to understand the "Truobles" as a whole. Her arguing about "the parallel between the struggle of republican women for recognition and voice within the republican movement, and the struggle of republican movement for recognition and voice within the arena of Northern Ireland politics", as well as about the issue of decommissioning, helped me in understanding the full, underlying meaning of what was going on along the difficoult months following the Good Friday Agreement.

In Aretxaga's words, "this book is an ethnography of unrecognised and misrecognized nationalist working-class women" as political subjects, and it's very useful to people who wish to know more about gender and violence in Northern Ireland thruogh the last 30 years. But because of its analysis of the interlocking systems of inequality of colonialism, class and gender, I recommend it to everyone interested in getting a better comprehension of the complexities of the Troubles and of the ongoing, difficoult, sometimes disheartening, peace process.

Rating:
Summary: Mnà na hEireann
Review: When discussing the troubles in Northern Ireland, women are seldom mentioned at all. And when they are mentioned, mostly they are depicted as passive victims of a male-dominated war waged in a male-dominated society. This is often the case, but not a reason in itself to deny or underestimate women's contribution to political and social development in Ulster. Begona Aretxaga's book, born from the author's "prima facie" experience during a 15 months stay in West Belfast (plus several other visits in loco), is a successful attempt to analyse the role of women in Nationalist/Republican struggle. The author makes excellent use of anthropological and ethnographic categories in order to stress the importance of West Belfast women in contributing to the strategies of Irish Republicanism and the creation of Irish Nationalist identity. Although cast in an environment which tends to limit their participation to social life according to traditional values, Nationalist women often succeeded in breaking socially determined barriers. In doing so they contributed to Irish history more than is generally recognized. Moreover, the author's feminist approach, far from being a limit to her analysis, is an effective intellectual tool and succeeds in bringing to the fore a perspective on Irish troubles too often overlooked by many.