Ireland has museums for dinosaurs, country life and rugby. It’s time we had one for women

Just before the first Covid-19 shutdown in the spring of 2020, Epic, the Irish emigration museum, wheeled an empty plinth into the middle of O’Connell Street in Dublin and asked passersby to name a woman who ought to be placed upon it. The question elicited much humming and hawing. The exercise was an eloquent encapsulation of women’s invisibility in the State’s history and its commemorative architecture, with scarcely a monument, a train station or a laneway named after a female who was neither a foreign queen nor a man-made myth.

In 2019, a small group of women met for the first time to embark on a mission. Instigated by journalist Lise Hand, the group was united in a single purpose that we knew would be scorned in some quarters as feminism-gone-mad. Far from deterring us, it made us all the more determined to chase our dream for the establishment of a national women’s museum.

By then, the finish line for the decade of commemorations was in sight. One of the most significant about-turns in those 10 years had been the establishment’s acceptance that women had been as good as eliminated from Ireland’s revolutionary and State history, whetting a public appetite for more information about these ghosts among us. In that climate, Dublin got its only bridge named after a woman, the trade unionist Rosie Hackett. Cork followed with the Mary Elmes bridge honouring an exceptional humanitarian.

Still, a giant hole persists in our heritage. Among the multitude of men it commemorates in stone, our capital city features few women in public sculptures – Catherine McCauley, the founder of the Sisters of Mercy, Constance Markievicz and Margaret Ball, a 16th-century mayoress of Dublin, and the murdered journalist Veronica Guerin. We feared the moment of enlightenment was passing and that its legacy would amount to no more than a couple of symbolic sops to the female of species. After the injurious disrespect shown to women and girls by the State in its first 100 years, we were damned if we were going to let this opportunity pass. Women had entered the picture. And we were not about to slink meekly out of it again.

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This week, the Minister for Culture, Catherine Martin, obtained Cabinet approval to appoint an advisory committee to examine the feasibility of a national women’s museum. In her announcement at the National Gallery of Ireland on Wednesday, standing in front of a poster for the current It Took a Century showcase of female artists, Martin said that “cultural expression is the litmus test for a society’s values”.

A giant hole persists in our heritage. Among the multitude of men it commemorates in stone, our capital city features few women in public sculptures

After more than five years’ slog, our little group – we call ourselves Irish Women’s Museum Advocacy – was giddy with excitement but braced for the inevitable naysayers ready to rubbish the idea of a dedicated centre. Why do we need one when there are women represented n the existing cultural institutions?

Why bloody not, when we have museums for dinosaurs, country life, GAA and rugby, emigration, literature and all sorts? It would be the poor country that could not afford a national centre to remember the role played in it by half the population and encourage the following generations to strive for greater participation. This would be a museum about women and girls, for men and boys too.

As our group’s Mary McAuliffe, the director of gender studies at UCD, put it during Wednesday’s announcement, it would be part of a “process of restorative justice”.

Despite advances in gender equality in recent years, Ireland has never had a woman taoiseach, minister for finance, Ceann Comhairle, secretary general to the government, Dublin city manager, chair of the National Maternity Hospital, president of the Irish Farmers’ Association, comptroller & auditor general, president of the GAA, chief of staff of the Defence Forces, chair of the Standards in Public Office Commission, and so on.

Out of 578 streets between the canals in Dublin, only 32 are named after women – 308 are named after men. Apart from the numerical gulf, one of the starkest differences between the national representations of women and men is that the latter appear as mortal individuals while the former tend to be amalgams of stereotypes and fables.

Out of 578 streets between the canals in Dublin, only 32 are named after women – 308 are named after men

On Wednesday morning, a woman contacted Brendan Courtney’s radio show after the presenter had welcomed the initiative of a museum. She said what she needed from the State was help, not patronisation. The prospect of a museum does not necessitate a choice between money for it and money for childcare or other forms of assistance. It is an addition; a brick in the wall for the construction of new, inclusive State architecture.

Disrespect underpins much of the apathy about and antipathy towards women that prevails in our society. A clear example is the level of domestic violence. Establishing a bricks-and-mortar national centre dedicated to women in all their guises and identities would transmit a message of respect by the State that would percolate into society. Nobody is above reminding.

“I know from talking to my friends, my sisters and women I work with, how bad things can be, and the barriers that still exist,” Taoiseach Leo Varadkar, said in 2022. “I also know that many times I don’t see [misogyny] unless it is pointed out to me by the women in my life.”

Last year, Micheál Martin said that, on “this island and around the world, women’s voices, experiences and interests remain under-represented and women’s contributions are under-acknowledged and insufficiently harnessed. That’s the uncomfortable truth”.

I recall my bewilderment in 1991 when the Field Day Anthology of Irish Writing was published to great fanfare. It was voluminous, covering more than 1,000 years and it virtually ignored women writers. The hurt was palpable, not only for the many talented writers who had been written out of the record but for girls and women who had seen themselves in their books and been shaped by them.

The furore that followed promised to be a defining moment for gender equality. Or so we thought. Nearly a quarter of a century later, Waking the Feminists was born to protest against the sidelining of women once again when the Abbey Theatre – the national theatre – published its 1916 commemorative programme, featuring just one play written by a woman. These fits and starts towards equality need a permanent beacon for the good of the whole of society. Our group believes a national women’s museum can be that guiding light.

As we say, his-story is only half the story. History should include us all.