A Political History of the Two Irelands: From Partition to PeaceBy Brian M Walker Palgrave MacMillan, £16.99
In this book, Prof Brian Walker, of Queen’s University, Belfast, argues that “prescriptive, exclusive and confrontational ideas of identity grew in the two parts of Ireland in the decades after 1921. This development helped to lead to the outbreak of violence in 1968 and to inhibit meaningful accommodation of the different sides for decades”.
Taking 1921 as his starting point, Walker undertakes a study of political and cultural developments in both Northern Ireland and the Republic since their foundation. The book is divided into two parts, the first looking at majority and minority identities and commemorations in both states between 1921 and 1960, the second examining conflict, change and conciliation from 1960 until 2011.
Walker analyses many contentious episodes throughout this time, and not everyone will accept his conclusions. He writes about one recent event that a “settlement of the justice issue was followed by the appointment in 2011 [sic] of Alliance Party member David Forde [sic] as agreed justice minister”. The nationalist SDLP and some political commentators might take issue with his blunt assessment of Ford’s appointment, which actually occurred in 2010. They might argue that the arrangement owed more to power politics between the big two of the DUP and Sinn Féin – hence the quip about Northern Ireland being a “two-party state” – than any principled motivation.
Walker argues that: “We have witnessed a transformation of identities, involving new views of diversity and pluralism and affecting key concepts of sovereignty, nationality and consent. A new political discourse has emerged, north and south, based around the idea of acknowledging and supporting a diversity of identities.”
Pól Ó Muirí
Rock and Popular Music in Ireland: Before and After U2
By Noel McLaughlin and Martin McLoone
Irish Academic Press, €24.95
In the manner of a good thriller – of which the authors, being eminent Irish popular-culture scholars, would approve – Noel McLaughlin and Martin McLoone don’t fully reveal their hand until the final sentence of this important, challenging and occasionally contentious study.
“This book shares the nostalgic and utopian impulse of much Irish music, but ours is a nostalgia for the possibilities born of the co-mingling of rock, pop and nation; for a time when music was scarce, tribal and subcultural, when music and its pleasures and meanings were heavily invested in and when music had the related capacity to subvert, surprise, challenge and change – in short, nostalgia for imagining a better future, a better politics and other ways of being.”
So, academic gowns discarded, they are fans, and knowledgeable, idealistic fans at that. As such, we can frame their ambition to “challenge some of the orthodoxies of the Irish rock narrative” within a reflexive reading of the music and performances that have moved them.
The authors are clear in stating that the book is neither a history nor a survey. Their choices for inclusion are supported by impressive scholarship and this groundbreaking work will sit comfortably beside key studies such as Sean Campbell’s Irish Blood, English Heart in the emerging literature on Irish popular music.
However, while it is authoritative, it is not definitive, and there is much room for debate, not least in their elaborate arguments about the meaning of rock and Irish identity, with particular reference to U2.
The book is organised into three sections – Before, U2, and After – with 12 chapters plus an introduction and a conclusion. Apart from U2, the impact of Horslips, The Boomtown Rats, Van Morrison, Sinéad O’Connor and (the wild card) Gregory Gray are discussed, among others.
This is an academic study and general readers will have to penetrate through thickets of scholarly discourse, but the authors illuminate the text with real enthusiasm.
They conclude with a question that is of real economic and academic interest: has culturally specific Irish rock had its day? “The issue is whether place-bound tropes have any currency in the global popular music economy.”
Will the centre devour the periphery?
Joe Breen
Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking
By Susan Cain
Viking, £12.69
Extroverts have it easy. They are socially rewarded for their gregariousness, seen as happy, shiny people that everyone likes to be around. People are conditioned to be outgoing, and the corollary of this is that the perfectly normal state of introversion is frowned upon and seen almost as a defect.
Author Susan Cain is an out and proud introvert. Fascinated by how “the quiet ones” get a raw cultural deal, she has set out in this fascinating book to examine extrovert and introvert states through a series of neurological, psychological and sociological studies.
In crude terms, about one third of the population would qualify as introverts, but, as Cain points out, they are still made to feel alien in a society that glorifies the extrovert ideal. In a more controversial vein, she argues that extroversion may in fact be dangerous, claiming that reckless, Alpha-type behaviour contributed to the global economic collapse.
Cain wants a resetting of the balance of power. Descending somewhat into unwelcome self-help mode, she asserts that we should embrace the power of quiet.
She cites studies which show, counter to received wisdom, that thinking can bring better results alone than in groups. Leadership styles that recognise and reward introverted thinking can be a lot more effective, she writes, than traditional “group think” models.
Cain succeeds in drawing together a lot of disparate strands to argue her case well. A somewhat lighter touch might have helped, but this is an important contribution to an area that, as she points out, has some importance for how our world is run.
In a society where extrovert parents have been known to send their introvert children to psychiatrists to have their condition “treated”, and where we have problems distinguishing between the chatty and sociable, and the loud and attention-seeking, this works as a good redress.
While it would be an oversimplification to call time on extroversion, Cain cogently argues the case of the oft-ignored introvert. The “quiet revolution” may not be as far off as it seems. As Julian Cope put it so eloquently many years ago: “World Shut Your Mouth”.
Brian Boyd
