Madam, - I am a researcher based in the geography department of the University of Edinburgh, carrying out a project on Irish people recently returned from living in the United States.
I would like to interview people who grew up in Ireland, then left during the years of high emigration in the 1980s and early 1990s, and have recently returned to live in a very different Ireland.
While much political and media discussion focuses on the immigration of foreign nationals into Ireland, those Irish-born people who have returned to live in Ireland in recent years are often "invisible". Their readjustment to "Celtic Tiger" Ireland is often not straightforward, and this project wants to give voice to their experiences.
Interviews can be conducted at a location of the interviewee's choice, and should not last much more than one hour. The project wishes to record the experiences of the Morrison and Donnelly Visa "generation", as well as the experiences of those who may have spent many years in the United States without a visa.
- Yours, etc,
DAVID RALPH, 5 Grattan Court, Salthill, Galway.
davidralph81@gmail.com