COMMEMORATIONS:THERE DOES not have to be a consensus about historical commemorations, Prof Diarmaid Ferriter told the Burren Law School.
“Commemorations should be divisive. They should create a certain discomfort. You don’t have to please everyone. History is about conflicting interpretations.”
He also made an impassioned plea for history to remain part of the school curriculum, saying it would make a mockery of the planned commemorations if young people were deprived of historical knowledge.
Commemorations were dictated as much by contemporary concerns as by history itself, he said, and the use of language was important.
“‘A decade of reconciliation’ carries a charge that ‘a decade of commemoration’ doesn’t. There was often an idea that the ideals of those who fought for independence were noble and very clear-cut, when they were not. They were often confused and difficult to define, though views and ideas were retrospectively attributed to them.”
He gave as an example a campaign to have a statue to Michael Collins erected in Dáil Éireann, which was all well and good. But the website of this campaign made extraordinary claims, including that Michael Collins would have made common cause with hard-pressed homeowners, “as if he was an early 20th century Eddie Hobbs”.
Difficult questions would be thrown up. “Are we going to be able to commemorate 1916 if we don’t effectively have our own sovereignty in 2006?
“How do we now interpret the phrase ‘our gallant allied in Europe’?”
Caitríona Crowe of the National Archive stressed the importance of keeping history on the school curriculum. “If ever there was a country where history should be compulsory up to the Leaving Cert, it is Ireland,” she said.
Through the commemorations we should aim at a new understanding, well supported by good archival evidence, with no concessions to any sacred cows, of how we got to the point of achieving independence in 1922, and how that objective shaped the lives of many people during that tumultuous decade, she added.
Dr Laura Cahillane of UCC appealed for the commemorations to include the 90th anniversary of the 1922 constitution, pointing out that much of it was incorporated into the 1937 Constitution.
“It was a revolutionary project,” she said, and sought to address many of the problems under discussion today.
“These included complete government control over the Dáil, lack of interest in politics, petty party politics [and] no voice or real role for the people to implement the reforms they want.”