Here is the program across the university, staff and student-led:
3 October 2023 – Black History Month Launch, 12:45pm on Teams
3 October 2023 – Black History Month Trivia Night, African Caribbean Society event, 8,30pm (details here)
10 October 2023 – Public Talk and Book Launch DIE STANDING with Elmer Dixon, Black Panther and Consultant, Senate Room, Lanyon Building, 5:30pm
12 October 2023 – Networking for Underrepresented Groups in STEM. African Caribbean Society with the Women in STEM Society (see ACS Instagram for more details)
19 October 2023, Belfast Film Premiere: “On Resistance Street”Queen’s Film Theatre, 6:15pm
25 October – Mock United Nations and BHM night, with Africa House NI (see ACS Instagram for more details).
27 October – Closing BHM event (sponsored by iRISE)
Queen’s Film TheatreBHM program ’23:
9 Oct, 8.30pm, “Queen & Slim” Daniel Kaluuya and Jodie Turner-Smith star as a couple on their first date who become fugitives after an altercation with the police. Free posters designed by Brazilian illustrator Daniel Batista for each attendee. https://queensfilmtheatre.com/Whats-On/Queen-and-Slim 12 Oct, 8.45pm, “Omen” A deserving winner of Cannes’ Un Certain Regard New Vision Award, rapper-turned-filmmaker Baloji’s magical realist drama is a dazzling debut. https://queensfilmtheatre.com/Whats-On/Omen
13-15 Oct, “Bobi Wine: The People’s President“ From the slums of Kampala to the national political arena, this gripping film charts the rise of Robert Kyagulanyi, better known as Bobi Wine – the pop star-turned-politician seeking to end Uganda’s brutal dictatorship. https://queensfilmtheatre.com/Whats-On/Bobi-Wine
14 Oct, 3.15pm, “Claudine” In an attempt to counter the far-fetched excesses of the blaxploitation films at the time, Claudine focuses on the day to day struggles of a single black mother and her working class family. https://queensfilmtheatre.com/Whats-On/Claudine
17-19 Oct, “Once Upon a Time in Uganda” Set in the heart of Uganda, Once Upon a Time in Uganda celebrates a universal love and passion for movies through the story of the world-famous Wakaliwood studios. https://queensfilmtheatre.com/Whats-On/Once-Upon-a-Time-in-Uganda
19 Oct, 6.15pm, “On Resistance Street + Q&A” With contributions from a host of renowned musicians, bands and commentators, On Resistance Street is an in-depth examination of the role music plays in the fight against fascism, racism and bigotry. https://queensfilmtheatre.com/Whats-On/On-Resistance-Street
The library is offering a trial of ProQuest Black Studies during the whole month (here)
Some other events are still being organised and will be listed as they are confirmed.
The International Consortium for the Study of Africans in Ireland(ICSAI) invites submissions of papers for an interdisciplinary conference on Africa in Ireland: Historical and Theoretical Perspectives
This conference aims to address the historical presence of Africans and the Black diaspora in the past, present, and future on the island of Ireland. It will critically engage with this presence and the convergences of Irish-African cultural, political and religious relationships and connections. How does the presence of African-descended people in Ireland disrupt the notion of Irish monoraciality? How should we theoretically address issues of race in the defining of Irish national identity in light of historical and contemporary Black Irish identities? What is the nature of the relationship between Africa and the African Diaspora in Ireland? What remains of Ireland’s soft religious colonialism and the mission project? How did Ireland’s postcoloniality align with pre- and post-independence subjugated African nations?
Post-Celtic Tiger Ireland, North and South, offers great possibilities to study the “complex, variegated, transitional nature of contemporary Irish experience.” [1] However, whiteness is still the vector through which Irishness is determined. In Ireland, which Luke Gibbons so memorably called “a First World country, but with a Third World memory,” [2] the African and Black diaspora are confronted by an essentialist discourse of impassable racial demarcation. Though Ireland has never been monocultural, its predominant monoraciality ensures that Irishness is interpellated as white. The existence of whiteness is, as Connolly & Khaoury have argued, the “constitutive and founding elements [3] of Irishness, and this Irishness is “ethno-racially rigid” [4].
An additional way to explore and explode the monoraciality of Irish society is through history. Very few studies have looked at the presence of Africans and people of mixed heritage in Ireland, the common street view being that this is a phenomenon connected to the Celtic Tiger and/or post-conflict Northern Ireland, and in good part linked to the refugee question. There is little awareness that Ireland was never wholly white. While a few studies have looked at that past, much work remains to be done, a diachronic understanding and chronology need to be established, and implications need to be explored.
It is important to hear African and African-descent voices in this critical examination. In the study of Ireland’s Black identities and diaspora, as is the case in the rest of Europe, it is necessary to make explicit the authentic and historical specificities of their experiences since they serve to elucidate “global entanglements and trends by tracing the ways in which they are worked out at the personal and local level.” [5]
We are particularly interested in papers that interrogate the following topics within, or in relation to, the framework of the conference theme:
Black Irish Studies
Africa in Ireland
The relationship between Africa and the African Diaspora in Ireland
Ireland’s soft religious colonialism and the mission project
Ireland’s postcoloniality and alignment with pre- and post-colonial African nations
Notions of Blackness and Africanness
Irishness and Afro-Europeanism
History of African migrations to Ireland pre- and post- Celtic Tiger
The interaction of categories like nation, gender, class, and religion within the category of Africans in Ireland
How Black Irish have conceived themselves historically
Africans in Irish Studies within the larger field of Black Diasporic Culture/Diaspora Studies
Negotiating Black Consciousness in Ireland
Black Cultural Production on the island of Ireland
The relationships of the Black Irish to other ethnic minorities on the island
African students in Ireland
Centring Africa as a decolonised subject for investigation in the Irish curriculum
Please send your abstract of 300 words and a short biographical note to Dr Mark Doyle (mdoyle@mtsu.edu ) by 1 February 2023.
Conference Committee: Dr. Mark Doyle, Middle Tennessee State University Dr. Eric Morier-Genoud, Queen’s University Belfast Dr. Phil Mullen, Trinity College Dublin Dr. Nik Ribianszky, Queen’s University Belfast Dr. Jonathan Wright, Maynooth University
[1] Brown, Terence. 1985. Ireland. A social and cultural history 1922-1985. London: Fontana Press, p. 322.[2] Gibbons, Luke. 1996. Transformations in Irish Culture. Cork: Cork University Press, p. 3.[3] Connolly, P., & Khaoury, R. 2008. Whiteness, Racism and Exclusion: A Critical Race Perspective. In C. Coulter & M. Murray (Eds.), Northern Ireland After the Troubles: A Society in Transition. Manchester: Manchester University Press, p. 208.[4] Lentin, R, & Moreo, E. 2015. Migrant deportability: Israel and Ireland as case studies. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 386, 884–910.[5] Aitken, Robbie, & Rosenhaft, Eve. 2013. Black Germany: The Making and Unmaking of a Diaspora Community, 1884-1960. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, p. 3This conference is supported by the School of HAPP, the Institute of Irish Studies, iRISE and the Diversity and Inclusion Unit at Queen’s University Belfast.
1,30pm Opening lecture I . ——————————————- Andrew Holmes, “‘Where have the Protestants gone?’ The Irish Protestant missionary experience, 1790-1914.”
2.00pm – Panel One “Green and Orange” ———————————————————– Matteo Binasco, “Whenever Green is Worn: The Holy See and Irish Catholic Missionary Movement in the Nineteenth Century.” Declan O’Doherty & Aglaia de Angeli, “From novice in Newchwang to Minister in Manchuria. A discussion of the early experiences of the Presbyterian missionary Rev. Alexander Crawford in Manchuria, 1895-1913.” Alannah Jeune, “Complexities of identity: Juvenile Mission literature in the Presbyterian Church of Ireland”
4.00pm – Opening lecture II . ——————————————- Colin Barr,“The Children of the Household’: Irish Catholic Missionaries and Indigenous Populations in the Settler Empire, 1815-1914.”
4,30pm Reception
FRIDAY 13 September 2019
9,30am – Panel Two “Great Works…” —————————————————– Jamelyn B. Palattao, “James A. Greig of the Presbyterian Church of Ireland (PCI): Mission, Humanitarianism and Diplomacy in China.” Eric Morier-Genoud, “Donal Lamont. A (northern) Irish Bishop in Africa?” Barry Sheppard, “‘The great cannot exist without the small; nor the small without the great.’ Catholic Action in Ireland and Abroad 1932-49.”
11-12,30 – Panel Three “Home and Abroad” ———————————————————– Sarah Roddy, “Temporary missionaries: or, how the ‘spiritual empire’ changed Catholic Ireland” Stuart Mathieson, “Irish Missions, Science, and Scripture in the Holy Land” Fiona Bateman, “Echoes of Irish history in Eastern Nigeria: Cultural loss and conflict”
12,30 Lunch
2, 00-3,30 – Penal Four “Exhibition, Text and Photographs” —————————————————————————— Denis Linehan, “‘A Stuffed Gold Coast Monkey’: Exhibiting Irish-Africa in the Missionary Exhibitions in 20th Century Ireland.” Justin Livingstone, “Writing Mission: Empire, Decolonisation and the Qua Iboe” Fiona Loughnan, “The Album and the Archive: Migratory Photo-Objects and Irish Spiritan Missions in Kenya”
Friday 25 May (1-6pm) – Saturday 26 May 2018 (9am-5pm) Queen’s University Belfast, Senate Room
FRIDAY 25 May 2018 Africa Day
1pmWelcome
Peter Gray, director of the Institute of Irish Studies
Eric Morier-Genoud, organiser
I. Africa, Ireland and Queen’s University, 1,30-3,00pm
Nini Rodgers (QUB) – “At Queens: African students, Martin Lynn and me, 1959-2005”.
Eric Morier-Genoud (QUB) – “Queen’s University and Africa, 1900s-1970s”.
Emmet O’Connor (Ulster) – “Belfast labour and ‘Chinese slavery’ in South Africa, 1904-47”.
3,00-3,30pm coffee
II. History and Historiography of Africa, 3,30-5,00pm
Donal Lowry (Oxford) – “A mirror to Ireland’s face: colonial echoes and analogies in Rhodesia-Zimbabwe ca.1890-1990’.
Laura S. Brown (Maynooth) – “Class, culture and historiography in Egypt and the Sudan 1899-1956”.
Robert McNamara (Ulster) – “Pearls and perils in the documentary record”.
III. KEYNOTE, 5,00-6,00pm
Richard Rathbone (SOAS) – “Reading, thinking and writing about sources on the ending of colonial rule in West Africa”.
SATURDAY 26 May 2018
IV. Ireland, Africa and Art, 9,30- 11,00
Jonathan Wright (Maynooth) – “Agency and abolition: Africans in eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century Ulster”.
Fiona Loughnane (NCAD) – “A Shamrock-Shaped Image of Africa: The Photographic Encounters of Catholic Sisters in Uganda”.
Bill Hart (Ulster) – “The Afro-Portuguese Ivories, 1988-2018”.
V. Conflict resolution, Peacekeeping and Culture, 11,00-12,30
Tom Lodge (Limerick) – “Conflict-Resolution in Nigeria after the Biafran War”
Walt Kilroy (DCU) – “The impossible mandate? Protection of civilians by UN peacekeepers in Africa”.
Laura Basell (QUB) – “Shihrazad’s Baths: 1001 Tales of Zanzibar Nights”.
12,30-14,00 lunch
VI. Hunters and Music in West Africa, 14,00-15,00
Theodoris Konkouris (QUB) – “Heroes or Villains: The Social Status of Hunters & Their Musicians in Malian Imaginary: An Ethnographic Approach”.
Joseph Hellweg (Florida State) – “‘Playing the Hunters’ Qur’an’: Performing Islam and the Hunt in West Africa”.
VII. Contemporary African issues, 15,00-17,00
John Brewer (QUB) – “African Universities as agents of social change”.
Stefan Andreasson (QUB) – “The 21st Century transformation of global energy markets: impact of the US shale revolution on African oil and gas producing states”.
John J. Hogan (Limerick) – “Analysis of negotiations to design the African Peace and Security Architecture”.
“Sounding violence. Music, Ritual & Poetry in Contemporary West Africa”
Workshop organised by Dr Theodore Konkouris & Dr Eric Morier-Genoud, Queen’s University Belfast, 27 October 2017
Session I. Ambiguity, Aggression and Presentation in Hunters’ Brotherhoods
(Chair: Dr Eric Morier-Genoud)
——————————————————————————– 10:00-11:00 Dr. Theodore Konkouris (QUB)
“I am sorry that we made you bleed”: Locality and Apprenticeship among the Mande Hunters in Mali’
11:00-12:00 Dr. Lorenzo Ferrarini (Manchester)
‘Re-sounding hierarchies: music, visual display and aggression at donso hunter gatherings in Burkina Faso’
Session II: Poetry and Conflict
(Chair: Dr. Theodore Konkouris)
———————————————— 13:00-14:00 Dr. Mohomodou Houssouba (University of Basel)
‘Conflict in writing: the poetics of lyrics in Songhoy Blues’
14:00-16:30 FILM projection: ‘They will have to kill us first’ (2015, 1h 45m)
Introduction by Dr Alexander Fisher
09.30. Bill Hart (Ulster University): ‘American sources for a black presence in nineteenth-century Ireland’
09.50. Eric Morier-Genoud (Queen’s University Belfast): ‘Cosmopolitan Belfast? Africans and Africa at Queen’s University, 1941-1971’
10.10. Abel Ugba (University of East London): ‘Identity, belonging and media use by Irish Africans’
2. African Studies in Ireland [A]
11.15. Laura Brown (Maynooth University): ‘“They were a greasy, downtrodden lot”: Egypt and the perception of Egyptians in Anglo-Egyptian Sudan 1899-1956’
11.35. Roger Boulter: ‘Target Pretoria – Dieter Gerhardt and the Soviet penetration of the South African Defence Force’
11.55. Filipe Ribeiro de Meneses (Maynooth University), ‘From metropolitan revolution to colonial exodus: The fall of Portuguese Angola, 1974-5’
3. African Studies in Ireland [B]
13.45. Michelle D’Arcy (Trinity College Dublin): ‘The historical antecedents and contemporary political impact of devolution in Kenya’
14.05. Padraig Carmody (Trinity College Dublin): ‘The geopolitics and economics of BRICS resource and market access in Southern Africa’
4. The Irish and Africa: Connections and reflections
14.45. David Dickson (Trinity College Dublin): ‘The missionary motorist: Thomas Gavan Duffy’s Africa crossing, 1927-8’
15.05. Ailish Veale (Trinity College Dublin): ‘Irish Catholic medical missionaries in the development era’
15.25. Kevin O’Sullivan (NUI Galway): ‘Lessons from Biafra’
15.40. Tom Lodge (University of Limerick): The Irish Anti-Apartheid movement’
5. Keynote paper
16.30. Donal McCracken (University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban): ‘The retreat down Africa. The Irish in Africa – Colonial running dogs or harbingers of change?’
