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This thesis examines the shifts in political culture effected by the 'X case' (1992), when the State issued an injunction to prevent a fourteen year old pregnant and suicidal rape victim from travelling abroad for an abortion. In so doing, this thesis focuses on the connection between discourses of Irish nationhood, gender and sexuality in the fields of reproductive politics and women's citizenship. Abortion law and politics has had constitutional status in Ireland since 1983, when the right to life of 'the unborn' was officially recognised as ostensibly equal to that of women. This has situated debate on abortion access in an explicitly national framework, since political sovereignty is invested in 'the people'. Shifting articulations of nationhood and abortion are examined in three specific sites of political culture: the national press; political activist discourses; and official legislative debates. The terms of debate in the press and the Oireachtas (legislature) in particular are compared over time, from the 1983 campaign to recognize a foetal right to life, to 1992, when the legitimacy and meaning of constitutional abortion law was thrown into crisis by the X case. Two specific reversals in the terms of post-X case abortion politics are examined. Firstly the anti-abortion construction of the nation in familial terms produced popular pressure in 1992 to allow for a right to abortion in the interests of familial integrity. Secondly, the primary antagonism opposing Irish 'pro-life' traditionalism to English 'pro-abortion' modernism was reversed both by the anti-abortion lobby's key role in 'interning' X within the State, and by the popular perception that feminist advocacy of abortion access would reassert the integrity of the violated family. Significant continuities in the construction of abortion law and politics in national terms are also analyzed.

This thesis examines the relationship between Ulster unionists and the United States during the Home Rule era from 1880 to 1920. As they fought to uphold the Union, Ulster unionists reacted to Irish-American involvement in the Irish nationalist movement with anxiety and fear of the impact on a potential Dublin parliament. At the same time, unionists cultivated an image of a violent and extremist Irish-America in order to counter Irish nationalism and support their own movement. Unionists condemned the American funding of Irish nationalism and United States government interference on the Irish question. However, they were also anxious to show that unionism had international appeal, seeking American support against Home Rule and promoting a self-image of close ties to the United States. This thesis argues that Ulster unionists took a multifaceted and paradoxical approach to America, repudiating American involvement in the Irish nationalist movement while attempting to find opportunities to advance the cause of unionism in the United States. Throughout the Home Rule period, the Ulster unionist record of appeals and responses to the United States was marked by unevenness and contradictions which limited their effectiveness. However, unionists increasingly used an idealized, imagined America to support their own movement. They cited American historical and constitutional examples and fostered an Ulster identity based in part on Scotch-Irish heritage and Protestant connections. Ulster unionists were less insular and more internationally focused than they are generally portrayed. Chapter I introduces the historical context and historiographic framework in which the thesis operates. Chapters II and III provide an overview of the relationship between Ulster unionists and the United States from 1880 to 1920. During this period, unionists attempted to garner American support for their movement while contemporaneously responding to Irish-American nationalism and the involvement of the United States government on the Irish question. Subsequent chapters are arranged thematically, examining the elements of the Ulster unionists’ American strategy. Chapter IV investigates Scotch-Irish ethnic revival and associational culture in the United States, analyzing continued links to Ireland and attitudes toward Irish Home Rule. Chapter V provides case-studies of unionist visits to the United States as they endeavored to counter nationalist influence and build up a unionist following. Chapter VI explores the interconnection of religion and politics in Ulster’s relationship with America. Chapter VII examines the impact of American history and politics on the Ulster unionist movement. Chapter VIII concludes that the inability of Ulster unionists to effectively deal with the United States in the present day has roots in the relationship between unionists and America during the Home Rule era.

The theology of reconciliation, as it applies to God’s relationship with humanity, has been studied extensively throughout ecclesial history. Currently, theologians are expanding this research to include the “horizontal” element of reconciliation, or the implications of God’s relationship with humanity on human to human relations. This dissertation further examines the development of the horizontal understanding of the theology of reconciliation in the context of two Christian reconciliation communities in Northern Ireland, the Corrymeela and Cornerstone Communities. This is attempted by exploring the use of the concepts most commonly associated with the theology of reconciliation, truth, justice, repentance and forgiveness, as interpreted through past publications of Cornerstone and Corrymeela and in interviews with current members. This study illustrates, through the use of a theology of reconciliation model, how the social context moves one’s theological beliefs between a focus on liberating tendencies (justice and truth) and reconciling tendencies (repentance and forgiveness). The result of this analysis show that within both Communities, throughout the years of the Troubles to now, it has been possible to map a movement between a focus on reconciling and liberating tendencies that correlates to the stability of the social context. Implications for further study include: creating a clearer definition of the theology of reconciliation, exploring the theology of reconciliation within other conflict-ridden areas, and working to establish the theology of reconciliation as existing under the umbrella of traditionally understood local theology.

This thesis tackles Presbyterian Church government and the Covenanted interest during the Commonwealth and Protectorate, and for the first time examines the subject in a three kingdoms context.  It reasserts the importance of Presbyterians and their Solemn League and Covenant during the decade.  The first part of the thesis demonstrates that despite their difficult journey during the Commonwealth, Presbyterians in all three kingdoms retained loyalty to the Covenant.  It also highlights Presbyterian attempts to propagate their church government in difficult circumstances. Part two explores these themes further during the Protectorate and argues that Presbyterian Church government was in ascendancy.  The Presbyterian Church in Ulster flourished; there was a revival of Presbyterian Church government in England.  The Scottish kirk, despite English attempts to bring it into line with the Tiers and Ejectors’ system in England, stood and held fast for the traditional practices of the kirk, so much so, it forced a u-turn on certain aspects of English religious policy in Scotland. Lastly and overall, this thesis highlights the continual threat which Presbyterians and their Covenant continued to pose to the English state throughout the 1650s, their relationship with the Royalists in the three kingdoms during the decade, and the confusion of successive regimes over the loyalty of Presbyterians to the English state.  Therefore the thesis constructs a picture whereby Presbyterians and their Covenant were significant elements in religious and political developments in the 1650s.

This thesis examines ways in which literacy practices are shaped by local norms in all-Irish immersion schools, as evidenced in storybook reading events in Irish and English. Within a sociocultural framing, the thesis takes as presuppositions that (i) reading is not a set of autonomous, transferable skills but is embedded in social settings; (ii) contexts and literacy practices co-emerge; (iii) children learn ways of being readers through participation in classroom literacy events; and (iv) language, literacy and identity are inextricably linked in all-Irish immersion programmes. In a classroom the teacher and pupils co-construct their own particular models, understandings, and definitions of literacy through their actions and the events they engage in. In the present study literacy is theorized as a performative accomplishment co-constructed by the participants in the event including those not directly present such as authors and illustrators. A micro-ethnographic case study approach was used to examine literacy practices in infant classes in all-Irish schools. Taking a phenomenological approach data were gathered using video-recording, observation, and pupil and teacher interviews and data were analysed using inductive analysis and interpretive discourse analysis. Key findings from the study are that (1) local norms, filtered through teachers' intentions and motivations, shaped the storybook reading events; (2) classroom literacy practices constructed during the Irish events were being transferred to the English events; and (3) children selected from their first and second language linguistic resources during storybook reading events to support their reading development. These three processes together were part of how children negotiated their socially situated identities as bilinguals and bilingual readers. Parental support for speaking Irish as well as social proximity to the Gaeltacht community, were factors closely associated with positive attitudes to speaking Irish and to reading in Irish. One implication of the findings is that teachers in all-Irish schools will need to make explicit their views of knowledge and of what it means to be a reader in an all-Irish school as they consider young children's agency in constructing their interpretations of texts.

Archaeological records at the Navan site are fragmented and difficult to interpret. This site, in County Armagh, Northern Ireland, features artefacts extending over 4,000 years from the Neolithic period to the Iron Age. This thesis provides a framework for understanding this important material culture. Through an analysis of archaeological theories and specific physical items, links are established among the natural world, culture, and the Navan residents’ understanding of the cosmos. This analysis covers the landscape (e.g. topography), constructed objects (e.g. prehistoric infrastructure such as pools, roads and earthworks), and metaphysical concepts (e.g. sound and time), thus building a holistic picture of how these settlers might have viewed themselves, the physical world around them, and the spiritual world they imagined. While it is not possible to determine definitively these groups’ purposes and motives, the thesis finds clues in the incoherentarchaeological evidence. It explores possible functions for archaeological markers whose significance is not clear. These markers could, for instance, have beenmeans of social separation orceremonial signifiers. Therefore the thesis is both an analysis of a particular site and an investigation into how the archaeological process itself, specifically in a situation of challenging evidence, enables distant worlds to be understood.