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Thursday 7th February at 17:30 in room G230, The Grove, Hendon Campus ADRI research seminar with Jane Tynan (Central Saint Martins, UAL):

‘Legion of the Excluded’: uniforming the 1916 Rebels in Dublin

 
This paper explores images of the 1916 insurgents to consider whether their self-presentation became critical to the legacy of the Rising in Ireland. Few rebels were smartly dressed. Did this rag tag army of Fenians, socialists, politicised women and young people form a coherent image of military strength? Many could hardly afford the dark-green Irish Citizen Army uniforms or the regulation khaki worn by the Irish volunteers. The standard tunic for the volunteers had a rolled collar, dark green shoulder straps and pointed cuffs, distinguished by brass buttons that bore the Irish harp and the words ‘Oglaigh na hEireann’ emblazoned on the belt clasp. The popular image of the wartime rebellion was instead an improvised soldier: civilians who wore regulation caps at jaunty angles or brown leather bandoliers over working clothes. This paper uses photographs, advertisements, documents and art from the period to consider how the rebellion was embodied.
 Seán Keating’s 1917 painting 'Men of the West' suggests that a new kind of citizen soldier emerged from the Rising, a guerrilla warrior that inspired other European militant groups to take up arms.

 
About the presenter:

"My research primarily concerns the history and politics of design. At the moment my focus on military uniform draws attention to embodied aspects of war and conflict. My recent published work explores the military uniforms worn by the British army in the First World War: in particular the adoption of khaki as camouflage device, the experiences of conscientious objectors who resisted military uniform and the role of the tailoring trade in wartime army clothing production. I am currently completing a book about the khaki service dress worn by British combatants on the western front; it considers how uniform embodied social class and ethnicity, the modes of its production and consumption, and subsequent incorporation into the iconography of war remembrance. I have also published on the popular fascination with military themes in contemporary fashion design and media. In future I would like to explore the material culture and improvised uniforms created for
 guerilla warfare and insurgency. Social theory is another area of research interest, which I use to interpret the politics of material culture. An essay I am working on for a forthcoming anthology Thinking through Fashion considers the significance of Michel Foucault’s thought to the analysis of fashion as image, practice and discourse."

Location: Room G230, The Grove, Hendon Campus, Middlesex University

Time: Thursday 7th February at 17:30

Light refreshments are available.


Dr Bharain MAC AN BHREITHIÚN
Senior Lecturer in Visual Culture and History of Design Middlesex University The Burroughs Hendon London NW4 4BT