Dear Mary,

Your cfp reminded me that I hope someone will be able to attend the lecture 
on Redmond (in Waterford) next week - as you probably know, it's part of the 
'official' commemoration of the centenary of the Home Rule bill and I would 
suspect that it might need a touch of the suffrage woman.  Unfortunately, I 
can't be there, nor at the conference at the end of May.

Best wishes,
Mary Pierse
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Mary McAuliffe" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, April 10, 2012 4:56 PM
Subject: extended call for Papers WHAI Conference 2012


Extended CALL FOR PAPERS – 1912: Irish Women before the Revolution

Women’s History Association of Ireland -Annual Conference 25-26 May 2012
Mater Dei Institute of Education (a college of Dublin City University)

Keynote Speaker: Dr Senia Paseta, St Hugh’s College, University of Oxford.

The WHAI invites proposals for the 2012 annual conference that will address 
aspects of women’s lives and activism in the years immediately before 1913. 
As has been noted the success of republican nationalism after 1916 has 
obscured the reality of the aspirations and experiences of constitutional 
nationalists in the early twentieth century. Yet for constitutional 
nationalists 1912 appeared to be the year in which expectations for a new 
Home Third Home Rule Bill would be realized either as individuals or in the 
context of their roles within family structures.  Literature such as Paeseta’s, 
Before the Revolution, has focused on the identities of the male nationalist 
elite-in-waiting. This conference will provide an opportunity to explore the 
identities of Irish women who supported in various ways and hoped to benefit 
from the Home Rule solution to Ireland’s national question. Indeed, the 
Irish Women’s Franchise League turned to militancy in 1912 because of the 
refusal of Redmond to allow women to attend the National Convention in 
support of the Bill in April of that year. Suffrage women wanted votes for 
women to be included in the third Home Rule Bill. The period also saw a 
strong anti-suffrage lobby in Ireland, spearheaded by women, and the 
conference welcomes papers on this subject.

1912 was also, however, a year which saw perceived and real challenges to 
the success of the Home Rule campaign. While the militancy and demands of 
the IWFL, in the wider context of the mass WSPU demonstrations in England, 
was seen to have the potential to derail the Liberal/IPP alliance by forcing 
a general election on the issue of women’s suffrage, a more serious threat 
was emerging in the north of Ireland. 1912 saw the signing of the Ulster 
Solemn League and Covenant by which Ulster Unionists pledged to go to arms 
to resist the imposition of Home Rule; the UWUC signed a separate women’s 
covenant.

1912 was also the year of the establishment of the Labour Party and the role 
of women in labour activism prior to the 1913 strike deserves greater 
attention. For many Irish women, of course, the activist causes had little 
or no resonance or impact and in the spirit of a holistic investigation of 
female lives before the revolution papers are encouraged that address the 
‘day-to-day’ concerns of Irish women, an area that has been hugely aided by 
the launch of the 1901 and 1911 Irish census online.

The conference themes might include, but are not limited to the following:

• Women in the Home Rule campaign
• Suffrage and anti suffrage campaigns and intersections with the Home Rule 
debate
• Women and unionism
• Labour and trade union activism
• The United Irishwomen
• Papers on the family, fashion, sexuality, marriage, work inside and 
outside the home, women and popular culture, female sport and leisure 
activities, literary history, participation in the organisations of the 
cultural revival are also welcomed.

Paper proposals should be 500 words and be sent by 29th April to Dr Leeann 
Lane and Dr Mary McAuliffe at [log in to unmask]

-- 
Dr. Mary McAuliffe
President, Women's History Association of Ireland (WHAI)
Women's Studies,School of Social Justice,
L517, Library Building, UCD, Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland
Tel: +353 1 7167325