Hanafin, Patrick (2003) Valorising the virtual citizen: death, gender and citizenship in Ireland. Working Paper. European University Institute, Italy.
Abstract
This piece advances a reading of postcolonial Irish citizenship which is premised on a form of citizenship as self-sacrifice. Despite substantial political victories for a liberal politics of citizenship in recent decades, there continues to remain lodged within the national psyche traces of a societal formation which privileges virtual citizens over fully realised ones, myth over history, and male violence over female autonomy. The sacrificing self is urged in her role as citizen to forego aspects of her individuality in the interests of the postcolonial project of state formation. In particular I want to examine why over and over again it was the body of woman which was the site of much of the symbolic and actual violence in this sacrificial social contract. In the post-independence period it was clear that women would have to repay the sacrifice of men with a sacrifice of themselves to the idealised version of Irish citizenship espoused by the postcolonial elite. The men died for mother Ireland and now mother Ireland must earn her keep, as wife and mother.
Metadata
| Item Type: | Monograph (Working Paper) |
|---|---|
| Additional Information: | RSC No. 2003/6 |
| School: | Birkbeck Faculties and Schools > Faculty of Business and Law > Birkbeck Law School |
| Depositing User: | Sarah Hall |
| Date Deposited: | 11 Feb 2019 17:06 |
| Last Modified: | 02 Aug 2023 17:48 |
| URI: | https://eprints.bbk.ac.uk/id/eprint/26201 |
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