Dr Sophie Cooper (QUB), ‘“in harmony with the people of the parish”: Working towards a multigenerational Irish community in 19^th-century Melbourne and Chicago’

This paper explores the maintenance of multigenerational ethnic communities in Melbourne and Chicago, moving away from an emphasis on male 'culture brokers' such as priests, politicians, and publicans to consider the role of men and women in shaping the identities of second and third-generation Irish American and Australians. These children, who would grow up to take leadership positions in nationalist, religious, and ethnic organisations throughout the diaspora. This research therefore places an emphasis on the histories of childhood and education to better understand the myriad influences on multigenerational identity in Irish migrant communities.

Dr Sophie Cooper holds her PhD from the University of Edinburgh and is a social and cultural historian, focusing on Irish migrant communities living in the United States and Australia during the nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries. She is currently a Lecturer in Liberal Arts at the Queen’s University Belfast. Her monograph, Forging Identities in the Irish World: Melbourne and Chicago, c.1830-1922, is forthcoming with Edinburgh University Press in February 2022.

This event will be held both in person in the Irish Studies Seminar Room and online via MS Teams. 

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