VIRTUAL IAS Festival: Crossing the line: contested borders and bounded space in Ireland

2021 marks the centenary of Irish partition, a major turning point in the histories of Ireland, the United Kingdom and the British Empire. This anniversary provides a moment for reflection on the past but contested boundaries of politics and identity continue to shape Ireland’s present. Much of the recent Brexit debate turned on the Irish land boundary – a site of violent and deadly conflict during the period of the Troubles – with the return of a ‘hard border’ avoided only through the creation of a new and controversial ‘border in the Irish sea’. Amidst talk of a future ‘border poll’ on the prospect of Irish unity, the city of Belfast remains deeply scarred by division. More than twenty years after the Good Friday Agreement, almost 100 walls or ‘peace lines’ still delineate and separate its Catholic and Protestant communities. In this panel discussion, historian Peter Leary, architect Aisling Rusk, and artist and researcher Paula McCloskey, explore the very different ways in which their work seeks to navigate and subvert these lines of demarcation.

If you missed the event, you can watch the recording here:

MediaCentral Widget Placeholderhttps://mediacentral.ucl.ac.uk/Player/1BddBaEb