Speaker: Dr. Síle Ní Choincheannain.
Talk Title: Brian Ó hUigínn: Who was he and why is he featured on the famous mural in the O’ Curry Irish College
Date:Wednesday, 13th July 2022 at 8pm No. 2 of 9 Talks.
Talk Description:

Brian Ó hUigínn (1st July 1882 – 10th March 1963), also known as Brian na Banban, was an Irish Revolutionary, Poet, Gaelic Revivalist, Sinn Féin Politician and a founding member of the organisation. He was President of Sinn Féin from 1931 to 1933.

Born in Meath his ghost resides mostly in the history of West Clare. After attending an Irish-language summer college at Ballingeary, Co. Cork, O’Higgins received a Language Teacher’s Certificate in 1906 and began work as a Múinteoir Taistil (Travelling Teacher) for the Gaelic League.

During this time, he was one of the founders of Coláiste Uí Chomhraidhe, an Irish Language College in Carrigaholt, County Clare and in 1917 he became the College Secretary. In May 1918 he was arrested and deported to Birmingham Jail on suspicion of German conspiracy. While he was in prison, he was elected Sinn Féin candidate for West Clare during the 1918 General Election.
It is said that because of Brian’s republican affiliations and involvement with the Irish College that the Black and Tans paid a visit to the college in 1920 and burnt half of the building down. Dr. Síle Ní Choincheannain Coláiste Uí Chomhraidhe ~ Carrigaholt, Co. Clare Brian Ó hUigínn 12 This talk hopes to shed some light on Brian Ó hUigínn, this lesser-known Republican, and his connection to West Clare, particularly Carrigaholt.
O’Curry College, better known as Coláiste Uí Chomhraidhe, was named in honour of Doonaha native and renowned Irish scholar, Eugene O’Curry.
About the Speaker:
Dr. Síle Ní Choincheannain is currently working as a full-time Irish Lecturer in Mary Immaculate College. She spent time lecturing in the University of Limerick and spent two years (2017-2019) in Canada as an Irish Canadian University Fellow at the University of Ottawa.

Síle also spent the academic year 2013-2014 on a Fulbright Scholarship in the University of Montana. Síle also has experience working on Raidió na Gaeltachta and TG4. Her current research deals with modern Irish historical fiction, the role of women in this genre, and the O’ Curry Irish College. She recently held a conference commemorating local scholar Eugene O’ Curry, 160 years after his death in Mary Immaculate College.

Speakers:Peadar King
Rachael English
Thomas Lynch
Talk Title:
The Art of Place:
People and Landscape of County Clare
Talk Description:
Writer and broadcaster Rachael English and poet and undertaker Thomas Lynch in conversation with Peadar King.

About the Three Speakers:

Peadar King

Originally from Kilkee, Peadar King is a documentary filmmaker and non-fiction writer.
For the past two decades, he has filmed in over fifty countries across Africa, Asia and The Americas for the award-winning RTÉ Global Affairs series What in the World?.

Peadar King regularly contributes to World Report (RTÉ Radio One) as well as other radio stations. He has written for a number of other publications including Being Irish (2021).
His book War, Suffering and the Struggle for Human Rights was described by The Irish Times as: ‘A call to humanity in a world full of atrocity.’
Along with Anne Jones he is co-editor of The Art of Place: People and Landscape of County Clare (2022).

Peadar King is currently Adjunct Professor of International Relations in
University College Cork.

Rachael English
Born in Lincolnshire in 1969, broadcaster and writer Rachael English grew up in Shannon, Co. Clare.  Her broadcasting life began on Clare FM and from there she moved to 2FM and RTÉ Radio 1.

As presenter of Drivetime, she was the recipient of a PPI Award for her coverage of the September 11 attack in the United States and since then as presenter of Morning Ireland has covered all the major domestic and international events.

An enthusiastic reader, she started writing only seven years ago. Her first novel, Going Back (2013), was shortlisted for the most-promising newcomer award at the Bord Gáis Irish Book Awards and spent two months in the Top 10. Her subsequent books include Each and Every One (2014), The American Girl (2017), The Night of the Party (2018), The Paper Bracelet (2020). 

On her own writing she has said: “Sometimes, I find myself thinking that I’m not suited to writing. I tell myself I’m an imposter who should stick to what she knows. More often I wonder how I managed for so long without it”.

The Letter Home is her most recent book.

Thomas Lynch

Essayist, Poet, and Funeral Director – Thomas Lynch has written five critically acclaimed volumes of poetry, four books of essays and a book of short fiction.

His most recent collections include,

THE DEPOSITIONS
NEW & SELECTED ESSAYS (Norton, 2019)
and
BONE ROSARY
NEW & SELECTED POEMS (Bloodaxe UK, 2022)

A novel is forthcoming.
Thomas Lynch has written for the New York Times, the Times of London, The Irish Times, Newsweek, and Harper’s.

His book The Undertaking: Life Studies from the Dismal Trade (1997) won the Heartland Prize for Non-Fiction, the American Book Award, and was a finalist for the National Book Award.

He has taught at Wayne State University Department of Mortuary Science, University of Michigan Graduate Program in Writing and Emory University Candler School of Theology.  His work has been the subject of two documentary films, PBS Frontline’s “The Undertaking” and Cathal Black’s “Learning Gravity.”  He divides his time between his home on Mullett Lake in Northern Michigan and his ancestral home in Moveen, County Clare.