Professor James Smith of Boston College's English department discusses the beginnings of an "architecture of containment" in Ireland, constructed to silence those whose sexual behavior or family circumstances contradicted an emerging image of Irish Catholic identity. James O'Toole, history professor at Boston College, responds. This talk is the second in the series "Ireland Before the Republic: Culture and Politics 1922-1949." Smith is introduced by Robin Lydenberg, English professor at Boston College.
James Smith is currently employed as an Associate Professor of English at Boston College, where he specializes in modern and contemporary Irish literature and culture, and cultural studies. His book,* Ireland's Magdalen Laundries and the Nation's Architecture of Containment *(2007), focusing on cultural representations of institutional care, reflects his interest in twentieth-century Irish narrative from a post-colonial perspective. Similar interests inform Smith's recent graduate seminars, "Twentieth Century Irish Fiction," "Contemporary Irish Fiction," and "Ireland: The Colonial Context." He have taught undergraduate electives on contemporary British Isles fiction, American realism and naturalism, major Irish writers, and both 19th and 20th century Irish literature surveys. Smith am also interested in recent scandals in Ireland's Catholic Church and the manner in which these affect relations between church, state, and society.
Robin Lydenberg is the author of *Contemporary Irish Art on the Move: At Home and Abroad with Dorothy Cross*.