The spectacle of memory: Ireland's remembrance of the Great War, 1919

The New Armies formed during the Great War comprised of three Irish Divisions; the 10th and 16th Irish and the 36th Ulster. Although Ireland's role in the First World War has received scant historiographical attention, this paper contends that the history of remembrance of Irish soldiers lost in the war exposes the manifold allegiances which Irish society experienced in the immediate aftermath of the war. By treating the Peace Day celebrations of 1919 as public spectacle. I suggest that the construction of a postwar memory directly confronted the paradox of attempting to inaugurate an intelligible basis for remembrance in a society unsure about its political Future within the United Kingdom. (C) 1999 Academic Press.