The researcher will spend time researching the material culture of Ulster-American life, delving into relevant museum collections, and through consideration of other sites’ best practice, explore how the Ulster American Folk Park could best present case studies of Ulster emigrant life in American tenements.
The focus of this PhD will be on the experiences of Ulster emigrants to northern cities in the United States – an experience which is currently understudied in Irish migration history, which tends to separate Protestant and Catholic experiences, and in Ulster historiography, which emphasises Ulster Presbyterian life in rural settings. It will therefore contribute to filling a gap in Irish diaspora scholarship while presenting opportunities for additional interpretation in the Ulster American Folk Park.
The time-period studied allows for consideration of multigenerational community identity development, expanding the narrative from dominant male middle class experiences to familial structures, single working women, and children growing up in an American city. This, therefore, allows for the exploration of themes of class, gender, religion, and, as these migrants were living and loving in multi-ethnic urban spaces, ethnicity and race. In these ways, this project contributes to the historiography of Irish migration and the priorities of National Museums NI.
Lead Supervisors
Image courtesy of the Library of Congress