Legal texts as cultural documents: interpreting the Irish constitution

Book synopsis: This collection, the first sustained attempt to account for the Republic of Ireland as a cultural entity, analyses the ways in which the state has adapted to, and to some extent, reinforced partition in Ireland. Shifting attention from the traditionally defined canon of Irish culture, and addressing the political and cultural narratives that underlie partition, it offers an original intervention in Irish studies, and a timely overview of a concept, the state, which profoundly affects Irish intellectual life at many levels