National identity construction and the popular ballad in nineteenth century Ireland

This dissertation sets out to analyse the discourses surrounding the construction of a nationalist sense of Irish identity through the medium of popular culture specifically song lyrics throughout the nineteenth century. The English language songtexts that this work is based on provide evidence of the process of Anglicisation which, some would have it, began with the arrival of the Anglo-Normans in the twelfth century, or at least since it became English colonial policy to force them to retain a distinction upon the gradually assimilating English population with the statutes of Kilkenny 1366, the first of a number of such laws proclaimed intermittently over the subsequent centuries aimed at halting a drift towards Gaelicisation. By the nineteenth century however, and particularly in the post famine period with the sharp decline in the use of the Irish language, anglicisation was a trend that was felt to be fast becoming irreversible and with its progression, some perceived, went any legitimate claim for recognition of nationhood either as an independent territory or as an autonomous region of the United Kingdom. However, these song-texts also provide other evidence, evidence regarding the social, economic, political, sexual, and religious life that was deemed worthy of comment by, in the main, anonymous witnesses who have left shreds of information which suggest that the lives of the Irish masses were often more varied and engrossing and displayed moments of agency and resistance (in unexpected ways) than many orthodox historiographies would allow. I reproduce these texts as my main primary source and place them within an historical framework based upon readings of primary and secondary sources in order to try ground them in their proper contex