Nature and the Environment in Ireland during the Long Nineteenth Century
Society for the Study of Nineteenth-Century Ireland
University of Southampton
16-17 June, 2016
This conference seeks to raise the profile of the environmental humanities in Irish studies. It invites proposals for individual papers, panels or round table discussions on any aspect of nature and the environment. Particularly welcome are proposals looking at the production of Irish nature, exploring its anthropic or hybrid character, whether imaginative, political, scientific or material. How and why were Irish rural landscapes transformed in the nineteenth century? What role was played by experts? What can be known about changing flora and fauna? How did representations of Irish environments evolve? How was Irish nature made politically legible? Were cultures of improvement challenged by preservationist and conservationist politics, and were these necessarily nationalist? Did ideas about the Irish natural environment shape ideas about the Irish people?
Please contact Dr Matthew Kelly (mjk1@soton.ac.uk) with any questions or send 200-word abstracts or panel descriptions and a brief CV to the same by 26 February 2016.